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On Borrowed Time by Graeme Hall

11/01/2021 / Paul / 0 Comments

Welcome to Halfman, Halfbook for my stop on the Blog Tour for On Borrowed Time by Graeme Hall and published by Rodrigues Court Press.

About the Book

On Borrowed Time is set in Hong Kong and Shanghai over the period 1996/1997 – including the handover of Hong Kong to China. The novel explores the choices that people have to make; in particular between doing what is easy and what is right.

In Hong Kong Emma Janssen discovers the truth behind the death of her brother four years earlier. Meanwhile, in Shanghai, a PhD student meets a woman with an unusual degree of interest in his research. These storylines converge at the time of the handover of Hong Kong to China in 1997, and Emma finds that she has to choose between revenge or the future happiness and safety of both herself and those close to her.

While being a work of fiction, On Borrowed Time is rooted in the author’s own experiences of living and working in Hong Kong from 1993 to 2010, in particular the final years of British rule and the transfer of sovereignty back to China.

About the Author

Author Photo

Graeme lived in Hong Kong from 1993 to 2010 and still keeps a close connection to the city. His first novel was set in Hong Kong and Shanghai over the period 1996/97 and most of his writing comes from his love of that part of the world. Graeme first visited Macau in 1993 and he quickly became fascinated by the oldest European settlement in Asia. His short story collection, ‘The Goddess of Macau’ was published in August 2020 by Fly on the Wall Press.

He has won the short story competitions of the Macau Literary Festival and the Ilkley Literature Festival, and his writing has been published in anthologies by Black Pear Press and the Macau Literary Festival. He is an active member of the Leeds Writers Circle whose members have been a constant source of advice, support and encouragement. Graeme lives in Calderdale, West Yorkshire with his wife and a wooden dog.

My Review

In Shanghai, Kwok-wah is slowly finding his feet. He forgoes doing a PhD in America, choosing to join Professor Ye in studying comparative algorithms in mobile data transmission. It was taking him a while to settle in, but playing basketball with the guys in his dorm was helping him with the language and not being seen as an alien.

The first time that Emma met Sam was when she became a temp at his office. He was an up and coming lawyer at the McShane Adams firm. She is there to cover for a short period of time and demonstrates that she is a cool efficient worker. Everyone wants to know who this new blonde in the Hong Kong office is, especially when he catches up with Kate and Rob for her birthday.

Emma headed out of the office to meet up with her friend, Alice, who had finally persuaded her to join a human rights group she was involved with. There she meets the small number of members that they have, including a tall Chinese lad called, Liang-bao. He had a good English accent and when Emma questioned him on it, he said that he had completed a masters in England and lived in Stepney.

Alice happens to be Kwok-wah’s cousin too and he is finding in Shanghai that he has attracted the attention of another student. She is a tall slender American-Chinese girl who is studying building sciences. He keeps seeing her around and one day she stops to say hello; it makes him miss the basket he is aiming for! They slowly get to know each other better as they spend more and more time together.

Emma is also in Hong Kong to see if she can find out more about her brother’s death in Hong Kong a few years earlier. He had been killed in a traffic accident and the guy jailed for his death had just been released, but Emma didn’t believe that he was the person really responsible. Susan is not just interested in Kwok-wah she also wants to find out more about the guy visiting the professor he works for. Slowly these six peoples lives become more intertwined as the story heads back to Hong Kong.

I am not a big reader of fiction and it has been a long time since I have read a thriller. I had read Hall’s book of short stories that were set in Macau and enjoyed this one, hence why I decided to give this go too. I must say that I liked it, it is a reasonable plot as he manages to tangle the six characters lives up as the story builds to the end. I liked the setting most of all. I have been fortunate to go to Hong Kong briefly a few times and he got the character of the city spot on, with the chaotic mash-up of London and China that it feels like. Worth a read if you like a different sort of thriller.

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 from Fly on the Wall Press for the copy of the book to read

Buzz by Thor Hanson

09/01/2021 / Paul / 0 Comments

3.5 out of 5 stars

Bees have been revered by humanity for generations, they have provided honey but most importantly have been key pollinators for the plants that we rely on for foods. Not just honey bees, but other pollinators that we rely on are the more solitary bees that we don’t notice as much. It is these bees that Thor Hanson concentrates on in this book, beginning 125 million years ago, when a wasp first dared to feed pollen to its young.

