Books - What are you reading?
Discussion
Have recently read this…
…which I enjoyed, partly cos I’m a fan, and partly cos it was an entertaining read.
Now halfway through this…
…from the same author as 809 Squadron about the Falklands Harriers, and in the same vein as John Nicol’s books on Tornado, Spitfire and Lancaster. So far, so excellent!
…which I enjoyed, partly cos I’m a fan, and partly cos it was an entertaining read.
Now halfway through this…
…from the same author as 809 Squadron about the Falklands Harriers, and in the same vein as John Nicol’s books on Tornado, Spitfire and Lancaster. So far, so excellent!
MC Bodge said:
towser said:
Off the back of comments here I’ve just started it - pretty average so far - assume it picks up?
It does. The first section tries too hard to be like a heavy Russian novel.
Just finished this.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Cold-War-Forty-five-Years...
Very accessible, not too dry and creates a coherent narrative, rather than just describing isolated events. One of the best if not the most detailed account I've read on that time period. A couple of minor nerdy errors, and it could have expanded a lot more on the Fleetex 83-1/KAL007/Oko/Able Archer escalation, but there are other books dedicated to that particular series of events which do a good job.
10/10 for a general overview of the Cold War though.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Cold-War-Forty-five-Years...
Very accessible, not too dry and creates a coherent narrative, rather than just describing isolated events. One of the best if not the most detailed account I've read on that time period. A couple of minor nerdy errors, and it could have expanded a lot more on the Fleetex 83-1/KAL007/Oko/Able Archer escalation, but there are other books dedicated to that particular series of events which do a good job.
10/10 for a general overview of the Cold War though.
Skyedriver said:
Life in Kinloch continues, the characters expanded, there's some nice humour/banter in this one, more then earlier books in the DC Daley series.
I had to read the ending (well almost the ending bit) a few times, just to make sure I got it right.
Visited mainly due to the books!
Lovely area
Currently re-reading "A Rumor of War" by Philip Caputo. He volunteered for the Marines a year or two before the start of Vietnam and was in the first U.S. combat unit posted there. A great read.
Sobering. He describeds the unit packing up and heading for Nam. Decribing his comrades. Every so often mentioning a name followed by "lost his foot to a mine in XXXX." or paralysed by a sniper etc. Then before his first action he decribes the high spirits of the jarheads. Mostly aged 18-24. Laughing and joking.
Then he goes into the NCOs tent. Korean war vets aged 30-36. Old men in the view of the platoon. They are sitting silently. Some writing letters home. He mentions the morose mood. One replies "this company acts like it is going on a boy scout hike" "If somebody gets killed tomorrow he oughtta be laid out and the company marched past to look at the body. Then we'll see if anybody still has something to laugh about"
Full of illusions I did not realize they had none.
Sobering. He describeds the unit packing up and heading for Nam. Decribing his comrades. Every so often mentioning a name followed by "lost his foot to a mine in XXXX." or paralysed by a sniper etc. Then before his first action he decribes the high spirits of the jarheads. Mostly aged 18-24. Laughing and joking.
Then he goes into the NCOs tent. Korean war vets aged 30-36. Old men in the view of the platoon. They are sitting silently. Some writing letters home. He mentions the morose mood. One replies "this company acts like it is going on a boy scout hike" "If somebody gets killed tomorrow he oughtta be laid out and the company marched past to look at the body. Then we'll see if anybody still has something to laugh about"
Full of illusions I did not realize they had none.
droopsnoot said:
I've just read "The Murder Bag" by Tony Parsons. Someone is killing off members of a group of old school friends, and DCI Max Wolfe has to figure out who it is, and why. A decent book, enjoyed it.
Yes, quite a decent book.There a series of Max Wolfe books now, just starting to plough my way through them.
Wifedom by Anna Funder.
