Life on Mars

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Contributor: Rosalind Esche

The thing that has kept me going during all three lockdowns has been the British tv drama series Life on Mars, first unleashed on our tv screens 15 years ago in January 2006. I somehow managed to miss it then, but discovered it, thanks to my son, during the first lockdown during the spring of 2020. Now I wonder how on earth I’ve managed without it all this time. What a life saver! Life on Mars boasts some of the best writing for British tv drama in living memory. This is no ordinary popular tv series, it is so much more than that. In case you don’t know, it’s about a police detective who has a car accident in 2006 and wakes up in 1973. If that sounds bizarre, too “sci fi” for you, outlandish, silly even, don’t be put off – watch it, you’ll be surprised.

If you like strong characterisation, tight plotting, sharp dialogue, profound themes, laugh out loud humour – you will find all of these and more in Life on Mars. This is genuinely great writing. Life on Mars, groundbreaking in its day, has to be one of the most remarkable tv dramas ever broadcast – after 15 years it has not dated at all and is still held in great affection by legions of devotees. It is easy to see why – it fires your imagination, evokes powerful emotions, makes you fall in love with its characters, refuses to deal in easy stereotypes, presents you with complex moral dilemmas, surprises and challenges you, and amidst all of this it entertains and amuses with tremendous pace and energy.

The writers manage to create a seamless interweaving of all these disparate elements, producing a compelling drama enacted by characters who steal into your heart as each episode unfolds, drawing you into their world, making you care. The subtle layering of themes, and the cross referencing between not only the various plots, but between the two different worlds of 1973 and 2006, is deeply satisfying, and warrants more than one viewing in order to capture all of its rich complexity. Most of all it is the development of personal relationships between the characters which is ultimately so moving. But there is no sentimentality here, this is tough writing, demanding mature reflection on thought provoking subjects such as corruption, loyalty, conscience, duty, truth, loneliness, alienation, friendship and love.

Once you start watching it you feel an overwhelming need to discuss it endlessly with someone else who’s watching it, conversations can last hours and continue over days, weeks, months. Is Sam in a coma or is he mad, or has he actually travelled in time? Are his colleagues real, or a figment of his imagination? Who, or what, is Frank Morgan? Ultimately you realise that what really matters is the emotional immediacy of the drama itself – it isn’t meant to be a realistic text, it’s about the transformational power of love and friendship, about choosing life in the face of grey, bleak isolation.

This must be why Life on Mars speaks to so many people at the moment. Everyone I know who’s been watching it during lockdown has felt compelled to watch it over and over again. You never tire of it, and each time you re-watch an episode you discover something new. That is the mark of excellent writing. It is life affirming and uplifting, which is why it has become the comfort viewing of so many people during this wretched pandemic. It should be prescribed by the NHS as essential to mental wellbeing.

Hats off to writers Matthew Graham, Ashley Pharoah and others, for producing such great work, to the cast for exceptional acting, to the directors and producers and everyone else involved in this most wonderful drama series, what an outstanding achievement. Thank you for enriching my life.

Life on Mars is available on Britbox.

#LifeonMars

 

It was nice to sit down in a quiet room and read

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Contributor: Joe Swindells, Gardener.
Interests: Sports, gardening and cooking

Have you read more or less during lockdown, or much the same as usual?

I have read a bit more than usual during lockdown.

Has lockdown affected your choice of reading material?

No, same as usual technical, informative books.

Have you switched from your normal genre? eg started reading poetry, short stories, non fiction, drama?

No, stuck to my usual informative and educational reading.

Have you been using reading in a different way – for example for comfort, raising your spirits, escapism, distraction?

Have used it more for distraction, when had enough of tv and doing jobs around the house it was nice to sit down in a quiet room and read.

Have you been finding it harder to concentrate during lockdown?

Yes it’s been harder to carry on working, as having to travel to work you sometimes think you’re the only one working and everyone else is in bed and watching tv.

Have you started books and been unable to finish them?

No actually much better at finishing the books I have started instead of leaving them half unread

Where do you get inspiration for titles? 

