As mentioned at the end of the article, Sutton Library has reason to celebrate as their present building was 40 years old last December. To celebrate it has been decided to hold a week of special events during the local half term week in February (week beginning Monday 13th). On the Tuesday morning, I will be at the library from about 11 am on Tuesday 14th, along with local author Janet Roberts, to talk about blogging and some of the books I have written about over the years. (I’d better have a look back at some of the previous postings to refresh my memory!).

Also Janet will have copies of some of her publications to sell. Janet also writes a blog – in fact she has two, so she is probably more experienced than I am in that regard. So if you live in the Sutton area, do come along to the library on Valentine’s Day – we’ll both be pleased to see you and I’ll try to answer questions about blogging as best I can.

Back to Mansfield Library now and Sue Townsend will be there on March 6th to launch a reading group for the visually impaired. I hope to be there and record a brief interview with Ms Townsend. Sue Townsend is of course the creator of Adrian Mole and the very first in the Adrian Mole series was published 30 years ago. Penguin have brought out a 30th anniversary edition with a foreword by David Walliams. [£7.99 978-0141046426 ] I’m reading ‘Adrian Mole and the weapons of Mass Destruction [Penguin £7.99 978-0141015880] at the moment and I’m thoroughly enjoying it. More about that in a future posting.

Last time I was saying how much I had enjoyed reading the collection short stories by Stella Gibbons entitled Christmas at Cold Comfort Farm . At the time I hadn’t finished the book- there were still a handful of stories to go, one of which, the last but one story, simply called “Cake”, was especially good. Jenny and Rickey are having their last meeting before going their separate ways: they have just had an amicable divorce. She is a journalist working for a magazine and immediately after the meeting goes to interview a rather strange elderly lady, whose past life turns out to have one or two parallels with her own. The whole thing leads to a striking and satisfying conclusion. 

I can’t say that I approve of his taste in sports jackets, but I am enjoying Michael Portillo’s new series of Great British Railway Journeys on BBC2. Like the last series, there is a book to go with it, but this time there’s a difference. Great Victorian Railway Journeys: How Modern Britain was Built by Victorian Steam Power [Collins £20 9780007457069]by Karen Farrington is out this week. The book follows the routes taken by Mr Portillo in this, the 3^rd series of Great British Rail Journeys, but the text and the illustrations concentrate on the history of the routes rather than a comparison between their appearance in Bradshaw’s time and the subsequent changes that have taken place. By the way, look out for big discounts on the price.

Karen Farrington has several other books to her name: Mayday! Mayday!: The History of Sea Rescue Around Britain’s Coastal Waters by Karen Farrington and Nick Constable and Great Lives: As heard on Radio 4, the book accompanying the programme of the same name, which has an introduction by Matthew Parris, the presenter of the programme.

The 20^th Century author Stella Gibbons is chiefly remembered for her comic novel Cold Comfort Farm [Penguin £8.99 978-1856132749] ,(remember “something nasty in the woodshed”?) but did you know that she wrote 31 other novels?

At Christmas I was given a copy of Christmas at Cold Comfort Farm [Vintage, £7.99 9780099528678] a collection of short stories by Gibbons. Now, I’m not normally a short story reader, but I’m really enjoying reading this book. Apart from the one story about the Starkadder family’s preparations for Christmas (wondering who is going to find the strange objects in the pudding – a coffin nail meaning that person hasn’t long to live or the finder of the bad sixpence is destined to lose all his money in the coming year), most of the stories are not set at Christmas time. There’s the married woman who decides to invite some of her friends she used to associate with before her marriage for the weekend and discovers what a ghastly mistake she has made. Then there is the spinster who takes pity on a girl in the village who has had a child born out of wedlock, by employing her as domestic, but is ostracised by the rest of the villagers.

This collection of stories was published in 1940 and the stories are set in the 1930s and mainly about the well to do. They are quite short and always come to a satisfying but sometimes unexpected conclusion. They are often about relationships, particularly within the family and the main character is always female, except for the one Cold Comfort Farm story.

The book is one of several which have been reprinted by Vintage and given attractive covers. For a lengthy and informative article about Stella Gibbons and the books in the series, have a look at this Guardian article.

Next time : Downton Abbey has revived interest in a book about life below stairs at Rufford Abbey.

There is one book which is just a thin paperback with a plain cover which was apparently published before the disaster and appears to foretell it. When I was working in libraries several years ago, the book was requested by a reader and we managed to get a new copy even though it was (I think) from the USA and published by a small publisher. Unfortunately I can’t remember the title – if anyone recognises what I’m trying to describe, perhaps they could remind me of the title?

