Category: Blog Tour (Page 1 of 9)

Welcome to Halfman, Halfbook for my stop on the Blog Tour for Oaklore by Jules Acton and published by Greystone Books.

About the Book

What connects Robin Hood, the history of ink, fungi, Shakespeare and sorcery? In Oaklore, Jules Acton, an ambassador for The Woodland Trust, explores the incredibly diverse history of the ‘king of the woods’: from a source of food and shelter to its use in literature as a plot device and muse, its role as an essential ingredient in ink, and in mythology from across the British Isles as a sacred plant and precious resource. Acton’s infectious enthusiasm shines through in chapters that open with excerpts from oak-y poems, as well as tips for connecting with nature – like how to recognize bird songs and help moths and butterflies thrive. Meeting fellow oak-lovers along the way, and trees like Sherwood Forest’s Medusa Oak or the gargantuan Marton Oak in Cheshire, Acton plots an unforgettable journey through the tangled roots of the oak’s story, and that of Britain itself.

About the Author

JULES ACTON – whose surname means ‘oak place’ – can trace her love of nature back to childhood. A former journalist, she has worked for the Woodland Trust, the Wildlife Trusts and WaterAid. She lives near Sherwood Forest, Nottinghamshire, with her husband, Toby, and rescue dog, Pepe. This is her first book.

My Review

I love being in a woodland, especially in spring and early summer when the sunlight filters through the leaves, dappling the floor with light. Equally good is finding a really old single tree this planet for several of our lifetimes.

Like Acton, I have a particular fondness for oak trees and similar to her too, my surname means oak, coming from the French le Chene. These are long-lived trees; it is said that an oak takes 300 years to grow, 300 years to live and 300 years to die. Though there are a select few that have even outlived this.

This book by Acton is a celebration of these magnificent trees and all the stories and folklore associated with them. She tells of how there are more ancient oaks in the UK (100) than there are in the whole of mainland Europe (85). This is one of the few positives left over from the feudal system that we have lived under for 1000 years or so.

Oaks are capable of supporting up to 2300 different species. They are probably not all on the same tree though! There are purple hairstreaks that live at the top of the canopy, so you have to look very hard to see them. They support a variety of different types of gall wasps, whose homes have been used to make ink for hundreds of years. These are just two of the 1178 different invertebrates that can be found on or in the oak.

If you like lichen, then an oak is the place to look. She has written a whole chapter on these algae and fungi hybrids, and even the Remedy Oak near me in Wimborne gets a mention. Fungi aren’t always funguys though, some of the ones found on oaks can either feed or kill you depending on the one that you pick…

Oaks are pretty resilient, hence why they live for such a long time in the right places. There are diseases out there that can affect them, but they thankfully haven’t suffered in the same way that elms and ash have. They can’t live the length of time that they do without some help and they rely on the whole menagerie of creatures and plants on them to help them survive. Even an oak that has lived 900 years, when it dies can still support a different set of creatures for another century or so.

Don’t think that they are all in good health though. We have really low tree cover compared to mainland Europe (13% versus 30%) and only 7% of the forests and woodlands that we have are in good condition, I found this quite shocking.

I thought that this was a really engaging natural history book. Acton is very enthusiastic about her chosen subject of the oak, but she is keen to point out that she is not an expert. If you are keen to read a natural history book that doesn’t have the personal backstory you may find elsewhere, then this is a good book to start with.

Don’t forget to visit the other blogs on the blog tour

Buy this at your local independent bookshop. If you’re not sure where your nearest is then you can find one here

My thanks to Anne Cater from Random Things Tours for the copy of the book to read.

Welcome to Halfman, Halfbook for my stop on the Blog Tour for Vagabond by Mark Eveleigh and published by Summersdale.

About the Book

This incredible true story of one man’s 1,225-km hike across the Iberian Peninsula is a celebration of rural Spain along the road less travelled.

Inspired by a nomadic “vagabundo” he met decades ago, travel writer Mark Eveleigh eschews the fast pace of modern life and sets off on a solo hike 1,225 km across the Iberian Peninsula – from Gibraltar in the far south to Estaca de Bares, Spain’s most northerly tip – carrying just a backpack and a hammock.
Hiking through sleepy siesta-hour plazas, shady cork forests and heat-shimmering plains, the hours would be long, dusty and hot. But, as Mark passes through the many small villages and communities en route, his trek comes to be characterized most of all by the sharing of stories, the true kindness of strangers, and the unbridled freedom of the open road.

Recounting Mark’s fascinating nomadic journey through Spain’s least-visited region, Extremadura, Vagabond is a homage to the disappearing lifestyle of the vagabundo, as well as a celebration of rural Spain and its forgotten communities. It reminds us of the value of slowing down and finding connection with others, and the beauty that can be found in taking life one step at a time.