There are around 20,00 species of bee in the world today and even in the UK, we have 270 different species. Even though we most commonly see honey bees and bumblebees around, 250 of the bees in the UK are solitary bees, diggers, miners, leafcutters, and masons. If you know where to look then finding then isn’t difficult. I have found leafcutter bees in our garden, making homes in the holes in the brickwork of our garage.

Hanson is fascinated by them and is passing that fascination onto his son. He looks at how we have evolved with the help of these insects and how we are dependant on them for the food that we eat, going as far as to dissect a fast food meal to show what would be left if we didn’t have them pollinating flowers. There are photos of some of the species that he covers in the book, I never realise that there were iridescent blue bees, having always imagined them in the usual brown and yellow stripes.

It is an engaging book, Hanson is passionate about his little subjects and that is very evident from his prose. It is very US-centric, and if you want to read more about UK bees then I would recommend Dancing with Bees by Brigit Strawbridge Howard or any of Dave Goulson’s books.

My Books of 2020

08/01/2021 / Paul / 6 Comments

That wasn’t really the year that any of us were expecting at all. As grim as it has been I have still found some respite within the pages of books. These 14 books are my top reads of the year

The first three on my list are by the wonderful author, Terry Pratchett. The first two are the first in the Tiffany Aching sub-series of Discworld and the final one is his take on a riotous football match in the city of Ankh-Morpork. He is still one of my favourite authors.

One of the books that were in the category that I was judging at the beginning of the year for the Stanfords Travel Writing prize was Where There’s a Will by Emily Chappell. I did get to meet her there and she is modest and unassuming. It didn’t win the prize, that went to Rough Magic. However, this is one of the best and most intense cycling books that I have ever read.

Next on my best books of the year are four books from Eland. This publisher is one of my favourites as they plough on regardless unearthing the best travel books that have dropped off other publishers backlist. Two of them are set in World War 2 and are equally historical documents as well as the author’s reflection on the place that they working.

I am not sure that you would be able to recreate the journey that Nicolas Bouvier took now. Too many borders and conflict, but this is a snapshot on a world that seemed gentler and more tolerant. Brue Wannell is one of those people that we have fewer of these days. He was a traveller, linguist and Orientalist who knew so much about the history of the orient that he shared generously with all those that worked with him.

There are lots of books out there by cyclists and travellers who have been around the world for a variety of reasons, but this one by Stephen Fabes is one of the best that I have read. It is very different from Emily Chappell’s book as he doesn’t really rush, but takes time to see the people and places he is travelling through.

It is not often that we get a new young talent emerge onto the writing science, by Dara McAnulty is one who has taken the nature writing genre by storm this year, winning several prizes and showing that he is going to making an impact in years to come. Tim Dee is an author who has been around for many years and his latest, Greenery, continues his ability to form the same words that others use into wonderful forms.

Lev Parikian is a conductor who has rediscovered the natural world in his middle age. His first books, Why Do Birds Disappear was hilarious and Into The Tangle Bank continues that humourous way of looking a the natural world. On a completely different scale is Roy Vickery’s vast tome about the folklore and names and uses of British and Irish plants. It took me ages to read it, but it is a gold mine of a book that you can dip into again and again.

My book of 2020 is something very different, Unofficial Britain by Gareth Rees. We have a lot of history in this country and if you know where and how to look you can decipher the lumps and bumps in the landscape. What Gareth Rees does in this book is to get us to look at those places that you would normally ignore and shows how others are using them for their own particular ritual elements. It is a heady mix of folklore, history, landscape and cityscape writing and all built on the foundation of psychogeography.

The Lost Pianos of Siberia by Sophy Rogers

07/01/2021 / Paul / 2 Comments

3.5 out of 5 stars

Siberia is a vast place, in fact, 13 million square kilometres of bitterly cold tundra and has the briefest of summers. It has fifteen mountain ranges but is best known as the place where Russia has banished its people who for whatever reason didn’t fit the current political climate. It is a bleak and uncompromising landscape and has a grim history with what seems like almost countless deaths.