A uniquely frustrating read. If you’ve read my posts in this thread you will have come away with the (correct) impression that I am something of a George Orwell fan. According to Anna Funder, she is too. Unfortunately, Wifedom feels, in places, more like a heavy-handed literary assassination of the man. On the surface the book argues the point that Orwell’s first wife, Eileen O’Shaughnessy, has been written out of the picture we have of Orwell. Funder makes the case that Eileen was the making of George Orwell, and that his best writing came following their marriage.
Alas, Orwell comes out of this an abuser, a serial rapist, and a repressed homosexual. Orwell dominates proceedings throughout. Eileen does not. This is potentially explainable by the fact that the historical record is relatively scant. The overwhelming portion of Eileen’s voice stems from letters written between her and and Norah Sykes. Six letters, in fact.
Six letters alone do not make for a strong historiography, let alone the basis for a 400-page book. What they do, however, is give a much more charming impression of Eileen. She is charming and wry in what writings of hers survive.
Much of Wifedom is literary fiction. Funder supposes what must have happened, writes of events as she believes they occurred, and invents where needed. How else could she have known what Eileen could see from her hospital bed while awaiting the hysterectomy that ultimately killed her? There are also brief chapters dedicated to discussing the nature of Funder’s own marriage, of the unpaid labour unequally split between her and her husband, and the omniscient patriarchy and all its social institutions.
Wifedom’s greatest strength lies in its portayal of Eileen’s experience of the Spanish Civil War. Funder writes that, having read Homage to Catalonia twice, she was never aware Eileen was in Spain. Having read it once I remembered seeing a passage indicating that she was sending supplies to the frontline, having been in Madrid. Nevertheless, it is here that Wifedom excels in its portrayal of Eileen as a ready and capable ally of the POUM militia with which Orwell fought. That Homage does not clearly state Eileen’s activities in Spain appears countered by Funder’s own emphasis on Orwell’s paranoia that a Stalinist agent might assassinate him at any time.
The question lingers - how much of Eileen’s time in Spain is veritable fact, and how much of it is conjecture? The blurring of fiction and reality, inevitably, makes discerning one from the other much harder.
There are other issues, too. Orwell is noted to have bought a Luger upon his return to London; Funder supposes that it must have been difficult to obtain ammunition for an enemy weapon despite it having been chambered in the same 9x19mm as some British service weapons, including the Sten. In writing about the Blitz, Funder alludes to the dangers posed by the V-1, four years before they first struck London. Laurence O’Shaughnessy, Eileen’s brother, was not killed whilst heroically refusing to take cover from a bombing raid in Dunkirk, but by shrapnel. Finally, most egregiously, George Orwell was not born in Burma.
I came away from Wifedom doubly disappointed. Firstly, because I had read Funder’s Stasiland some years ago and thought very highly of it - what if I was wrong? What if it too had veered from Stasi surveillance to railing against patriarchy, and I hadn’t noticed? Secondly, because there are the makings of a truly interesting study, blurred as they are by conjecture and an admittedly pleasant writing style.
Perhaps it is no surprise that, in an interview with Waterstones, Funder described her approach to Eileen as ‘writ[ing] her into being’. The question remains whether that being has any connection to Eileen. I have heard that Sylvia Topp’s Eileen: The Making of George Orwell is a better account, and would like to read it when possible.
Next, I shall be reading Julia, by Sandra Newman. I’m not sure what to expect, and I don’t know if I’ll write anything about it afterward, but I am cautiously optimistic.
A uniquely frustrating read. If you’ve read my posts in this thread you will have come away with the (correct) impression that I am something of a George Orwell fan. According to Anna Funder, she is too. Unfortunately, Wifedom feels, in places, more like a heavy-handed literary assassination of the man. On the surface the book argues the point that Orwell’s first wife, Eileen O’Shaughnessy, has been written out of the picture we have of Orwell. Funder makes the case that Eileen was the making of George Orwell, and that his best writing came following their marriage.
