Hi Diddly Dee, an Actor's Life for Me
"Those who agree with us may not be right, but we admire their astuteness."
Cullen Hightower
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Book 20
Play to the End by Robert Goddard Anyone who has ever read a Robert Goddard novel will recognise the formula - Toby Flood, the protagonist, is an actor in a Joe Orton play, coming to the end of a rather undistinguished run. He has separated from his wife and become a bit of a loner. An innocent request from his soon-to-be-ex wife to stop a man who appears to be stalking her in the hopes of getting to meet Toby turns out not to be quite as simple as it seems and he is plunged ever deeper into various life-threatening situations. Despite the formulaic setup, however, Goddard's plots are invariably twistier than a tornado and you never quite know what is going to happen next. This makes for an exceptionally compelling story which, combined with his meticulous research, keeps the reader's interest right through to the final page, which tends to come all too quickly. I particularly enjoyed this novel as it was set in my world - the world of touring theatre and behind-the-scenes backstabbing. Goddard has gone to the lengths of reading The Orton Diaries and has set characters to be in the right place and time to have met Joe Orton when he was visiting Brighton in 1967, shortly before his murder. The play in which Toby is appearing is Lodger in the Throat, a long-lost and previously unperformed manuscript. As far as I know no such manuscript exists; but it could, quite conceivably, which is the beauty of this novel - the lines between fact and fantasy blur to the point where you are not entirely sure which is which. In short, Play to the End has enough details to keep fact-fans happy, along with a plot that races along at a roaring pace, never leaving time to draw breath or get bored. Great stuff. |
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1.9.05 10:39 |
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Lost
It's always a little worrying when the sponsorship adverts (in this case 118 118) at the start and end of the ad break are rather more entertaining than the actual programme, don't you think?
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1.9.05 11:25 |
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Wheeee!
We booked our holiday last night. We're going here for a week in October (only 5 1/2 weeks away, by the way - can you tell I'm excited?), staying in the rather amusingly named Harpy Hotel. I really can't wait...
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6.9.05 11:01 |
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THOMAS!
Last night I returned home from work to find that the cats had been playing under the hall rugs again. They were all rumpled up and the post was strewn around the flat - the usual signs. Sighing, I straightened the rugs, picked up the post and went to cook supper. An hour or so later, the cats were still sitting in the hall, looking intently at the standard lamp. Then they started trying to knock it over. So I moved it out of their way - and the cats nearly died of fright as I shrieked loudly and ran for the sofa, still brandishing a large lamp stand. There was a mouse. I HATE mice. It's the way they scuttle and can get into really small spaces by dislocating their jaws. I turn into a great big screaming girl when there are mice around, standing on pieces of furniture with my skirts hitched up, yelling at the cats to 'take it OUT - OUT, I say!' They, of course, ignore this instruction, play with said mouse for a bit, lose it under pieces of furniture and then get bored, leaving me stranded on the sofa. Last night I was brave enough to grab myself a broom and managed to poke the mouse out from behind the records, where it was hiding, but the cats were being worse than feckin' useless, so The Architect arrived home from the pub to find me perched on the back of the sofa, clutching a broom and gently weeping. He of course found this uproariously funny and took over the mouse hunt, goading the cats into action quite effectively. However, he kept getting in their way in his drunken state, and at one point the mouse ran underneath him as he knelt on the floor. He took this rather personally and leapt up, shouting about how he could feel it scrabbling over his shin. Can you guess what's coming? Yes, the mouse had gone up his trouser leg. It actually hung on in there for a minute or so as well, despite The Architect doing his best hokey-cokey impression. It would have been quite funny if I hadn't been hyperventilating and in near-hysteria. The cats, suffice to say, are not in my good books at the moment. I'm thinking of trading them in for a jack russell. Bastards.
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8.9.05 11:01 |
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Book 21
We Need to Talk About Kevin by Lionel Shriver In case you've not heard about this book, which won the 2005 Orange Prize for Fiction, We Need to Talk About Kevin is the story of Eva Khatchadourian, the mother of Kevin, who, one Thursday afternoon three days before his 16th birthday, shot 11 people at his high school, killing 9 of them. The book takes the form of a series of letters, written by Eva to her husband Franklin, who it would seem is no longer with Eva after Kevin's killing spree. It is a conceit that doesn't always work - talking about the past in such detail sometimes rings false, as Franklin would obviously know the facts as well as Eva herself did. However, due to the fact that Eva and Franklin saw such different sides of Kevin's character - Eva felt that Kevin had rejected her from birth, whereas Franklin was blind to his son's faults - most of the time we accept the letter format. It does make for a rather one-sided story, however, which is sometimes frustrating. I found myself wanting to hear some different voices apart from Eva's brittle, bitter narrative. The story is told in a series of flashbacks, from Eva and Franklin's life pre-Kevin, right through his life up to Thursday (as Eva always refers to Kevin's killing spree) and beyond, as she visits him in prison. It is a compelling read, if not always comfortable. In terms of the nature/nurture argument, this book comes down heavily in the nature camp. Along the way, however, it also manages to condemn the Great American Dream - Eva and Franklin are both successful and wealthy, lacking for very little. They live in a nice house in the New York suburbs, they have two children - surely their life should be perfect? However, with a son like Kevin it is very far from that. Eva feels that she is in constant battle with him, although unable to prove this to her husband. It is the stuff of nightmares for every prospective parent - what if, despite your best efforts, your child just doesn't like you? What if, also, that same child manages to wreck your previously happy marriage and leave you alone, with no-one else to turn to? This is car-crash fiction. The twist in the ending is less of a twist and more of an inevitability that you keep hoping against hope will not happen. It is a story that raises some giant questions, however. Could Kevin's murder of his classmates been prevented? How many of the problems we see in children and teenagers are down to parenting and how much down to a core evil? These are questions that I thought I knew the answers to before reading this book.. I now find that I don't. This book is chilling, thought-provoking, and most definitely worth the read. |
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10.9.05 21:15 |
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Book 22
Journey to the South by Annie Hawes This is Annie Hawes' third book about her life in Italy. The first two, Extra Virgin and Ripe for the Picking, focused on her move to Liguria, in the north of Italy, and subsequent settling in and finding her feet. This, however, takes a slight departure from that format, as she travels with her partner Ciccio's mother Francesca, sister Marisa and nephew Alberto to Calabria, in the south, where Francesca and her husband Salvatore originally came from. True to form, the book is amusingly and disingenously written. Italy has many different dialects and going out of region can result in having to speak almost a completely different language. Combine this with a mad aunt; a maze of a house with no corridors, three kitchens and a stream running through the scullery; the southern Italians' love of chilli with everything; and the seemingly ever-present threat of the Mafia, and you have the recipe for plenty of culture confusion and anecdotal stories. A thoroughly enjoyable read. |
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11.9.05 17:41 |
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A Salad By Any Other Name...
Who exactly do Pret think they are fooling with their 'no bread sandwiches'?
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12.9.05 14:38 |
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