Library Book Deja Vu

Hello there. Hope you're feeling well today.

Housekeeping, or rather housepossiblynotkeeping news first. There has been an offer on the house and subject to contract/no unexpected hitch we'll be off to Penarth pastures (or surrounding areas) new....hopefully for the wife/daughter anyway. As explained before I'm not as enthusiastic as either of the females. Best description of myself in this regard is neutral. However I'm conscious that the wife was there for me when unemployed. Conscious that she was there even in a way that she does not know when I was in the grip of an all consuming and paralysing depression. Therefore feel I owe her one

So as when the last time we thought the house was going to be sold the library books will be the first things that will be dealt with as it's a quick fix. Return the books walk away job done. I've seen Penarth library about a month ago, and from the outside it looks impressive. Of course should this fall through like the last offer I'll go back to Porthcawl library, becoming it would seem the Frank Sinatra of book borrowing with yet another comeback.

This time though I spent yesterday making sure that these books were read before returned.

They are though different in all other respects similar in that they reminded me of ones I read last year so some of what I'm going to say will be a bit repetitive. Apologies in advance for that.

Under the Duvet by Marian Keyes is a selection of columns she wrote around the nineties/turn of the millennium. It's a funny amusing read. The best thing I can say about this book is that it reminded me of a similar collection off magazine columns by Sue Townsend The Public Confessions Of A Middle Aged Woman which I read and chatted about in this blog last year. It's as good as that.

I'm not saying that she's the Irish Sue Townsend but she is similar to the extent that her books can be read by any adult whatever their age or situation in life. Of course having said that I'm probably one of the few men who's actually read a Marian Keyes book and as I've read more than one, well you'll probably see me on a freak show soon. But her books can be enjoyed by guys...honestly.

I've explained before she's one of those female writers who a lot of male readers have avoided specifically because of their covers and the blurb. In her case it's the chick lit bright colours, silhouetted cartoon figures and swirly lettering. And before you can say "You can't judge a book by it's cover". True. But if you consider a book cover to be a signpost to the reader about what's inside. A Marian Keyes book cover says "Women welcome...men go away". You have probably little time to choose and so as a reader a cover (including the blurb) is important.

As also said before she's not the only female writer that I've avoided for exactly the same reason. Georgette Heyer was not read for years because her covers were too much of the Mills and Boon style for me to take seriously as a teenage boy.

Wonder how many good female writers I've avoided in my life because the book cover led me astray.

Sven: My Story, the autobiography of the ex England (and many other clubs) manager Sven Goran Eriksson is ultimately an unsatisfactory read. Let's get the praise done first. Stefan Lovgren was the ghost writer for this book and the man who translated it from the original Swedish to English and yet it's far better written (in English) than the one produced by Sam Allardyce's excuse for a ghost writer that I read and chatted about late last year.

However I continued to have the feeling that despite what the cover described as a "no holds barred" autobiography bars were being held. For example in the early stages of his career he managed Gothenburg when they won the UEFA cup. A truly outstanding achievement that would have earned a book by itself. But no, his entire tenure there is covered in ten pages.

And since this is turning out to be a knock the book cover post on this blog it also describes this account as "tender". Well apart from when he discusses his immediate family tender is not a word I'd describe what I've read. Discussing his relationships with women I was surprised by the cold, matter of fact approach.

My view on reading this was that it was a fat book with an even more obese version screaming to get out. Perhaps in the future that will happen. In the epilogue Eriksson mentions that he keeps a diary.

Now that's a book I'd like to read.

Until the next time.

I'm Going To Repeat Myself In This Post....Sorry About That

Hello there. Hope you're feeling well today.

Well I'm writing this at 3:32am on a Friday morning. Insomnia me as arrived for two days in a row, I've put a recording of last Sunday's match in the Irn Bru cup (yes there is such a thing as I've learnt  last week) between the Scottish team Livingston and the Welsh team The New Saints on the TV. The DVR, and the video recorder before it, is really the insomniac's best friend.

Anyway yesterday finished the last two of the library books I took out a few weeks back. So going to begin by giving you a warning that on the first book I'm about to repeat myself. But it's worth saying.