Even though the Soviets tried to eliminate the indigenous peoples some survived and people do choose to live there. Those that were banished to the Gulags never returned home to their home cities and brought some of their cultures with them. Sophy Rogers first came to realise that traces of their culture that they bought with them still existed in homes all over the landscape after a conversation with a talented pianist in a tent in Mongolia who didn’t have an instrument to play.

Until then, it hadn’t crossed her mind that people would have had the time or energy to play music, but it is something that runs deep in the Russian culture. She began looking for these pianos, and treks back and forwards across the continent from Khabarovsk to Sakhalin Island, Kamchatka to the Yamal Peninsula and even into the Siberian part of China

Some of these pianos have been long abandoned other which are still treasured possessions of their owners. The earliest pianos date back to the late 1700s and there are other more recent Russian made examples that she finds. Each of them has a story to tell, some about how they ended up in that part of the world, some about the people that first bought them there and other modern-day stories of their current owners, or perhaps custodians is the right word.

Some of the books that I have read about Siberia have been pretty tough going, one called the Road of Bones, in particular. This book has some of those stories, it has to really, the tragic loss of life permeates the landscape, but this is mostly about the people that tried to bright a little light, life and music to this place. What I liked the most about it was her tracing the stories of the people that made the very best of what they had there and how music can take away from some of the stresses. She has split her search into pre- Soviet, Soviet and post Soviet instruments. Even though it was written as a one-off trip, in actuality, it was a series of trips there and it felt a little disjointed at times.

The Truth About Christmas by Philip Ardagh

04/01/2021 / Paul / 0 Comments

3 out of 5 stars

As a child I grew up loving Christmas, there was something warm and comforting about it at the darkest time of the year. As an adult, I have grown more cynical as it has grown into something that starts as summer ends and the expectations of the perfect presents and food are forced on us.

A lot of the ‘traditions’ that we now participate in (not in 2020 though) are not actually that old. Christmas was banned under Cromwell, It was restored after King Charles was restored to the throne and then it fizzled out. In the Victorian age, Dickens and Prince Albert were two of the people who were key in making it a thing again.

This tiny little book has charming snippets of information about our modern Christmas and where the traditions that we now have originated from, what the first advent calendars were like, what mince pies actually contained, why there is a fairy at the top of the tree and gives me convincing reasons why we shouldn’t have sprouts. Great little stocking filler.

2020 Book Stats

03/01/2021 / Paul / 4 Comments

I finished 190 books in 2020, there were several reasons for dropping from my 2019 total; really busy at work and distracted by what seems to be even more pressing world events at the moment. I did reach my Good Reads Target though. Here are my stats for the last years reading.

My total pages read was 49347 and my monthly average of books was 17, just ahead of last years, 16.7. This broke down into these monthly totals:

January – 17

February – 16

March – 16

April – 16

May – 16

June – 16

July – 18

August – 17

September – 15

October – 15

November – 16

December – 12

The split of books read

Male Authors – 131

Female Authors – 59 i.e. 31% (This was 2% down on last year’s reading)

Review Copies – 94 (last year was 90)

Library Books – 42 (last year was 89)

Own Books– 54 (last year was 25)

Non-Fiction – 141 – 74.5%

Fiction – 25 – 13%

Poetry – 24 – 12.5%

Stars Awarded:

5 Stars – 14 Books
4.5 Stars – 21 Books
4 Stars – 79 Books
3.5 stars – 41 Books
3 stars – 27 Books
2.5 Stars – 4 Books
2 Stars – 3 Books
1.5 stars 0 Books
1 star – 0 Books

Genres

I use a spreadsheet to keep a note of the types and genres of books that I read. There are detailed below:

Travel	38
Natural History	26
Poetry	23
Memoir	13
Fiction	12
Science	9
Science Fiction	7
Fantasy	6
Landscape	5
History	5
Environmental	4
Miscellaneous	4
Language	3
Gardening	2
Britain	2
Maths	2
Politics	2
Biography	2
Craft	2
Psychology	2
Maps	1
Spying	1
Technology	1
Sport	1
Humour	1
Social History	1
Cricket	1
Reportage	1

Publishers

These are the number of books read by each publisher. The top eight are all independent publishers. Bloomsbury were top last year.

