Alan Garner's "Elidor"

When I was nine (back in the dim, distant past that we’ll refer to as 1968) I had a teacher called Mrs McEke. She was a strict disciplinarian but she probably needed to be given that her class was full of little oiks from the local council estate (like me!). Mrs McEke used to spend the last half-hour of every school day reading to us. She loved language and was a wonderful orator, bringing the stories to life through the strength of her vocal delivery.

Given that we were only nine she made some fairly ambitious choices; The Hobbit, The War of the Worlds, The Silver Sword, The Railway Children and even John Wyndham’s The Midwich Cuckoos (definitely left-field). However I will always be indebted to her for choosing to read Alan Garner’s Elidor.

Elidor had only been published in 1965, so at that stage it was a fairly contemporary novel. Although Garner was ostensibly writing for children the book had some very adult themes. It was a brave Mrs McEke that tried to illustrate symbolism to a bunch of largely disinterested nine year olds. However she would probably be delighted to learn that some forty-four years on at least one of her pupils still remembers the symbolic importance of the sword, the spear, the stone and the cauldron.

I was completely entranced by the tale of four children and their rusty relics, which opened a gateway to another world. It seemed like a cool and edgy version of “The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe” but set in the real world, or at least a world that I could identify with.

We used to have a travelling library van that visited the estate every Monday evening, and I managed to obtain a copy of Elidor and raced through it in advance of Mrs McEke’s reading so that I was always one step ahead of her. Garner’s writing was a revelation to me and he became one of my early heroes as I worked my way through his other books.

Characterisation is not really his strong point as a writer, although his dialogue is an object lesson to any aspiring writer, exploding like little emotional depth charges on the page. As ever with Garner it is the power of myth which is his main fascination.

As an adult I do have a few gripes with the novel which weren’t as apparent to me when I first read it. Overall the tone is cold and distant. There is very little to engage the reader in Elidor’s plight, and therefore very little sense of empathy. The ending seems horribly rushed, almost as if Garner had grown tired of his tale and wanted to finish it up and move on. However these minor gripes aside Elidor will always have a special place in the memories of my childhood.

"Life! Death! Prizes!" by Stephen May

Quite simply this is the best novel I have read over the last year. It almost has a will of its own, an insistency that demands that you keep reading it and will not let you stop until you breathlessly reach the end.

I’ll readily admit that it’s not always an easy journey. It can be raw, ragged and uncomfortable, but it has a tender and compassionate core that ultimately restores your faith in humanity.

In Billy Smith May has created an authentic and utterly believable character, emotionally flawed and occasionally almost psychotic. At the outset Billy is ill-equipped to deal with the care of Oscar, his younger brother, as they both try to come to terms with their Mother’s murder. But Billy knows that Oscar is relying on him and that he needs to shape up, despite the fact that his own life isn’t exactly working out.

May’s observations have the precision of a surgeons scalpel and the cast of characters he has assembled are sharply defined and truthfully rendered.

Many reviewers seem to want to compare May to other writers (Nick Hornby, David Nicholls, Kate Atkinson, Dave Eggers and even J.D. Salinger….and that’s just on the inside cover of the book!). Personally I think he stands on his own as a major talent without the need for lazy comparisons.

I had wondered whether May could write another book which was as strong and self-assured as his debut “TAG”. But this wonderful novel demonstrates that Stephen May is developing into a literary force to be reckoned with.

"Not Funny - Not Clever" by Jo Verity

“Not Funny – Not Clever” is Jo Verity’s fourth published novel and it’s an engaging read. It is essentially a character study where the feelings and emotions of the main protagonists take centre stage, rather than the plot.

It is a fairly straightforward story told as a linear narrative and describing the events of a single week in the life of Elizabeth Giles. This tightly focused timeline gives the book a satisfying structure and Verity’s deft writing allows the storyline to gently develop and gather pace.

