Down the Line by Cally Phillips (and The Admirable Crichton by JM Barrie) Reviewed by Dennis Hamley

I never used to like JM Barrie.  Of course, like many people, I only knew Peter Pan which, quite frankly, always seemed to me to border on drivel.  An open air over-the-top contemporary reworking I recently saw in New Zealand  hasn't done much to change my mind.  

However, no matter what I feel about Peter Pan, I have changed my mind about the hitherto unknown rest of Barrie.  I didn’t realise what a sharp and acerbic commentator on Edwardian society he was, how observant of its manners, how critical of its assumptions, how scathing about its conventions, how he revels in an almost Gilbertian topsey-turveydom.   Nowhere are these features seen more acutely than in arguably his best  and certainly, after Peter Pan, his best-known play, The Admirable Crichton, which hides its criticism behind the façade of a good-natured and often very funny comedy of manners.

The plot is simple.  Lord Loam is holding his well-intentioned but quite dreadful monthly tea-party with his severely embarrassed servants (including Tweeny, destined for a crucial role) his daughters, some male hangers-on, and Crichton the butler, who could be Jeeves’s brother and is a strict guardian of the class system. An entirely inappropriate way of mixing the classes in such a stratified society.  But Lord Loam plans a three-month voyage in his yacht and when they are shipwrecked on a desert island, the roles slowly reverse.  At first there is confusion: two years later there is an efficient and developed little society, organised, run and ruled  by Crichton.  Rescue  arrives and back home the old society re-forms itself.  But the damage is done and nothing can be quite the same again.

Cally Phillips has history with this play, fully – and lovingly – recounted in the  introduction to this omnibus edition which juxtaposes Barrie’s play with Down the Line, her own rewriting and updating of it, in which the Edwardian social system is replaced by modern celebrity culture.

Instead of Crichton the butler we have Jim Crichton (JC), the Close Protection Officer (CPO) of Caroline Carter, pop diva. She is engaged, almost inevitably,  to Steve Brook, a professional footballer.   Posh and Becks still rule.  Kevin the documentary film maker is there to film Steve’s proposal to her – if Ted, Caroline’s watchful father, ever lets him.  Caroline’s sister Catherine and wide boy Dave augment Team Caroline.  Ted feels he is the leader, fulfilling the same role as Lord Loam – but after they are shipwrecked, SAS-trained JC, like Crichton before him, takes the dominant role.  Back home, the trappings of celebrity culture take over again – but,  for the audience -  too late; they have been seen for the meretricious baubles which they are.

Updating a famous and much-loved work is fraught with difficulty.  Courting comparison can be dangerous. Misunderstanding or (worse) trivialising the original are ever-present rocks to founder on.  Cally Phillips avoids them.  She knows the original play in production, she knows Barrie’s other work and she understands him.   She knows her own play in production as well.

Down the Line is a lovely take on the original.  The dialogue, the product of a good ear, crackles along and, just as in the original and as in all good drama, what the characters say is what they are.  Tones, idioms and rhythms are judged exactly.   To expand on Aristotle, character issues in action, but it issues in its words as well.  Both productions which Cally Phillips describes in her introduction  were with youth groups, Scottish students and Oxfordshire schoolkids (the latter the  result of interesting outreach work by the Oxford University Dramatic Society), and indeed it is with a good Youth theatre group that the play would live best.  I only have my own internal production to go on.  But if I had my way it would be produced again now, near enough to home for me to go to to see it on stage – and I’ll do anything that  I can to make it happen because I’d be assured of great entertainment and, afterwards, a lot to think about.  And so would everyone else there.

This review was first published in The Independent Ebook Review. I’ve revived it because this intriguing omnibus edition shouldn’t be forgotten and nor should its writing and production history.

And edition of Down the Line on its own and an annotated omnibus edition of Down the Line and The Admirable Crichton are both available on Kindle.

