Cheering up Man Flu – Londonopolis

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Christmas presents, Daphne du Maurier, East India Company, London, Londonopolis, Man Flu, Martin Latham, Rebecca, William II

I’m reading Londonopolis – A Curious History of London at the moment (thanks to my family for a great Christmas present). The author, Martin Latham, says, “You can read this book in any order, or leave it in the lavatory for the occasional reverie.” I can add another good use for it: silent entertainment for a case of Man Flu. It’s written in easy chunks (chronologically ordered), and so can be picked up and put down as fitfully as the suffering patient desires, with no loss of continuity.

It’s amusing and full of interesting oddities. It encouragingly takes on received historical wisdom: eg William Rufus was actually quite a good King (his Westminster Hall is a masterpiece), and the East India Company was in some respects better than the Raj that replaced it in India, and it had enlightened HR policies here at home (thieving employees would merely be publicly whipped through the street rather than be hanged or transported to the colonies). The illustrations are fun. While reading this the invalid won’t be plaintively and feebly calling to his devoted nurse for more lemon tea or more pillows or fewer pillows.

I was reading Daphne du Maurier’s excellent Rebecca (a 2016 Christmas present!), but felt that if I was already feeling sorry for myself that book’s atmosphere of tension and worry was hardly going to help. So Rebecca is on hold. Better something quirky that brings a smile.

There’s a fuller review of Londonopolis on the Turbulent London website, at https://turbulentlondon.com/2016/02/11/book-review-londonopolis-a-curious-history-of-london/.

Nasty germs apart, a Happy New Year to all ninevoices’ readers!

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The Opening Chapter

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Balloons, Daphne du Maurier, Enduring Love, Ian McEwan, M40, Rebecca, Vicar of Dibley

The opening chapter – it must really work, we’re taught. Maybe it’s the bit a potential agent would read. Maybe it’s the bit that a browser in a bookshop will look at. Maybe it’s the bit that will make a reader decide whether to carry on reading …

One of the most exciting opening chapters I’ve read is that of Enduring Love by Ian McEwan. This was recommended by our creative writing tutor, and as soon as I read it I could see why. Its dramatic account of a balloon ride gripped me. I think of it every time I drive down the escarpment on the M40 where it’s set (going towards Oxford, near Stokenchurch – as in the film shown during the opening credits of ‘The Vicar of Dibley’). Curiously, after that amazing start, the subject matter of the rest of the book drifts away from balloons. But that opening definitely made me read on.

The opening chapter of the book I’m reading now, Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca, is another Must Read On one. Its description of the abandoned and overgrown Manderley is all the more evocative as it’s a dream, and reads with all the mystery and menace that a dream can have.

What opening chapters stay in your memory?

‘The Birds’

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Daphne du Maurier, Fear, Great Novels, Lighthouses, Rebecca, The Birds

Talking of lighthouses: – a week or so ago my wife and I were on the coastal walk near Fowey in Cornwall and rested at the old lighthouse at the top of the hill called Gribbin Head. There we read a plaque stating that not only were we near Menabilly, said to be the real Manderley in Rebecca, but that it was in the very area we were then standing in that Daphne du Maurier got the inspiration for The Birds. How interesting, we thought, and then noticed the seagulls circling above us. Us. They kept circling. Let’s press on, we thought. We pressed on.