Queen Camilla by Sue Townsend is absolutely brilliant. Off the top of my head she was the last popular writer that I can recall. Not popular in the bestselling sense (though she was that) but in that she could appeal to a wide range of people whilst in a humorous way give us a not always flattering picture of Britain. She is unfortunately no longer with us and she is missed.

Now that I've finished Tiny Stations by Dixe Wills I feel that I should make a new shelf to put this book in and mark it "curate's egg".

The book is about his journey through the "request stop" train stations in Britain. This is the first problem. For he doesn't visit all of these all of these places, not even half and I felt cheated by that. To be fair that isn't necessarily Dixe Wells' fault more the person who wrote the blurb. Still it created a problem for me from the start.

Secondly when describing the individual history of these stations he can be a bit trainspottery (or rather trainstationspottery). Clearly Wells did his research but it could have done with a bit of editing if you ask me.

However when he writes about his experiences at the stations and the surrounding area it is interesting and worth the read. Those were the bits I enjoyed. To be honest I think this is the sort of book that you would have been dissatisfied with if you'd bought it but feel perfectly OK with if borrowed from the library or received as a gift.

So today I'm amongst other things off to the library to bring these books back and to borrow the next football book. I'm three days late so will have to pay a fine. The wild and criminal things I do just to finish a couple of books.

Until the next time.

Still In The Midst Of It All......There's Always A Book

Hello there. Hope you're feeling well today.

Well the TV that was in the living room is now in the spare room. An indoor aerial hanging on a ledge connected to a booster actually has worked. Yippee.

Of course that means that we've bought a new one. It has a bigger screen, though not so big that people will ask why we didn't go the whole hog and buy a cinema.

The definition is higher but not so high that you could see nose hairs on whoever's on the wide but not the widest screen that we have now.

And it is also SMART. But not as smart as it thinks it is. Who really wants to go on Twitter or Facebook on the TV? And as for the other apps, a lot of them seem to require a working knowledge of either German or Turkish.

Still we're all relatively happy. Especially the wife, who if you take out sport (admittedly like saying "just ignore the elephant in the room") now seems to watch more television than I do.

Still in the midst of it all there's always a book.

I've explained before that although yet to reveal my job I've made no secret that it's neither glamorous or that it's on fat cat pay. Still it has it's difficulties and for reasons I'll not bore you with working during the next few days is going to be tricky. What I'd not prepared for was that Friday was just as taxing. It's making me feel nervous for the rest of this period.

Still in the midst of it all there's always a book.

There's going to be a second viewing of the house tomorrow afternoon whilst I'm at work. Wife wants to know what to do if an offer is made. Of course I don't know because I don't know what the offer will be. Wife is worried that any delay in responding might damage the chances of selling the house. There is an agreement between us. Should there be an offer she'll come down to where I'm working and discuss it with me.

I won't lie. There is a part of me that does not to be disturbed whilst I'm at work and another part of me nervous in looking for a house ourselves. At the same time there is yet another part of me (man of many parts me ) that wants to make sure that we've made the right decision and we've made it together. All very confusing and tense this.

Still in the midst of it all there's always a book.

And for today that book is Queen Camilla by Sue Townsend. I've read 116 pages of this novel today and I've enjoyed every moment of it. This is what a good book can do when you're seeking a respite from the confusions, uncertainties and fears life brings to the table.

That;s what reading can do,

Until the next time,

In Which Feeding My Addiction......To Books Continues

Hello there. Hope you're feeling well today.

Yesterday (Tuesday)was a day where there were things to do before I went to work on the afternoon/evening shift. First off was the library, not Porthcawl but Pyle where I needed to get a few documents printed and photocopied (our printer having run out of ink and discovering that looking for new cartridges was about as simple as discovering the source of the Nile).

Now I hadn't intended to borrow a book at a different library, honestly. But I was tempted.

Dixe Wills - Tiny Stations

This is about a man who decides to visit every request stop train station in Britain. It's the sort of one person mad challenge story that attracted me. So it was borrowed.

Now we had a viewing on the house at 1pm which meant we needed to get out well before that. The wife suggested that we as a family had lunch together. I said no on the grounds that as I was working I'd be too busy clock watching. So wife/daughter went out by themselves and I would spend the ninety minutes of free time left by having lunch in Porthcawl..and visiting the library.