They are practical books which I already have and not had time before to read

Where are you sourcing your books/audiobooks from?

Normally get them from the internet after researching them.

Have you embarked on reading all the books you already own but have never read?

Not all the books, just made a start on some of them when time allows, but would like to read them all if I had time.

Have you been listening to audiobooks rather than reading? If so, does listening add something to your experience of the book that you wouldn’t get by reading it yourself?

No not been listening to audio books, prefer to read an actual book than listen as have problem concentrating when listening, as have found out trying to learn a new language online, not good at listening!

Have you been reading books about pandemics? eg The Plague by Albert Camus, Journal of the Plague Year by Daniel Defoe, Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez, The Roses of Eyam by Don Taylor etc?

No not felt interested in reading about pandemics after hours of tv talking about the  pandemic.

Can you recommend up to 5 books/audiobooks that you have enjoyed during lockdown?

Being technical books I don’t think anyone would be interested, but here are two:

Start and run a gardening business by Paul Power

Pruning and training by RHS

I reverted to being 13 & just read massive epic fantasy sagas. Anything with dragons. 

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 Contributor: Stressed out mum

Have you read more or less during lockdown, or much the same as usual?

I read more, I had more time because we couldn’t bloody well go anywhere!

Has lockdown affected your choice of reading material?

Very poor concentration and not able to focus on non fiction. 

Have you switched from your normal genre? eg started reading poetry, short stories, non fiction, drama?

I switched from trying new novels and new genres to familiar, easy to read ones. I reverted to being 13 & just read massive epic fantasy sagas. Anything with dragons. 

Have you been using reading in a different way – for example for comfort, raising your spirits, escapism, distraction?

Definitely escapism. I’m very happy to read darkly comic books or crime but I don’t want to read anything about children being hurt (features in books more frequently than you might think). Can’t read anything political either. 

Have you been finding it harder to concentrate during lockdown?

Much harder to concentrate in lockdown AND I have to homeschool AND there is no break from kids.

Have you started books and been unable to finish them?

I never finish books which I ‘take agin’ – that’s time I could spend reading something I enjoy. 

Where do you get inspiration for titles?

BC (before covid) : I would search bookstores and charity shops. I read reviews or asked for recommendations. 

AC (after covid) : I rely on my own knowledge of genre / author, hence the big epic sagas! Podcasts but they’re not very reliable for good books. Costa prize books – way more readable than Booker & less political.

Friends & readers I trust.

Where are you sourcing your books/audiobooks from?

Amazon (sorry). We use a Kobo to download library books for Fred. He gets through several a week so I’m not buying them. I deleted Audible because it kept pinging notifications at me.

Have you embarked on reading all the books you already own but have never read?

I don’t often reread but I did reread The Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett. But I last read it in 1807 and couldn’t remember all of the plot. 

Have you been listening to audiobooks rather than reading? If so, does listening add something to your experience of the book that you wouldn’t get by reading it yourself?

I like audiobooks but I’m not getting any time to myself since schools closed. I’m interrupted 9 million times a minute and I can’t go for walks with my headphones on without children accompanying me. It sucks!!!!!

I do listen to drama & podcasts because I can carry my phone round the house & switch it off when kids follow me about. It takes a long time to finish anything!

Have you been reading books about pandemics? eg The Plague by Albert Camus, Journal of the Plague Year by Daniel Defoe, Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez, The Roses of Eyam by Don Taylor etc?

I love plague books and always have : )

I read all of Plague Times Trilogy by Lousie Welsh (Love Lousie Welsh crime books too)

The Outcasts of Time by Ian Mortimer

Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel

Duty of Care – not strictly a plague book but I think I wanted to gain perspective on what was happening. It was recommended on the Jeremy Vine show.

Listened to The Plague by Albert Camus on R4

Already read Defoe & Love in the Time of Cholera. 

Will look up The Roses of Eyam immediately : )

 

Can you recommend up to 5 books/audiobooks that you have enjoyed during lockdown?

