As Seen In Blitz - fashion from the iconic magazine

From former fashion editor of Blitz magazine comes As Seen In Blitz, a celebration of the hedonistic, creative and 'subversive' fashion pages that set the style for a whole generation going out in the 1980's. After Punk and before the internet, the club scene that emerged was New Romantic and had a cast of characters so colourful I can't quite believe there are not more books and exhibitions to celebrate them. Iain R Webb was at the centre of this fashion and cultural revolution and this book looks to present over 100 of the Blitz fashion stories plus previously unseen archive content. There are interviews with designers and memories from a time that was important to those who lived it and to those who came after.

So if you wore Bodymap, Comme Des Garcons, Jasper Conran or Vivienne Westwood or strutted at Club for Heroes, The Wag or later the Camden Palace alongside Boy George, Marilyn and Steve Strange then this is definitely the book for you.

Order it today from Waterstones, £35 and get free delivery.

The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry book review

The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry

Another book which you must download or buy for the next holiday is The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry by Rachel Joyce which I have just finished reading and found absorbing and thought provoking too.

Harold Fry leads a very quiet life. Mundane, repetitive and extremely unglamourous. He is unhappily married, retired, bored and almost just waiting for death yet one day, going out to post a letter while his wife is vacuuming upstairs, he decides to just keep on walking.

And here starts the beginning of an extraordinary adventure for Harold and a journey which looks at human behaviour and reaction to the different and odd. This book, which was long-listed for the Booker, has us following Harold on his 600 mile walk from his home and wife in Devon to Berwick-upon-Tweed. He believes that this journey will help his friend who is dying of cancer, to live. With yachting shoes on his feet, a cashpoint bank card, no maps and no waterproofs we feel every step of the journey as he takes this often painful but enlightening road.

With Maureen is at first angry and ashamed but during their time apart she comes to terms with events that have driven a wedge between them and remembers how much her husband meant and still means to her.

He attracts a growing band of fellow pilgrims - some jumping on the publicity wagon, some searching for their own inner peace and we meet some very good people along the way.

It's a quiet story befitting a quiet character but is one that doesn't leave you. We all have our moments when it would be simpler to walk away from life's disappointments and trials, but we never do, and it is following someone who steps out into the unknown take on a rhythm and meaning that makes this story so compelling. It's a book of small detail rather than big ideas but you do want to know how it all ends...

Anyone else read this and if you did what did you think?

Available for your Kindle now for £2.69

Audio books for on the go people...

We have had a wonderful weekend visiting family in South Yorkshire and taking in the eldest daughters production of Jesus Christ Superstar at Leeds Uni. Youngest daughter is also at Sheffield Hallum so it was easy for her to join us too (and for us to take her home) but with all the motorway driving and to-ing and fro-ing we should have thought about organising an audiobook download from AudioGo, the home of audio books from the BBC.

This site contains a plethora of books - from Shakespeare (great if you have anyone in the car who needs to do some revision) to sci-fi classics, Dr Who scripts, children's novels, and a wide, wide range of modern literature too.

Here are my top five that I will be downloading so we will never be stuck with dreadful local radio again...

Michael Palin, New Europe
I loved this programme although they only briefly touched on Belgrade (which is a shame) and I could listen to Michael's dulcet tones all day. He does a whistle stop tour of the Balkans including Bulgaria, Macedonia, Turkey, Serbia, Hungary and the Ukraine amongst others too. He throws himself into local life and really gives some great insight into this part of the world which has emerged from behind the curtain in recent years.  Download - £7.99

Maeve Binchy, Whitethorn Woods
I love Maeve Binchy, but this will have to be for when I'm alone in the car as the husband is not so keen. Well she is a woman's writer really so I don't blame him. Once again we visit an Irish town where the action takes place and I know I will soon become wrapped up in the characters and the story as I always do with a classic Binchy.
Download - £7.99