About the Author

British writer Mark Eveleigh bases himself between Bali and South Africa when he’s not chasing travel stories for the likes of the BBC, CNN, National Geographic Traveller and The Telegraph. He spent 16 years living in Spain and returned recently to fulfil his ambition to hike coast-to-coast – the long way – across the country with a backpack and his trusty hammock.

My Review

People have been walking across Spain for hundreds of years. The vast majority are following the well trodden pilgrim trails to add meaning to their personal faith; the Camino de Santiago is probably the best known of them.

Eveleigh wants to walk through Spain, but not on a pilgrimage. He is partly inspired by Laurie Lee but mostly by a nomadic vagabundo he met a number of years ago on a train, This man followed the same route that took him through the same towns and villages every two years.

Eveleigh has just passed his 5oth and felt the urge to travel again. He heads back to Spain where he spent 20 years of his life. He chose his route from Gibraltar to Estach de Bares and decided to walk over the summer when the daylight hours were the longest. He was going to go super lightweight with a hammock to sleep in and a plastic cover should there be any rain.

It felt a bit reckless but it was something that he needed to get out of his system.

Passing through the border between Gibraltar and Spain gave the first Brexit benefit as he now had to have his passport stamped. It would be 1.5 million steps before he would see the sea again. The walk out of Gibraltar felt uphill for the first 100 Km. One of his first mornings in Spain he wakes in his hammock that is tied between two olive trees and all he can hear is the sounds of bells and goats bleating.

Some of the distances that he undertakes each day are huge, he mentions reaching 43 km on some days and at one point in the book he says that he has walked nine marathons in eleven days. These long hikes each day mean that even the top notch boots he has can’t stop the plethora of blisters on both feet. Couple that with walking through one of the hottest summers on record in Europe, where the temperatures would kill thousands.

He had a routine of walking early in the morning, finding shade in the hottest part of the day, and walking later into the evening. The search for water would be constant. He finds some amazing places to each for what sounds like pennies, but often turns up just as they have stopped serving food for the day!

I really liked this book. Eveleigh is a generous man taking time to find out a little of the people he meets and places he passes through. I don’t think he slowed down for this walk at all; he was covering huge distances each day on his trek. I liked his minimal approach so he could get as close to the hobo lifestyle as he could, but he did have the luxury of a bank card, which most hobo’s wouldn’t have. IT is quite amusing in parts, I particularly thought his account of being caught singing in the middle of the road by a peloton was hilarious. Well worth reading.

Don’t forget to visit the other blogs on the blog tour

Buy this at your local independent bookshop. If you’re not sure where your nearest is then you can find one here

My thanks to Anne from Random Tours for the copy of the book to read.

Some other books on Spain I can recommend:

Slow Trains Around Spain by Tom Chesshyre
As I Walked Out One Midsummer Morning by Laurie Lee
As I Walked Out Through Spain in Search of Laurie Lee by P. D. Murphy
My Midsummer Morning: Rediscovering a Life of Adventure by Alastair Humphreys

Welcome to Halfman, Halfbook for my stop on the Blog Tour for The Volunteers by Carol Donaldson and published by Summersdale.

About the Book

When Carol’s world suddenly unravels, leaving her single and jobless, she stumbles upon an unexpected opportunity: leading a ragtag team of countryside conservation volunteers. At first glance, the prospect of nurturing Britain’s diverse wildlife in the great outdoors seems like a dream come true. However, reality paints a different picture: her office is a ramshackle porta- cabin overrun with mice and plagued by leaky ceilings, and the volunteers are far from impressed with her lack of practical skills.
Despite this rocky beginning, Carol gradually earns the respect of her eclectic group of volunteers, forging a tight-knit community that will grow to become essential to each member. This diverse group spans generations, from twenty-somethings to septuagenarians, with each of them looking to get something different out of volunteering, whether it’s a sense of purpose, a fresh start in life or a tick on their community service form. They also bring their unique quirks and life experiences to the mix.
Volunteer days soon evolve into the highlight of Carol’s week, as they bond over their love of nature, mental health battles, and the desire for companionship. As they work together outdoors, the team discover a simple yet powerful recipe for self-confidence, improved well- being and a newfound perspective on life’s challenges. This journey not only brings solace and new joys to Carol’s weeks, but eventually it helps her move on with her life, too.
The Volunteers is a heartwarming tale that celebrates the redemptive force of the woods and wildlife. It underscores the universal need for belonging and illustrates how, even in the most unexpected places, we can find a community to call our own.

About the Author

Carol Donaldson is a writer and naturalist. Originally from Essex, she has worked for many of Britain’s best wildlife charities and currently works as a freelance ecologist advising farmers across Kent and Essex to restore wetlands and rivers and manage land for waders. Her first book, On the Marshes, was published by Little Toller in 2017. She is a regular contributor to the Guardian travel pages and was BBC Wildlife Magazine’s Travel Writer of the Year in 2011. Carol lives in a very old and slightly crumbling house in Kent and enjoys wild swimming and dancing the Argentine Tango.