Elizabeth has settled into a largely uneventful life. When her husband heads off to France on a cooking course she decides to visit her old school friend Diane in Cardiff. However, just as she is making plans to leave an unexpected problem arrives on her doorstep in the shape of Jordan, the teenage son of her own son’s older lover. She decides to take Jordan to Cardiff with her for the week, setting a train of events in motion which will challenge her perceptions and force her to re-evaluate her life. The catalyst for this re-evaluation is Diane’s neighbour, the charismatic TV weatherman Dafydd Jones. Elizabeth, Diane and Jordan are invited to stay at Dafydd’s parents-in-law’s holiday cottage on the Gower peninsula along with Dafydd and his two teenage daughters. In this idyllic setting Elizabeth is challenged to confront the direction her life has taken.

Jo has a great ear for dialogue and it’s the conversations she constructs for her characters which makes them authentic and convincing. She also does a superb job of balancing the various characters’ back stories with their present actions, teasing out details that provide a depth and a resonance to each of her cast. There are beautifully judged echoes between how the teenagers and the adults react to different circumstances which give the book an edgy realism.

Based in Cardiff, Jo’s books are published by the independent Welsh co-operative publishers Honno. On the strength of this novel I shall definitely be ordering Jo’s other books to add to my “must read soon” pile.

Solid Air - John Martyn

Unique and intoxicating.

John Martyn’s songs are woven into the fabric of my life; no album more so than Solid Air. I was introduced to it back in 1973 when I was fourteen and heavily into Bowie, Pink Floyd and Yes. But Martyn’s music was like nothing I had ever heard before. It had a raw intensity and an emotional core running right through it. I was hooked.

He was a gifted guitarist, with a delicate touch and a sparseness that tricked you into believing that he wasn’t doing very much. He used his voice as if it were another instrument, with slurred indistinct lyrics where the feelings and emotions seemed more important than the actual words he was singing. I simply got it. It connected. It spoke to me.

Over the years I continued to buy virtually every album that he ever released, but it was always Solid Air that I would go back to, time after time; my late-night album of choice.

Even after thirty-nine years of repeated listening the title track can still make me cry if I’m in the right frame of mind. But it’s an album full of other little gems like “Over the Hill”, “Go Down Easy” and “Man in the Station”. It also has John’s “signature” composition, the wonderful “May You Never” which he performed acoustically on The Old Grey Whistle Test, and was what prompted me to buy the album in the first place. But for me none of these surpass the sublime title track.

The Moment DT’s bass and those vibes kick in I’m back in 1973 at the age of fourteen, where everything is possible, and the future stretches out in front of you full of limitless possibilities. It also, even after all these years, makes me feel stoned just listening to it.

I guess that’s what great music does for you.

John’s death affected me greatly. It was no real surprise; he’d lived on the edge for so long that sooner or later he was bound to slip off. His self-destructive path finally led to a point where his luck ran out. But it was a genuine sense of loss, almost as if I’d lost a part of my personal history.

I was fortunate enough to see John live on dozens and dozens of occasions. The first time I saw him was in the mid-seventies about the time of One World. My first proper date with my wife was to see him at the Town and Country Club in Kentish Town back in 1986. With an amazing symmetry the last time I saw him was twenty-two years later when I took our then eighteen-year-old son to see him perform the “Grace and Danger” album at The Barbican in November 2008. By January 2009 he had gone.

He leaves a legacy of stunning music, and Solid Air remains one of his finest hours.

Uncoupled by Lizzie Enfield

“Uncoupled” is Lizzie Enfield’s second published novel and it demonstrates that she is a gifted author who fully deserves the rich praise she has been receiving. This is a much more accomplished novel than “What You Don’t Know”, which in itself was a superb debut. However the overall feeling here is of a novelist really hitting her stride and finding her voice.

The characterisations are beautifully judged, with sufficient depth to make the reader really care about their story and their lives. The main protagonist Holly survives a serious train crash where she is helped by a stranger, Daniel, a fellow commuter who stays with her until the emergency services arrive. When they meet again some weeks later on their regular commute up to London a friendship begins to develop, despite the fact that they are both already committed to other relationships. Holly’s husband Mark runs a struggling PR company, whilst Daniel’s partner Daisy is a fitness instructor. Gradually the four lives begin to intertwine, along with the mysterious Anne-Marie, who claims to be a survivor from the same rail crash.