These are 5 books I’ve really loved in the past year

Swan Song – Kelleigh Greenberg-Jephcott

The Salt Path – Raynor Winn

Mudlarking – Lara Maiklem

Girl, woman, other – Bernardine Evaristo (it’s a very funny book and I like her for owning up to being desperate to win the Booker prize)

Let It go – Dame Stephanie Shirley and Richard Askwith – this made me think again about women in business, how money can be used to benefit society & more. 

 

 

‘Life on Mars’ a lifeline during stressful times

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Contributor: Aileen Downham

In the last couple of years, aided by belonging to a book club, I was usually reading a book a month. When the first lockdown began in 2020, there were two dozen or more unread books on the shelves, but I felt the need to stock up on some new titles. These were mostly inspired by Radio 4’s ‘Good Read’ or book dramatisations and the like. I had a good mix of genre, no doubt pandemic-influenced. 

Mistakenly, perhaps, I began with ‘The Plague’ (Albert Camus), but didn’t get far!  Next, I dipped into sections of the ‘Frederick Douglass Narrative’ (on slavery). Painful, but important, reading. I thought of starting Claire Tomalin’s ‘Samuel Pepys’ for some balance, but 400 plus pages looked too daunting. I should’ve persevered! Lockdown life had adversely affected my concentration.  It was easier to opt for newspaper articles (not pandemic-related), occasional poetry and some mini-autobiographies in the Sunday Supplements. On the whole though, much less reading during lockdown.

Several months into the pandemic, I was dealing with (non-Covid-related) health problems, trips to A&E and a few stays in hospital. Life became hugely stressful. Diagnosis unconfirmed. It was after many months of this uncertainty that a close friend recommended watching the drama series ‘Life on Mars’. This is a drama like no other. A masterpiece. It instantly lifted my spirits. I was hooked, and watched daily until the last episode! It’s a multi-layered piece, dealing with all human emotion. When you’re stressed and worn out, any viewing ideally needs to be something that won’t totally drain you, but provide you with some light relief. This it certainly achieved.

Episode by episode, the story became comforting and the characters familiar. One could identify and empathise with them and their own personal troubles. ‘Life on Mars’ is a moving tale, thought provoking, challenging, and never dreary. During all of this visual/mental stimulation, you forget your own problems and become more outward looking. The stress inevitably lifts for the duration, and in some cases, even longer. This, of course, is helped by an outstanding cast, headed by the main character ‘Sam’.

Watching this series bestowed a real sense of wellbeing, and remains go-to viewing whenever I feel overwhelmed by personal events. ‘Life on Mars’ allows you to forget about yourself for a while – no bad thing.  One has to say that this is a drama with definite health benefits!

Contributor: Aileen

Discovering Tower Treasures

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What’s really housed in Cambridge University Library’s fabled 17 storey tower? Contrary to a popular notion among students, the tower is not packed with pornography (Neville Chamberlain did rather unfortunately refer to the tower as ‘this magnificent erection’) but you might be surprised to learn that it houses a remarkable collection of so called ‘ephemera’ (non academic material) including board games, recipes, Victorian toys, handbooks on poultry farming, colourful children’s books, pamphlets on palmistry and treatises on phrenology, all jostling for shelf space in this 1930s landmark of the city skyline.

I was lucky to be part of the Tower Project at the University Library, cataloguing online all items received under legal deposit by the library from 1800 to 1925. A collection that had up until then been accessible only by consulting small, handwritten, wedge shaped books which read from back to front, and were slotted into niches in a corridor wall, became discoverable through the library’s online catalogue by anyone around the world with an internet connection. 

I blogged about the books I was cataloguing for the Tower Project, and I’m still blogging about them now in the hope that they will amuse, intrigue and entertain.

I thought it was a Zombie Apocalypse book …

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Contributor: John Constable

Have you read more or less during lockdown, or much the same as usual?

Slightly less as I’ve not listened to as many audiobooks.

Has lockdown affected your choice of reading material?

Definitely! I am reading much less non fiction and the fiction I do read tends towards escapism, even more than usual…

Have you switched from your normal genre? eg started reading poetry, short stories, non fiction, drama?

Not really.

Have you been using reading in a different way – for example for comfort, raising your spirits, escapism, distraction?