My Review

Donaldson’s plans had come to an abrupt end one Christmas Eve when she found out about her partner’s affair. He unkindly told her that it had been over for ages, but didn’t even think that it might have been the right thing to do and mention it to her before…

To add to her woes was her employment situation. It was a massive blow to her self-confidence and she was unsure of the route to take. She was sitting counting geese, a little freelance work that she had picked up, when her phone rang, It was the guy who had interviewed her last week and her was offering her the job. The money wasn’t what she was hoping for, but he wasn’t going to budge on that, but it was something. She accepted.

Her main task in the new position would be to manage the volunteers for the Kingsdown Partnership. The people would be looking after the habitats on council-owned land. She would be working out of a pretty dilapidated set of portacabins that leaked a lot and had a bit of a problem with mice.

The people that she was responsible for were a motley crew. They came from a range of different backgrounds. A lot of them were troubled in some way or other, with their own backstories and often a lot of baggage. However, this new role was a steep learning curve.

But they were a good bunch and mostly all seemed to get along. They could teach her as much as she could teach them. They didn’t take long to accept her. They had particular skills they were good at and she had to learn who was best at doing what task. That balance of skills and working with each other’s strengths and weaknesses meant they grew stronger and could support each other through the ups and downs of modern life.

What wasn’t helping her was her new boss… He wants her to clear her to-do list each month but is continually adding things to it without caring how long things take and not realising that it is an almost impossible task to do everything. As the portacabin collapses around them, it all comes to a head one day and she is signed off for two weeks.

Donaldson doesn’t know if she will have a job at the end. And if she doesn’t she is really going to miss her team of volunteers.

This is a touching story of a bunch of people from a diverse range of backgrounds coming together for society and the natural world and most importantly for each other. It is a story about friendships, companionship and mutual support and is full of life’s joys and tragedies. It will make you smile and maybe cry a little as you read it. I really liked it and can thoroughly recommend it.

Don’t forget to visit the other blogs on the blog tour

Buy this at your local independent bookshop. If you’re not sure where your nearest is then you can find one here

My thanks to Anne of Random Things Tours for the copy of the book to read.

Welcome to Halfman, Halfbook for my stop on the Blog Tour for All Boats are Sinking by Hannah Pierce and published by Summersdale.

About the Book

All Boats Are Sinking is a memoir of love, life and chaos on a narrowboat, perfect for fans of Dolly Alderton, Helen Fielding and Phoebe Waller-Bridge

“All boats are sinking, Hannah, just at different rates.”

After a break-up, some hit the gym; some cut their hair; others have a one-night stand. In the aftermath of her break-up, Hannah bought a narrowboat.

Newly single and plunged into life on the water, Hannah had to learn quickly how to grapple with exploding toilets, disappearing hulls, and the curious glances and questions from pedestrians on the towpath. But when career burn-out, a global pandemic and an ill-advised rebound relationship threatened to sink her, Hannah felt the need to escape. In a bid to let go of the past and restore her sense of self-worth, she embarked on a narrowboat odyssey which took her from the bustling streets of London to the tranquil yet dramatic waterways of West Yorkshire.

Suffering from an apparent magnetism to drama but buoyed by her brilliant friends, Hannah tells of the challenges of off-grid life as a single 30-something on the water. All this as she tries to balance the tension between owning her singledom and giving in to a deep desire to find love.

Peppered with lists, recipes, maps, footnotes and diagrams, and spanning hundreds of miles of the British waterways, it’s an uplifting and often hilarious story of adventure and personal growth, and of a woman trying to keep her boat and life afloat. And to answer that perennial yes, it’s cold on the boat in winter.

About the Author

Hannah Pierce has worked as an actor, pub manager, events promoter and live music programmer. She wrote, produced and performed in several theatre shows for young people and adults. Her one-woman theatre show on the valiant adventures of an online dater received critical acclaim. This is her first book.

My Review

Her relationship had been unravelling for a while and now it was finished. When there was no more to say, she stood up and left the flat. It was over and untangling thier lives would take time, but in this exact moment, she had nowhere to live. It was time to call on some friends for help.

Piece knew that she would never be able to afford to live in London by herself. Just a flat in certain areas of London costs at least £1200 a month, well beyond her means. Then she remembered her friend, Megan. She had started a theatre company with her a while ago, and while that had now finished, they remained friends, but Megan was living in London on a narrow boat. Perhaps that was an affordable option and a way of staying in London?

She mentioned it to her mum who is slightly aghast at the thought of it. After a little while they come around to the idea, so much so that her dad is doing all sorts of research on narrow boats. The hunt for a suitable boat begins and they find one that looks ideal. So she is the proud owner of Argie Bargie.