Talking of the Titanic, I can highly recommend And the Band Played on by Christopher Ward [Hodder £20 9781444707946]. The author is a former editor of the Daily Express and chairman of the Redwood magazine agency. The main subject of this book is Mr Ward’s grandfather, Jock Law Hume, the violinist and member of the small band of musicians which travelled on the Titanic and kept on playing as the ship went down.

It’s also the story of Jock Hume’s wife to be, Mary, whom he left back in Dumfries, expecting their first child, the author’s mother. Jock’s father Andrew, also a musician, was seemingly expert at passing himself off as someone with a better pedigree than he actually had. He was also a very strict father and most of his children tried to get away from the family home as soon as they could.

The book begins with the rather grisly story of the recovery of the bodies from the site of the wreck by the ship, the Mackay-Bennett ,which was sent out from Halifax, Nova Scotia. The writer goes on to show how the Titanic disaster had a devastating effect on all members of Jock’s family and that of his fiancee: the wrongful appropriation by Jock’s father of compensation money awarded to Mary; the claim by his father that Jock had taken two very valuable violins along with him on the journey, when in fact his violin was quite an ordinary one. Then there is the attempt by one of Jock’s sisters to scare her father and stepmother by claiming that her sister Grace had been brutally murdered by the Germans in the First World war, when in fact Grace was living quietly in Huddersfield. Those are just a few examples of episodes in a fascinating story.

This book is well worth reading and you may even be able to pick the book up in the remainder bookshops for a small fraction of the cover price.

Library news

I was given a guided tour around the newly refurbished Mansfield library the other day and what a difference they have made. I was very pleased with what I found and will be popping in from time to time. My article about it will be in the Chad soon.

The Sutton-in-Ashfield Library building reached its 40^th anniversary last December and they will be celebrating a couple of months late – during the February half term week – with a series of special events. One of these will be an informal drop-in session on February 14^th when I will be talking to people about the books I like and finding out what they like as well as answering questions on writing blogs.

Let’s start with David St. John Thomas’s Remote Britain [Frances Lincoln £18.99 978-0711230545] which roams over many different parts of the country finding out about the wildlife, the people, the history and, as you might expect from this author, abandoned or heritage railways. He has since written Railway Season[Frances Lincoln,£14.99 978-0711232594] which some reviewers have criticised for including rehashed content from previous books. For a review, have a look at the “Steam Index” website.

I’m over 60 and being an almost fully fledged “wrinkly”, I am making frequent use of my bus pass which gives me free travel on local bus services anywhere in England. A new book called Bus Pass Britain[Bradt, £16.99, 978-1841623764] brings together and describes 50 of the best bus journeys in the UK as voted for or suggested by the bus travelling public. These range right across the country, but unfortunately there are none in the North East Midlands. I’m sure there are several in our region that are as interesting as some of those that made it into the book.

If you enjoy the BBC series “Coast”, then you might also enjoy the book by the first presenter of the series (before Neil Oliver), Nick Crane. Coast: our Island Story [BBC Books £18.00 978-1849900362 ] is the first narrative account of a journey around the coast by a “Coast” presenter. All the elements of the TV series are in the book: the geography, geology, history, industry and so on.

I came across a lengthy review of this book in the Lancashire Evening Post

I love travelling by rail, so I thought Sunrise on the Southbound Sleeper [Aurum Press £20 978-1845136680]might be “right up my street”, so to speak. Michael Kerr has collected a large number of accounts of rail journeys in all parts of the world by well known writers. This is apparently the second collection. You can read a few extracts from the book on the Daily Telegraph’s travel website by clicking here.

I know the connection with travel is in this case is very tenuous, but….here’s a book about countries in Europe you can no longer visit simply because they don’t exist. This is not the Europe we usually think of – in other words the countries that exist today. Over the years there have been many kingdoms, empires and republics in Europe that have come and gone. In Vanished Kingdoms by Norman Davies [Allen Lane £30 978-1846143380] you will not only find information about many of the long forgotten kingdoms of Europe, but also facts that might surprise you. For example how many people know that Glasgow was founded by the Welsh before the existence of England and Scotland? This is quite a pricey volume and a weighty one too (848 pages), but I think I’d find it endlessly fascinating. You can find an extract from the book on the Penguin website.

Happy New Year!

