april 2026 books…

Inside The Wave (Helen Dunmore): I’ve read this book countless times – poems written at the end of Dunmore’s life (many from her hospital bed). Full of life’s reflections and memories. Another one of my early morning poetry ponderings. Beautiful and moving (as always).
Sincerity (Carol Ann Duffy): Another early morning re-read. Duffy is an acknowledged ‘top poet’, but I’ve never really particularly enjoyed her writing (despite having read four books of her poetry). This one “gazes out from the autumn of life” (in the words of the book’s cover) on scenes from her childhood, adolescence and adulthood… and “taking stock of a world in turmoil”. Sadly, for me, while I acknowledge her sincerity and sentiments, I once again found that her words didn’t really resonate for me.
The Places In Between (Rory Stewart): This fascinating book (first published in 2004) tells of Stewart’s remarkable journey at the beginning of 2002 on foot across Afghanistan, from Herat to Kabul – immediately following the defeat of the Taliban. Ridiculously (to the likes of me!), he chose to do so through the ice and snow of winter and, if that wasn’t hard enough, took the harshest, most inaccessible mountainous route (following the Mogul Emperor Babur)(Stewart had spent the previous 16 months walking through Iran, Pakistan and Nepal!). The journey took him 36 days (covering in excess of 25km each day!) and he endeavoured to record events in his diary at the end of each day (as well as sketching some of the people he stayed with along the way). The dangers and difficulties of the undertaking proved quite as intimidating as one would expect – unexploded mines, mountainous terrain, extreme weather, bandits/hostile factions (and further complicated by Stewart's acquisition of a large, elderly, toothless and semi-wild dog!). Stewart’s ability to speak and understand various languages was obviously crucial but, despite the difficulties, his survival was ultimately dependent on the kindness and hospitality of strangers in the villages they passed, who were mostly desperately poor. A rather wonderful book.
Greengates (RC Sherriff): Another Persephone book. I decided to read this book (first published in 1936) after previously having read and enjoyed Sherriff’s ‘The Fortnight In September’. The novel starts in the early 1920s, on the day Tom Baldwin retires (aged 58) from his job as Chief Cashier of an insurance company in London. Tom+Edith Baldwin live what appear to be pretty boring lives and the prospect of retirement seems somewhat depressing to them both. They have no family, no real friends, and very few interests. Edith finds the prospect of having Tom at home all day particularly challenging. But then, out of the blue, while re-tracing a walk they used to take in the early years of their marriage, they find that a new small housing estate is being planned close by… and they end up deciding to take the bold decision to sell up and move into one of these new houses… and the move transforms and revitalises their lives (new friends, new interests et al). It’s a ridiculously gentle, comfortable, feel-good tale of the ‘olden days’ – somewhat over-romanticised and idyllic - but, nevertheless, a welcome relief from some of today’s current horrors.  
And When Did You Last See Your Father? (Blake Morrison): I’d previously read this book twice before (first published 1993 – I first read it in 1994), but the last time was 15 years ago. It felt somewhat strange to be reading it again. Although Morrison’s father and my dad were very different characters (middle-class doctor/working-class printer), there were odd aspects of their stories that overlapped. Morrison’s father died in 1991, my dad died in 1992 (although my dad was a little older than Morrison); and Blake Morrison is a couple of years younger than me. It’s an incredibly honest, unflinching book. Morrison’s father was something of a charismatic, yet complicated man (“a loving father, a boastful ‘sexual charmer’, a skilled doctor, and a difficult man with a penchant for reckless driving and saving money”)… but, despite the obvious differences, the book triggered all sorts of memories of my own father and, at times, our own somewhat difficult relationship (and all those things I failed to ask him about!). What it also did was to remind me of my father’s final days – a time when I wanted to ask him about his life and his memories – but a time when my dad seemed in denial about his life coming to an end. A rather special book – and a compelling memoir.