Living on a narrow boat brings a lot of delights and an equal number of challenges. One of the conditions of living on the London waterways is that you have to move every fortnight to a new mooring and it has to be a minimum distance away from the previous mooring. She had to do regular maintenance on the vessel, ensure that the prop was clear, learn how to steer the boat and to operate the locks on the canals.

She begins to fall in love with the way of life on the canals. Not only is it a low-cost way of living in the capital, but she starts to form meaningful friendships with other narrowboat owners. Romance is again in the air, as she begins to get involved with one of her managers at work. Life was very much on the up compared to a few months ago.

But life has a way of throwing curve balls. This curveball was one that was going to affect the entire planet. The pandemic had arrived…

The lockdown that was imposed on the country meant that movements on the canal were suspended, she could only move to get waste and dispose of waste. This meant that she could get to know her nautical neighbours so much better. They had each other’s back too, helping where they could in this uncertain time. She was made redundant from her job, but that was then revoked as the company furloughed the staff instead, Life was suddenly very different for her.

Having this extra time gave her time to think about and reconsider lots of things going on in her life. She wanted to head out of London on the canals and go north to visit her brother and his family. She also had to consider her current relationship as the guy she had hooked up with sounded an unpleasant type who was using his senior position to exploit her and others.

I thought that this was an enjoyable book full of Pierce’s watery escapades. Not everything that she does goes smoothly, and that makes for entertaining reading, but she does convey just how much fun it can be on a narrowboat. If you like travel books with more of an emphasis on the people and their relationships and interactions then this book is going to be right up your canal…

Don’t forget to visit the other blogs on the blog tour

Buy this at your local independent bookshop. If you’re not sure where your nearest is then you can find one here

My thanks to Anne Cater of Random Things Tours for the copy of the book to read.

Welcome to Halfman, Halfbook for my stop on the Blog Tour for Teatime at Peggy’s by Clare Jenkins and Stephen McClarence and published by Journey Books (Bradt).

About the Book

A warm, humorous and evocative celebration of the eccentric, time-warped and fast-disappearing Alice in Wonderland world of one of India’s most endangered communities: the 150,000-strong Anglo-Indians (mostly descendants of British men and Indian women).

For 15 years, award-winning travel writer Stephen McClarence and his BBC Radio journalist wife Clare Jenkins regularly visited Jhansi, the railway town in Uttar Pradesh that inspired Bhowani Junction, John Masters’ classic 1954 tale of Anglo-Indian life during Partition. There they spent hours ‘down the rabbit hole’ with Peggy Cantem – ‘Aunty Peggy’ as she was known throughout the town, daughter and widow of railwaymen, overseer of the European cemetery with its 66 Mutiny graves and ‘dancing and prancing peacocks’ – and with her great friend Captain Royston (Roy) Abbott, ‘The Rajah of Jhansi’, possibly India’s last British landowner and ‘more British than the Brits’.

In Peggy’s tiny, crowded ground-floor flat, she and her friends would reflect on Anglo-Indian life then and now: the dances (waltzes, foxtrot, jive), amateur dramatics, May Queen balls (Anglo-Indian women were famed for their beauty), meals of Mulligatawny soup, toad-in-the-hole and ‘railway lamb curry’.

Those friends included the ladylike Gwen, scooter-riding Buddie, Cheryl with her ‘hotchpotch’ ancestry, Winston Churchill-reciting Pastor Rao, Peggy’s tiny and impoverished maid May, her cook Sheela and auto-rickshaw driver Anish. Conversations covered Monsoon Toad Balls (to find ‘the most hideous-looking man’), moonlight picnics in the jungle, pet mongooses, the British Royal Family… They also covered the history of the minority Anglo-Indian community, once designated an OBC (Other Backward Caste).

The only community in India with the word ‘Indian’ in its name, it’s now in danger of dying out. There are only 30 Anglo-Indian families left in Jhansi, many officially below the poverty line. Their first language is English, they often dress Western-style and their homes could be in the 1950s Home Counties, were it not for the mounted tiger heads alongside the Sacred Heart fridge magnets, the aviaries of parakeets outside, the three plaster flying ducks inside, the pictures of Buckingham Palace embroidered on the antimacassars. Teatime at Peggy’s is a valuable addition to the history & literature of this fast-dwindling community.

About the Authors

Stephen McClarence is an award-winning travel writer whose work has appeared in The Times, Sunday Times, Daily and Sunday Telegraph, Daily and Sunday Express, Yorkshire Post, National Geographic Traveler and DestinAsian magazine. A finalist in (and winner of) numerous travel writing awards, he won the major National Daily Travel Writer of the Year award for a Times article about Ramji, a rickshaw driver he met in Varanasi. He has also reviewed books for The Times and been an exhibiting photographer.

