Sunday, February 28, 2021

Mermaid's Pool by David Nolan reviewed

It dawned on me half way through The Mermaid's Pool that I was far more familiar with the universe it depicted than I first appreciated. It takes a rare skill as a storyteller to do this. Not only has David Nolan carefully and painstakingly crafted characters and a realistic backdrop, he's also planted seeds in your imagination in his first novel, Black Moss, set nearby, but with a seemingly different storyline, era and location. There are overlapping characters, but not in an overt way, not as a centrepoint, but as a landscape. Obviously part of the reason I liked the book as much as I did is because it's got bits in it that I know about and am a little bit obsessive: British fascism, Kinder Scout, rave music and local politics. So often I read books about worlds I know something of and when a vague detail isn't quite right then it ruins it for me. Again, it's a skill of a journalist and writer of David Nolan's quality that he never slips up. I trust then that the depictions of police procedure and cancer care are as well researched. All that said, the real pinnacle of Mermaid's Pool is the story. It is pacy, shocking, violent, but also very well structured. You think you've worked out plot twists, but there's always a surprise in store. Highly recommended and I can't wait for the third in this Manc Noir trilogy, The Ballad of Hanging Lees.


Wednesday, February 10, 2021

Review - 'Life of a Mountain: Helvellyn' by Terry Abraham



In fairly short order we were treated to the BBC showing all three of Terry Abraham's films in his series Life of a Mountain, the latest being A Year On Helvellyn. Although this is the most recent addition to his series of stunning films about the mountains of the Lake District we didn't watch them in strict order. First we watched the Scafell Pike film from 2014, then the latest one, and then last night finally completed  the trilogy with the return to BBC4 of A Year on Blencathra from 2017. I loved how all of the interviewees were so passionate and eloquent, how they seemed to be just in conversation, rather than being interviewed. That takes a particular skill. They are in no way tourist films, but are deeply respectful of the everyday lives of people in the Lake District and their relationship with all three mountains and their different characteristics. Terry has clearly got better and better as a film maker and developed a sense of what worked from the first two, so much so that I would almost militantly urge anyone who hasn't seen any of them to view them in the correct order - Scafell Pike, Blencathra, Helvellyn - and see how they reach a peak of their own. A spiritual dimension definitely populated the first two, but deeper historical and social context seeped into the Blencathra film (as well as more music), but Helvellyn had the right blend of everything (and less music).

My own relationship with the Lake District is lifelong and I love it deeply. My Mum is from there, my Grandma spent time in the sanatorium on Blencathra when she conducted TB, and I've probably had more holidays there than anywhere else. For all of that my run rate on its mountains isn't great - I've hiked up a dozen, no more. I went up Catbells and Skiddaw in October last year (not on the same day) and still feel quite emotional about how much I enjoyed doing so, and with the friends I did it with, at a time we now look back on as a false dawn, when we all felt lockdown was easing. These films have drawn me ever closer to these mountains as I'm sure they will for you too. And I think we'll do so more respectfully, more sensitively and with an enormous sense of gratitude that it is possible. Thank you Terry Abraham.

Saturday, February 06, 2021

Lockdown telly and why we're really missing Saga Noren

 



We tend to fall head over heels for some series. The Bridge (BBC4) was definitely one of them. Having arrived at it 9 years late, and seen the conclusion just three years after everyone else, I do feel slightly foolish for not having responded to a strong recommendation from my friend Martin Carr throughout that time. I know that an obvious question will be about my own take on the depiction of Saga Noren as a rare principal character with Asperger's (though it's never described as such). My own personal response is the same as it often is about anything related to the condition, and that Sofie Helin does an incredible job as the actor playing the very well written part of Saga. She's not a type, she's unique, she's both brittle and hard as nails; impenetrable and yet lovable; vulnerable yet impervious to others. There's still much to forgive with the series, unlikely plot twists and dramatic reveals, and often ludicrously complex themed killing sprees, but though it's gruesome at times it never feels exploitative or cruel. I've only been to Copenhagen once, and don't remember it being this gloomy either, or having so many disused industrial sites where ritual murders can take place, but it is portraying a grim world, and usually in winter. It has all been quite a ride with Saga, Martin, Henrik, Hans and Lillian, and all of the complicated, messy, normal, odd and quirky characters that have formed the 38 episodes. I feel I want more and I have genuinely felt loss over the last 24 hours that I will never again see that Porsche 911 ("ahem, 911S, actually," Saga Noren would say), or hear the words: "Saga Noren Lanskrim Malmo".
For the time being I'm immersed in The Bridge fandom, here, and here. A warning though, there are spoilers.

Modern Love (Prime) - slightly quirky, but brilliantly well acted crop of New York-based single act stories. The one with Anne Hathaway utterly broke me. But mostly they were beautifully packaged, wonderful immersions.

The Serpent (BBC) - there was something creepy and unsettling about the BBC’s drama based on the true story of Charles Sobhraj; and at times it was unbearably tense just waiting for him to kill another hapless victim lured into his lair of evil. But the BBC adaptation of the true story hangs together really well and manages to pull it off with enough panache without you still feeling anything but revulsion for him and his pathetic sidekicks. Going down the rabbit hole of research on Sobhraj was quite an eye opener, the consistently excellent Andrew Anthony, who has met him twice, is particularly good in GQ here. Good use of music in the series too. 

Lupin (Netflix) - really enjoyed this stylish and slick French thriller with a deeply moral core. 

Tuesday, February 02, 2021

Vikas Shah's new book - impressive access, delightful insights



I've known Vikas Shah for about ten years. I first noticed him as he was doing a blog where he interviewed incredible people that you wouldn't expect a textiles trader from Manchester to be accessing, never mind uploading to a very basic looking blog called Thought Economics. In that time I've seen him grow in confidence, but never diminish in either energy or ambition. I've seen him fall in love and get married, get an MBE and deliver an incredibly powerful TEDx talk. This book then marks just another milestone in his fascinating life. In it he tries to do justice to the access he's gained by virtue of his own raw audacity and package the insights gained into a useful bundle, curated under such headings as identity, culture, leadership and entrepreneurship. The interviews include Maya Angelou, Marina Abramovich, Bertie Ahern and Carlo Ancelotti. And that's just the As. 

There's a lot of insight and some remarkably candid reveals, which I won't spoil, but having gone through them all, I still found myself being genuinely more stimulated and impressed by the interpretations of those insights that Vikas himself shares. Maybe that's a bias of my own pride in what he's achieved, but I rather think he's earned the right.