Recent radio silence…

Spent the best part of last week in the picturesque seaside town of Tenby, down in Pembrokeshire, South Wales. I was there on family business: my Nanna - who'll be 91 years old in just a few weeks - decided a few months back that she probably wasn't going to be able to cope through another winter on her own (my Grandad having passed away a couple of summers ago) so it was high time she relocated to a bungalow in Leeds.

A very good decision, if you ask me: her old house, was horribly inaccessible for someone of her advanced years (halfway up a hill, with steep steps at the front and back) and she's now much closer to most of my family and only an hour from Jo and I in Manchester. And it was a very brave decision, too: leaving the home she's lived in for the past 56 years to start a new life at 91 is just an incredible thing to do (and it was her decision, too; nobody pressured her into it) and I have nothing but admiration for her.

So, being the dutiful type and eager to assist in any way I could, I went on down to help out with the move: packing up the last few boxes, waving Mum, Dad and Nanna off on their car journey back to Leeds, then coordinating with the removal guys at the tail-end of the week, before making my own way back home by train on Friday.

The thing about Tenby: lovely place to visit, nice place to live if you fancy a bit of peace & quiet (except for the summer season, which can get a bit hairy), but not exactly what you'd call a wi-fi hot-spot. Hence my complete lack of T'Internet access all week, and the subsequent mad scramble to sort through my email backlog mountain and catch up with various work-related tasks (and resulting lack of blogging here) since I've been back at the weekend.

Of course, a week to myself with no WWW access - plus a six-hour train journey at the end of it - meant that I was able to read a whole two books (Charlie Huston's second Joe Pitt novel, No Dominion, the second of John Connolly's Charlie Parker novels, Dark Hollow) and make a good start on a third (K.J. Parker's Evil For Evil - finally!). And this, sadly, is something of a personal best since I knocked the daily commute on the head, not counting holiday reading...

And here - just in case you're contemplating a holiday, or even retiring to the coast (I know where you can buy a very nice semi - in need of redecoration, true, but in a great location) - are a few scenic shots of Tenby that I snapped off with my trusty old Fuji Finepix on the Monday evening. This was the last spell of sunshine that I was able to enjoy before the rain-clouds set in for the rest of the week.

The subject matter: St Catherine's Island (complete with largely-derelict C18th fort), the approach to Castle Hill (with a section of the old town walls), and the old lifeboat house (now replaced by a shiny, modern one, from where this last photo was taken).

Back to the regular genre-fiction-stuff next time I find a spare moment to put fingers to keyboard...

June 27, 2007 | Filed Under Books, Life, Photography | 9 Comments

Highly Recommended Reading: 'Scar Night' by Alan Campbell

I've been meaning to read Alan Campbell's debut novel, Scar Night [Amazon] ever since I received a proof copy from Macmillan / Tor UK about a year ago, but for some reason there always seemed to be just one more book to go before I got around to it. But now I have, and I'm extremely glad indeed that I finally made the effort.

There's a distinctly Miévillean air to the setting for Scar Night: the city of Deepgate squats astride a vast and quite literal abyss - suspended from and supported by a network of immense chains, with streets made of rope and plank bridges and buildings that exist in permanent danger of toppling to the darkness below - into which the city's dead are cast, in order (so the holy books of the priests tell Deepgate's populace) to swell the ranks of an army being gathered by the god Ulcis so that he might storm the gates of heaven, overthrow the usurper who cast him down, and lead his followers to glory. It's a wonderfully gothic, sumptuously insane vision: a city driven to exist on the constant brink of disaster by the dictates of religion (read into that as much metaphor as you like).

