Funny and heartbreaking, Australian Paul Whitby's poetry book How to Measure the Distance of Things resides somewhere between the head and the heart. Follow the narrator as he drifts through rural Victoria and New South Wales, house-sitting. See him hug an alpaca, walk in an old quarry by moonlight, and wake up with a cat on his face. Entwined with plenty of navel-gazing and manic episodes, these little poems ask big questions with a natural voice that speaks to you like a trusted confidante. In the tradition of Charles Bukowski, but with Walt Whitman's connection with nature, Whitby creates a poetic style that wins you over, entertains, makes you think and keeps you wanting more.