first game of the cricket season at bristol…

I turned up at Bristol’s Seat Unique Stadium yesterday for Gloucestershire’s first home game of the cricket season. After Gloucestershire’s ‘very disappointing’ innings defeat by Middlesex earlier in the week, the signs weren’t good!
Anyway, a fresh start (I thought!). A chance to make amends(!?).
It didn’t start well.
Glos won the toss and put Durham in to bat (really?!).
The Durham openers made a nonsense of that decision by batting away untroubled in beautiful sunshine… and, at lunch, were 143-0 in 30 overs (at just a little under 5 runs/over!). By 2pm (170-0), Durham’s 21-year-old opener, McKinney, had scored his century. Just after 3pm (257-0), Durham’s other opener Lees had also become a centurion. Lees was eventually the first wicket to fall (305-1 in the 59^th over) – just after the floodlights had been switched on at 3.30pm!
It didn’t end well either (for Glos)!
The weather deteriorated somewhat (cold, blustery winds) and rain stopped play for a brief time. Play later resumed, but the day ended early when the players departed due to bad light – by which time, Durham’s score had advanced to 456-2 (with McKinney on 214 not out).
A really poor day for Gloucestershire (but a not altogether surprising one?)… and another defeat already beckons. I’m afraid they look like a very ‘ordinary’ team. The captain used eight (EIGHT!) bowlers yesterday and, frankly, none of them looked at all impressive or threatening. Last season, their batting was unreliable (to put it mildly) and I suspect it’ll be the same old story this season… and so the team will probably languish in the bottom half (or worse!) of the County Championship’s Division 2.
Frankly, I only go along to watch Gloucestershire because they’re my ‘local’ team and because I love watching ‘old fashioned’ cricket. Watching Somerset at Taunton (in Division one) would be a much better prospect – but involves a 30 minute+ train journey. Instead, I jump on no.75/76 bus and can be in the ground within 20 minutes.
So, I’ll no doubt continue to ‘enjoy’ watching my cricket in Bristol… sitting among tiny ‘crowds’ of under 100 people (and all of us old codgers)… and everyone talking about the ‘good old days’ and mis-remembering the cricketing days of their youth!!
Photo: This is McKinney hitting his second ‘six’ of the day – and the game is still only 55 minutes old!
Note: Sadly, yesterday, even though it’s the school holidays, I counted only half a dozen children in attendance.

march-april 2026 books…

A Bird’s Idea Of Flight (David Harsent): Another book of Harsent’s poetry. This one, at times, I found quite hard to grasp. It describes a circular journey which focusses on (in the words of the book’s cover) the “deeply curious business of his own death… during which the figure of death, as companion, mentor and guide, appears along the way in various guises”. Sometimes obscure, sometimes extraordinary – but his way with words is always intriguing.
Essex Clay (Andrew Motion): This is a beautiful prose-poem description of three events that have haunted Motion throughout his writing life, namely: the story of his mother’s death in a riding accident, long unconsciousness and slow death; recalling the end of his father’s life; and an unexpected meeting with an old love after 40 years. I read the book out loud to myself as part of my daily early morning time of reflection. Profound, haunting and really rather wonderful.
A Year In Provence (Peter Mayle): Strangely, but in a very comforting way, this book (first published in 1989 – 37 years ago!) came to mind as I reflected on all the awful things happening in the world at the present time… The thought felt like a reassuring, calming reminder of the beauty of nature and all those people and places that make our lives special (a tenuous link perhaps, but hey!). I think this is the third time I’ve read the book but, sadly, I’d given my copy away and so ended up buying another copy… BUT (wait for it!), on finishing reading it this time and in the process of tidying it away on our shelves, I came across our original copy (I know!) – all appropriately arranged in alphabetical author order and, of course, alongside all the other ‘white spine’ books!! Once again, the book ticked all those ‘comforting’ boxes. He writes beautifully, evocatively and amusingly… although I do have some reservations about the sense of privileged arrogance that the book represents? Hey ho… I still very much enjoyed it.
Wilderness Taunts (Ian Adams): I think this is the fifth time I’ve used my great friend Ian Adams’s book as part of my Lenten reflections. Each time, I find his words incredibly challenging, thought-provoking and helpful… and I have absolutely no doubt that I’ll continue to use this rather wonderful book for many years to come. For me, it’s a very special book.
Treasures New+Old (Rupert Martin): This is a book of biblical-based images and essays by my good friend Rupert. The photographs provide an A-Z of images from the Bible. From the outset (and you won’t be surprised by this), I have to admit that I didn’t purchase the book because of its biblical texts (very well researched - with perhaps up to a dozen biblical references for each key word)… no, I did so knowing that it would contain lots of Rupert’s rather wonderful photographs compiled from his extensive travels over the past four decades (and I was duly impressed!).

orwell 2+2=5…

I went along to the Watershed again this morning (11am showing – for old retirees like me!)(surprisingly, there must have been an audience of some 80-100) to see Raoul Peck’s film about the Nineteen Eighty-Four novelist.
Obviously, one appreciates that going to watch a documentary film about George Orwell isn’t going to be a bundle of laughs(!) – particularly when we have a madman like Trump ‘in charge’ of a significant portion of the western world - and so it proved. Listening to Orwell’s prose (read by Damian Lewis) from his published works, letters and diaries is a sobering experience (albeit strangely invigorating). I don’t think I’d been fully aware that he’d written his ‘1984’ masterpiece when he was so close to his death (the book was published in 1949, he died the following year).  
It’s a very impressive film.
Obviously, with all footage available of past+present totalitarian/scary regimes, the documentary was spoilt for choice as far as illustrative examples were concerned. Orwell actually predicted the rise of AI and, of course, we now have the internet when it comes ‘information’ availability (and, with it, ‘fake news’ and propaganda). The documentary also includes present-day videos involving the likes of Trump, Orban, Modi, Netanyahu and Putin. No doubt, Orwell would have just nodded and said “I told you so”!
Overall, while I thought the documentary film was excellent, there are lots of gaps when it comes to some of the somewhat controversial aspects of Orwell’s life (eg. his anti-Semitic views in his younger days) and so there were times when I almost felt I was being ‘manipulated’ and that perhaps I wasn’t being given a more balanced view of things (but, hey, don’t get me wrong – I’m on Orwell’s side!).
It was a very powerful film and yet, somewhat predictably, also a pretty depressing one. It left me feeling very sad about how things might pan out in the coming years – not my future, of course, but my children’s children’s futures.
Oh for a simple, beautiful world of decency, integrity, honesty, respect and love.

