Author: Paul (Page 3 of 182)

5 out of 5 stars

The publisher provided a copy of this, free of charge, in return for an honest review.

Those that arrive on these shores in small boats are here with the faintest hope of re-making a life on this island, and are vilified in the right-wing press. This narrative has sadly been picked up by the current prime minister, Kier Starmer, as he tries to out reform, Reform.

To try and understand what was happening to these people, who are desperate to try to start a new life, Clare heads to Dover, the current front line for those arriving from the continent. He is hoping to speak with some of these people, the volunteers who are caring for them, the people manning the lifeboats who often end up rescuing them as the substandard boats they are on get into trouble and who see tragedy most weeks> He is hoping to speak to the personal of the UK Border Force who are tasked with repelling this invasion force.

Mostly, he is there to discover the truth of what is happening, as he feels that the way this is being reported in the press is at best wrong…

Most of the people that he ends up speaking to wish to remain anonymous, which is understandable. There are various reasons behind this, but it is predominantly because they are not opening themselves up to the torrent of abuse they would get from trolls online. It is quite sad that it has come to this, but such is the power of populism. There are a few who don’t mind their names being mentioned. The discussions are eye-opening, and it is here that he begins to learn how big businesses ‘manage’ the situation through the lucrative contracts they have been awarded.

He moves on to Calais. The centre of this town is quite pleasant, however, the outskirts are pretty grim. There is a lot of poverty and crime. He is helped in finding where the people who want to cross the channel are by others who work in charities supporting those who have made it this far through Europe and are desperate to reach the UK.

There is a strong presence of the CRS riot police, who, it turns out, are partly funded by us. They seem to be aiming to irritate and provoke the 3000 or so people who are sleeping rough in the area.

Another charity worker highlights the folly of the amount of money being spent on this hostile environment. They suggest that the money would be better spent on infrastructure, integration and jobs for the people arriving. Not only would it make a massive difference, but the overall ongoing costs would be much lower in the long run.

This relentless demonisation of migrants didn’t apply when it came to Ukraine, though. 267,000 people applied and were granted visas. He imagines what it would be like of this same principle was applied to all asylum seekers who were wishing to move away from opposition and persecution in their home countries.

Back in Calais, Clare finds out that the police have stepped up their persecution of the rough sleepers. They raid camps, take tents and possessions. The charities helping these people can’t supply replacements fast enough. It is a nasty campaign. Immigration across Europe is a huge political hot potato. Borders are being closed on the southern shores, and Clare writes about the UK companies that have used this for their own advantage. They don’t seem to have a single atom of empathy or compassion among them.

The government at the time this book was written plan to house a large number of immigrants awaiting processing (horrid phrase), in a barge called the Bibby Stockholm. It is in need of a lot of repairs and upgrading to become fit for habitation, and surprise, surprise, a private company has been awarded a very lucrative contract to undertake the work. It is being carried out in Falmouth before being moved to Portland. No one is happy about it (except probably the company with the contract) and even when finished, it is fraught with problems. The inmates (it was described as a prison) complain of the treatment they receive there, and when Leonard Farruku commit suicide, the home office refuses to pay to repatriate his body. His sister starts a crowdfunding page and raises £19K in one day. The compassion of some of the British people is very moving.

The description of a boat journey undertaken by an artist in a small dinghy is quite tense. The projection of a future where immigrants realise their relatives took the same journey is touching too.

As winter comes, the cold makes the journey much harder. Clare heads to Liverpool to see how people are being helped in that city. There has been a lot of protests against them being there, mostly egged on by right-wing groups, but it is found that these protests fade if there is dialogue and resistance.

There are countless stories that could be told, but Clare only picks up on a few for this book. We are fed an ever more hysterical rhetoric by a press that leans further right each day, but the thing to remember is that there is only a small number of genuine asylum seekers each year. Having safe routes for these people would stop all the small boats and paying councils, particularly in the North, rather than the corporations that are making huge profits, would be better for everyone.

As climate change bites harder in the coming years, more and more people are going to be on the move, so we are really going to have to deal with it properly. This is a brilliant book, full of compassion for those who have made the decision to leave their home (or had it forced on them). There is a lot of food for thought, and as with all his other books, it is so well written. Read it as soon as you are able to.

4 out of 5 stars

The publisher provided a copy of this, free of charge, in return for an honest review.

I haven’t seen many owls, mostly because they tend to be fairly elusive and nocturnal. I have heard a few Tawny’s in the woods near home, but never been fortunate to catch sight of one.