Alan Bennett - Telling Tales
There are tons of Alan Bennett downloads on the AudioGo site and of course this would have been perfectly fitting for our trip to Yorkshire. Telling Tales brings us 10 childhood snapshots in the form of his famous monologues and Alan Bennett reminisces about his early years from school to undergrad life at Oxford. He grew up in Leeds where the children longed 'for German bombs to lend their city some wartime glamour' and even if you are way to young (I am thankfully) to know what that was like, he still never fails to strike a chord.
Download - £2.99

The Dinner - Herman Koch
I've never read anything by Herman Koch but this caught my eye and that is why it's on my list. Set on a summer's evening in Amsterdam, two couples dine out in a fashionable restaurant where their banal conversation covers for the unsaid. Each couple has a 15 year old son involved in a single horrific act and as dinner comes to an end the formality breaks down... I haven't read it but as I say it looks fascinating so that's why it's on my list!
Download - £7.99


Frankie Boyle - If I Could Reach Out Through My TV and Strangle You, I Would
Frankie Boyle is not everyone's cup of tea but he is mine. He is controversial but is also thought provoking and very, very clever. This is a live recording from 2010 which I haven't heard yet but as I have never managed to see him live this is the next best thing...
Download - £1.49

The 100 year old man who climbed out the window and disappeared - book review

The 100 Year Old Man Who Climbed Out of the Window and Disappeared

I haven't done many book reviews but as part of my New Year promise to myself (and because I do read books albeit on my Kindle) I am now going to start telling you about the one's I like. The one's you shouldn't bother with are not going to be reviewed just the one's I would recommend.

To start with I must tell you about The 100 Year Old Man Who Climbed Out The Window and Disappeared by Jonas Jonasson and translated by Rod Bradbury. I loved this book so much I have bought and given it to my husband and one of my best friends. Don't think because this book is by a Swedish author that it is similar to Larsson (who wrote the superb Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest etc) or Mankell (who wrote the Wallender series) because it's a completely different type of animal entirely.

The protagonist, Allan Karlsson, is 100 years old and we meet him bored and lonely in an old peoples home.  Being livelier than his years would normally dictate, he decides to do a runner and climbs out of the window, across the flower beds to freedom.

We follow Allan through the story of what happens next while visiting his past life where, due to being in certain places at certain times, he becomes embroiled in some of the most exciting and historic events of the 20th Century from the Russian revolution through to saving Franco's life and getting drunk with President Truman.

It's a surreal crime novel and a surreal historical novel. The characters are mad, the situations even more so. Our hero unwittingly becomes involved in problems with drug-dealers after taking their suitcase full of money at a local bus station, and is soon being chased through the countryside where he teams up with a small-time thief called Julius.

This book is pacy and will have you hooked after the first couple of chapters as you really can't believe that things can get any more bizarre - and yet they do. You will laugh and will be amazed at the genius of the author who ties in so many varied events of huge significance in a way that is highly entertaining and infinitely readable.

I loved reading it and finished it in about a week. The 100 Year Old Man Who Climbed Out The Window and Disappeared is available in paperback and ebook.

The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel book vs film

Certainly hyped up recently, The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel seems to be an aquired taste. My younger colleagues in the office simply loved it and thought it hilarious, but I should have taken note of my colleague who is nearer me in age who was left singularly unimpressed, before heading out on Saturday night to my local Vue cinema.

Films are rarely if ever as good as the book - and it probably didn't help that I finished the book on Saturday afternoon so it was fresh in my memory, but still, what on earth had they done to the storyline?

