april-may 2025 books...

Orange Dust: Journeys After The Buddha (Kenneth Wilson): I bought this book (published in 2011) after reading ‘High Cello’ (about his pilgrimage to Rome, on a bike, with a cello!) and after he hosted a ‘Lenten Quiet Day’ at Bristol Cathedral in March. I think he’s 10 years younger than me and, among other things, he’s been a CofE vicar, property developer, poet and also founded ‘Soul of India Tours’ in 1992 (guiding people on spiritual journeys in that country). This book is another pilgrimage – this time exploring some of the Buddha's teachings and visiting sacred sites. Wilson is an unassuming, but fascinating, individual and an excellent, entertaining writer. I’m not sure if he’s a Christian or a Buddhist or indeed of any faith these days (and perhaps that doesn’t matter at all), but he comes across as a decent, spiritual man – and a pilgrim in the true meaning of the word. It took me a little time to get into the ‘rhythm’ of this book but, when I did, I found it impressive and engaging.
Virgina Woolf: A Critical Memoir (Winifred Holtby): For a number of years now, I’ve been fascinated by the work of and the individuals linked to the Bloomsbury Group (and have read several books about them/it). This memoir, however, pays only scant reference to the group and focusses on Virginia Woolf’s writing. The book was first published in 1932 (my copy was published in 1978) – 9 years before Woolf’s suicide in 1941, aged 59. This memoir’s author is the distinguished novelist+writer Winifred Holtby (who herself died at the early age of just 37 in 1935, after suffering from Bright’s Disease). It’s a brilliantly detailed assessment of Woolf’s writing career by someone who clearly was entirely familiar with all her books and her critical reviews. Somewhat predictably, I didn’t have such extensive knowledge of Woolf’s writing (I’ve only read 3 of her books: ‘The Waves’, ‘Mrs Dalloway’ and ‘To The Lighthouse’), but found Holtby’s memoir absorbing. I was also fascinated, given the nature of her death, by Woolf’s frequent references and books relating to the sea/water and to death (she’d struggled with mental illness throughout her adult life and drowned in Sussex’s River Ouse). As the book’s cover rightly acknowledges: “the work of one intelligent novelist commenting upon another”.
Zee+Co (Edna O’Brien): Continuing to work through my collection of Edna O’Brien books - actually, although I’ve recently bought three ‘new’ secondhand novels of hers, this (first published in 1971) is one we’ve had on our shelves for some years. It features three rather detestable characters: Zee, her husband Robert, and his mistress Stella and essentially explores the sexual geometry of the eternal triangle (Zee+Robert are particularly horrible, selfish individuals). Rather wonderfully written (it was an original screenplay) but, although I’ve never seen the film, I was somewhat put off by the knowledge that the characters were played by Elizabeth Taylor, Michael Caine and Susannah York respectively. I found it quite amusing to discover that this Penguin paperbook was originally priced at 0.25p (just published before decimalisation)!
To Have And Have Not (Ernest Hemingway): First published in 1937, this consists of three ‘long short stories’ which form three sections of the life of Henry Morgan, a struggling fisherman in the Florida Keys during the Great Depression, who makes a living by rum-running, gun-running and man-running between Florida and Cuba. I like Hemingway’s writing – except, in this case, for his regular references to one of the characters as ‘the n*gger’ (yes, I know it was written over 90 years ago, but I still think it’s awful). Morgan is forced by dire economic forces into the black-market activity of running contraband between Cuba and Florida. It’s a tough, uncompromising story about (as the title suggests) the haves and the have nots – about the rich and powerful and those who have no option but to bend to their will in order to survive (but many fail in the process).
Vagabond (Mark Eveleigh): This is our next Storysmith bookgroup selection (theme: literary road trip). I really loved this book (published in 2024). Eveleigh has been a travel writer/journalist (I like his style of writing) for the past 25 years (he’s 54) and the book relates to a 1,225km solo hike – inspired by a nomadic vagabundo (vagabond/tramp) he met decades ago - across the Iberian Peninsula, from Gibraltar in the south to Estaca de Bares (Spain’s most northerly tip) carrying just a backpack and a hammock. I very much enjoyed the slow rhythm of the book – the walking-pace journey (although he actually completed his trek in 35 days – that’s 35km/nearly 22 miles per day!) and the fact that he hadn’t set himself any particular goals or time targets and was happy to take detours if something struck him to be of particular interest. Although he did occasionally stay in a hostel (some of the journey was part of the many Camino trails to Santiago de Compostela – although Eveleigh was travelling in the opposite direction of course), his main objective was live ‘under the stars’. Having said this, he was happy to use some of the bars and simple restaurants he encountered en route (and to replenish his water bottles). It’s a story about a trip he’d been promising himself and something of a celebration of rural Spain (he’s a UK citizen but had lived in Spain for several years in his 20s/30s and so language was not an issue). It’s something of a pilgrimage… it’s about the journey; the people he met on the way (and the rural communities); the challenges he faced (including the heat and his agonising blisters!); the history of his surroundings; and the value of slowing down and noticing things. A beautiful book.