But I have been lucky enough to see a handful of barn owls and two short-eared owls that are resident nearby. Atkin is the same, she has been hearing Tawny Owls whilst in her attic room in her house in the Lake District, but hasn’t seen any as yet.

It is thought that Tawny Owls are the most common of owl species, but nobody actually knows as they are so difficult to spot! Then one evening around the solstice, she sees a Tawny Owl. It is a magical time of the year, everything feels like it is turned up to 11, and this was quite a special moment.

In the spring of 2020, the world changed. Lockdown because of the COVID-19 virus meant that we were only permitted outside for exercise for one hour a day. The skies cleared of aircraft, and there were almost no cars on the roads. Nature began to claim back some of the spaces that we had dominated for so long. It was on one of these permitted exercises that she sees another Tawny Owl. It was to become a regular sighting on her and her partner’s walks.

Their walks start to take longer so they can enjoy seeing these birds, they notice the bird songs from others too, downloading an app to help them identify the songs.

Her three tips for seeing owls:

1. 1. Live near them
2. Walk around at different times
3. Pay attention.

They then spot two owlets, one sadly has fallen from a nest box, and they can see the other in the next box as it moves around. They then find a dead owl and she buries it in her garden and then worries as to whether there won’t be another to take over the territory. She needn’t have worried as there is another in the area come the next spring.

It feels like her heart is full of owls.

One of her fears when younger was being afraid of being in the dark. She needed a night light for a long time. She moved to London, and it was never dark there. However, moving to the Lake District was where she learnt to love the dark and all the creatures that inhabit the night.

Atkin is someone who needs space. She can spend time with people, but it takes mental energy that she doesn’t always have. Tawny’s are similar. They come together to raise a brood, but it affects them both and they need to be apart for the rest of the year.

She sees the owlets again. But there are three of them this time. She learns what they can do at that age, and it reminds her of her own limitations with the body that she has. She is often thought of as a night owl, being most lucid between 10 pm and 2 am. She stays in bed until late morning, which can make very early medical appointments a tough call.

As the owlets begin to fledge, they leave the nest book. Atkin has to look very carefully for them now, as they just disappear as they branch hop. It is a learning process, though, and she develops the skills to find other owls in her local area. It can be incredibly frustrating, though, as they are rarely in the same place each time, and that ability to vanish doesn’t help! They are becoming more independent, but will still snuggle together for security. It won’t be long before their parents drive them away to make their own way in the world.

I liked this book a lot. Her previous book concentrated on her chronic illness, but this feels more like a nature diary that has been transformed into narrative prose. The chapters are short and focused, concentrating on a moment that is important to her at that particular time. It reads very differently from other nature memoirs that I feel can be contrived. What comes across in this is her feeling of wonder for these beautiful birds and the empathy she has in wanting them the survive and thrive. Great stuff.

5 out of 5 stars

The publisher provided a copy of this, free of charge, in return for an honest review.

My parents are both from London, my father was born next to a pub in Fulham and my mother was born in the Royal Borough of Kensington. Her mother was a Cockney and all my grandparents lived in London in Putney and the Wandsworth Bridge Road. London has always had a special place in my heart.

I have always loved the names of some of the areas in London, Ladbrook Grove, Perivale, Cricklewood, Cockfosters and of course Burnt Oak.

The Elms family are Londoners through to their very core. He can trace his family back to Fredrick Elms, son of Eliza and father unknown and who was delivered in the Uxbridge Union Workhouse in 1862. Further digging into the roots of his family tree would lead back to Wiltshire. It adds fuel to his theory that as people migrate into London, they settle in the part of the city that faces the part of the country they come from.

His family is a blend of this London Mix along with dashes of Romany and Yiddish. For their sins, they are all almost supporters of QPR…

It just goes to show that all that cockney bollocks about Bow Bells is just that: Londoners are Londoners; choose the streets and they will shape you.

This is a book about memories, and he remembers the significant buildings from his childhood. They have been torn down, and London constantly reinvents itself. Cinemas are now evangelical churches. He almost never went to the theatre. Re recalls those who would do card tricks on the public and would always win. He mentions those dodgy shops that looked like they were selling quality goods, until you opened the plastic bag that they had sold you and realise that it was just crap inside.

London used to be full of secrets. If you lived there, you knew them almost by osmosis. There are less secrets now everything can be found on a search engine, but some can still be found if you know where to look.