Enfield successfully juggles these five main characters alongside a larger ensemble cast, primarily Holly’s work colleagues whose love lives provide a contrasting echo to the confusion that Holly begins to experience. She uses this wider cast of characters for some excellent observational humour which balances the book’s slightly darker tone.

Her writing style reminds me a little of early Joanna Trollope [particularly the period of “A Village Affair” and “A Spanish Lover”] especially in her deft handling of the fragility and the emotional entanglements of relationships. That comparison aside Lizzie Enfield deserves to be judged in her own right, and I am convinced that she will go on to produce a body of work that will be enjoyed by a host of admiring readers.

I would thoroughly recommend this immensely satisfying novel.

High Fidelity

Over the years I have bought about half a dozen copies of “High Fidelity” and given them all away to friends with the exhortation to “…read this, it’s just wonderful”! Sadly none of my friends ever seem to find the same sense of unadulterated joy in Hornby’s prose as I do.

My current copy came from a charity shop and has a small sticker on the back saying “50p – Good”, obviously intended as a comment on the physical condition of the book, but which I mistakenly took to be a critical review. I still recall my embarrassment on marching to the desk demanding to know why it didn’t say “excellent”!

The blurb inside the front cover starts with a quote from the Guardian: “The most frequent response to High Fidelity is ‘Oh God, I know people just like that’…” Well it’s true; I do – me. Whenever I re-read the novel, which has been every couple of years, I find myself wincing with painful self-recognition. Right down to the obsessive list making (each new diary of mine used to start with a list of my top ten albums, novels and movies so that I could compare the lists back to previous years).

Hornby is such an astute writer, with a real gift for comedy. If you regard “Fever Pitch” as a memoir then amazingly “High Fidelity” is his debut novel and it is astonishing. I know all the jokes yet still find myself reading with an inane grin on my face, when I’m not laughing uncontrollably – not a book to read on a quiet train. In Rob Fleming he has created a totally believable and fatally flawed human being, and I still find myself rooting for him from the bottom of my heart.

Hornby’s authorial voice is conversational with an immediacy that makes you feel as though he had written a confessional just for you alone. His dialogue is an object lesson in authenticity for any aspiring writer; effortlessly fluent and compulsively readable. It certainly makes its way into my list of my top five favourite novels, year on year.

Equinox

Rain in rivulets

runs trickling down windows.

Opaque images of trees,

violent against the pale skyline,

fight through the gloom

and cast shifting shadows

over the seated figure.

The boy gazes, silent,

lost in another world.

He watches the rain

jagged line of pines beyond

but they do not register.

He sees only the window

and you.

You waved at him

through that very window

then returned to your own life.

He wishes you were back,

rain dripping on the porch.

Deceptions by Rebecca Frayn

Rebecca Frayn’s second novel is elegantly written with a compelling and convincing plot which demonstrates one of her key skills as a writer.

She chooses to narrate the story as a male character, Julian Poulter; slightly detached, emotionally ambivalent and yet utterly believable. Julian’s profession as an art valuer, trying to spot fraudulent copies and fakes, creates a deft sub-text to the central premise of the book, alongside his own agendas and self-deceptions. The unreliability of his narration creates an interesting distance between the events and the reader, prompting you to question his motives and the truth beneath his blinkered perspective. There is also a fascinating echo to Annie’s self-deceptions as she tries to deal with the disappearance of her son. I was interested to learn that Frayn’s working title for the piece was “The Art of Self-Deception” which works effectively on a number of different levels.

With a limited cast of four main characters and a few minor ones I was fascinated by the authentic depth that Frayn is able to give to Annie and Julian, particularly through her use of dialogue which is beautifully judged and weighted throughout.

Frayn was inspired to write the book after reading an article by Nick Davies in The Guardian which described the true story that lies behind her tale. I understand that it took her nearly three years to write the piece, with numerous drafts and re-writes as she grappled to nail her story.

