Book Review

One track Minds – True Stories about Life-Changing Songs edited by Kristian Brodie and Adam Shakinovsky

3 out of 5 stars

Unbound Publishing

The book One Track Minds – True Stories about Life Changing Songs originated as a live show, where writers, musicians and creatives discussed a life-changing, and epoch-altering song that they heard, and the impact it had on them.

With writers such as Inua Ellams, Joe Dunthorne, Stella Duffy, and many others the songs are a rich variety, ranging from pop to blues, jazz and even more outré faire.

Music is a universal force, linking people and generations, where one song can speak for a whole generation, and change how a musician or a writer views the world. It is a bijou version of Desert Island Discs, with more given to one song than to the eight we are more used to on Radio 4.

The book is a good variety of experiences, with both music and the acts that a song inspired in the subject. So, we have chapters that encompass Leicester and the video nasties boom, then we have stories about AHA’s video for Take on Me, or the heavy metal becoming entranced by the sound and very individual style of Daniel Johnston.

The individual chapters in the book are only short, with many being only 5 or so pages long. There would have been time for a longer discussion during the live shows, and the edited versions perhaps don’t show the emotion that a live show would bring, with ad-libs and ideas built upon as the conversation progresses.

The fact that there are QR codes on every song, with which the reader can access the songs is also a good thing and allows for the discovery of new music, as well as new ideas, writers, people and ways of looking at the world.

Ben Macnair

Book Review – The Cure for Death by Lightning by Gail Anderson Dargatz –

First published in 1996, The Cure for Death by Lightning, the debut novel from writer Gail Anderson Dagartz is a novel of many things.

It is a gothic tale, fusing elements of magic realism, with folklore, deep, well-drawn characterisation, and experiments in terms of character, tone, and story-telling. There are passages of extreme lyrical beauty explaining the countryside and the changes of the season, but there is also visceral violence, and people not being very pleasant to each other.

It is a book about family, about tough lives, about any number of recipes and first-aid solutions. It focuses on the lives of Beth Weeks and her family as they navigate farm life in Turtle Valley during WWII. The characters are eccentric, isolated and living on their wits.

The chores that Beth carries out are described vividly, as are the seasons, and time spent in nature. It has much in common with Cold Comfort Farm, with characters forming a makeshift family of people who met by happenstance. However, there is a much darker theme at the base of The Cure for Death by Lightning. Beth is a victim of sexual assault but also witnesses far worse.

Then there is Coyote. Is he a shape-shifter? A coyote going about his business? A warning to stay away. There is much to distinguish this novel, it is the bravery of the story-telling, but at the heart of it all it is a coming-of-age tale, of a young girl seeking some form of future for herself, but having to make do with the imperfect world and imperfect family she finds herself in.

Book Review – Murder in the Family by Cara Hunter

In 2003 Luke Ryder was murdered. He had a much older, richer wife, and three young step-children, but the murder was never solved.

In 2023 a small team was put together in a podcast, a live-action podcast that would dig over old ground, and re-interview old suspects, and family members, not in the interests of justice, but in the interest of entertainment. One of the producers is Guy Howard, Ryder’s young stepson, looking into the mystery that defined his childhood and of, his two older sisters and their mother, only just reeling from the untimely death of her first husband.

Luke comes into the orbit of the family, he is charming, much younger and has surface attractions that prove to be irresistible. As the investigation begins it soon becomes obvious that Luke Ryder is not who or what he claimed to be. He stole identities and found himself in trouble with the law. He claimed to be Australian, but his floating accent never convinced anyone of his claims’ veracity.

Over 10 months, from the beginning of the crime series, and its research, the reader is introduced to a lot of people. The Howard family, people who knew Ryder in his previous identities, people who knew the family, and felt for the children, the police who investigated the crimes, and the production team, many of whom have their rivalries, and secrets from the past that they would hope to remain hidden.