I'd decided to read all the Sue Townsend books that I hadn't yet read having seen a documentary about her recently. Pyle library didn't have anything but Porthcawl did (aside from the one I'd already written and raved about before). It was this.

Sue Townsend - Queen Camilla

I'd read The Queen and I and loved it so am looking forward to reading this one.

Now being Porthcawl Library this also meant that I needed a football book to replace the disaster that was Sam Allardyce's autobiography. This was the one I picked.

Michael Calvin - The Nowhere Men

This is a book about football talent spotters. It does on the surface link in to the Oliver Kay book on Adrian Doherty I spoke about recently.

After that I even had a bit of time to buy a Penguin paperback from the Porthcawl Animal Welfare Shop.

Penguin Modern Poets 17 - David Gascoyne - W S Graham - Kathleen Raine

It only cost me 20p. Which means I've still got £1.40 in the Penguin book budget.

And amazingly I finished reading a book too. Geology in the Service of Man (1950 edition) by W G Fearnsides and O M B Bulman. Now to be honest I found it to be a literary sleeping pill but it doesn't matter. It's I who am the weird collector of vintage Pelican/Penguin paperbacks. So if these books are on a subject that normally I wouldn't read about then it's hardly the authors' fault. Mind you the description of the book as "Eminently readable" on the cover? Rocky if you ask me.

So that means I need another Pelican/Penguin paperback to fill the void there. From the great unread it turns out to be.

1149 - Ellery Queen -The Roman Hat Mystery

You know off the top of my head G K Chesterton and Ellery Queen were the only "classic" crime writers I've never got round to reading. At least one of those anomalies will be resolved in the future.

What this all means is that if we remember the Michael Palin book I read in the car I have now six books on the go,

Yes I know.

But when you have an addiction to reading it's hard to let it go. Even if  only slightly.

Until the next time.

Books:The Good.The Bad And The Unfinished

Hello there. Hope you're feeling well today.

It's been a while since I've done a post solely about books but then again it's unusual when I finish three in one day. The literary equivalent of waiting for buses.

So let's start with the good. Sue Townsend's The Public Confessions Of A Middle Aged Woman, a collection of her columns in the Sainsburys Magazine was a joy to read. With her trademark engaging humour she writes about subjects as varied as Vodka and car boot sales though tinged with sadness towards the end with the decline in her eyesight. It's the best book I've read this year.

It occurred to me as I was reading that she is the last writer that was liked by so many readers. When I say liked I mean that you can be an academic or a gardener, male or female,work in a petrol station or a rail station, work in London or her home city of Leicester and still feel that you can relate to what she's writing. Her recent death robbed us of a person who I think we now realise was a quiet British literary institution.

Just as Sue Townsend's book is the best I've read this year then Ali Smith's The Accidental is the worst. This book won the Whitbread book of the year in 2005. Whitbread own the coffee chain Costa which is why this prize has changed to the Costa book of the year. But either way it struck me that the judges must have been high on caffeine to have awarded this first prize.

As a parent in the beginning there's an incident that upset me and I almost put the book down. I wish now I had.

If I was to say to you that some important characters are called Magnus and Astrid but it's not set in Sweden then you'll have an idea of how pretentious this piece of work is. But this is not so much a novel of pretensions but a pretend novel. For the author does not hesitate in using a hundred words where ten would do. Somewhere there might be a short story that I wouldn't bother to read screaming to be set free.

The writing style is best described as a "stream of consciousness" but is more a stream of urine. It rambles around like an intellectual tramp and in the middle there is even pages of poetry for no good reason whatsoever.

As a reader the only pleasure I had from this book was the feeling of relief when it was finished.

The trouble with The Dirty Game by Andrew Jennings is that for all the goings on in FIFA that it goes into intricate detail to explain (and it's a book that you truly need to be paying attention to or else you'll be lost in all the dealings it goes into) the investigations are still ongoing. When I finished this book I felt the phrase "TO BE CONTINUED" should have been placed at the ending.

