Book after Book

By Dorothy Koomson Published by Headline Review   Synopsis: Pieta has a secret. Ten years ago, Pieta was kidnapped by a man calling himself The Blindfolder who said he wouldn't kill her if she kept her eyes closed for 48 hours. She never told anyone what happened to her, vowing to move on with her life. But when The Blindfolder starts hunting down his past victims, Pieta realises she may finally be forced to tell her deepest secret to stay alive… Jody has a secret. Fifteen years ago, policewoman Jody made a terrible mistake that resulted in a serial killer known as The Blindfolder escaping justice. When Jody discovers journalist Pieta survived an attack by him, she realises she may finally have found a way to catch him. But that would mean endangering at least two innocent people… How did this book end up in my hands? I read this book thanks to a serialisation via The Pigeonhole app. Was it a page-turner? Reading the daily instalment of the book was the firs...

A Bit of Spoon Throwing On a Chilly Spring Night A few weeks ago I went to a Victorian Séance Experience at Brighton’s Preston Manor. For those of you who don’t know, Preston Manor is a gloriously mismatched manor house on the edge of Preston Park, right in the heart of the city. The original house dates from the early 1700 but there was a religious small-holding there in Saxon times and the Manor is mentioned in the Doomsday Book as belonging to the Bishops of Chichester. The foundations are still visible in the basement, and this is where you first get that spine tingle that comes with knowing a place has such a long history. The temperature suddenly drops and you fancy you hear footsteps on the stairs along the corridor or feel the brush of a breeze, though there are no windows at hand and no-one else has joined the tour. The rest of the house was added by degrees and refurbishments over the centuries, the house was substantially renovated in 1905 by the last private owners the Stan...

Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome Erinna Mettler, author of Starlings , who has kindly agreed to delight the readers of Book After Book with tales from the unique city of Brighton (and Hove!)... The Starling Stag Do There are a few weeks left to catch one of Brighton’s most spectacular performances and the good thing is you don’t even have to buy a ticket. If you head down to Brighton Pier on any evening in winter you will see the beautiful ballet of our visiting starlings. The birds come down here from their breeding grounds in Scandinavia to sit out the winter in our relatively warmer climate. It’s like they’re on an extended stag weekend, taking a few months out on the town to eye up the talent, binge on the local produce and go dancing. Every evening as day turns into dusk the birds congregate around the piers in huge groups much like those men and women with L-plates and fairy wings who throng the city’s streets. As the birds collect they begin to swirl across the skies in mas...

The Iambic Arts Theatre is a little gem hidden away in the centre of Brighton’s North Laines. Bringing the public a selection of high quality plays, poetry and music events under the guidance of Artistic Director Emma D’Arcy, this month the theatre hosted Vita and Virginia: A love relationships in two acts , directed by Alison Grant. Dramatized by actress and playwright Eileen Atkins, the show was originally produced by The Players Collective in Lewes in 2011 and, not surprisingly, it was performed to critical acclaim. I knew that I was going to love the play even before the two actresses - Valerie Dent in the role of Virginia Woolf and Tamar K. Karpas in the role of Vita Sackville-West - recited their first lines. The attention to detail that was evident from the stage setting and the costumes could only be a sign of good things to come! And so it was: from the very first words used by Tamar/Vita to describe her first impressions about Valerie/Virginia to their joint recital of a pas...

Brighton's Jubilee Library helps celebrate LGBT History Month 2012! For more information on events etc., please click here .

In parts of Italy, December 13th - or Saint Lucia’s day - is a very special day. Forget about Santa Claus and Christmas day, this is when you get your presents! I haven’t celebrated Saint Lucia’s day since I was a little girl… until this year, when the people who organised The Big Book Group event at Brighton’s Pavilion Theatre brought the magic back into an otherwise uncelebrated day! As the name suggests, this was an occasion for book groups to come together and enjoy an evening of bookish delights. “Unattached” book lovers, however, were also welcome, which was good for me as I haven’t yet taken the plunge into the world of book groups. The stars of the evening were authors Carol Birch and Araminta Hall , who both experienced a very successful 2011. Carol Birch’s latest novel, Jamrach's Menagerie , was shortlisted for the Man Booker prize, while Araminta Hall’s debut novel, Everything and Nothing , made it to Richard and Judy’s Autumn Reads. The two writers took it in turns to...

One more title from my ever-expanding reading wish list. ** The cover image is for illustrative purposes only. If you are a publisher and would kindly like to offer me a copy of this book for review, I will change the cover so as to reflect the edition received. ** Breakfast In Brighton: Adventures on the Edge of England By Nigel Richardson Amazon's product description: Inspired by Brighton as a state of mind as much as a place, Nigel Richardson returns after a gap of 20 years to capture its spirit. The narrative is woven from strands of memoir, travelogue, reportage and fiction. Why I want to read this book: Because I live in Brighton and absolutely adore it!

