David Toms

AVAILABLE NOW My new book HOLD OVER FIRE has just gone live on the Veer2 website so you can order it directly wherever you are: veer2.org/David-Toms-H...

I tilfelle du befinner deg i Oslo på 12. november. Det er ikke mye plass på bokhandelen, men du kan reservere her: shop.prismaticpages.com/products/boo...

Gode Oslo folk! Jeg lanserer boka mi 12. november på Prismatic Pages. Bli med!

This is what me translating Rudolf Nilsen to English looks like

Thanks to Books Ireland for giving me some space to reflect on the process of bringing Hold Over Fire into the world

Never let it be forgotten that public sector workers are also taxpayers, also create value in the economy. Staffing public services is job creation. If they are worse off, if they are burnt out, it affects everyone. Full support for them.

Thrilled to get my hands on the first copies of 'not on like birds but under the curve', a pamphlet of tiny poems with Seán Ó'Ríordáin and birds in them, hand sewn with red thread. Out soon with Wild Honey Press 🌼

Thoroughly enjoyed this chat with David. Grab yourself a glass of wine or a cup of tea and spend an hour in our company. You won’t regret it. Thanks for joining me, @daithitoms.bsky.social

Big thanks to @itstomshiels.bsky.social for having me on to his new podcast to chat about some of my favourite stories, songs and season. A real pleasure to cover so much ground: open.spotify.com/episode/3J7i...

My top tip to learn to drive: don't do it in your second language!

And now at the tender age of 38, following a few false starts, and while raising a newborn, and moving home and city, i passed my driving test today. The RELIEF

Preparations for my Japan trip going well.

I have separated the art from the artist and am now whipping the art to stiff peaks, after which I will gently fold it into the artist before baking at 350 til golden and puffed

Little boost for this excellent chat with Jenny O'Connor on The Nerve which was released friday. Was a nice chance to really talk, in an accessible way, about experimental form in poetry, among other things

Was a real pleasure to hop on and chat about my new book Hold Over Fire with Dr Jenny O'Connor of the SETU English dept. on their poscast, The Nerve: open.spotify.com/episode/6PcH...

I've got a review of Dwellings forthcoming in the next issue of Poetry Ireland Review, and can thoroughly recommend it to you.

I don't know, maybe all those non-"straight white dude" people won their awards because their books were actually really fucking good, how about that as a hypothesis

Got tickets for the Waterford Panto and it was as stressful a ticket buying operation as I've been part of for years. Practically the entire family will be going 😂

Excited to be in London on October 9th to read/ chat with one of my favourite living writers, Daniela Cascella. We'll be talking about our new books from @erratumpress.bsky.social and @brokensleepbooks.bsky.social Free tickets at link below 💙 www.eventbrite.ie/e/little-boo...

Just a reminder that I have some copies available for any poetry reviewers who might be interested! Some of the advance praise:

Dette vekker mange tanker—også om det ellers relativt få samlingspunkter i det norske offentlig rom utenom det som er forhåndsbestemt. Det er lite som er spontant når det kommer til folket og torvet.

This annoys me all the more as it was sheer luck that I grew up right at the tail end of the next most risky move in the history of Irish education: fee-free university. I got to do a BA and a PhD that would have otherwise been completely beyond my means. Two things that made me a writer today

First copies of my new book Hold Over Fire have arrived, so had to put it next to all the previous ones. Some review copies available, get in touch with me if interested. Link to buy coming soon.

A little rumination on the cover of my new book: davidtoms.substack.com/p/43-the-art...

Oslo, State Funeral of King Harald V, 09.09.2026.

Nordic Currents will fund cultural projects linking all eight parts of the Nordic Region with European partners in 2027–2028. #nordics

just saw a story about the second season of Three-Body Problem coming soon and I mean surely we can come up with a better TV system than "hey remember that thing you watched eight episodes of two and a half years ago? no? you don't? you can't remember the plot or characters at all? well we're back!"

The sea of flowers left by people at the Royal Palace in Oslo, 31.08.2026.

[Exit Queen.]

1/ Thorough debunking of arguments against banning, by law, «smart glasses»/«perv glasses» in Norway. «The Government’s Capitulation to Meta. It seems Karianne Tung has forgotten who she works for.» 🧵

Another little boost for this we fella. Innset's novels are worth reading and deserve translation out of Norwegian i reckon, cos too much of what gets translated from Norwegian especially into English is very one-note in terms of the image of Norway it represents.

Here I am, writing about some recent Norwegian books that I've found interesting and thought-provoking: davidtoms.substack.com/p/42-under-m...

New project alert! Really thrilled & amazed to say I've been given support from NORLA to work on some tentative translations of Rudolf Nilsen's poetry over the next six months. If you / you know of any presses in the market for a pamphlet of translated poetry in the coming months, keep me in mind.

I've been in Norway ten years this month, so wrote a little substack about some music and literature I like from Norway: davidtoms.substack.com/p/41-a-decad...

In the interests of fairness, Greek filmmaker Yorgos Lanthimos is going to adapt the UK's best poem "The Tay Bridge Disaster" as a blockbuster movie.

If anyone has recently been to Japan and had to find a workaround for hotel bookings that required faxing your reservation, please get in touch!

Ståle Solbakken better hope the plan to get hockeyed by France tonight pays off against Cote d'Ivoire. Otherwise he'll be the guy who denied us the chance to see Haaland take on the French for nothing.

Hold up, is there no one starting for Scotland against Brazil who plays their ball for the Old Firm? That must be a first!

I am ads for Morrissey in Lillestrøm years old.

The art of book design is as important to the idea of us making and asking people to pay for a quality product as anything else. AI out of all of it.

Landscape with Question is published tomorrow. Here is a piece I wrote on the book for the Carcanet blog. 🌱❤️

Hydration break? It's raining FFS.

Where is the John Foot piece on how Italy not making it to three world cups in a row is a sign of the national malaise is what I want to know