Clare Jenkins has been a regular contributor to Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour, including reporting on women’s lives in India. She has also made hundreds of features and documentaries for BBC Radio, including some from India, latterly via her production company, Pennine Productions.  These include a half-hour programme about Jhansi’s Anglo-Indians, broadcast in 2015 and also called Teatime at Peggy’s – https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b05tpwc7

She has previously published books about women’s relationships with Roman Catholic priests, and people’s experiences of bereavement, and is a member of the Oral History Society.

Teatime at Peggy’s is a joint project, although the narrative is written in Stephen’s voice. The couple, who have visited India regularly for over 20 years, are now working on a sequel, about their encounters with other people in India who have British connections.

My Review

Auntie Peggy was the President of Jhansi’s Anglo-Indian Association. She was the nerve centre of this vast number of people and kept the community together, and even attracted attention from literary luminaries such as Sir Mark Tully and William Dalrymple. Her house was a jumble of things she had accumulated over the years, but it was a warm and welcoming home.

The area has a lot of ghostly echoes of the past, no one at the hotel they were staying at knew what ‘Cheese Gatwick’ was as no one had ordered it in living memory. They visit one of the last British residents in the area, a Captain N.R Abbot. He is one of the last of the Raj that is still left, a tiny part of the past still going in the modern age. He loved living in India and was heavily involved in the community, supporting them in all sorts of projects and on a personal level.

It would be another year before they saw Abbot again, bringing with them some of his favourite Cracker Barrell cheese. They describe the pain and delights of the Indian railway system that they have to negotiate each time they visit the country. It makes our train system seem punctual… They had the full tour of his house and a trip to one of the 800 or so European (i.e. mostly British) cemeteries in the country before setting off on a five-hour journey to his farm.

Abbott had lived in India all his life apart from a brief period in the 1970s, but he found Britain too cold so moved back. He preferred the lifestyle in India and felt that living in the UK would give him less autonomy. He runs his farm and household with military efficiency, micro-managing every detail and being involved with every decision. The discipline is rigid, but he does look after his staff very well, paying for schools and other community projects.

Jenkins and McClarence return time and time again visiting Peggy and Roy, as they come to call him. They become friends but they never really feel that they know him completely.

On a later trip, they spend more time with Peggy. She is quite a character, full of in-depth knowledge about the Anglo-Indian community. Strangely though, here own family history is a little sketchy, she didn’t even know the names of all her siblings. She introduces them to Cheryl, another larger-than-life character with a mixed family history, and this is something that her own children have continued with their own cultural hotchpotch going on.

They become tourists for a bit in Orchha, a place favoured by hippies but is now inundated by coaches of tourists. They are soon back in Jhansi and are invited to an inauguration ceremony, but it isn’t until they get there and are seated in the front row, that they realise that they are the VIP guests.

On each of the trips back to the region, they learn that the Anglo-Indian community is slowly diminishing and they are integrated into the wider Indian population. They have never really fitted in, and have always been considered one of the lower castes. But the change isn’t all bad, it is just bringing different opportunities and challenges.

On their frequent trips to India they take the time to visit other parts of the country and in one of the places they visit, Anand, they learn about the ritual of ‘cowdust time’. Each trip always ends up in Jhansi and time to catch up with Roy and Peggy. Every time they see them they are a little more frail and showing their age.

I really liked this book. It has a certain charm, helped greatly by the main people that the book focuses on, Peggy and Roy. Jenkins and McClarence have captured their personalities really well as well as the delights and frustrations of India, from the trains, the squalor and the consistent exuberance of the locals. Like all good travel books that I have ever read, this captures the spirit of the place exceptionally well. I felt that I have learnt a little more of the real India in this briefest of glimpses.

Don’t forget to visit the other blogs on the blog tour

Buy this at your local independent bookshop. If you’re not sure where your nearest is then you can find one here

My thanks to Anne at Random Things Tours for the copy of the book to read.

Welcome to Halfman, Halfbook for my stop on the Blog Tour for Mystic Orchards by Jonathan Koven and published by Kelsay Books.

About the Book

Mystic Orchards is a collection of spellbinding poems and hybrid pieces. Exploring cultural heritage and identity, the shared pain and joy of family, art, reality, memory, and true love; these pages confront a dream. Visiting the orchards is a journey from the darkness of fear toward hope, from total stillness back into the tumult of life.

About the Author

Author Photo

Jonathan Koven grew up on Long Island, NY. He holds a BA in English and Creative Writing from American University, works as a technical writer, and reads chapbooks for Moonstone Arts. He lives in Philadelphia with his wife Delana, and their cats Peanut Butter and Keebler. He has both fiction and poetry published by Assure Press, Animal Heart Press, Thirty West Publishing, and more. Read Jonathan’s poetry debut Palm Lines (2020), available from Toho Publishing. His fiction debut Below Torrential Hill (2021) is also available, a winner of the Electric Eclectic Novella Prize.