I’m not sure which of the characters in the book the title refers to. It’s the story of two brothers, Asahel and Benjamin who grow up on a farm in the USA. Benjamin has already left to seek his fortune elsewhere as the story gets going, whilst Asahel stays put on the family farm and marries Benjamin’s former girlfriend Nellie. Their mother, Amelia, has always made no secret of the fact that she prefers Benjamin to Asahel and remains convinced to her dying day that Benjamin will one day return having made his fortune.

Asahel has no desire to go wandering and stays put to run the farm with his new wife and their ever growing family. On the face of it, all seems to be sweetness and light amongst the family members, but his children seem to prefer the company of their mother to him and communication between Asahel and particularly his eldest son is difficult. There is only one of the children, Dolly, who finds her father good company, but perhaps out of spite, Amelia takes Dolly a walk one snowy night and leaves her to rest in the snow and die of hypothermia. Amelia is already showing signs of eccentricity by then, so the finger of blame is not automatically pointed at her.

Later on in the book, Asahel’s children , having left home, are all living and working with the oldest son, Nat. He appears to have done very well for himself using business methods which are not entirely honourable. He tries to persuade his parents to retire from the farm (as it is still in Benjamin’s name, so they are technically tennants), so that he can take it over and build factories on the land. No word has been received from Benjamin, who is assumed to have died.

Nat does not get his way and Asahel finally gets the chance to venture beyond the nearest big town. Until I reached at least two thirds of the way through the book, I felt that this was just another family saga, possibly a candidate for one of those 1950s black and white films. (By the way, that may remind you of RKO Radio Pictures. I was surprised to find that the company is still going). After that point though, things became more interesting and I was glad I didn’t give up on it earlier. Possibly not a contender for my “Forgotten Gem” accolade, but well worth the read nevertheless.

Dolly gets them reading

I’ve just been listening to a programme on Radio 4 about “how Dolly Parton got Rotherham reading”. It’s all part of Dolly’s campaign to get children reading books. Under the scheme every child in Rotherham between the ages of 0 and 5, who signs up to the scheme, receives a book through the post every month. Now 85 % of this age group in Rotherham is enrolled. The scheme operates all over America and is spreading throughout the UK. You can hear the programme on the BBC iplayer at http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b012ql5c . I think this will be available for the next 7 days.

You can also read the article which the presenter of the programme Sarfraz Manzoor wrote for the Guardian in July.

For the booklover who has everything?

I’d love to have a look at the latest book by Lucinda Lambton. It’s all about the various edifices we humans have built for our animal friends – pig sties, kennels, memorials and so on. It’s lavishly illustrated and I gather from the press, hugely entertaining. It’s called Palaces for Pigs and other Beastly Dwellings  [English Heritage £14.99 978-1850749899] and I’m going to seek it out the next time I pop into Waterstone’s.

According to the website, this book has taken 5 years to compile as it involved sorting through an enormous pile of negatives taken between 1960 and 1968 in various locations around the North of England. The photographers were Ken Horan, a former locomotive fireman and Ted Parker, a professional photographer. The book has been favourably reviewed in the enthusiasts’ magazines. I was going to say that it can be obtained from the website, but the website states that currently the book is out of stock and Amazon don’t have any copies either, but you may be able to pick one up at one of several retail outlets, listed on the website, which are scattered around northern England. They include Bill Hudson Transport Books at Matlock, Peak Rail at Darley Dale or Hudsons Music in Chesterfield.

Were you a fan of the BBC TV sitcom “Only Fools and Horses”? I wasn’t particularly sold on it, but I must be in a minority, as it is reckoned to be Britain’s most-watched and best-loved sitcom. Well fans of the series can now indulge themselves in Only Fools and Horses: the untold story of Britain’s favourite comedy by Graham McCann [Canongate £20 978-0857860545] Read the full story of this comedy, with lots of behind the scenes information and contributions from the actors, the scriptwriters, and the producers.

Simon Hoggart, the Guardian’s political sketchwriter, has a new book out – Send up the Clowns [Guardian Books £8.99 9780852652435], which is a collection of some of his parliamentary sketches from 2007-11 which spans the period from the last days of the Blair premiership, through what are termed the “shadow filled” days  of Gordon Brown (“the grumpiest prime minister in recent history”) and ending with the “comedy double act” of Clegg and Cameron. The book follows on from Hands of History, a similar collection covering the decade of Tony Blair as prime minister.

Grumpy Old Man?

Well, I seem to have caused a very minor stir last time with my comments about libraries scoring own goals by introducing self service issuing systems and using an automated phone system to inform people that the book(s) they requested is/are now available for collection.