The tragedy that unfolds in the final chapters is surprising, but it is also highlighted at some points in the novel. The interesting way of telling the story, using emails, exchanges between production staff, using podcasts as a way of digging into the past is new, but in a few years, it will probably feel dated, to cast a new and evolving murder mystery around a cold case it certainly a novel way to tell a crime story, and making it modern.

Book Review – Ordinary Human Failings by Megan Nolan

3,5 stars out of 5.

Jonathan Cape, London

Set in the 1990’s. Ordinary Human Failings is a book of many strands. It is a crime thriller, a character study, and a historical setting, but it looks at the lives and times of the Green Family, who moved from Ireland to London when fifteen-year-old daughter Carmel became pregnant.

On the estate, there has been a murder. A three-year-old child has gone missing, and when following an all-night search her body is found, the Greens are the first suspects. On the scene is up-and-coming reporter Tom Hargreaves. He works hard at his job and is ruthless to get ahead, so he is first on the scene when the child is found, the first with the headlines, and the scoop.

Although it was only set 34 years ago, a lot of the things we take for granted aren’t there. There is no internet, no Google, no digital cameras, so the work is hard and long and laborious, bringing the tragedy to life, showing how overlooked a child’s death can be in a poor housing estate.

Carmel’s brother Richie is only 21 but is already an alcoholic who despairs of his lack of choices, the sense of desperation of all of the people who live on the council housing estate, their lives under the microscope of the police and the tabloid press.

The book is bleak and unremitting, building towards a wholly satisfying but shattering denouement, and we find out who murdered the child and why.

Although the book is a little over 200 pages long, it packs a lot in. The characters are all believable, and it shows how traumas in one generation have a habit of affecting the generations that follow. The setting is well drawn, with the estate and Tom’s desperation to get to the bottom of the story, to make his reputation, and to shed some light on the lives of quiet desperation that many at the time lived through.

Book Review – Good Material by Dolly Alderton

Fig Tree Press – Penguin

4 out of 5 Stars

By now we know what to expect from a Dolly Alderton novel. Well-written, believable characters, well-drawn scenes, scenes that make sense, imperfect people with imperfect lives, and Good Material is no different.

We meet Andy, a 35-year-old career comedian, still waiting for his big break. He has done a bit of TV, and regular gigs all over the country, but he has just broken up with Jen, after four years of a happy relationship.

As Andy moves around, trying to get over Jen, making his moves on an Instagram influencer, and eventually finding some form of comfort with a much younger woman, are let into his life. His close relationship with his Mum, his Birmingham-based youth going against his London set later life, with Ari his oldest friend from University.

He, Jen, Ari and Ari’s wife Jane are a close-knit group until the break up severs that. They don’t want to take sides, but report on each other’s life, Seb, Jen’s unsuitable new suitor from work. He is everything that Andy isn’t.

Andy eventually finds himself the lodger of Morris. A decidedly strange man who cleans his curtains on Christmas day, and has an unrequited postal friendship with Julian Assange. The friendship is well drawn and believable, with Morris agreeing to spend Christmas Day with Andy. Some more of Morris in the book would have been good.

There are also a couple of chapters towards the end of the book that see the relationship and the inevitable breakup from Jen’s side. If you have ever seen 500 Days of Summer, it is something like that. Boy meets Girl, the boy develops deeper feelings, and then the couple meets later, have one last conversation and part as friends, with the career of the male protagonist seemingly on the up.

The comedy scene and the camaraderie between comedians are also well-explored. They support each other when things go well, and commiserate when they don’t. Andy gets a bad review and it goes viral. He finds himself dropping down a pay threshold on the comedy circuit.

The writing is sharp, and the pace and the characterisation are well drawn. The story is plausible with a good ending. It lives up to Dolly Alderton’s previous work, and it has something to commend to anyone who has fallen in love, and then out of it. We all get better, eventually.