Eland	12
Faber & Faber	9
Elliott & Thompson	8
Canongate	8
Granta	7
Bloomsbury	6
Fly on the Wall Press	6
Little Toller	6
John Murray	6
Jonathan Cape	5
Saraband	5
Penguin	5
Picador	4
William Collins	4
Haus Publishing	4
Icon Books	3
Chelsea Green Publishing	3
Allen Lane	3
Cinnamon Press	3
Sandstone Press	3
Corgi	3
Penned In The Margins	2
Vintage	2
Melville House	2
Hamish Hamilton	2
September Publishing	2
Salt	2
Head of Zeus	2
Michael O’Mara Books	2
Bradt	2
Modern Books	2
Gollancz	1
Jo Fletcher	1
W&N	1
The Westbourne Press	1
Summersdale	1
The Bodley Head	1
Golden Antelope Press	1
Myriad Editions	1
Carcanet	1
Duckworth	1
Birlinn Books	1
Dey Street	1
Chroma Editions	1
Headline	1
Profile Books	1
Michael Joseph	1
Arcadia Books	1
Little, Brown	1
Batsford Books	1
Headline	1
Wildings Press	1
Stella Maris	1
Titan Books	1
Sphere	1
Portobello	1
Allen & Unwin	1
Seven Dials	1
4th Estate	1
Pelagic Publishing	1
Sort of Books	1
Twist It Press	1
Reaktion Books	1
Doubleday	1
Inkandescent	1
Pursuit Books	1
Wood Wide Works	1
Pan Macmilliam	1
Uniform Books	1
Unbound	1
Longbarrow Press	1
Octopus Publishing	1
Tor	1
Fitzcarraldo Editions	1
Influx Press	1

Favourite Book Covers of 2020

02/01/2021 / Paul / 2 Comments

These are my favourite covers of the books that I have read over the course of 2020. They are in no particular order, but the one at the bottom is my cover of the year. The way I see it, the cover of the book has one job only and that is to be catching or attractive enough to make me want to pause, pick them up and then make me want to read it. In my opinion, all of these covers do that.

And my favourite cover is Wanderland

January 2021 TBR

01/01/2021 / Paul / 7 Comments

Another year passes and I have small hopes for this one… Thankfully though there are books. New books and old books that I have yet to read. So without further ado, here is my TBR for the coming month

Finishing Off
Lotharingia – Simon Winder
Time Among the Maya – Ronald Wright
Footnotes – Peter Fiennes
A Tomb With A View – Peter Ross
Invisible Women – Caroline Criado-Perez

Blog Tour
On Borrowed Time – Graeme Hall
Enough – Dr Cassandra Coburn

Review Copies
The Gardens of Mars – John Gimlette
How Britain Ends – Gavin Esler
Thin Places – Kerri ní Dochartaigh
American Dirt – Jeanie Cummins
Rotherweird – Andrew Caldecot
Wyntertide – Andrew Caldecot
Behind the Enigma – John Ferris
The Germans and Europe – Peter Millar
Saving the World – Women – Paola Diana

Library Books
On The Marsh – Simon Barnes
Another Fine Mess – Tim Moore

Challenge Books
Mirrors of the Unseen – Jason Elliot
The Marsh Arabs – Wilfred Theisger
Travels With Myself And Another: Five Journeys From Hell – Martha Gellhorn
In Search of Conrad – Gavin Young
Use of Weapons – Iain M. Banks
Letters – Saul Bellow
Seveneves – Neal Stephenson

Poetry
The Martian Regress – J.O. Morgan
Postcolonial Love Poem – Natalie Diaz

Science Fiction
One Way – S.J. Morden

There are a few that have been on here before, but I am hoping to up my monthly total to crack through them

2021 Reading Intentions

30/12/2020 / Paul / 4 Comments

The only New Year’s resolution that I have ever kept was the one where I vowed never to make another New Years resolution. These are therefore things that I plan to do in term of reading over the coming twelve months but are not hard or fast resolutions. I enjoy reading and I fear if it becomes too much of a chore or job then I’d stop. This fantastic Tom Gauld Cartoon sums it up for me.

My Own Books

I think this year I have bought in excess of 60 books, not sure exactly how many as I stopped counting then. So my note to myself from last year (try not to buy so many books) didn’t really get listened to… I did get given a first edition Lord of the Rings set and found a signed Margaret Durrell which I am quite pleased about. I have bought one new bookshelf and I am about to order another with some of my Christmas money. I realise that I have a lot of books that I want to read but not necessarily want to keep, so what I have decided to do with these books is to read them and pass on or back to charity shops or to my local secondhand bookshop. The aim of this is to free up some much-needed space!