As interesting a book as it is it really is unfinished and can only be completed once the legal and police processes are completed. Perhaps this can be best described as a first draft.

So new books now need to be picked from the great unread. The next Penguin to be picked is:

Not A Hazardous Sport - Nigel Barley

Apparently this is a book about a visit to a particular tribe in Indonesia. Hope this isn't going to be patronising. We shall see.

Unless anything unexpected happens I won't be able to visit the library until Monday week. So the non Penguin book I've picked is this one.

The American - Martin Booth

As you may remember I bought this book for a pound in Poundland but what pushed me into getting it was that it was set in Tuscany, the Rhondda of Italy.

Until the next time.

Do You Remember Harry Carpenter? (Even Great Books Can Die). Also Books Bought And Borrowed

Hello there. Hope you're feeling well today.

Let's start with the question in the title. That's for anyone living in what will probably soon be named the Disunited Kingdom. A land whose government is apparently telling people living here originally from the EU that they might not be allowed to stay post BREXIT.

No matter that you worked here, started up businesses and/or a family

With every day that has followed since the referendum this Kingdom seems to be slowly moving to a very dark place indeed. A look here,a remark there, a graffitied wall strewn with racial insults, in some cases violence.

Britain has become a very worrying place to live right now. And I say this as a white male with a British passport.

So I went today to Porthcawl mainly to go to the library. Here is the Porthcawl view of the day.

Metaphor time

That view seemed to match my mood. Calm but with a sense of foreboding.

Before I went to Poundland for a few odd groceries. Poundland sell small stocks of stuff mainly for, surprise, surprise a pound. Now they do sell books most of which deserve to stay there. Some though will surprise you. There was a Howard Jacobson. But that wasn't the book that caught my eye. It was this.

Martin Booth - The American

This attracted me because it was set in Tuscany, where my Italian relatives live. Remember starting to watch the film on TV and nodding off but liking what I saw before seductive power of the nap took over.

It's not a Penguin paperback I know. But as it was only a pound it was bought.

And so to the library. Picking the football book to read was easier than I thought.

Andrew Jennings - The Dirty Game

Well the cover says it all really.

I was about to leave when in the corner of my eye I noticed this.

Sue Townsend - The Public Confessions Of A Middle-Aged Woman

Sue Townsend wrote the Adrian Mole books (I've read when he was a teenager but not those as an adult) but she also wrote some other stuff as well (I remember a novel...though not the title... where the Royal family were moved in a Republican Britain to a council house). These are a selection of columns she wrote on various subjects. I borrowed it, pathetic as it sounds, because I thought it would make me laugh. How sad is that?

So to the question Do You Remember Harry Carpenter? If you do then I've finished my "car book", Glued To The Box by Clive James. Let me say now that the next car book is volume one of  Michael Palin's Diaries bought a couple of weeks back. I now have five books on the go. I'll never kick the habit of reading but I've got to learn to control it. Thing is I don't know how.

This was his final published collection of his TV columns for The Observer between 1979-1982. It's quite simply just as good as I remember it all those years ago. Funny yet erudite. Here is a man capable of talking about an opera and then move on to The Rockford Files (that was in an earlier book - Just lumped that in to say that The Rockford Files seem to be one of the few seventies detective shows that has stood the test of time - I liked The Rockford Files - It seemed to be written and performed by adults - Clive James liked it as well).

He is the best critic I have ever read. One of the few that I would look forward to reading (or perhaps even prefer listening to, as I mentioned when discussing the book of his radio show he used to do called A Point Of View).

But........

Do you remember Harry Carpenter? He was a BBC sports presenter in the seventies and eighties. He was mainly known for his Boxing commentary but he'd also present The British Open and Wimbledon. Clive James writes about him here. If you do then you will read the book with a wistful smile about a time long gone.

If you don't then the bulk of this book is not for you. It'll mention programmes and people long since forgotten unless you look them up on Google or Youtube. I don't know why book or literary or theatre criticism (Christopher Hitchen,Dorothy Parker, Kenneth Tynan) survives but TV doesn't, certainly not for this period anyway.

So when the last person to remember Harry Carpenter dies. This book, great as it is will die with it.

Until the next time.