Book Review – Pop Stars in my Pantry: A Memoir of Pop Mags and Clubbing in the 1980’s by Paul Simper

Unbound Publishing

In the 1980’s Paul Simper was forging a career writing about 1980s pop music and the vibrant London dance scene. He worked for a never-ending array of magazines at that time, writing about such bands as Spandau Ballet, Wham, and Banarama, and many of those people became friends, giving him an insight into the world of pop from both sides. He saw the frivolity and success of it, the trips from club to club, the recording studio, but he also saw the negative sides of it, knowing that as a writer, he would never truly be allowed into the inner circle of Pop music and popular culture.

It is the work of a talented writer who seemingly had a knack for finding the right story at the right time, and the right angle to write from, that would earn him both a reputation and a wariness. Throughout the book we are shown the inner sanctum of pop life, but also the tedium of waiting around for nothing to happen. Although we see what things were like hanging around with Madonna, Paul Weller, Sade and Boy George, many other people didn’t have the luck of a long and influential career, and it would have been interesting to have seen some of their stories as well.

Although successful people with their hit songs are what would help to sell a book like this, there is more to a musical career than a hit song, and Pop Stars in My Pantry mentions very little about the other people Simper would have met along the way. The many other writers don’t get much of a mention, and although it is a job with many perks, the many deadlines, and the competition between magazines and other writers are barely touched upon, neither is the conundrum of being close to people personally, but knowing that a story you write could make or break their career.

As a break-neck rip-roaring trip down pop’s storied memory lane, Pop Stars in My Pantry has a lot to recommend it. It has style, humour and humanity by the bucket load. There is also another book here, a look at pop music writing as a historical, factual record of a time before social media, curated life being displayed on Facebook and Instagram, and palatable opinions being held on X (or Twitter), and it is perhaps as the second book of this type that might have found a space on bookshelves as well, but as a first-hand account featuring cameo roles for some of today’s most long-serving, and influential figures, the book is hard to fault.

Book Review – Record, Play Pause by Stephen Morrison

Book Review

Record, Play, Pause Confessions of a Post-Punk Percussionist, From Joy Division to New Order Volume 1

Joy Division and subsequently New Order were popular, successful post-punk bands that blended solid punk energy with an open-minded approach to music-making that delivered to the world the deathless pop classics Blue Monday and Life Will Tear Us Apart amongst others.

Stephen Morrison was the drummer for both bands, seeing the band, and the world from behind his drum-set. This is not a memoir of glamour, of the big hits, never-ending excitement, critical acclaim and riches beyond avarice, it is the story of an office worker in Macclesfield, dreaming of life in the bigger cities, meeting up with like-minded people who wanted the same, working incredibly hard to get what they wanted, and were lucky enough to meet the right people at the right time, to make those dreams reality.

Stephen Morris talks about his drum kits, and the electronic percussion he used, which would go on to be some of the rhythmic staples of the electronic music scene in the 1980s. He talks with admiration, and affection of the early days of struggling with poorly paid gigs, travelling hundreds of miles in unreliable transport, of underwhelming concerts abroad, of their first trip to America. He writes candidly about the suicide of the charismatic Ian Curtis, not just a singer, but a friend.

The book also speaks of his early life in Macclesfield in the 1960s and 1970s, a place far removed from the swinging 1960’s scene in London. He dreamed of the hedonistic, freewheeling life and never-ending adventure that nearby Manchester offered a place that was also home to The Smiths, and Tony Wilson, who became the band’s manager for a while.

This is a book that also looks at the less desirable elements of life as a musician. The gigs, the small, dank rehearsal spaces where songs miraculously sprang to life, of where drum track after drum track was recorded, or hours were spent recording Peter Hook’s iconic bass parts.

The book is incredibly well-written, with a wry sense of humour, and shows the reality from one of the more important chairs in the room of any gig, the drum-stool.

Book Review – Elliot Alagash by Simon Rich

3 out of 5 stars

Serpent’s Tail

Elliot Allagash is a tale of riches beyond avarice, of bored teenagers and the possibilities inherent within the American dream, which can only be fuelled by unlimited wealth, opportunity, and a willingness to work.