Review Copies

I have managed to keep on top of my 2020 review copies, but have not really made any inroads into the massive backlog that I have acquired that goes back to 2018! I think there are around 93 review books that I need to read that still take up two shelves on the bookcase behind where I sit. I will be working my way through these as fast as I can and where I have been sent books to read that I hadn’t requested I will be passing them on or donating them to the library.

Library Books

My local library (Wimborne) has been fantastic during the most recent lockdown. They couldn’t open but were running a click and collect service. Yes, I still have too many library books out, and will still keep getting them out too, one of the factors that libraries are measured by is book issues so I like to feel that I am doing my part. I am fortunate that I have two library cards, what I intend to do is to get them down to a point where all my library books fit on one shelf on the bookcase in the lounge.

Female and BAME Authors

In 2020, 31% of my reading was by female authors. I was lower than I wanted, but intend to read at least 35% this coming year. I read 12 books by BAME authors this year and want to read at least one book a month next year too.

Poetry

Last year I managed to read two poetry books a month in 2020. I am aiming to continue this in 2021

Literary Awards

Having failed to do some or all of these last year I will be aiming to read all of these again

Edward Stanford Travel Writing Awards (much shorter prize this year because of Stanford’s financial woes and the lack of travel)

Wainwright

Royal Society

Baillie Gifford

Arthur C Clarke

The World From My Armchair Challenge

I have read a further 20 books now for this from the countries listed below.

Bolivia
Brazil
Bulgaria
Cuba
Cyprus
Fiji
Greece
Kiribati
Latvia
Macedonia
Malaysia
Myanmar
Nepal
Slovakia
Somalia
Syrian Arab Republic
Timor-Leste
Turkey
Ukraine
Uzbekistan

I did spectacularly fail to read my #20BooksOf Summer which was all books for this; only managed half of them. I will be reading my way through the rest in the early part of this year. I have now read books about or passing through 64 countries and seas out of a total of 215 so far.

Discworld

Managed four more from the Discworld series this year, but these are still to go:

I Shall Wear Midnight

Snuff

Raising Steam

The Shepherd’s Crown

I am also intending on reading his Bromeliad series after I have finished Discworld

Science Fiction

Only read seven science fiction books this year which I am ashamed of really as I had high hopes of getting more than that read. Aiming to read at least one book a month again.

Blogging

I have always been a reader first and foremost and I get immense pleasure from reading and talking about books. It was reading that introduced me to NB magazine and the blog came off the back of that. I am still going to continue with the blog, mostly because of the friendships that I have got from it. It will still be all about the books though, but not exclusively about the shiny new books. I am still happy to receive a book for review if a publisher or publicist still wishes to send them to me and will only be requesting books that I really want to read so I can work my way through my backlog.

So there we have it, broadly the same as last year, with a few tweaks here and there.

What are your reading intentions?

So How Did My 2020 Reading Intentions Go?

29/12/2020 / Paul / 12 Comments

I have been reviewing what I wrote for my 2020 reading intentions and seeing what I actually did compared to what I wanted to do.

My Own Books
Sarah has said again that I have too many books piled up (Tsundoko) around the house. (Note to self, try not to buy so many books). Did manage to read 25 of my own books, but that isn’t enough. That said, I am allowed to get some more bookshelves! So that is a new year project to sort that all of that out and unhaul some books. I am looking forward to having all my Little Toller and Eland books together in one place too!

Even though bookshops and charity shops were shut for a sizable portion of the years in the various lockdowns, I have bought far too many books this year and the piles of books around the house have not diminished at all. I have bought one more bookshelf and that is mostly full. I am just about to buy another from Shelfstore as I thought the first was very good. In the end, I read 58 of my own books this year, many more than last year.

Review Copies
According to my spreadsheet, I have 124 outstanding review copies to read. Even though there is a lot of books on the two shelves that I have for them, I’m not sure if this is right as I counted way less than that on the shelf!!! I am grateful for every book I receive through the post from publishers, so thank you to you all. I fully intend to read and review as many of those as possible as soon as I can, but also see the blogging post below.