The city - and by extension the novel - is populated by a varied cast of eclectic and fantastical characters. The prinicpals and supporting cast largely comprise: two angels (one, Dill, is a callow youth struggling to find both acceptance and a place in his world; the other, Carnival, is a periodic murderer struggling to avoid being slain for her crimes), Rachel Hael the Spine assassin (assigned to guard and train the young angel), Presbyter Sypes the Patriarch of the temple (grown old and bent over by the weight of the secrets on his shoulders), Devon the Poisoner (a twisted genius and mastermind behind the city's very worst and nastiest weaponry who is gradually falling prey to his own alchemical experimentation), Mr Nettle the net-scavenger (who loses his daughter to the abyss but vows to regain her... if only he can first find and regain her soul) as well as diverse guardsmen (red-shirts, all), aristocratic aeronauts, Heshette tribesmen (the city's ancient and implacable foe), the priests of the temple and their Spine guards (who are all 'tempered' to remove any trace of emotion... well, all but Rachel, that is) and a few more besides, whose roles are somewhat central to the unfolding of the plot, and so will have to remain shrouded in mystery for now.

The prose itself is very good indeed. Alan Campbell's writing is very easy to read, and the visuals come thick and fast. He blends character development, background information, plot exposition, atmospheric description and action scenes with with most definite aplomb. All in all, he writes with the easy, flowing style of an expressive, imaginative, confident writer; a style that's all the more impressive when you occasionally remember that this is still his first debut. If he's this good now then I look forward to reading his work in five or six books' time, by which time he should be superb.

Highly recommended to fans of China Miéville, Jeffrey Ford, Jeff Vandermeer, K.J. Bishop, Steph Swainston, Scott Lynch... you know, the usual crowd. One to watch in years to come as well, definitely, starting with the second part of The Deepgate Codex, whenever that one's due...

Author info: www.alancampbell.co.uk / anurbanfantasy.blogspot.com
Ordering info: Amazon
Publication info: May 4th 2007 (paperback edition), Tor Books, UK

June 15, 2007 | Filed Under Books | 2 Comments

New Music: Broooooooce! Live in Dublin

I'm really quite unfeasibly excited right now. My 2CD + DVD copy of the new Bruce Springsteen live album - Live in Dublin with the Sessions Band - has just arrived from Play.com, (where it's a few quid cheaper than either Amazon.co.uk or CD-Wow, folks!)

Bruce Springsteen Live in Dublin with the Sessions Band

I've been a Springsteen fan since I was 12, and two of the best gigs I've ever been to were three-hour Springsteen spectaculars. One of those was at the MEN Arena, when Bruce and the 20-odd-piece Sessions band raised the roof with everything from tracks from the Seeger Sessions album to gospel sing-alongs (say one thing for those Christian types, they do know how to organise a good sing-along) to bluegrass / roots versions of some of his classic tracks. I loved the version of 'Cadillac Ranch' that he played that night; unfortunately he didn't repeat that one in Dublin, but then there are a whole bunch of new renditions for me to hear now, so that'll do me nicely. Wonder if Jo will let me watch the DVD tonight..?

And yes, I know what you might be thinking. But then if Born in the USA is the only Springsteen album you've ever heard, you're missing out on a whole career's worth of quite fantastic music. That was his most commercial and radio-friendly album, but he's been writing and playing great songs since the early '70s, and his latest outing takes him into the realms of Amerciana / roots music, with a collection of traditional bluegrass, blues and gospel tunes with a huge sound that really does have to be heard to be believed.

So if you're a fan of Bob Dylan, or just know how to appreciate a damn good singer / songwriter when you hear one, then do give Mr S another go. I really think you might be rather pleasantly surprised.

Oh, and if anyone needs me this afternoon, I'll be in my headphones...

June 8, 2007 | Filed Under Music | 4 Comments

Highly Recommended Reading: Neil Gaiman's 'Fragile Things'

I thoroughly enjoyed Neil Gaiman's latest collection of short stories (plus one novella, and a smattering of poetry), Fragile Things - Short Fictions and Wonders, as I rather suspected I would.

Given the sheer variety and frequency of Gaiman's major projects (novels, comic series, movies, theatre, audio performances, you name it...) it's almost a surprise to find that he actually has time to sit down and put pen to paper on a short story these days; but I'm very glad that he does, because the results rarely disappoint. It does, however, mean that his collections (or miscellanies) are rather few and far-between; there are but two of them, in fact. The first, Angels and Visitations (later re-released in an expanded edition as Smoke and Mirrors, of course) was published by Dreamhaven back in 1993, so it's been quite a wait for this, his second.