Elliot Allagash is one of the richest boys in the world. He is heir to an enormous family fortune, and he sees Seymour, painfully shy and inept, unprepossessing, but from a loving family, and made of integrity and ethics as his latest project.

Allagash is the kingmaker, wanting to turn Seymour into the most popular kid in the school, and as Seymour raises through the ranks, becoming class president, due in part to a dirty tricks campaign, his self-worth goes through the roof.

There is something of a Wodehouse pact here, with Jeeves having an evil streak, wanting to put Wooster through the wringer, both emotionally and financially, but knowing that there is always a way out for him.

This is a coming-of-age story for Seymour, but nothing seems to change for Allagash. His relationships remain stagnant, his riches mean that he has staff and not friends, and everything he does is an impotent show of power, trying to impress his Father, who seems to take much more interest in Seymour than he does his son.

Mr Allagash buys expensive gifts for Seymour, he is much more used to the simple pleasures of Monopoly nights with his parents. Elliot, on the other hand, has moved from school to school, never settling due to his riches, and the fact that the teachers indulge his bad behaviour and bullying ways because of his family’s wealth.

The end of the book is a reckoning of all of the morally dubious things that Elliot Allagash and Seymour did during their years at school, from faking serious illnesses, to bogus qualifications and experiences. As well as being funny, and poking fun at the awkwardness of teenagers, and the teenage years, where we are all trying to find our feet, there is also a moral lesson to be learnt from the book. For all of his wealth and influence, Elliot Allagash will never be a fully emotionally mature adult, whilst Seymour will be. It is not the comfort that provides the strength of character, but what we have to go through in life that does.

Book Review – The Possession of Mr Cave by Matt Haig

Vintage Books – ISBN 9780099522959 – 7 out of 10

Matt Haigh’s latest book, The Possession of Mr Cave looks at the life of Terence Cave, the intellectual and unworldly owner of Cave Antiques. He has known pain, his mother committed suicide, whilst his wife was murdered, and now he faces a new tragedy, the untimely death of his teenage son, Reuben, following an easily avoided accident.

Now all he is left with is his daughter, Reuben’s sister, Byrony, the Cello playing and Pony riding apple of his eye, but when he vows to protect her, both his love for what his daughter was, and his repulsion at the teenager she is becoming tear what remains of his life apart.

This is a story of everyday life, interlaced with Soap Opera like tragedy and accidents. It is a well written story, and Matt Haig’s writing style allows for a lot of black humour to leak into the story.

The ghost of Reuben haunts his father, almost possessing him at times, particularly when Denny, who was at the scene of Reuben’s Death starts to take a romantic interest in Byrony, and that interest is returned.

Byrony gives up her Cello, and Pony riding interests, and starts to take an interest in teenage things, and Terence sees this natural progression as a threat to what he holds most dear.

All in all, this is a good read, with plenty to recommend it, although it slips through many different genres, and as such it is a difficult book to pigeon-hole.

Book Review – Emerald City by Jennifer Egan

The author Jennifer Egan made her name with a series of critically acclaimed, commercially successful novels, such as ‘A Visit from the Goon Squad’ and ‘The Invisible Circus’ so her story-telling talents have been honed by years of practice.

It is this facet of her talent that is allowed to shine the brightest in this small collection of eleven perfectly formed tales. We are let, for a short time into the lives of a number of characters, from the businessman in ‘Why China?’ who sees the man who swindled him and countless other small firms out of money, and follows him, dragging his whole family in his wake. In ‘Sacred Heart’ self harm bonds two disparate girls together, whilst in other stories we meet dissatisfied models, bankers, housewives, all looking for something to make their existences complete.

The book is a globe trotter’s delight, taking the reader from China to Bora Bora to life in big cities and small towns, places where everyone knows your names, to places where people don’t know their neighbours. It is a book about small lives, and big dreams, people wanting to escape, but trapped by the feeling of wanting to belong.

This is a fine collection, and if you enjoyed Egan’s other work, this is well worth a read.