Animals - Emma Jane Unsworth

Laura and Tyler are best friends who live together, angrily philosophising and leading each other astray in the pubs and flats of Manchester. But things are set to change. Laura is engaged to teetotal Jim, the wedding is just months away, and Tyler becomes hell-bent on sabotaging her friend's plans for a different life.

Animals is a hilarious, moving and refreshingly honest tale of how a friendship can become the ultimate love story.

Don't ask me why, but this isn't the kind of book I would normally read. But as with so many novels that I've loved over the years, I originally approached them tentatively with a sprinkling of cynicism.

The book description sums it up as "A filthy, funny story of friendship, love and the morning after the night before". That strapline puts it so brilliantly that really there is no point in my giving you this review but I'm going to anyway, obvs.

So yeah, I really loved this book! I'm sure a lot of women who pick this up will think 'oh my god, this is me' as Emma Jane Unsworth recounts the drunken escapades of Laura and Tyler. But for me it wasn't like that. Sure I've had eventful nights out, but I'm quite frankly a wuss and like to be in bed at a reasonable hour on as many nights of the week as I can manage. Saying that, I got completely absorbed in this. It's hilarious for starters, had be genuinely laughing out loud which is rare for me when I'm reading. Hate to think what my reading face is... perhaps a little dull an experiment for series 2 of Gogglebox...

Anyway, I digress again. The book's funny, really funny. There's the occasional moment where the comedy is a tiny bit self-conscious but who cares.

The story is also very real. Who hasn't had a time in their lives when you feel like you're being pulled in two different directions and you're desperately trying to stay loyal to both but ultimately jeopardise both? Laura is exactly in that play, stranded between wanting the security of growing up and getting married to a sensible man and still wanting to have irresponsible drunken nights on the town with her addictively crazy sister from another mister, Tyler. Both simultaneously so very appealing, and so very grim.

Consequently, you kind of want to give Laura a slap and a hug at the same time but whatever you choose, Unsworth's created a character that you just kind of 'get' and can't help but feel sorry for when things start crumbling around her.

8/10

Book Slam: Emma Jane Unsworth, Ned Beauman, Elvis McGonnagall

Tonight was Book Slam night. For those of you unacquainted with the brilliance that is Book Slam, it basically involves a group of reasonably like-minded liberal book-loving intellectuals gathering for one night in the delightful and oh-so-classy Clapham Grand (on this occasion) for “London’s Best Literary Club Night”.

The evening started off well. Very well. You all know me well enough by now to know that that means there was food on offer. Flame-grilled barbecue steak or ribs, only without the flame-grill part because, you know, it was inside... so each steak was served with a portion of ‘this would normally taste better if they’d let us use our blowtorch’. Unflamed but still delicious. And what is better than food? FREE food. And what’s better than free food? Free DOUGHNUTS.

Anyway, books. Great line-up tonight and for the first time I’ve actually read one of the books. Emma Jane Unsworth read from her new novel, Animals. As kindly summed up on the front, it’s basically Withnail and I but with women. It’s an hilarious read, but also very touching and, at times, hugely frustrating. Unsworth’s protagonist is desperately trying to navigate her way through her late twenties, on the one hand trying to settle down with her very sensible and stable tee-total fiancé, while still being drawn in by the addictive madness of best friend, Tyler, who is still very much into all-night benders and one night stands. Loved. It. Will review shortly.

Generally I’m not in to poetry. Occasionally I like to romanticise about sitting down by a peaceful canal on a sunny day with a pretentiously named ale in hand and reading TS Eliot, but mostly poetry just makes me recall studying poetry at school and how rubbish I was at it. However, if you want to bring in a tartan-wearing Scot reciting his hilarious satirical verses, then I’m all ears. We got to meet Nigel Fromage and hear what the queen really wants to say in her Christmas speech. Good fun. Thanks Elvis McGonnagall.

The finale was Ned Beauman reading from his new novel, Glow. He began by explaining how he had become aware of his portrayal in the media as being very pretentious and that a journalist had recently contributed by wrongly declaring he had been wearing all black (classic sign of pretentiousness apparently) during the interview, when he hadn’t and the accompanying photo of him proved said fact. Sadly, rather than making me warm to him, it just sort of made me a little more certain that he probably is a little pretentious, judging (perhaps unfairly) by his attire and fashionable beard (which I still don’t get, by the way). I don’t mind him being pretentious, hell we’ve all paid to go listen to authors read from their literary novels while we gorge on pop-up bbq deliciousness. I’d just rather he’d embraced it all, rather than slam dunk the journo. Yeah, wasn’t keen. Sorry Ned.

All of this was brilliantly brought together in the middle by music from the brilliantly weird, Benin City. Downloading their stuff legally right now.

Thanks Bookslam. Top evening, great doughnuts.

The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore

This animation makes me feel all smiley and growy like watching a sepia toned movie on a rainy Sunday afternoon. In 2011 it won Best Animated Short Film at the Oscars, so you may have come across this little gem before but even if you have, you should just watch it again. If your job is in books, I like to think this counts as work... as does the Daily Mail sidebar of shame - it's RESEARCH.

To give you a little bit of background info and credit the brilliant people behind it, 'The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore' is a short animated film directed by American's William Joyce and Brandon Oldenburg. The film was originally made to showcase Joyce and Oldenburg's the quality of the work coming out of their studios, Moonbot Studios in Louisiana. Winning an Academy Award I think probably secured them a little recognition... they later went on to create DreamWorks' Rise of the Guardians.