Okay it's still set in a hotel in Jaipur and the characters are roughly the same but they have swept aside the subtle back stories of each character and in some cases rewritten their story entirely. And not to the films advantage either! Without spoiling either the book or the film too much for you (though I fear I've already spoilt the film) leaving out the integral reason for each character being the way they are and allowing you more insight into the family dynamics they have left behind, means that the film is a slightly patronising, thin, rom-com that doesn't stretch the wonderful caste in any way and relies heavily on the obvious in terms of characters. Indians are portrayed as either headwaggling lower-caste extras from It Aint Half Hot Mum or highly educated and desparate to learn more about England (because let's face it England is so wonderful isn't it). And why is the hotel set up in the first place? This is an integral part of the book and isn't even covered in the film...

I can watch Maggie Smith, Judi Dench, Tom Wilkinson, Bill Nighy and Penelope Wilton until the cows come home and really it's only their wonderfully warm and real performances that elevate this film at all. It is beautifully shot but it certainly aint no Monsoon Wedding.

Read The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel if you want a great story and characters that engage and that you will actually care about. If you don't read the book then wait for the film on DVD or Sky is my advice. Beautifully shot but a bit of a missed opportunity alround really...

The Master and Margarita - Complicite at The Barbican

Where do I start with this? The Master and Margarita has always been one of my favourite books. It was recommended to me by my mother when I was about 20, I read it, couldn't put it down and it's been on my bookshelf ever since.

It was written by Russian writer Mikhail Bulgakov in 1939 but, due to the political control over literary publications at the time, it wasn't published until 1966 long after his death in 1940. To say it's a complex novel is something of an understatement.  It's magical, thought provoking and highly complicated. The main story is about the Devil and his entourage (including a talking cat) arriving in Moscow and creating havoc. It's also a take on organised religion and how it's lost it's way, and is about self-sacrifice, love, revenge, guilt, actually I could go on and on with a list of topics featured in this novel.
It travels from Moscow to Jerusalem, bringing in Pontius Pilate condemning Jesus to death, alongside parties in hell and literary meetings in Moscow.  It's the story of a novelist stuck in a lunatic asylum and his mistress and the question of whether everything is really preordained.

It's complex, skips hither and thither through time and storylines and yet is a wonderfully compulsive read that you remember long after the final page. No-one has successfully turned it into a play or film though some have considered it seriously (including Andrew Lloyd-Webber who looked at doing a musical version). Complicite and it's director Simon McBurney have met the challenge head on and using the huge theatre space at London's Barbican Theatre, have produced a work that is heart stopping in its visual impact, and takes you through the story at quite a pace. The music ranges from Shostakovich to The Rolling Stones giving added drama and rhythm to the movement of the ensemble. Three hours is a long time to sit through a play and I must admit the first half of an hour and 45 mins did leave me a bit numb with a desire to walk around for the full interval. The second half brings everything together and from the moment the actors appear back on the stage they've got you on the edge of your seat until the end.

Sadly it's now unlikely you'll get a ticket although it is running to April 7th but I would queue all night for returns. If you like physical theatre and especially if the book is on your favourites list then you mustn't miss this treat.

When God Was A Rabbit

Now I know When God Was A Rabbit by Sarah Winman is a bit last year but being a working parent it takes me about a year to catch up. I also (like most of the world) have to wait for things to come out in paperback and hence for the price to fall on Amazon Kindle before I will purchase - can't afford to pay the newly published prices. So I have finally got around to reading it - and what a read.

It sums up an era I recognise perfectly. For anyone who shouted out the prizes on the conveyor belt while watching The Generation Game or remembers a parent diligently filling in the football pools then this book will transport you back. It's a book about family relationships, family secrets, the bond between brother and sister and about starting over. It's about love in many forms and friendship and loyalty. Its a quick read - I couldn't put it down. Some people have criticised it for being too difficult to follow and over wordy - I didn't find this to be the case at all, and I have the concentration of a gnat especially while reading on the tube.

From Essex then Cornwall, taking in New York and 9/11 this book takes in the fortunes of Elly and Joe and her former best friend Jenny Penny. It has eccentric characters, a dark storyline, and I think will grab you and stay with you for a long time after you have read it, it's that sort of book.