My Review

Poetry is a very personal thing for me. For a long time it felt like a school exercise, but over the past few years I have been trying to read more widely and have discovered lots of different poets since picking them poetry collections up again a few years ago.

But where to start? Well, you could go for one of the recognised classic collections, or you could explore the more modern collections, such as Mystic Orchards by Jonathan Koven. This is a very personal collection with a mix of poetry styles and short prose pieces that tease out his cultural heritage and the joy and pain of families, love, art and his idenity.

The lyrical prose felt like I was reading a series of dreams and it felt very personal, almost intimate. Even though I didn’t understand the context of some of the poems in this collection, they often resonated because of his choice of words and his openness in the subjects covered.

Some of the lines are particularly beautiful, these were some that stood out:

of wish maker gone
to the water a wanderer turned water strider

To draw maps of light
As it reaches this rock

Outside
Bonded
inside,
fragments left
for a new self.

I liked the variety of forms in the collection, short poems, longer stanza’s and short prose work really well with his chosen subjects. Family is a bit subject, but I also liked that themes from natural world permeated lots of the poems, wolves, fireflies, elms and rivers all get a mention as you read the collection. Overall I though that this was a thoroughly enjoyable collection.

Three Favourite Poems

Future Is Older Than The Past
Ineffable
Reason On The Horizon

Don’t forget to visit the other blogs on the blog tour

Buy this at your local independent bookshop. If you’re not sure where your nearest is then you can find one here

My thanks to Isabelle Kenyon, from Kenyon Author Services for a copy of the book to read.

Welcome to Halfman, Halfbook for my stop on the Blog Tour for More Numbers Every Day by Micael Dahlén & Helge Thorbjørnsen and published by Monoray.

About the Book

How many steps have you done today?
How many emails answered?
How much money have you spent this week
And how many hours have you slept?

Welcome to the numberdemic, where a deluge of figures, stats and data manipulate your every move. From the way you work, date and exercise to the products you buy and the news you read, numbers have worked their way into every part of our lives. But is life better this way? How are all of those numbers affecting us?

With fascinating, sometimes frightening and sometimes shrewdly funny research, behavioural economists Micael Dahlen and Helge Thorbjørnsen explain why we’re so attached to numbers and how we can free ourselves from their tyranny. Along the way, you’ll learn why viral videos, however inaccurate, become more convincing with every view; how numbers can affect the way we physically age, if we let them; why the more films you rate the less impressive you’ll find them and how numbers that ‘anchor’ themselves in your brain can affect the size of your mortgage – plus much more.

Sharp, insightful and totally engaging, MORE. NUMBERS. EVERY. DAY. is your vaccination against a world obsessed with numbers.

About the Authors

Micael Dahlen is Professor at the Stockholm School of Economics, with a particular interest in what makes us happy. He is the author of several books and an acclaimed public speaker.

Helge Thorbjørnsen is Professor of Marketing at the Norwegian School of Economics. He is curious about human behaviour and decision-making, particularly when technology is involved.

My Review

Do you remember the days when the only way that you would find out that a restaurant wasn’t that great was if you had been yourself or a close friend had recommended that you avoid it. Now you can google a town and find all the places that you might want to eat at and alongside everyone is a rating that a member of the public has graded it. We naturally gravitate towards those that have a higher rating because that’s where we feel we will have the better experience.

But what if the number that you are seeing isn’t telling the whole truth? Have the glowing five-star reviews been placed by friends of the owner? Have the dreaded one-star ratings been added by rivals with the intention of making their own establishments seem better by comparison?

What is real and what is pure manipulation on the part of the algorithm? Welcome to the numberdemic…

In this entertaining book, Micael Dahlén & Helge Thorbjørnsen talk about how the obsession with numbers for absolutely everything in our lives is beginning to cause problems and how we can be aware of it and make those subtle adjustments to free ourselves from this new tyranny.

Coving all manner of subjects from how the number a sportsman wears can affect his performance, the age when we suddenly feel older, how the number of likes on a social media channel is affecting the mental health of teenagers obsessed with how their image is projected to the wider world. Numbers can affect our health too, from step counting every day, to wanting to beat personal bests each time we run or lift weights and they have sensible suggestions on how to manage your very personal data. They explore just how we can be swayed by numbers in our relationships and experiences, and just how true a number actually is.

I found this book an enlightening experience. The authors have an easygoing and entertaining style of prose, which for me made this hugely complex subject quite accessible rather than diminishing it. And most importantly it made me think about the way that I see this data when I am looking for something specific. I read, rate and review a lot of books, and giving the book that I have just read a mark out of five seems very mean sometimes. When looking at other reviews of books or items that I am going to buy, I have for a long time dismissed the glowing reviews and the ones slating the product as outliers and this book has given me a better insight into how to take the numbers we are presented with. As the quote goes, there are lies, dammed lies and statistics…

Don’t forget to visit the other blogs on the blog tour

Buy this at your local independent bookshop. If you’re not sure where your nearest is then you can find one here

My thanks to Anne Cater of Random Tours for the copy of the book to read.