I have read 94 review books this year and whilst the outstanding total has dropped to 93, I am slightly embarrassed to still have review books from 2018 to read and review still. I have tried to keep on top of the books that I was sent or requested in 2020 and only have three outstanding.

Library Books
As I said last year, these places are a precious resource. Sadly, our present government seems hell-bent on eradicating them from our cities, towns and villages. I still have too many library books out, and will still keep getting them out too. The author gets a small amount every time a book of theirs is borrowed and for the reader, most books are free or have a nominal reservation fee. I am fortunate that I have two library cards, and I am going to try not to max each one out…

I read 42 library books this year and still have maxed out cards. Some things never change.

Female and BAME Authors
In 2018, 35% of my reading was by female authors. Had intended to raise that for 2019, but have dropped back to 33%. So will be aiming for 40% in 2020. I want around 5% of my reading to be BAME authors too.

Sadly I only managed to read 31% of female authors this year. I did manage to read 12 BAME authors too which I am pleased about.

Poetry
Last year I managed to read a poetry book each and every month and sometimes read more than one. I like poetry, even though I don’t always get it, so am going to try to read around two books a month in 2020.

I am pleased to say that I have read two poetry books each month and mostly I have enjoyed them. I do find them difficult to review though, I can’t seem to be able to get the deeper meaning that some reviewers can find.

Literary Awards
Will be aiming to read all of these again (Next year I might get to the Baillie Gifford list as I didn’t this year)

Edward Stanford Travel Writing Awards (I am judging the Adventure Travel next year)
Wainwright
Royal Society
Baillie Gifford
Arthur C Clarke

Did really poorly on these awards this year. It is the first year that I have not read the longlist for the Wainwright, but I do have the books so will be finishing off the three outstanding before the 2021 prize is announced. I had read one of the Royal Society and have Bill Bryson’s to read at some point. I had read one of the longlisted books for the Baillie Gifford but have not gt to any of the others. Not likely to read the winner though as I am not a fan of the Beatles.

The World From My Armchair Challenge
Managed to read 13 more books for this long term challenge bringing my total read so far to 44. I have been acquiring books for it though, and have a further 41 books on various bookshelves scattered around the house to read for other countries. I am still looking for travel books (or non-fiction) that are set in or pass through these countries, below. So if you know any, please do let me know.

Antigua and Barbuda
Brunei Darussalam
Capo Verde
Central African Republic
Chad
Dominica
Gambia
Grenada
Kuwait
Micronesia
Persian Gulf
Saint Kitts and Nevis
Saint Vincent and the Grenadines
Sao Tome and Principe
Seychelles
Swaziland
Timor-Leste
Trinidad and Tobago
Uruguay
Balearic Sea
Ligurian Sea
Alboran Sea

I managed to read 20 books towards this challenge in the end. And found (and bought) a lot more!

Discworld

Managed two more from the Discworld series, but these are still to go:
The Wee Free Men
A Hat Full of Sky
Unseen Academicals
I Shall Wear Midnight
Snuff
Raising Steam
The Shepherd’s Crown

Please feel free to pester me to remind me that need to keep reading them.

I read four more books in the Discworld series. Nearly there.

Science Fiction
Only read two (yes two) science fiction books this year which I am ashamed of really as I had high hopes of getting more than that read. Aiming to read at least one a month.

I managed to read seven in the end, five less than I wanted to. But an improvement on 2019.

Blogging
I have always been a reader first and foremost and I get immense pleasure from reading and talking about books. It was reading that introduced me to NB magazine and the blog came off the back of that. After a lot of thought, I have decided that I am going to change the way that I am blogging. I am going to still be reading and reviewing on here and Good Reads and so on, but will be drastically reducing the number of review copies that I request as I can’t keep up. I am still happy to receive a book if a publisher or publicist still wishes to send them to me, but will not guarantee when I will get to read it. Instead, I have decided that I will either get the newly released books in 2020 from the library or buy them myself to read as and when I can. I will still take part in Blog Tours, but only a maximum of once a month as I don’t always like reading to a deadline.

Overall I am happy with how I did this year, but there were some disappointments too! All of the above still applies. I ended up doing more blog tours than I intended and have two lined up for January too!