Definitely escapism.

Have you been finding it harder to concentrate during lockdown?

Yes, I….. 

Have you started books and been unable to finish them?

No more than usual, but I’m slightly more inclined to stop a book that I am not enjoying.

Where do you get inspiration for titles? 

Sadly it’s all Amazon and already-known authors for me. Hard to break out of a rut! I do like the kindle recommendations made by monevator.co.uk and Steven Blackamore on Twitter though.

Where are you sourcing your books/audiobooks from?

A kickstarter for a couple of audio books, HumbleBundle.com for technical books, bundleofholding.com had a collection of fantasy/sci-fi from an author I follow that isn’t really mainstream. Other than that it’s all Amazon for eBooks. 

I might ‘lendle’ an ebook from a friend every now and then.

I buy physical books from big green bookshop – he used to have a physical store but these days does most of his selling via Twitter.

Have you embarked on reading all the books you already own but have never read?

No the dust on the stack of ‘round to it’ paper books by my bedside just keeps increasing… It’s not as convenient to read paper books late at night, the Kindle paperwhite with its built in backlight is just so much nicer.

Have you been listening to audiobooks rather than reading? If so, does listening add something to your experience of the book that you wouldn’t get by reading it yourself?

I have a few podcasts I listen too, but am really struggling with audiobooks. I used to listen to them on my commute and got through at least one a month, but with no commute I just don’t get the same time. I prefer audiobooks for travelogues, biographies and other non fiction that I want to read but rarely sit down and pick up when there is some escapist fiction available!

Have you been reading books about pandemics? eg The Plague by Albert Camus, Journal of the Plague Year by Daniel Defoe, Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez, The Roses of Eyam by Don Taylor etc?

Only one, by mistake – Emily St. John Mandel’s ‘Station Eleven’. I wouldn’t have started it if I thought it was pandemic related, but I thought it was a Zombie apocalypse book! It was very good though.

Can you recommend up to 5 books/audiobooks that you have enjoyed during lockdown?

The aforementioned Emily St. John Mandel’s Station Eleven

Gideon The Ninth by Tamsyn Muir. 

Rolling Rocks Downhill by Clarke Ching (a fictionalised account of moving a business to use agile software methodology. It’s a thing now!) consumed via both audible and kindle via whisper-sync.  A great way to read and listen to a book, which magically picks up where you left off in whatever format you last read/listened.

Audiobook: Dark Adventure Radio Theatre: Masks of Nyarlathotep By: H.P. Lovecraft Historical Society – full cast production!

Contributor: John

Reading has been one of my main pleasures during lockdown

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Contributor: David Lowe

When the first lockdown started last March, I had 50 or 60 books waiting to be read, mainly generous gifts from friends and the result of my purchases from charity shops, visits to which have been rather an addiction in recent years. I cannot say that the number of unread titles has reduced in the past 12 months, rather to my surprise. On the contrary, during lockdown I acquired a significant number of new items (including many Virago imprints) from Bookish, the second hand stall on Cambridge market which offered a local home delivery service during lockdown. With bookshops closed, I also added a number of titles to my Kindle.

Reading has been one of my main pleasures during lockdown, and one of the things which has kept me sane, but the amount that I have read over the past twelve months has only been marginally more than in the year before. I don’t have the same capacity to read for extended periods of time that I had when I was younger, and whilst my powers of concentration are good in the morning, I read very little in the evening.

There has been a slight shift in the sort of books I have been reading. When it comes to fiction, I have tended to favour titles which are humorous, which are set in warm, sunny climes, or which have a strong plot line. Just as I try to avoid watching too many news broadcasts, I have very deliberately avoided titles about plague and pandemics, such as the obvious Camus and Defoe. Definitely not for me at the moment.

I have a lot of books about art history on my shelves, chiefly acquired for their illustrations or when visiting exhibitions. Very few of them had I actually sat down and read from cover to cover, but that has changed during lockdown, and I have read several of these titles with great pleasure. It’s partly in response to a vague desire to stretch my mind a little bit, since I am all too aware of the temptation to vegetate at the moment!

