May Day

Hey readers hope you are all well and making progress with the book.
I haven’t gone back to it yet, as it was on my now nicked iPad so will have to retrieve it  from Cloud and do my best to update in time for our meeting.
As you will know by now, we are giving Sloan’s a go to meet in – seems like a nice bar and we should be reasonably quiet at that time on a Monday although it’s a Bank Hol so maybe there will be some carousing. Wodevs, as they say, we will give it a go.
Long books have pros and cons, don’t they? Great if you have time for total immersion, but can feel gargantuan and impossible. Hope your experience has been more former than latter.
I’m doing a poetry and image workshop at Cafe Create (http://www.cafecreatedarlington.org) as part of the Darlington Festival if any of you fancy it – Friday 3rd at 7pm – it costs £6. This is a lead in to an event I am doing in July at which the fantastic Pascale Petit is coming to read her poems about Frida Kahlo – will keep you informed.
So whatever the wold looks like outside, our inner lives can shine. Books rarely let you down. Innit. Looking forward to seeing you all in May.

All change

Hi All and thanks to those who made it to my house yesterday evening to discuss Coming Through Slaughter and many other topics ..
The decision we made last time was to try and find a better and maybe more permanent venue for the bookgroup. So next, we are going to try Sloan’s bar in Grange Road: we will check that it’s OK with them first before posting up the address, but here’s a link.

http://www.facebook.com/sloansbardarlington

I guess we are still missing the Arts Centre.
If anybody has any other suggestions, please bring along to the next meeting which will be on May 6th – this is another bank hol, so if it’s going to prove problematic for people, can you let me know? The book will be a return to 1Q84 so hope you have all managed to catch up with it a bit by now. For new members – just get as far as you can with this mighty tome! It’s worth the effort, really.
Look forward to seeing you all again soon.

Spring? Not

Hello my lovelies. This post comes to you from the Cambridge travelodge where I am shovelling down some couscous with chargrilled veg from Sainsbury’s next door. It’s pretty much a fun-packed life, and I can feel your envy from here.
Sorry I didn’t make book group – and I really hope somebody did as I haven’t had any feedback. Do let me know somebody? As for April, our date is Easter Monday. I’d still like to go ahead – and am going to have the meeting at my house. Contact Olivia at New Writing North for my address, if you don’t already have. Book is Coming through Slaughter by Michael Ondaatje, an old favourite of mine. I hope you enjoy. And at next meeting let’s finalise some more book titles going into the summer and also maybe decide to try out some new venues around town.
For those of you who didn’t catch it, I won a poetry film comp with this offering:

Miracles

So I have finished the book and thought it was an excellent read. Good to discover a new writer, even though it seems that very few of his books are translated. I found this one very moving, mainly because it felt so authentic and because of the character of the narrator – his interior life clearly at odds with the image he presents to the world – the village idiot. The comradeship of the team of loggers is beautifully portrayed. Also it has several of the ingredients that I love – set in Finland, wood chopping and men in uniform of various kinds. The historical aspects of what happened in Finland during the war are so complex and fascinating – hope this will be one of the things we discuss on Monday.
I haven’t managed to organise another venue so hope it will be OK to give the Forum another go. We can have a rethink or move on somewhere else if it is noisy. Look forward to seeing you all.

Roll over readers

Sometimes you just have to roll with it .. so all of you who didn’t manage to get much of 1Q84 read have agreed to go for a second attempt later in the year – May provisionally. Those of us who have read and enjoyed it hope it goes better for you a second time. I didn’t get the feeling you couldn’t stand the thought of it – more that there just hadn’t been enough time among all the carousing of Christmas.
Distinct carousing going on at The Forum that night too – who WERE those guys?
Thinking that we might try another venue next time – and it might be the Voodoo Cafe. I’m going to see f that’s possible and will let you know.
Hope you are finding this month’s book a bit easier to get through (not supposed to be a punishment, is it?). Confession: haven’t started it yet. Am having an Ann Tylerathon plus reading loads of poetry. Tyler is an interesting writer. These are re-reads for me (currently reading Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant) , and the kind of rich, character based dramas that Americans do so well. After 1Q, it feels like eating a massive comforting pie. A slightly guilty pleasure but perfect for winter. Sometimes you have to indulge yourself.
Some great NE news this month: both Angela Readman and Avril Joy are shortlisted in the Costa Short Story awards. Both are excellent writers, and Angela a very fine poet also. Results announced on Tuesday so fingers crossed for both of them.

And yours truly is getting a couple of poems published on line over the next couple of weeks, via Kumquat Poetry so check them out if you have a mo.
Looking forward to seeing you – will post re the venue.

How are we doing, dear readers?

Happy New Year to all. Hope you don’t feel too lumbered with the great tome that is 1Q84. Remember I do not require you to have finished it – started would be good – but even if you have just managed to lift it, that’s sufficient.
Really, it’s a great book, and I would hate it to feel like a burden – so have a taste and let’s chat about it – you can always go back and finish another time. I am nearly through the third volume now, and am glad to have persevered. As my mum always said – you’ll like it when you get there. Also made me think of other trilogies I have read – Lord of the Rings, for example? Doris Lessing’s Children of Violence (4 or 5?) Then there were those 8 volumes of Clarissa. I was younger then – there was more time. 
Look forward to seeing you all at The Forum next Monday.

Seasonal

Thanks to those who made it to the last Darlo bookgroup where we discussed the wonderful Patrick Hamilton among other topics. I hope that we are all decided that we will stick with The Forum as a venue into 2013? I think it’s probably the only remaining community (ish) space we have and so should support it – and maybe the film club will also become part of what we do sometimes.
Our first book of the New Year is 1Q84 – a big one, so I hope there is a chance of some reading time among all the festivities and conviviality – sometimes sneaking off with a book is the best thing to do when surrounded by people. Apparently a lot of books get sold in January – interesting! I will be giving and very possibly receiving books this year as always. Still rates very highly with me as one of the greatest pleasures on my life – so thanks to my lovely mum for taking me to libraries since I was knee high, and to all my lovely book group friends for introducing me to many new writers, and for sharing monthly Mondays with me. All the best to you, and look forward to seeing you all in the New Year.