I haven’t changed my mind about these innovations, but I think I should point out that I am not against new technology in itself, but perhaps the way new technology is being introduced in libraries. I’ll just make two more points: first if the introduction of these devices is the only way that some libraries will be able to remain open because of the financial situation, then I suppose we will have to get to like them in the long run. Second, when self service issuing systems are introduced, perhaps some libraries should be told that that doesn’t mean that they can do away with staff all together. It seems to be a common complaint that if you need help with the self service machine, there is never anyone around to help.

Next time: Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings

There are still some libraries where you can speak face to face with a librarian over the counter (Pinxton Library, just over the county boundary in Derbyshire is one), but these seem to be getting fewer and fewer. Even my local small library, which is only open about 12 hours a week, now has the self issuing machine. If this carries on we will soon be able to use public libraries without ever seeing, let alone speaking to a member of the staff.

What happened to the days when we could discuss the books we had just read – or not read – with the library staff, asked for some information, or just passed the time of day? When I worked in libraries there were some readers who preferred the library staff to choose books for them – I can’t imagine this happening now. Mind you, even before the new machines came in, at some libraries the staff were discouraged from having a chat to readers. This is all part of what libraries should be about – a place to find a book to read, a book to help someone learn more about a topic, a place to socialise and pass the time of day, a place where people are encouraged to read. Libraries are rapidly losing that personal touch which is so important in this day and age where individuals are increasingly seen as just numbers.

By the way, if you let the libraries know your email address and then change it without letting them know your new address, you may be blocked. That means prevented from borrowing. So be sure to keep your user profile (as I think it is called) up to date

Having got that off my chest, next time I’ll write about a few new titles which have caught my eye in the reviews and in the shops.

The Chad has asked me for two more columns before the end of the year, so I’ve also been spending time doing a bit of research. One of the topics in the next column will be ereaders. It was only in 2010 that I last wrote a column on this subject, but, as you are bound to know, things have changed a lot since then. There are some new brand names on the scene and both WHSmith and (very soon) Waterstone’s will be marketing their own exclusive (in the UK) brands of ereader. Anyway more about that in the next Chad column which will probably be at the end of this month or the start of next.

If you’re thinking about buying books for Christmas presents, then there’s – as always – an awful lot to choose from out there, whether your budget is large or small. If you are watching the pennies, then why not try one of the mail order remainder/overstock booksellers. The two which regularly send me catalogues are Postscript and Bibliophile. Their prices are a little bit higher than the “High Street” remainder shops – such as The Works – but the range of quality titles is much greater. Here are one or two of the many titles on offer from these two sellers at the moment:

From Postscript -

Blood Iron and Gold: how the railways transformed the world by Christian Wolmar. Hardback £7.99 (full price £25)

The Peak District (Picture the Past series) by Neil Bettridge. Hardback £4.99 (full price £14.99)

Mediterranean Feasts by Rose Elliott. Hardback £5.99 (full price £14.99)

From Bibliophile –

Victorian Farm by Alex Langlands, Peter Ginn and Ruth Goodman. Hardback £9 (full price £20)

William and Catherine: their lives, their wedding by Andrew Morton. Hardback £11 (full price £20)

Fast Cakes by Mary Berry. Paperback £4.50 (full price £8.99)

If it’s a very popular title you are thinking of buying from these sellers, it’s always worth popping into The Works, if you live nearby, just to check if they have any copies, which might be even cheaper. By the way, the stocks of these two booksellers is changing all the time, so I can’t guarantee that the above titles will be available when you log on.

And finally..

Just a couple of titles that you may not have come across: first a new novel by Magnus Mills. A Cruel Bird Came to the Nest and Looked in [Bloomsbury £12.99 978-1408821206] is described as “Quirky, curious and very funny” by Ben Schott, the man behind all those fascinating miscellanies. Here’s a quote from the Guardian review: “as utterly odd, as endearing and as disturbing a book as anything that has come before”. I seem to remember reading a book by this author many years ago: I know I enjoyed it, but I can’t remember the title, so I’ll be interested to try this one out.

I don’t often mention war stories – fiction or non-fiction – but this one has been recommended to me. Agent Zigzag: The True Wartime Story of Eddie Chapman: The Most Notorious Double Agent of World War II by Ben Macintyre [Bloomsbury £7.99 978-1408811498]. To find out more watch BBC2 tomorrow evening (15^th Nov) at 9 pm. It’s a programme in the “Timewatch” series.