Whilst I enjoy listening to audiobooks, for me they aren’t usually a substitute for reading a print copy. Just occasionally I have listened to something over the past twelve months which I wouldn’t actually have picked up (Kidnapped springs to mind), but usually I listened to titles which I have read in print, to refamiliarise myself with the book and perhaps get a new perspective. I especially love novels read by the wonderful Juliet Stevenson. One thing I always avoid are Radio 4 abridged versions of novels. For me it is the whole book or nothing.

Last but very definitely not least: during lockdown I have taken to listening to podcasts about reading, such as Backlisted, and BBC Sounds offerings about reading such as A good read. It is a mystery why I had very rarely listened to these before, for I find them stimulating and absorbing, and have listened to them in quantity. I have found many of the guests’ comments really enlightening. This has led in turn to my compiling lists of titles I would want to read in due course. In some ways this is not helpful…

My five choices are as follows:

The Enchanted April / Elizabeth Von Arnim. I love this book, and in present circumstances it was such a delight to be transported to the warmth and sunshine of Italy.

Call for the Dead / John le Carré. I had always been rather sniffy about this author. How wrong can you be. I thought this, I think his first novel, was extremely well written, and I definitely want to read more.

The Dutch House / Ann Patchett. A favourite author. I have three more titles by her waiting to be read, but I enjoy her books so much that I am pacing myself. I don’t like my pleasures all at once.

The House of Mirth / Edith Wharton. I was bowled over by this book when I read it 20 years ago, and loved it just as much when I reread it last November. It did make me realise how many books I have which I really want to reread. Oh dear.

For Esmé, with Love and Squalor / J.D. Salinger. I enjoyed these nine short stories even more than Catcher in the Rye, which I also read during lockdown. I read very few volumes of short stories, but during lockdown I have come to feel that this is a big mistake.

For a while I couldn’t read anything

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Contributor: Caroline Mead

For a while I couldn’t read anything, as I had a very short attention span. I suspect I was a bit stressed about the pandemic. But the best way we’ve been encouraged to help contain the pandemic is to stay at home. I’ve been working from home since March 2020 and normally commute in a lift share for two hours a day. More time in general, and more time at home, has meant I’ve read more books.

I’ve also, for a long time, had a resolution to read all the unread books in my house. This seems like a good opportunity to start reading them. But there are loads and I haven’t made massive inroads yet.

Over the summer I took part in a Virtual History Race with a company called Secret London Runs, who normally do themed running tours of London. The idea of the Virtual History Race was that you run 5k to an interesting historical site, and tell Secret London Runs all about it. The published runs were all fascinating. I ran to the 12th century Leper Chapel in Cambridge (chapel of the Leper Hospital, and one of the oldest complete buildings in Cambridge), because frankly King’s College is a bit of a media whore, and the Leper Chapel is much cooler.

I won the race! My prize was a book called Dr James Barry: a woman ahead of her time by Michael du Preez and Jeremy Dronfield. It tells the tale of a woman who became one of the most respected surgeons of the century, rising to a position no woman would ever have been able to occupy, whilst passing as a man called ‘Dr James Barry’. It’s not necessarily something I’d normally read, so it was interesting to get my teeth into it. I generally read it after work in my garden, whilst sipping on elderflower cordial (another lockdown activity – didn’t read the recipe properly and made 8 litres!).

This got me on a path of reading all the unread non-fiction in my house. One of the highlights was The Missing Lynx by Ross Barnet, which uncovers the mystery of all the missing mammals that used to roam the UK: lions, lynxes, bears, wolves and bison, and brings them to life using fossil evidence whilst positing what might happen if there are reintroductions. (There has long been a campaign to reintroduce lynxes as a top predator, and recently, Kent Wildlife Trust has been advertising for a Bison Ranger, to manage a reintroduced bison herd.)

I’m now reading a book called Other Minds: the octopus and the evolution of intelligent life by Peter Godfrey-Smith. It looks at the mind of octopus and how its tentacles are so packed with neurons that they almost think for themselves.

I find it comforting to remember that we’re animals too, and clearly not the most intelligent animals either. We’re not that important, really.