Frayn has described the writing of the novel as fulfilling “a kind of obsessive-compulsive disorder, a compulsion that wasn’t sated until the final proof copy went off (to) the printers”. I have to say that reading the novel elicited a similar compulsion, holding me in its thrall until I finished the book in the early hours of the morning. I would recommend that you do likewise.

Martin Turner's Wishbone Ash

I went to see Martin Turner’s Wishbone Ash last night at The Boom Boom Club in Sutton, a great little venue run by a wonderful promoter called Pete Feenstra. I’ve been to see Martin and the boys about three times a year in various venues since Mart decided to tour again back in 2005.

As ever the band were superb and played a great set including a host of old Wishbone classics. Astonishingly it’s forty years since the release of “Pilgrimage” and the guys played The Pilgrim last night as an acknowledgement. They still play a good selection of tracks from “Argus” including Sometime World, The Warrior, Blowing Free and my personal favourite Throw Down the Sword. Great additions to the set last night were Lady Jay from There’s The Rub and Front Page News from the 1977 album of the same name.

Ray Hatfield and Danny Wilson do a fantastic job on the twin lead parts, and their understanding is almost telepathic. It may seem almost sacrilegious to say it but I think they are nearly as good as Andy Powell and Ted Turner, although Andy and Ted actually wrote the parts, which probably gives them the edge. Martin’s voice still sounds great and his bass playing is awesome, particularly on FUBB, Persephone and Living Proof. Given that he’s 66 now his energy is an inspiration. I had a tear in my eye and a lump in my throat during Persephone, which I still think is one of Martin’s best and most ambiguous lyrics.

It was great to chat with Martin after the show and he autographed the cover of my old vinyl copy of the first album from back in 1970….one that will never find its way onto eBay!

They are playing at the Central Theatre in Chatham in a fortnight’s time with Curved Air as support with Sonja Kristina, which should be good. I’ll be there again, smiling broadly, and re-living my teenage years. Who says nostalgia is old hat?

Truly remarkable

I thought I would re-read “if nobody speaks of remarkable things” as it had been a few years since I last read it. I remember being very impressed by Jon McGregor when I initially read the book (I was going through a phase of reading debut novels at the time).

McGregor’s writing style is poetic; beautifully and meticulously structured. The story of a single day slowly unfolds through a series of little vignettes that slowly connect together, like projections on gauze. The narrative develops like a series of Polaroid snapshots, each slowly becoming clear to the reader, as you piece together the events of a seemingly unremarkable day. The multiple narration where the same event is seen through the filter of different eyes creates a series of repeating echoes with a cinematic sweep of motifs and images.

The tone is carefully measured throughout, and McGregor deliberately chooses to avoid inverted commas for speech marks. In fact he seems to have a bit of an aversion towards punctuation generally.

The structure interweaves the main first person unnamed narrator in the present (a girl facing her own personal crisis) back to the events of this specific Sunday. Each character is described rather than being given a name which creates a deliberate sense of detachment and anonymity, and forces the reader to really concentrate to remember who’s who, which is quite a clever ploy.

Some reviewers have criticised the resultant sense of emotional detachment, but this seems to rather miss the point. I found the book completely mesmeric and entrancing. I am certain I’ll be re-reading it again. As a piece of writing I think it’s a truly remarkable achievement.

Ten novels I wish I'd written.

As an idle diversion I’ve listed ten novels that I wish I’d written (not quite the same as my ten favourite novels although some of these titles would make both lists!). So in no particular order: -

• Damage – Josephine Hart.
• The Magus – John Fowles.
• The Owl Service – Alan Garner.
• The Great Gatsby – F. Scott Fitzgerald
• High Fidelity - Nick Hornby.
• TAG – Stephen May.
• if nobody speaks of remarkable things – Jon McGregor.
• Sin – Josephine Hart.
• The Bridges of Madison County – Robert James Waller.
• To Kill a Mockingbird – Harper Lee.

Now I fully appreciate that it’s an eclectic list, but these things often turn out that way. Equally I’ve probably got twenty other titles that could be on there (Twelve, The Crow Road, Red Dragon, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time, etc., etc.).

