september 2017 books...

Beast (Paul Kingsnorth): I picked up this book by chance when we were in Stratford and thought it looked ‘interesting’. Well, it was utterly absorbing… it’s about a man living alone on a west-country moor (he’s done this for the past 13 months)… we’re not quite certain what he’s left behind or why he’s on the moor, battling with both himself and the elements. It’s about survival and coping with a hermit’s life… and, gradually, about dealing with the animal he begins to see in the margins of his vision… which becomes a powerful obsession. The writing style is quite brilliant – brutal, relentless… you have a very real sense of the man’s emotions, his despair and yet, also, the logic of his struggle. At times, it actually felt a bit as though I was reading Cormac MacCarthy’s “The Road” (which I also loved). A wonderful, powerful book. 
The Long And Winding Road (Alan Johnson): I’d previously read Johnson’s first memoir “This Boy” (a remarkable, extraordinary account by the Labour MP’s childhood living in Notting Hill of the 1950s) some 3 years ago and loved it. Somewhat typically for me(!), I soon discovered that the ‘Winding Road’ was the third book of his memoirs – I’ll need to read book two out of sequence! He’s an excellent writer and it’s a wonderful, inspiring story of his journey from postman became Home Secretary. I might not have agreed with all his political decisions (eg. student tuition fees), but he comes across as an engaging, honest, funny man… the Prime Minister we never had. I really enjoyed this book… and have now acquired book two!
Paradise Lodge (Nina Stibbe): My second Nina Stibbe book… she’s a VERY funny writer! This is a novel, set in the 1970s, about a 15 year-old girl who is working at an old people’s home for 35p an hour instead of being at school (to pay for coffee and shampoo, luxuries her bankrupt mother can’t afford). She writes from the perspective of a 15 year-old girl and perfectly captures all the confusions, contradictions and anxieties. Stibbe has a gift for words and an imagination for the ridiculous which I thoroughly enjoyed.
The Summer Game (Neville Cardus): This book was first published in 1928 (my copy was published in 1949). Neville Cardus was from an impoverished home background but, self-educated, he became the Manchester Guardian’s cricket correspondent from 1919-40. He’s regarded by many (me included – with the possible exception of John Arlott?) as the finest of all cricket writers. This book (that I picked up for £4 from a second-hand bookshelf at Gloucestershire’s Brightside Ground’s shop) provides a wonderful, evocative, almost romantic, series of descriptions of particular matches (usually featuring Lancashire), cricketing superstars of his day, schoolboy memories and former players - frequently making reference to the pre-war (WW1!)  ‘lost art’ of batting. Beautiful, poignant stuff… and it always seemed to be June and the sun was always shining brightly.
The Riders (Tim Winton): My second Tim Winton book (but the first novel of his I’ve read), shortlisted for the Booker Prize 1995. Australian Fred Scully decided to leave his homeland and make a new life for himself and his young family in unknown Ireland. He labours alone to make their dilapidated cottage habitable before driving to the airport to meet his wife and daughter. That’s when this desperate story really begins… I’m not going to say any more, except that I found it completely compelling. Brilliantly written (something I discovered reading his “Land’s Edge”)… I read the novel within three days and finishing it left me feeling utterly spent (in a good way!).