 

If anything as a reader I’ve reverted to type and to what feels safe

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Contributor: Helen Jeffries

At the start of lockdown I had imagined I would read more, and I may actually have done, but it also doesn’t feel like I’m reading as much as I would like to.  Sometimes I just can’t concentrate and I’ve also lost all the time I would otherwise have spent on tubes and buses reading.  Because I’m an introvert for whom reading quietly by myself is usually heaven, lockdown suited me very well in many ways.  But one can have too much of even the best things and I guess as time has gone on lockdown has ground me down.  

I’m definitely reading different things now.  As the pandemic has gone on, I’ve found I can’t face reading anything sad as my emotions seem to have become amplified.  So all of those serious and important novels on the “to read” pile are getting screened for “does anything I don’t feel emotionally up to happen in it” and generally set aside.  Significant novels about the experience of being Black and British?  Not until the world perks up; Bernadine Evaristo I’m looking at you.

At the start of the pandemic I bought and read The Great Mortality about the Black Death by John Kelly.  It’s very good, but it’s not particularly cheery.  As evidence I offer the quote: ‘The bodies were sparsely covered that the dogs dragged them forth and devoured them…And believing it to be the end of the world, no one wept for the dead, for all expected to die’, which the good people at Amazon have chosen to introduce the book description.

If anything as a reader I’ve reverted to type and to what feels safe.  In the early days of the pandemic I was finishing off things I’d started reading already – such as, for example, Ulysses(!) because it was my project to get it read in 2020, which I did.  But as time went on I went back to the “old friend” books, to things I knew wouldn’t contain any nasty surprises, and to history (because one knows what’s going to happen at the end).  I’m autistic which means that predictability is a major part of how I make myself feel secure.  So novels that are rollercoasters of emotions are inherently stressful and I don’t want the stress of not knowing what will happen to the characters.  I’ve been reading less for education or to improve my mind (which I would do usually) and more for comfort and escapism.  Literary comfort food (known novels) and nice reassuring carbs (history) have been the way to go.  

The dilemma “how do I select books that I want” does not seem ever to have caused me any problems even in the absence of open bookshops.  Since early 2020 though I’ve really got into supporting independent bookshops online.  For example about a year ago there was a huge reaction on Twitter when the Petersfield Bookshop said they hadn’t sold a book all day and might have to close.  Neil Gaiman retweeted the Tweet and suddenly they had more orders than they could ship and happily they continue to flourish today.  I strongly recommend following them on Twitter for odd little book nuggets.  I also love Top Hat & Tales in Faversham run by the wonderful Rachel.  She curates her collection so carefully that there is seldom a book in her shop (or on her website) that I wouldn’t want.  So obviously I end up buying them.

I keep meaning to embark on my backed up “to read” pile but in all honesty that requires an effort of will for which I don’t have the energy.  Somehow it’s easier to buy a book and read it straight away.  Once something’s been put off once, it’s easier to put it off again. Probably because of my autism I have an absolute horror of leaving a book unfinished.  Which is perhaps why starting a new and unknown book requires an effort of will – it’s a big commitment that the end will be reached in due course.  If I haven’t finished a book it plagues me in the back of my mind – there’s a doorstop sized book called Quicksilver that I started more than ten years ago and haven’t (yet) finished and it preys upon my mind…

Being my version of autistic (not all autistic people are alike by any means), I’m not really into audio books because my main way of thinking is visual.  You might have encountered Thinking in Pictures by the famous autistic writer Temple Grandin, and that’s certainly how I think so it’s much easier to process things that I’ve seen rather than things I’ve heard.  That’s probably why books appeal to me so much – it’s a whole world in your hand and the only sense you need to process it is sight.