So what links this bizarre and random collection of novels? Well I suppose the common thread is that they all made a connection with me, and I was blown away by the breadth of their invention, the strength of their ideas and the sheer brilliance of their writing.

So there’s an aspirational group of novels to read again!

The Language of Art - Olafur Eliasson at the Tate

I went to an Art lecture on Saturday at the Tate Modern. It was a discussion in their Topology series entitled “Spaces of Transformation – Continuity / Infinity”, featuring inspirational Danish / Icelandic artist Olafur Eliasson who is fascinated by the nature of spatial perception. He was sharing a platform with Bruno Latour, the French sociologist of science and theoretical anthropologist alongside Peter Weibel, the German mathematical theoretician and artist.

I’ve always liked Eliasson’s work, particularly “Your Blind Passenger”, which was at the Arken Museum of Modern Art in Denmark when we visited last year. (Check it out on: - www.youtube.com/watch?v=JhQqtNUIlTY )

I spent a large proportion of the afternoon feeling intellectually inadequate. Eliasson was as erudite and entertaining as ever, Latour was dryly sardonic and quick-witted, but Weibel’s English was unfortunately completely impenetrable. At times it felt as if I was being given an introduction to Alzheimer’s; total incomprehensible confusion punctuated by occasional moments of brief lucidity.

The problem I had with the discussion was that the language seemed almost deliberately obtuse, with far too many concepts for my simple brain to grasp. As I looked around the lecture theatre I wondered just how many of the audience were keeping up, or whether they were all as confused as me. However the afternoon did perfectly illustrate a simple truth for me; don’t use forty words when ten will adequately suffice. It reinforced the feeling that brevity and sparseness are the elements that I most admire in writing (see Josephine Hart), and that’s what I should aspire to achieve.

Stephen May's TAG

Stephen May. Remember the name. You will certainly hear it again.

There is quite a thrill in finding a new writer that you admire (tinged with just a hint of mild envy). TAG is May’s debut novel, and quite simply it is stunning.

I’ll freely admit, with a hint of shame, that I had some trepidation about reading a novel where the main protagonist was called Mistyann. Now I can happily sneer at my misguided prejudice. Mistyann is a wonderful piece of characterisation.

TAG [acronym for Talented and Gifted] tells the story of fifteen year old Mistyann Rutherford, a troubled, unpredictable, foul-mouthed yet gifted child who is selected to attend a residential course for teen prodigies in mid-Wales. She is accompanied for the week by her acerbic forty-something teacher Jon Diamond, a frustrated musician and dried-out alcoholic. In the confined setting of the residential course their lives both unravel through a series of unfortunate events which are in turn both comedic and emotionally-charged.

May eschews a linear narrative, and structures his book with deft precision through a series of careful time shifts. He alternates the first person narration between the two main characters, creating utterly believable voices for each of them. He also makes clever use of second person narration with JD effectively addressing Mistyann as if writing her a confessional letter. I’m certain that much of the author’s own voice is used for the character of JD, but his real skill is in creating such a rich and authentic voice for the moody and belligerent Mistyann. However May’s palette is wider still and even his minor characters crackle with life and realism. By getting under their skins he has an uncanny knack of making you care about his characters and their back stories. He creates a strong ensemble cast and uses them to good effect.

Mistyann’s dysfunctional extended family is a good case in point, where May sketches out a believable mother, with her various partners and children without resorting to particularly obvious stereotypes.

May’s experiences on Arvon courses have obviously underpinned many of his descriptions of the TAG Residential Course, although I suspect his teaching style may be slightly more orthodox than the American educational psychologist of his novel. I’m quite surprised that he managed to get the Cinnamon Press, (a Welsh independent publishing house) to publish a book which both mocks and ridicules the Welsh at times, so full marks to them for a self-referential sense of humour.

In TAG May bravely tackles a number of difficult subjects, confronting taboos and challenging prejudices. He leaves me convinced that he is a writer to watch out for, and I look forward to his second novel ("Life, Death, Prizes") with keen anticipation.