Alas, Orwell comes out of this an abuser, a serial rapist, and a repressed homosexual. Orwell dominates proceedings throughout. Eileen does not. This is potentially explainable by the fact that the historical record is relatively scant. The overwhelming portion of Eileen’s voice stems from letters written between her and and Norah Sykes. Six letters, in fact.
Six letters alone do not make for a strong historiography, let alone the basis for a 400-page book. What they do, however, is give a much more charming impression of Eileen. She is charming and wry in what writings of hers survive.
Much of Wifedom is literary fiction. Funder supposes what must have happened, writes of events as she believes they occurred, and invents where needed. How else could she have known what Eileen could see from her hospital bed while awaiting the hysterectomy that ultimately killed her? There are also brief chapters dedicated to discussing the nature of Funder’s own marriage, of the unpaid labour unequally split between her and her husband, and the omniscient patriarchy and all its social institutions.
Wifedom’s greatest strength lies in its portayal of Eileen’s experience of the Spanish Civil War. Funder writes that, having read Homage to Catalonia twice, she was never aware Eileen was in Spain. Having read it once I remembered seeing a passage indicating that she was sending supplies to the frontline, having been in Madrid. Nevertheless, it is here that Wifedom excels in its portrayal of Eileen as a ready and capable ally of the POUM militia with which Orwell fought. That Homage does not clearly state Eileen’s activities in Spain appears countered by Funder’s own emphasis on Orwell’s paranoia that a Stalinist agent might assassinate him at any time.
The question lingers - how much of Eileen’s time in Spain is veritable fact, and how much of it is conjecture? The blurring of fiction and reality, inevitably, makes discerning one from the other much harder.
There are other issues, too. Orwell is noted to have bought a Luger upon his return to London; Funder supposes that it must have been difficult to obtain ammunition for an enemy weapon despite it having been chambered in the same 9x19mm as some British service weapons, including the Sten. In writing about the Blitz, Funder alludes to the dangers posed by the V-1, four years before they first struck London. Laurence O’Shaughnessy, Eileen’s brother, was not killed whilst heroically refusing to take cover from a bombing raid in Dunkirk, but by shrapnel. Finally, most egregiously, George Orwell was not born in Burma.
I came away from Wifedom doubly disappointed. Firstly, because I had read Funder’s Stasiland some years ago and thought very highly of it - what if I was wrong? What if it too had veered from Stasi surveillance to railing against patriarchy, and I hadn’t noticed? Secondly, because there are the makings of a truly interesting study, blurred as they are by conjecture and an admittedly pleasant writing style.
Perhaps it is no surprise that, in an interview with Waterstones, Funder described her approach to Eileen as ‘writ[ing] her into being’. The question remains whether that being has any connection to Eileen. I have heard that Sylvia Topp’s Eileen: The Making of George Orwell is a better account, and would like to read it when possible.
Next, I shall be reading Julia, by Sandra Newman. I’m not sure what to expect, and I don’t know if I’ll write anything about it afterward, but I am cautiously optimistic.
Interesting. My chum had similar thoughts - he's been an Orwell obsessive since I first knew him at university in the 70s . This year he went on an Orwell Society tour of Spain, which sounded extraordinary. I've not read the book , but the reviews and discussions I've read and heard suggest a good read , but with a passing acquaintance with the facts.
I love Orwell's style - simple but elegant , like his contemporary Arthur Ransome , whose journalism was a model of clarity.
I love Orwell's style - simple but elegant , like his contemporary Arthur Ransome , whose journalism was a model of clarity.
LOOKING FOR THE REAL WEASEL
Train Robber, Racer, Rogue – who was Roy James?
Rich Duisberg
Not so much a biography of Roy James, more a journey into the mind of Rich Duisberg.
Fans of Rich Duisberg’s outpourings just need to know he’s published a new book and they should buy it.
For everyone else, I’ll try to explain. The book is funny, irreverent and laid out in an unusual way. But that’s okay, it’s the kind of thing he does. He has a very broad base of interests, and this comes across in his writings. Some may remember he posted on here as The Crack Fox and produced the now defunct MotorPunk magazine. Very entertaining.
