Question What are you reading?

[Napster]

A fascinating book https://www.amazon.co.uk/Master-His...rds=master+and+emissary&qid=1654681362&sr=8-1

 

[Userorange]

Many thanks for the tip.Since it's our 4 year old grandson's 5th birthday soon I thought I'd order this for him.Make a change from The Hungry Caterpiller et al (which we still have hanging about the house).Hope I enjoy it too (since I normally get delegated to read anything in English)!

I think you may - like me - enjoy it. I suspect it’s way too young for a five year old. Time to introduce the lad to Roald Dahl.

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

1.I think you may - like me - enjoy it. I suspect it’s way too young for a five year old. 2.Time to introduce the lad to Roald Dahl.

1.Hope so! 2Got some of that still from the kids' time.Both our daughters were big fans IIRC.

 

[Massimo Giovanni]

The Salt Path by Raynor Winn.
A very good read imo, interesting and more about the spirit than a tour guide.
No surprise it is a highly rated book by critics.
I can see it being made into a film.

 

[GrumpyBlue]

The Salt Path by Raynor Winn.
A very good read imo, interesting and more about the spirit than a tour guide.
No surprise it is a highly rated book by critics.
I can see it being made into a film.

Not a film yet - but Raynor Winn has collaborated with the folk band Gigspanner to do a musical tour of the Salt Path - called `Saltlines` starting in July (I`m seeing it in Falmouth in a months time) plus a further tour in October

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

Ionathan Freeland's The Escape Artist.Effectively a biography of Rudolf Verba (and fellow inmate Fred Werzler) who were the first Jews to break out of Auschwitz.A wonderful journalistic account which is destined IMO to become an instant classic.

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

Raymond Stuart Canham's The Mitchley Waltz.A moving memoir of 1950's Tottenham,Written up from his mother's diaries.

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

Another vote for Raynor Winn's The Salt Path.Thanks for the recommendation Jim.It's an uplifting read.

 

[Rob Noxious]

I'm reading this but won't comment on it due to a personal interest. Here's the PR for it which should give you a flavour: -

Radio Therapy: A musical memoir – one hundred tracks charting the countdown of a breakdown and journeys in mental health

Rob Spooner’s ‘Radio Therapy: A musical memoir’ is going live. You’re invited to tune into this radio show in words. It’s a collection of ‘Our Tunes’-type stories telling of journeys into the world of mental ill-health and how popular music helps the novella’s key characters to explore how their respective personal histories have led them there.

It’s an interesting concept with references to popular music in its chapter titles which descend in an order of numbers from 100 to 1, just like a pop chart. It is narrated in the style of a personal radio broadcast.

This fictional musical memoir is a prequel to FM247: Radios In Motion, Rob’s ‘pop’ novel published last year. It’s set in 1999. Lugwin Loggins, DJ narrator, is broadcasting from The Southern Star, a community radio station moored in Harbour Head, a fishing village in west Cornwall. Lugwin has experienced mental health problems whilst in Harbour Head that led to his admission to a psychiatric hospital for treatment of depression. Whilst there, Lugwin has strange dreams with musical connections. An occupational therapist encourages him to write a memoir that begins with a description of these dreams. Lugwin is traumatised by past loss which is exacerbated following his break-up with Donna Raven who he moved to Cornwall to be with. He finds inspiration in his radio stories and sends cassette-tape copies of his broadcasts to a childhood friend from his hometown of Binfield-on-Sea, Winston ‘Wiz’ Wyndham, with whom he shared a love of the radio.

Donna visits Lugwin to tell him that she is pregnant. Lugwin is shocked and returns to Binfield to try to make sense of some of the issues from his past and in hope that he will see Wiz again. Lugwin’s mental health unravels further and he is admitted to Speedwell hospital where Doctor Beradi helps him via ‘Radio Therapy’. Can this radio therapy help Lugwin to overcome his past experiences and manage his brittle mental health? Tune into this countdown of one hundred tracks and their associated stories to find out.

Radio Therapy: a musical memoir is due to be published soon by The Conrad Press, ISBN: 978194913846.

 

[Massimo Giovanni]

The Fort by Bernard Cornwall, historical fact based on Penobscot expedition at time of American independence.
Interesting enough, especially about US folk hero Paul Revere, who seems to have been a bit of an arse.

 

[GrumpyBlue]

Another vote for Raynor Winn's The Salt Path.Thanks for the recommendation Jim.It's an uplifting read.

Her next book - the name which escapes me is good as well

 

[GrumpyBlue]

I'm reading this but won't comment on it due to a personal interest. Here's the PR for it which should give you a flavour: -

Radio Therapy: A musical memoir – one hundred tracks charting the countdown of a breakdown and journeys in mental health

Rob Spooner’s ‘Radio Therapy: A musical memoir’ is going live. You’re invited to tune into this radio show in words. It’s a collection of ‘Our Tunes’-type stories telling of journeys into the world of mental ill-health and how popular music helps the novella’s key characters to explore how their respective personal histories have led them there.