Welcome to Halfman, Halfbook for my stop on the Blog Tour for Taxtopia by The Rebel Accountant and published by Monoray.

About the Book

The Rebel Accountant has broken ranks to share his journey from clueless naïf to skilled tax consultant – and in doing so blows the lid on the murky world of making the tax burdens of the ultra-wealthy disappear. In the topsy-turvy world of tax avoidance, you can get richer by buying a yacht, the world’s biggest exporter of coffee is Switzerland, and billionaires like Jeff Bezos, Donald Trump and the Duke of Westminster often pay less tax than you do.
Written with sharp wit and over-brimming with inside secrets, the anonymous author shows us that not only does the global tax system encourage dubious practice which favours the rich, but that it was specifically founded with that in mind.
If you suspect that tax is a rigged game, a con, designed to fleece the little guy, you are about to find out just how shockingly true that really is.

About the Author

No one knows the true identity of THE REBEL ACCOUNTANT… But we do know he’s a chartered tax advisor who has worked widely behind the scenes in London and Australia, everywhere from major accountancy firms to tiny start-ups. He chose his career because he loves to be creative.

My Review

Tax is one of those things that I have paid since I started working many many years ago. Every month without fail the PAYE pops its head up and snaffles a chuck of the money that I have earnt that month. I am not unhappy about it, it has after all paid for my three children to be educated at minimal cost to me, pays for the roads that I drive on and paid for the ongoing treatment that Sarah has had for cancer.

It is something that I am happy to pay for as I know that it has wider benefits for society as well as myself. There are a number of people though who want to enjoy similar benefits as I do. These people are often wealthy and regardless of the way that they have accumulated their money, do not want to be encumbered with taxation. If they are in that tiny group of people who are so mind-bogglingly rich that they are often very reluctant to part with any of their money at all.

The Rebel Accountant has been one of the professionals who has helped this class of people evade and avoid anything that looks like a tax. So much so that someone with vast sums can often pay much less tax than you do in a year. They do this in several ways, firstly by employing clever people to find the loopholes that in the extremely complex tax systems, secondly but just not bothering and most infuriatingly, they gamed the systems to ensure that the people who have to pay taxes are you and me and not them.

I think that was his intention for those reading this book to be made very angry. And having read it I can confirm that it does. The entire taxation system is utterly broken and it isn’t helped by the endemic corruption of our political system that helps those with money get more and keep more. This will be at the expense of our society too if steps are not taken to address it. Even given the subject matter, it is quite an entertaining read; he is that rarest of people, an accountant with a bone-dry sense of humour. There was never a point when he ventured into the arcane depth of tax law, rather it was kept at a level that almost everyone would be able to understand. Don’t read this and weep, read this and start to put pressure on our political leaders.

Don’t forget to visit the other blogs on the blog tour

Buy this at your local independent bookshop. If you’re not sure where your nearest is then you can find one here

My thanks to Anne Cater of Random Tours for the copy of the book to read.

Welcome to Halfman, Halfbook for my stop on the Blog Tour for These Envoys of Beauty by Anna Vaught and published by Reflex Press.

About the Book

These Envoys of Beauty is writing straight from the heart. Over twelve essays, Anna Vaught uses her relationship with the natural world to explore themes of loneliness, depression, and complex and sustained trauma within the family home, issues that shaped her early life and continue to have a far-reaching impact decades later.

Vaught writes about how she oriented herself to the natural world and lived within it while growing up in a rural home; about wishing trees, talking streams, and her early knowledge of plants, animals, and botanical names; about her passionate relationship, even when very young, with foraging and what was edible, how things smelled, licking the rain from leaves, drinking, growing, and cooking. She writes about how nature fed and feeds her imagination, and how it gave her hope of something different beyond the world she experienced as a child and young person.

About the Author

Anna Vaught is an English teacher, young people’s mentor, Creative Writing teacher and author of several books, including 2020’s novel Saving Lucia (Bluemoose) and short fiction collection, Famished (Influx).

Her shorter and multi-genre works are widely published in journals, magazines, anthologies and the national press. She has been a Bookseller columnist and still writes regularly for them, while she is currently a columnist for Mslexia. Her second short fiction collection, Ravished, was published by Reflex Press in 2022, and 2023 will see four books: memoir, These Envoys of Beauty (Reflex Press), new novel The Zebra and Lord Jones (Renard. UK and commonwealth; Zebra is currently on US submission), plus The Alchemy, her first book about writing.