The studio's Louisiana roots are evident in this touching story which starts with Mr. Lessmore writing his memoir in the French Quarter of New Orleans before trouble hits.

Enjoy, friends!

Book Hoarding - The World's Only "Good Addiction"? No.

(c) Quentin Blake

Book hoarding is a condition that we regularly disguise as 'a good addiction'. There is, my friends, no such thing as a good addiction. "Addiction to vegetables!", "addiction to studying!", "addiction to documentaries!". No, no and no, people. Not only are those not good addictions, they will also make your life exceedingly dull so please please stop.

Basically, book hoarding is all about the deep stuff. What's going on inside our insecure little minds. Can you tell I'm the daughter of a CBT therapist?

I've been thinking about this, as a self-confessed book hoarder, and am trying to come up with all the potential internal dialogues we are having without even realising. One that I am certain is relevant to me, is an obsession with 'ownership'. Some how, and I think it's Brits in particular, we have persuaded ourselves that we need to OWN things in order to be accepted as a proper human. I mean who are you if you don't leave your relatives a dusty room full of things they will spend decades getting rid of?

In the case of books, of course, by owning them we do become more intelligent. Rich people have been building libraries for themselves in their own homes for centuries, filling them with mammoth great encyclopedias on the flowers and fauna of Cumbria just so that when they have their friends around for a nice cup of tea or a sophisticated cocktail party, they will think better of you. Maybe even be slightly intimidated. Now I don't think this is the case with me, not really. Largely because I don't think there are any literary shoulder-pads in this world that I could put on my shelf that would make me look intimidating.

There is always the more positive spin and that is that a physical book can be so PRETTY. I mean it was all Amazon's fault anyway. Even before Kindle, it was Amazon who preyed on the impulse purchaser in us all by making it possible to buy a book in pretty much one click. Then no delivery charge came in and we're hooked.

As for Kindle, it's convenient, yes, but after all this we still like pretty things. To hold a book, absorb its cover that has manipulated you in to buying it and turn its pages and feel its individual weight, all the things you don't think you're noticing when you're reading but you are.

After a bit of a ramble, I am definitely no closer to curing my addiction to owning books and you are probably fast asleep. But maybe I'll try and work my way through my hideously huge unread pile/bookshelf before buying another book...

The Library at Scotney Castle

This weekend a friend and I drove out of the city and into Kent for a National Trust day - don't pretend you aren't jealous of our old lady lifestyles. Scotney Castle is an English country house and, given its home in Kent - the Garden of England, has some suitably spectacular gardens.

The site was originally that of an old moated medieval castle, complete with secret priest holes, which still stands in the gardens today. Apparently when the Hussey family took it over they thought it would make a pretty cool centre-piece for the garden rather than an idyllic home, but it was all just in a little too good a condition so they went ahead and gave it a brutal makeover as they felt looked more picturesque as a ruin... some people are mental.

What has Scotney Castle got for the book geek, though, you might be asking - well one of the National Trust's biggest collections which is made up of ceramics, furniture, and a whole library of rare books with its own secret bookshelf doorway. Pretty awesome.

Scotney Castle

Lamberhurst

Tunbridge Wells

Kent

TN3 8JN

www.nationaltrust.org.uk/scotney-castle

Other Posts:

The George Inn

Monks House - Virginia Woolf

Christmas at Batemans - Rudyard Kipling

Sissinghurst Castle - Vita Sackville West

Tracks

Last night I went to see Tracks, the film adaptation of the memoir of the same name by Robyn Davidson. Davidson, for those that don't know, became famous after completing a 1,700 mile trek across Australia from Alice Springs to the west coast. The trek, much to her resentment it's understood, was documented by American photographer Rick Smolan who met up with her three times along the way on the understanding that the magazine would sponsor Davidson's trek. Smolan's photographs were published alongside an article written by Davidson herself and both went on to publish books - Davidson to write a full-length account in Tracks and Smolan to put together his photographic collection in From Alice to Ocean. 

What a film. It's beautifully shot, but you only have to see the trailer to see that. It was even more fun for me having been out to the Red Centre so recently, and flown over this extraordinary landscape myself but the film makes it all so immediate, so real, that you don't have to have flown to the other side of the world to appreciate it.

I have to admit I have never read the original memoir but I was immediately drawn in to this girl's world, and her eccentric character. Sure, the film can't resist providing some kind of emotional explanation as to why a 27 year old woman would try to cross the Australian desert with just the help and companionship of four camels and a dog... but Mia Wasikowska is brilliant, and somehow you can't help but fall for this essentially difficult, and slightly barmy, woman.

I was relieved, too, that not too much was made of this story being important because she was a woman. For once I felt inspired by a woman because of what she did, not because she's female or because the world is telling me I ought to look up to her because I'm a woman too.

It's a brilliant story and so, by default, you would assume it would make a brilliant film... but, to me, it's an achievement to keep an audience engaged with so little visual variation. The Australian outback is just desert. Once she passes The Rock, that's pretty much it save a handful of Aboriginal huts. But I was hooked, and it was certainly a good advertisement for whoever made those sandals... but less so for good sunscreen practice, pretty sure she doesn't have time for any of that mumbo jumbo...

I'm really keen to read the book now and see how faithful the film was but if you just want to go see a beautifully made film, escape for a while, and feel inspired to capture some frothing wild camels - go see this film.

9/10

Other relevant posts:

Voss by Patrick White

Literary Melbourne

A Town Like Alice by Nevil Shute