My top picks for lockdown reading?  Well I’d go for:

  • Acts and Omissions by Catherine Fox – a very gratifying sort of modern Barchester Chronicles
  • Red Plenty by Francis Spufford – the most illuminating book about Soviet Russia I have ever read
  • Music to Eat Cake By by Lev Parikian – a glorious collection of essays which resulted when the author (unwisely) allowed his readers to pick the subjects
  • Jews Don’t Count by David Baddiel – a polemic on how antisemitism has been allowed to persist that just landed on my doormat and which I already love, plus it’s short
  • The Vinyl Detective by Andrew Cartmel.  From the same stable as the Rivers of London sequence but with records, and cats, and JAZZ.

https://apolitical.co/en/solution_article/a-letter-from-the-autistic-colleague-you-didnt-know-you-had

 

Reading through the lens of lockdown
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Contributor: Claire Richards

“To acquire the habit of reading is to construct for yourself a refuge from almost all the miseries of life.” — W. Somerset Maugham

“I must say I find television very educational. The minute somebody turns it on, I go into the library and read a good book.” — Groucho Marx

I’ve always found comfort and escape in reading. Like Lucy Mangan, whose Bookworm was cathartic, I spent much of my childhood with ‘my nose in a book’. My sporty family despaired. Why on earth would I want to idle hours away in a corner, ruining my eyes? I read anything and everything: stories set in boarding schools or fantasy lands, about tomboys, good girls, plucky boys or ponies. I, a cowardly child, became them all. I was Enid Blyton’s George shinning up a rope and Julian daringly confronting the villain.

Last April, soon after the start of lockdown, I injured my back. ‘Keep on the move,’ my doctor advised, so friends suggested I try audiobooks… What a revelation! What a snob I’d been about how I ‘read’. How much I’d missed! The first book I listened to – recommended by an admirably wise and intelligent woman – was Robert Harris’s Conclave. Narrated by Roy McMillan with exactly the right tone and pace, I was riveted. 

I always feel better after delving into Jane Austen’s world, so next I (re)turned to Mansfield Park. I hadn’t bargained on the power of Juliet Stevenson’s narration to create a whole new hierarchy of detail. In Fanny’s censorious judgement of Mary to Edmund, say, is Austen revealing more than Fanny’s ‘good worth’? After all, doesn’t Fanny want Edmund for herself? Confined by our own lockdown, surely we can understand Maria’s desire to escape Sotherton by climbing over that iron gate. Yet, although beguiling, her antics ultimately destroy Maria, whilst cautious Fanny’s need for safety brings happiness close to home.

Still, with Edmund settling for a woman he doesn’t love passionately, something was missing. So I turned to Persuasion. How had I never realised it’s Austen’s most romantic text? Anne’s rivals for Wentworth’s affection, albeit younger, are not in her league for looks or intelligence. For Anne, who doesn’t have her eye on a Pemberley, true love conquers all – time, separation, misunderstanding, even understandings; genuine kindness, patience and loyalty prevail. And for us, separated now from those we love, isn’t that what we, too, hope for, what we always hope for?

I’ve long been drawn to the sense of closure in thrillers and detective stories, something even more appealing in these uncertain times. I listened to Sisters (Michelle Frances), reassured that the sisters eventually come together in a satisfying epilogue after the real criminal meets her end. I loved The Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman. Its retirement village setting adds poignancy, partly because the talent and valuable experience of ‘the elderly’ can be celebrated, but also because the pandemic has so cruelly targeted them. ‘There are people here who could take you apart and put you back together again,’ declares former trade union leader Ron somewhat melodramatically, but he makes the point. As Captain Sir Tom Moore proved, we need them. Let us not underestimate them.

And films and television? Have they provided the refuge I’ve found in a ‘good book’? As always, it depends on the text. Channel 4’s series It’s a Sin by Russell T Davies was shocking and heart-wrenchingly tragic in its portrayal of the homophobia and cruel loss of life to the plague of AIDS in the 1980s. Through the power of its drama, there is a message that desperately needs to be heard now more than ever. 

And then there was Life on Mars, recommended by a dear friend and creator of this blog. Isolated and alienated from those he loves, the hero, Sam, finds himself in a dystopian world of violence, sexism, homophobia and racism, a 1970s cop show world where ‘doing things by the book’ is scorned. Like many a dystopia, we see aspects of it today. Sam navigates his world with compassion and often a quiet and understated determination. Ultimately, the power of human connection and love has the last word. We can but hope…

Contributor: Claire