Saving Lucia will be published in Italian by Milan’s 8tto edizioni as Bang Bang Mussolini. She is a guest university lecturer, tutor for Jericho Writers, super-nerd, volunteer with young people, mental health campaigner and has recently established the new #Curae prize for writer-carers with industry-wide support. She works alongside chronic illness and is a passionate campaigner for mental health provision, including in the publishing industry.

My Review

Slowly people are learning to reconnect with nature. Whether it is forest bathing, meditation or wild swimming, it has helped numerous people deal with the stresses and strains f modern life. For some people that connection has been a lifeline for almost all of their lives. Anna Vaught is one of those who have sought comfort in the world around her away from a horrid childhood and parents that barely loved her.

To have depression is, in my experience, to experience things through a glass darkly

In these twelve short essays, she takes us back from some of the trauma that she suffered as and child and into adulthood, and the methods and techniques and places that she used in trying to heal herself and her mind. She coped with all that that happening by examining in almost forensic detail the world around her, discovering that gorse flowers taste of coconut, smelling the spicy scent of a cowslip as she lies alongside it and burying her head in violets trying to shut away the world.

What you do not know until you grow up a bit more is that the world is full of weirdos like you: water lovers, chuggers in the mud, wailers in the field where the cows have been. That is an encouraging thought

Vaught is honest and open in her writing and this means that this is not the easiest book to read, but it is so worthwhile. There are lots of painful memories in here; it is bad enough reading about them, let alone imagining what it must be like to live through what she did. But there is also hope in here; each chapter is an exploration of her emotions and feeling as well as outlines on how she coped and got through it all. Might not be for everyone, but for those looking for a glimmer of light in a bleak place, this book may have some of the answers that you need.

I never wanted the answers: I wanted questions so big that you could not possibly find answers

Don’t forget to visit the other blogs on the blog tour

Buy this at your local independent bookshop. If you’re not sure where your nearest is then you can find one here

My thanks to Anne Cater of Random Tours for the copy of the book to read.

Welcome to Halfman, Halfbook for my stop on the Blog Tour for What’s For Dessert by Claire Saffitz and published by Murdoch Books.

About the Book

Claire Saffitz returns with 100 recipes for all dessert people―whether you’re into impressive-yet-easy molten lava cakes, comforting rice pudding, or decadent chestnut brownies.

In this all-new collection, Claire shares recipes for icebox cakes, pies, cobblers, custards, cookies and more, all crafted to be as streamlined as possible. (No stand mixer? No problem! You won’t need one.)

To keep the recipes straightforward and simple, Claire makes sure each recipe is extra efficient, whether you’re making a Whipped Tres Leches Cake with Hazelnuts or Caramel Peanut Popcorn Bars. Fans will find all the warmth, encouragement, and deliciously foolproof recipes with loads of troubleshooting advice that they’ve come to count on from Claire.

Baking recipes include:

• Salty Cashew Blondies
• Blood Orange Pudding Cake
• Easy Apple Galette
• Mango-Yoghurt Mousse
• Sticky Pumpkin-Chestnut Gingerbread
• Flourless Chocolate Meringue Cake
• No-Bake Strawberry Ricotta Cheesecake
• Banoffee Pudding

About the Author

My Review

I have a lot of cookery books at home, a whole bookshelf and others scattered elsewhere around the home. The shelf needs a bit of a tidy-up, but amongst the shelves are books that are well-thumbed and splattered; these are the ones that we most often turn to for everyday meals and special occasions. Some of them we have had for over thirty years now and they are part of our home.

When we head out as a family to eat we often have a starter, but rarely have them at home. What we do have at home a lot though, is cake and desserts. My daughter, Lauren, who is a brilliant baker will make something most weekends when she is home from university and this is a joint review with her cooking some of the cakes and me (and the rest of the family) eating them. It is great but it doesn’t help the waistline…

Anyway, to the book. The layout is very clear and the format is used on each of the recipes, making it easy to follow the process and find the ingredients. I particularly liked the grid at the beginning of the book that had each recipe with difficulty and time so if you wanted a dessert that took about an hour and was moderate in difficulty, you’d find one quickly. Each recipe has an introduction with anecdotes about ingredients or why it was chosen. Also useful is the equipment list and essential techniques that are used across a number of recipes in the book.

There are some lovely cake and dessert recipes in here, though as with any cookery book there are some that we felt that we would never make. We selected about 20 or so that really appealed and my daughter picked the ones that she wanted to make from that selection. I have taken pictures of two of the deserts that she made, Salty Cashew Blondies and Flourless Chocolate Meringue Cake:

Both were delicious and didn’t last long.

I think that this will be a book that we will return to again and again to cook our favourites.

Don’t forget to visit the other blogs on the blog tour

Buy this at your local independent bookshop. If you’re not sure where your nearest is then you can find one here

My thanks to Anne Cater of Random Things Tours for the copy of the book to read and cook from.