Two more titles from my rapidly growing reading wish list. ** The cover images are for illustrative purposes only. If you are a publisher and would kindly like to offer me a copy of any of these books for review, I will change the cover(s) so as to reflect the edition received. ** Just Take You Coat Off: A lesbian Life By Barbara Bell From http://www.brightonourstory.co.uk/ : The daughter of a mill worker in Lancashire, Barbara Bell had her lesbian 'initiation' the year after Radclyffe Hall's The Well Of Loneliness (1928). Since then, she has never had the time to be lonely. [...] Barbara Bell here tells the full story of her extraordinary life and times. Truly Wilde: The Unsettling Story of Dolly Wilde, Oscar's Unusual Niece By Joan Schenkar Amazon's product description: Born a scant three months after her uncle Oscar's notorious arrest, raised in the shadow of the greatest scandal of the turn of the twentieth century, Dolly Wilde attracted people of taste a...

Published by QueenSpark Books Back Row Brighton – Cinema-going in Brighton & Hove is a glossy paperback that should feature in the library of anyone who’s interested in the history of cinema or in the past of this vibrant city. And if you’re interested in both, you will be amazed by the amount of information provided. Chapter after chapter, we learn about the cinemas that have graced the streets of Brighton & Hove from 1909 to the present. Some have had a short life, while others have lasted longer. Some have changed name an innumerable amount of times. Some were considered classy, while others were places that parents forbad their children to go to. Going to the cinema, however, whether shiny or shabby, was always considered a treat: an almost magical experience that most of the uninspiring buildings that host our cinemas today are unable to offer. The only cinema that is featured in the book and that is still operating today is the independent Duke of York’s Picture...

By Deborah Tyler-Bennett Published by Smokestack Books Rex Whistler's allegory of H.R.H. the Prince Regent Awakening the Spirit of Brighton dons the front cover of Pavilion, Deborah Tyler-Bennett’s second collection of poems, and is a perfect pictorial representation of the self-indulgent and gaudy characters that roam the pages of the little booklet. The carefully chosen words of Tyler-Bennett’s pen kept me company many times while sitting at the beach. The West Pier, one of Brighton’s icons, stars in many of the poems. My favourites, West Pier Serenade and The Brighton Mystery, allow readers to catch a glimpse of a pier that is derelict by day and alive by night, the setting of romantic moonlit dances. Browse the pages and the “spirit of Brighton” truly comes alive, with scenes of grandeur and decadence and a city populated by holidaying tourists, thugs, homeless people and all those picturesque characters that can be found between the piers.

By Tony Diamond Published by QueenSpark Books On 28th April 1965, Barnardos took a group of children to Australia, in search of a new life and better opportunities. Aged 16, Anthony Roy Bates was one of those children and this is his story. Through the pages of Pebble on the Beach, that same boy, now in his sixties and with a new name, Tony Diamond, recalls his adventure. He might have only spent 9 months away from his home in Hove but they were most certainly 9 action-packed months. After the flight from London Heathrow, young Tony spends a few days in Sydney before being sent to work on a farmhouse at Scone, New South Wales. That is only going to be the first of several jobs and several places that see him becoming more and more determined to go back to England, even if that means having to stow away on a ship, failing in his escape plans and being arrested in New Zealand. You will follow him to the other end of the world and back, you will meet all the people that enriched his exper...

By Sarah Rayner Published by Picador There are books that grab your attention from the very beginning and never let it go. One Moment, One Morning is one of them. One Moment, One Morning is also one of those books that leave a lasting impression and will linger at the back of your mind to suddenly jump into the foreground when a sound or an image reminds you of them. In her new book, Sarah Rayner takes us on a journey on the 07:44 train from Brighton to London. It’s Monday and Anna and Lou are travelling on the same train, packed with commuters. They don’t know each other and are sitting in different compartments. Anna is reading a magazine and Lou is listening to music while observing her travelling companions. Next to her, on the opposite side of the aisle, are Karen and Simon. A happily married couple, they are going to London to sign the contract for a new house. Suddenly, Simon collapses. He dies instantly, of a heart attack. In that same instant, many lives are changed. Karen’s, ...

The New Year has just begun and you haven’t got a calendar yet? Don’t panic! It is important that you choose something that you like, something that you won’t mind having in front of your eyes for the next twelve months... and teNeues has got something for every taste. Flowers, landscapes, design, art, humour... whatever takes your fancy! Two of my favourite calendars from their range are Hokusai 2010 and Miffy 2010 – to make both adults and children happy! Every page displays months and week days in six different languages, all bank and religious holidays are listed and at the bottom of each page you can find a useful box to write notes in. teNeues also has weekly calendars that can be propped up or laid flat on a desk. Each of the 52 pages displays a different image and, thanks to the perforation line, they can be used as postcards. Shells & Stones, with beautiful photographs by Laurent Pinsard is a very good example. If you want to support a smaller local publisher, wh...

Published by Brighton Town Press I approached this book knowing nothing about Brighton’s royally-approved Queen’s Park. 72 pages later, I reached the back cover of this exquisite volume – whose glossy cover shows a watercolour by the architect Charles Barry – feeling that I have been part of the park’s life since its beginnings. Brighton Town Press, in collaboration with the Friend’s of Queen’s Park, has done a masterly job in reconstructing the story of the park. From the lease of the land by a Mr Armstrong through the various following ownerships – the most important being those by the Attree and Duddell families – and up to the purchase by the Corporation in the late 19th century. And then, in more recent times, the survival of the park through two World Wars and its active role in the community up to the present year. But the book is not just about the park. It is about the great buildings that surround it, the people that enjoy it, the plants and the animals that have a hom...