It’s an interesting concept with references to popular music in its chapter titles which descend in an order of numbers from 100 to 1, just like a pop chart. It is narrated in the style of a personal radio broadcast.

This fictional musical memoir is a prequel to FM247: Radios In Motion, Rob’s ‘pop’ novel published last year. It’s set in 1999. Lugwin Loggins, DJ narrator, is broadcasting from The Southern Star, a community radio station moored in Harbour Head, a fishing village in west Cornwall. Lugwin has experienced mental health problems whilst in Harbour Head that led to his admission to a psychiatric hospital for treatment of depression. Whilst there, Lugwin has strange dreams with musical connections. An occupational therapist encourages him to write a memoir that begins with a description of these dreams. Lugwin is traumatised by past loss which is exacerbated following his break-up with Donna Raven who he moved to Cornwall to be with. He finds inspiration in his radio stories and sends cassette-tape copies of his broadcasts to a childhood friend from his hometown of Binfield-on-Sea, Winston ‘Wiz’ Wyndham, with whom he shared a love of the radio.

Donna visits Lugwin to tell him that she is pregnant. Lugwin is shocked and returns to Binfield to try to make sense of some of the issues from his past and in hope that he will see Wiz again. Lugwin’s mental health unravels further and he is admitted to Speedwell hospital where Doctor Beradi helps him via ‘Radio Therapy’. Can this radio therapy help Lugwin to overcome his past experiences and manage his brittle mental health? Tune into this countdown of one hundred tracks and their associated stories to find out.

Radio Therapy: a musical memoir is due to be published soon by The Conrad Press, ISBN: 978194913846.

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Just finished the previous book - do I get a royalty for the Railway pub in Monkstown?

 

[GrumpyBlue]

Her next book - the name which escapes me is good as well

Found the book - The Wild Silence. A new one - Landlines - is coming out in September

 

[Rob Noxious]

Just finished the previous book - do I get a royalty for the Railway pub in Monkstown?

You are CAMRA royalty.

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

Recently finished Helen Stevenson's Instructions for Visitors.A well-written expat's account of village life in Céret.

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

Maylis Besserie's Yell,Sam,If You Still Can .A moving novel of Sam Beckett's last days at the Le Tiers Temps residence in Paris.Moment mori indeed.

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

Just finished Ali Smith's Companian Piece.A rather strange lockdown novel.Not a patch on anything ih her seasonal quartet,IMO.

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

Davyd Boryson's Russia Ukraine conflict made Simple.Read this and Putin's Peple recently.Afraid I'm still not nuch the wiser about the reasons for this awful conflist.

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

Finished Raynor Winn's The Wild Silence earlier.It's an absolute joy to read and every bit as good as The Salt Path.Many thanks to Grumpy Blue for the heads up on this.

 

[Rob Noxious]

I recently finished Westcliff based singer, songwriter and poet Phil Burdett’s debut novel ‘Maledictus’. It is a tome of wondrous prose, enchanting imagery and vivid imaginings. It’s unlike any other novel I’ve read, so it’s very novel indeed. It’s here I have to admit not having read ‘Ulysses’ - I know that the author is a big fan of it, so other readers may know more as to whether there might be any parallels.

The central protagonist of ‘Maledictus’ is The Troubadour and we experience this character in differing states of being at various times in his life. There’s a metamorphosis happening here and it culminates in The Troubadour’s other incarnation as Captain Rehab. Captain Rehab sails a ghost ship of past and future selves and it’s possible that he is The Troubadour’s post-corporeal being, but this is only my speculation. It’s a book that will, I suspect, repay a second reading but my initial impression is that it’s an exploration of the uncertainties in trying to understand this life and I’ve inferred that it’s suggesting our lived experience is just one small facet within a wider unconscious that exists in our dreams and the worlds beyond our perceived world. The boundaries between the conscious reminiscences, the dreamworld scenarios and the contemporaneous real-life happenings are sometimes blurred in ‘Maledictus’ but maybe that’s the point.

There are a whole host of colourful and interesting characters who are part of The Troubadour’s journey (that takes in Basildon, Southend, London and Amsterdam between 1978 to 2021), including the inspirational but unpredictable Degory Priest, the reliably profane Jimmy Red, the enigmatic Ursula Major and the wise, shamanic Radio Repairman. There is also Boo, The Troubador’s first love. She plays a cameo role but frequently returns in The Troubador’s memories and dreams. The Troubador’s psychotropic experiences in Amsterdam towards the end of the novel open up new doorways to his greater perception and his meeting with Theo The Sailor leads to the revelatory meeting with The Radio Repairman and The Troubadour’s eventual journey home, via the uncertain waters that influence his soul.

This is a novel that challenges any readers who like their fiction to follow conventional story arcs. It’s highly unorthodox in style and structure and you’ll also need a dictionary to hand for some words too. I urge you to give it a go. I’m going to be doing so a second time in the hope that I’ll be a bit more on the wavelength with it. And that reminds me, there are some clever musical references that permeate The Troubadour’s thoughts and I’m delighted to see that Phil Burdett, the Thames Delta Troubadour, will be playing live again later this year.