Nam Le returns with poetry, but the question is: Where's his novel?; Sixteen years after The Boat, his barnstorming book of short stories, Nam Le has surprised publishers and readers alike with a book of poems.

When Nam Le was at primary school, his teacher read that rollicking narrative poem The Highwayman by Alfred Noyes to the class. To the little boy who arrived in Australia as a babe in his parents' arms after they fled Vietnam on a refugee boat, it had a profound impact. "The rhythms, they found their way deep into my body...