While you wouldn’t buy the book as an academic study into the life of Roy James, there are some lovely, fluid, informative, biographical passages. A biography of Roy Jamed is there, it’s just in amongst Rich Duisberg’s stream of consciousness observations, anecdotes and tireless pursuit of Bernie Ecclestone.
When I read it, I initially tried to differentiate between the Roy James bits, the funny and often lengthy asides and The Duisberg Guide to Researching Material for a Book. This was a bit frustrating. It’s easier to just go with it.
Self-published by Rich Duisberg through Amazon, Looking for the Real Weasel carries on a tradition for offbeat car books established with Confessions from Quality Control: Stories of bodges and balls-ups of car factories in the nineties and Nothing handles like a rental car: confessions of an automotive adventurer but sorely tested by Hands up!: The real lives of puppets who used to be on the telly.
Quilting Quarterly - “A patchwork.”
The Showman’s Gazette – “A rollercoaster.”
F1 Management Magazine – “Who?”
Train Robber, Racer, Rogue – who was Roy James?
Rich Duisberg
Not so much a biography of Roy James, more a journey into the mind of Rich Duisberg.
Fans of Rich Duisberg’s outpourings just need to know he’s published a new book and they should buy it.
For everyone else, I’ll try to explain. The book is funny, irreverent and laid out in an unusual way. But that’s okay, it’s the kind of thing he does. He has a very broad base of interests, and this comes across in his writings. Some may remember he posted on here as The Crack Fox and produced the now defunct MotorPunk magazine. Very entertaining.
While you wouldn’t buy the book as an academic study into the life of Roy James, there are some lovely, fluid, informative, biographical passages. A biography of Roy Jamed is there, it’s just in amongst Rich Duisberg’s stream of consciousness observations, anecdotes and tireless pursuit of Bernie Ecclestone.
When I read it, I initially tried to differentiate between the Roy James bits, the funny and often lengthy asides and The Duisberg Guide to Researching Material for a Book. This was a bit frustrating. It’s easier to just go with it.
Self-published by Rich Duisberg through Amazon, Looking for the Real Weasel carries on a tradition for offbeat car books established with Confessions from Quality Control: Stories of bodges and balls-ups of car factories in the nineties and Nothing handles like a rental car: confessions of an automotive adventurer but sorely tested by Hands up!: The real lives of puppets who used to be on the telly.
Quilting Quarterly - “A patchwork.”
The Showman’s Gazette – “A rollercoaster.”
F1 Management Magazine – “Who?”
Mathew McConaughey's 'Greenlight' on Audible with the man himself narrating. I thought it was wonderful, his story told by himself so much more intimate. Greenlight.
Paul Dix, After the Adults Change, Achieveable Behaviour Nirvana narrated by Dix. A very good insight into what is right, and wrong, about a lot of behaviour management in schools, and not just 'pupil management', I'd suggest it's essential reading for those considering a move into middle leadership or above, just as his original 'When the Adults change, Everything Changes' is essential reading for anyone becoming a teacher...and I'd suggest it's very good for parenting also.
Halfway through Atomic Habits, again narrated by the author James Clear, perhaps not as successful as the first two but there is some excellent advice in each chapter if a little laboured in its delivery.
Paul Dix, After the Adults Change, Achieveable Behaviour Nirvana narrated by Dix. A very good insight into what is right, and wrong, about a lot of behaviour management in schools, and not just 'pupil management', I'd suggest it's essential reading for those considering a move into middle leadership or above, just as his original 'When the Adults change, Everything Changes' is essential reading for anyone becoming a teacher...and I'd suggest it's very good for parenting also.
Halfway through Atomic Habits, again narrated by the author James Clear, perhaps not as successful as the first two but there is some excellent advice in each chapter if a little laboured in its delivery.
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