He witnessed things that were eye-opening in different parts of the capital and is scared for life after a football exhibition that he went to. I thought that the chapter on travelling around London is great. It also shows just how effective a properly thought-out and subsidised transport system is. It is the lifeblood of this city.

His chapter about food in London is excellent. It brought back so many memories of my childhood food. I even ate in the Won Kei restaurant in Chinatown in my late teens. I remember the waiters being brusk and abrupt, but thankfully don’t remember them waving cleavers at us!

The swirl of different cultures in the city meant that life wasn’t always rosy. He documents some of the wilder moments of city life, including football matches where violence would erupt around him. This was a time where a single moment could become a trigger point and recounts a memory watching a battle between miners and the police; they both paused and separated to let a family pass, before carrying on scrapping again.

London will definitely exhaust you, but you can never exhaust London.

Elms particularly likes London at night. The darkness hides the grime, and the neon lights brighten the place up. He knew, though, that it could be deadly, even though most of the time the nights out were dark and anarchic and feral and fun. AS he reached his teenage years, he discovered music and the sexual awakening that came along with it. The evenings out now are much more expensive and he missed the fug that hung around in the rooms. These places had a lot of character and not a lot of decorum…

Some people never leave London. His aunt Nell died in the same house where she was born 90 years earlier. Those who do find a reason to leave often end up at the coast to gaze at the waves.

Elms thinks that London is the greatest city in the world. He is certain of this as he has lived in Spain for a period and always returned to his home city. Where you live in London is important to Londoners; small distances make for big differences. But where to live when he leaves home, so many options and ironically so few choices. He ends up living with Sade (!!) for a while until fame pulls her away from him.

But what is most evident throughout this book is that London is his home, and it is as much a part of him and his family as they are a part of London.

As much as I love Dorset, London still has a special place in my heart. This book is a love letter to his favourite city, his home city. It is a wonderful book, I loved it. It is full of details of London that only someone who spends 24 hours a day there and has lived their life in this city. I would urge you to get a copy and read this as soon as you can.

I know I am now chasing shadows, know that this wonderous warren is not the shameful, disgraceful, lustrous, lustful place it once was, but then nor am I.
This is my home town. My home, my town.

4 out of 5 stars

I am old enough to have to have grown up in the 1970s and 1980s. I grew up in leafy Surrey and the north then for me was a place that was almost a foreign country. Catherine was growing up in the north, and had all the pressures of life there to contend with and this is her story of her time.

Beginning in 1976, a summer I remember being so very hot and long, it would be the last time she would spend with both her parents at their home in Sheffield. Having parents that had separated and divorced back in those days was really unusual, it would be a while before I would find out that my dad is a divorcee.

I remember the Yorkshire Ripper being a news story at the time. He claimed he was offering a public service by ridding society of certain types of women. He killed at will, with women of any profession, though and was a brutal psychopath. It was horrible but not a threat to a lad growing up in Surrey. For Taylor and her contemporaries, the threat was real, so much so that she wasn’t allowed to walk home alone.

What we did have in common was the spectre of nuclear Armageddon. For me, the fear was real, and as the two super powers jostled for supremacy. I thought I would hear that public announcement, ‘Mine is the last voice you will ever hear’ For Taylor, though, she was seduced by the non-violent protest at Greenham Common by thousands of women. She is an extra in the film Threads, a story about a nuclear strike on Britain, and to be honest, it sounds pretty grim. It horrified the audience that watched it in 1984

This isn’t just a story of the age, though; this is a personal memoir. We read about the relationships that came and went and friendships that deepened. She goes to University and works part-time in a knife factory. She has major health issues that she is convinced she is not going to survive.

Life, thankfully, continued, but she had an unexpected pregnancy. Taylor is going to have to make some difficult decisions. As her degree finishes, she applies for a job in a bookshop. She got the job along with another girl and began work in the travel section, She really wanted to work in fiction where she could put her English degree fully to use. At the end of the trial period, only one of them would be kept on though.

In amongst all of this, there is a tragedy. A friend of hers, Rosa, who she shared a house with, dies, Theo out pouring of grief from friends and family makes for painful reading. Her life is punctuated with the events of the time that I remember, too. Where and when I heard them was a different context to her, but they were equally memorable for me as well.

This is an honest and raw memoir. Taylor had a tough life emotionally, and this is eloquently recounted in this book. It also shows that we all have a story to tell, not just the rich and famous and that these stories need to be heard by everyone. This is well worth reading.