march 2026 books…

Penguin Modern Poets: Jackson, Nuttall+Wantling: First published in 1968 (Moira bought our copy the same year)… so, 58 years on, I’m not quite sure that the word ‘Modern’ in this Penguin series still applies! Once again, I read this book out loud to myself as one of my early morning routines. A real mixture of styles and, perhaps inevitably, some seemed somewhat dated… but enjoyable nonetheless.
Falling In Love (Donna Leon): When the world has lost its marbles, it’s probably time to read another crime novel(!)… and, of course, if it takes you to Venice in the process, then so much the better. This is another Commissario Brunetti story (I like him as a character… and his references to family life etc). This one involves an opera superstar (well used to adoring fans) at La Fenice in Venice one over-the-top anonymous admirer who inundates her with dozens of bouquets of yellow roses… in her dressing room and inside her locked apartment. She begins to fear for her safety and calls in an old friend. Enter Brunetti. Another enjoyable read.
Train Dreams (Denis Johnson): This is our next Storysmith bookgroup choice (which we’re reading and then seeing the film at 20th Century Flicks). First published in 2012, this novella tells the tale of a 1920s railroad worker, Robert Grainier. He’s an ordinary man – uneducated and unambitious, but a dependable worker – initially working preparing huge felled spruce trees for transportation down from Washington State. But it’s a fragile existence in the wilds of the frontier amid a world of bewildering changes. Indiscriminate, destructive forest fires are commonplace – and his wife and daughter fail to survive one of them). Grainier builds a makeshift shelter by the site of his destroyed home and falls into a grief that runs its long course, redefining him in the process as something of a recluse. Later, his dogged struggle is eased somewhat when he acquires a horse and wagon – which allows him to undertake odd jobs in the neighbouring town. It’s a book about nature, survival, sadness and grief. A tough, but rather beautiful book (I’ll be fascinated to see what the film version conjures up).
Paradise (Abdulrazak Gurnah): This is our next Blokes’ Book selection. This is a novel (first published in 1994) about an African boy's coming of age, a tragic love story, and a tale of the corruption of traditional African patterns by European colonialism. As a 12-year-old, Yusuf (in the decade before WW1), is sold by his father in repayment of a debt. From the simple life of rural Africa, Yusuf is thrown into the complexities of pre-colonial urban East Africa - a world in which Muslim Africans, Christian missionaries, and Indians from the subcontinent coexist in a fragile, subtle social hierarchy (with some communities fighting each other; trading safaris going badly wrong; and all this alongside the trials of adolescence). By the time he’s 18(?), Yusuf begins to comprehend the choices required of him but, just as he decides on the need to break free from his servitude under his so-called Uncle Aziz (“he isn’t my uncle!”), the German colonial forces invade and, instead of finding true freedom, a traumatized and desolate Yusuf chooses to run after the retreating German military column… and, almost certainly into a new form of bondage. A multi-layered, powerful novel about Africa on the brink of change. Hauntingly beautiful.
Legion (David Harsent): More early morning poetry. I came across Harsent poetry for the first time last month (‘Salt’) and was determined to read more of his work. This is a collection (first published in 2005) of various accounts of conflict from an unnamed war which, in a cruel irony, I started to read on the day the US+Israel launched bombs on Iran. Powerful - and frequently bleak - words that underline the starkness, pain and indiscriminate nature of conflict. Much food for thought.

sirât...