Well worth waiting for, though. I picked up Fragile Things because I was in the mood for something wonderful, and wonder is what I got. From the opening of the clever and charming Doylesque-Lovecraftian collusion 'A Study in Emerald' through to the conclusion of the moral and mythic novella 'The Monarch of the Glen' - which tells the tale of Shadow, a couple of years after the unfolding of events in Amercian Gods - I think I can honestly say that there wasn't single piece in Fragile Things that I didn't enjoy.

Particular favourites though, were 'The problem of Susan', 'Inventing Aladdin' and 'Forbidden Brides of the Faceless Slaves in the Secret House of the Night of Dread Desire' and the aforementioned 'A Study in Emerald'. I think I've always been drawn to the way that Gaiman tells the stories within stories, or the stories behind the well-known stories; this for me was the essence of The Sandman and has been Gaiman's best riff ever since; one that he continued to play on to great effect in American Gods (and, as I understand it, Anansi Boys, although I haven't had the time to appreciate that one just yet).

Would the non Gaiman-acolyte gain as much from this collection? I think so. It's a rich and varied assortment of interesting words put together in all sorts of entertaining, intriguing, amusing, evocative and wonderful (and wonder-full) ways. What's not to like?

Author info: www.neilgaiman.com
Ordering info: Amazon
Publication info: April 5th (pb edtn), Headline Review (UK)

June 7, 2007 | Filed Under Books | 6 Comments

Sergeant Pepper turns 40

From Joe Gordon's always-excellent and informative Forbidden Planet blog, a timely reminder that today is the 40th anniversary of an album that is widely regarded as being one of the most influential, the most revolutionary, simply the greatest, of all time:

Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band

I've become very fond of this particular collection of tunes in quite a short space of time. Although I've been familiar with a number of the album's more famous tracks ('With a Little Help From my Friends', 'Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds', 'When I'm Sixty-Four') for years, I hadn't actually heard it in its entirety until, believe it or not, March of this year...

The thing is, I've been listening to various collections of the Beatles' singles for a while, but for some reason I hadn't really taken the time to get to know their music better. But then, back in February, I picked up that month's issue of Mojo, with a cover CD of cover versions of the album, and - more importantly - a lengthy article on the making of the original.

It wasn't until I read this piece that I fully appreciated the depth of Sergeant Pepper's importance or the very real pinnacle of creative accomplishment that it represents. I'd always assumed it was a fairly typical piece of work for the time; but not so.

The Beatles, aided and abetted by legendary producer George Martin, managed to create - with nothing more than the Abbey Road Studio's ageing four-track recording equipment and a couple of slaved-together tape machines - the sort of sonic landscapes and effect-laden musical interludes that most bands today routinely take for granted. But this was back in 1967, and - especially according to the views of some of the other musicians who were around at the time - it was a truly revolutionary piece of work.

So obviously, I had to buy a copy. Take my chances on eBay, maybe? Or just splurge the full amount on Amazon (I'd never seen so much as a single Beatles CD in a reduced-price offer for years). But then, serendipitously, Jo and I were passing through Manchester Airport on the way to Northern Ireland, and it just so happened that the CD shop in the terminal had a three-for-two offer... which included Sergeant Pepper, as well as Revolver and about four or five others, by varying artists (well, it would've been rude not to, and Jo was buying them for my birthday...)

Fast-forward through the next couple of months, during which time I must have listened to the album about fourteen, fifteen times. Made quite an impression on me, I can tell you, particularly some of the tracks I hadn't heard before, like the achingly cathartic 'She's Leaving Home' and especially the concluding 'A Day in the Life'.

And I can tell you that if ever an album was made to be played loud and most definitely through headphones then this is it. Even if you think you're familiar with the Sergeant, if you haven't listened to it through a good pair of headphones before now, then you've probably only heard about half of what's going on...

So, there you go. My music recommendation for the year so far (hardly original, but most assuredly heart-felt): Grab a copy of Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, settle back in your comfiest armchair with the best pair of ear-cans you can get your hands on, switch off your mobile phone, press play on your hi-fi equipment of choice... and away you will go...

June 1, 2007 | Filed Under Music | 2 Comments