I went along to the Watershed again yesterday (it had been a few weeks since my last cinema outing!) to see Oliver Laxe’s film Sirât. I’d noticed that the film had been nominated for two Oscars (Best International Feature and Best Sound) and so thought ‘I’d give it a go’. I got to the cinema 15minutes before the show started and decided to check on Peter Bradshaw’s (from The Guardian) film review – as I often do – only to find that he’d given it a mere 2-star rating. Nevermind, I thought, I’m here now!
Set in the dusty mountains of southern Morocco, a father (Luis) and his son have arrived at a rave (miles from anywhere) searching for Mar - daughter and sister - who vanished months ago at one of these endless, sleepless parties. Hope is fading, but they push through and follow a group of ravers heading to one last party in the desert…
Well, although it wasn’t quite my kind of music, I can well understand why the film had been nominated for ‘Best Sound’ (Kangding Ray’s suitably rave-like soundtrack was intoxicating… and very loud!) but, after a while, as the story unfolded, I started to ask myself “is that it?”. I could imagine a group of drug-induced film executives sitting around a conference table and discussing what would make a suitable film… music, hippies, drugs, mountains, deserts, beaten-up buses and people dying? Really (I thought)??
I’m afraid I came out at the end of the film feeling somewhat underwhelmed (understatement!).
I don’t normally do this but, in the circumstances (and the fact I have little to say when it comes to any kind of assessment), I’ll leave you with Peter Bradshaw’s words: “…Well, the dual narrative possibilities and consequences of Mar’s discovery or non-discovery fade away into nothingness as the story disappears into the sand, as does the question of whether the hippies and Luis could conceivably learn from each other. In their shock and despair after the tumultuous events that follow, they take psychoactive substances and dance to electronic music thumping out of their speakers. The film’s doors of perception remain closed. Sirāt is a path to nowhere, an improvised spectacle in the Sahara; it is very impressive in the opening 10 minutes but valueless as it proceeds, and a pointless mirage of unearned emotion”.
You can’t win all the time (or am I just a boring old codger?!).

february-march 2026 books…

Gwen John (Alicia Foster): I read this book prior to attending the exhibition of the artist’s work at the National Museum, Cardiff – and it proved very useful. Although I had long been an admirer of her work, I knew only rudimentary facts about her life. Like her brother, Augustus, she attended the Slade School of Fine Art from the age of 18 – which unlike the Royal Academy, for instance, allowed male and female artists to work and study together relatively unimpeded. What I hadn’t realised was that, from 1904 until her death in 1939, she went on to spend most of her time in Paris… and, indeed, was Rodin’s lover (and frequent model) for some 10 years! I had imagined her as being something of a recluse (‘famous for painting solitary women’), but this was far from being the case. Towards the end of her life she embraced an ardent Catholicism. A useful, fascinating book that filled in LOTS of gaps in my knowledge about Gwen John and the background to some of her beautiful paintings.
The Impossible Fortune (Richard Osman): Two admissions: a) I’m appalled that ‘celebrities’ who make shed loads of money doing ‘other things’, decide to become writers, make shed loads of more money while aspiring writers struggle to make ends meet, and b) I have to admit that Osman is a very clever, gifted author! Ridiculously, I realise that this is the fifth ‘Thursday Murder Club Mystery’ that I’ve read… and, just like the others, I’ve thoroughly enjoyed this “warm, wise and witty” novel (as Val McDermid has apparently described it). I love all of the Murder Club’s characters (especially Joyce!). Another very pleasurable read.
Salt (David Harsent): I came across this book of poetry at our local £5 Bookshop. I’d never previously come across the author but, slowly reading his poems out loud to myself (as you do!) as one of my early morning rituals, I came to really enjoy his ‘way with words’. The book’s dust jacket provides an apt description: “The poems in this book are a series, not a sequence. They belong to each other in mood, in tone and by way of certain images and words that form a ricochet of echoes – not least the word ‘salt’”. I rather loved it and will seek out more of Harsent’s poetry in future.
Magic In Mossthorn Bridge (Alice Broadway): Exciting to be reading a new book by our very gifted author daughter (she’s a wonderful story-teller)! The book’s cover describes it as “a sweet and cozy small-town romance” – which, on the face of it, is really not my ‘scene’(!)… and yet I found it quite compelling (I read it in 2 days!). The setting is the town and community of Mossthorn Bridge in the north of England. After 10 years’ absence, a young woman returns to run her aunt’s music shop. But there are issues: a) her ‘first love’ still lives in the town (their relationship hadn’t ended well), b) her old flame is the son of the town's biggest landlord/landowner (who thinks he rules the town), c) their respective families despise each other and d) there’s magic involved (which rather complicates things!!). The two young people are forced into taking part in a community play (a very selective retelling of the town's history – written by the aforementioned major landowner/father). A story about power, music, fable/magic and love. I’m looking forward to the sequel already!
Waterland (Graham Swift): This rather lovely – and sometimes challenging - book (first published in 1983) is a brilliant mixture of history of England, a Fenland documentary and a fictional autobiography. It’s about the changing landscape/land reclamation, social history, empire-building, brewers, sluice-minders, Victorian patriarchs, local eccentrics and family fortunes… oh, and murder, incest, guilt and insanity! Swift is a brilliant writer and I found the novel completely enthralling.