Lad's Love by S.R.Crockett reviewed by Cally Phillips

'Lad’s Love' (Volume 17 of The Galloway Collection' ) was first serialised in ‘The Lady’s Realm’ before being published in 1897 by Bliss, Sands & Co.  A contemporary review stated:  ‘It is far from being a commonplace romance. It is indeed an admirable example of the writer’s power to portray the life, character and goings on of country lads and lasses.’

We have seen some of these ‘domestic/rural’ stories before in Crockett’s collections such as ‘The Stickit Minister’ and ‘Bog Myrtle and Peat’ but this the first time Crockett has given novel form to this type of story. It falls somewhere between the history of ‘Lochinvar’ (published the same year) and the romance of ‘The Lilac Sunbonnet,’ but it offers the reader yet another kind of story.  It is told in the first person by Alec McQuhirr, son of Saunders who features in so many of Crockett’s short stories.  If you like it’s a sort of ‘spin off’ of the McQuhirr family saga.  And if you like the McQuhirr family, as I do, it’s a real treat of a novel.

The key setting is Nether Neuk , (a fictionalised version of the area around Crossmichael and Balmaghie) – and Whinniyliggate (a fictionalised version of Laurieston) and one might describe it as a tale of ‘the back end of the byre.’   As such it gives an insight into the lives of ordinary rural young Scots in Crockett’s time. There is earthy humour and couthy romance, and tricks and schemes as the lads try to ‘catch’ their lasses. 

Reading ‘Lad’s Love’ one has to understand that Crockett uses the word, and concept of ‘idyllic’ ironically. A failure to do this is partly what has seen such work misinterpreted as ‘kailyard’.  There is a lot more depth to the novel than such a dismissive categorisation suggests.  No, it is not a moral story of the heights of Henry James, but Crockett on his own admission wasn’t trying to write ‘novels of purpose,’  he was simply recording the way life was, as he saw it, in his own small part of Scotland.  As such it provides us with an interesting insight into domestic ritual, social status and expectations in the society of the day. 

Throughout we come across characters familiar to us from other of his works, and new characters as well. Rab Anderson is now father to ‘Hoolet’ and ‘the Deil,’ the children previously attributed to Sawny Bean in ‘A Galloway Herd.’  Crockett is happy to reuse material from previous serialisations and his original audience would have been just as happy to re-read these stories with variations.

Central to ‘Lad’s Love’ are the Chrystie family, and Alec’s prospective girlfriend (eventually wife) ,the redoubtable Nance Chrystie, is a brilliantly drawn picture of a feisty lass.  If you view rusticity and rural life as ‘nostalgic’ you may not get on with this, but if you enjoy reading about the lives of rural folk and their ‘little’ stories, you will love it. The characters are drawn with love and humour and even the collie dogs are given due credit. Add to that a plethora of interesting small detail, such as games of quoits, poaching,  the ‘Scotch’ marriage convention and the passing of seasons, and you have a novel that punches well above its weight.  This is at least as much a novel of rural social structures as it is a romance and it will appeal to readers of both types of story.

You can buy Lad’s Love in ebook format (Kindle or epub) from Ayton Publishing for £2.99 HERE (You can also buy it as an ebook from Amazon UK or US)

To buy the paperback copy in UK from Amazon click HERE  £8.99 and in the US $14.99 click HERE  

A Week With No Labels by Cally Phillips.... various reviewers.

This is a bit of a cheek. I know it. But sometimes one has to do what one can, and this week it’s Learning Disability Week. And this year, thus far, I’ve done nothing about that. So I’m going to step over the line and post  a series of ‘reviews’ of ‘A Week with No Labels’ published  first as episodes during LD week 2012 but now available as ‘omnibus’ ebook and paperback (with additional ‘days.’)

The first two reviews are by AE’ers Julia Jones and Bill Kirton, and of the others, I know Brendan Gisby and the others I have no idea who wrote them (didn’t even know they existed till today when I went to find Julia and Bill’s.) I’m hoping that in the spirit it’s intended all the reviewers will be happy for their reviews to be posted here (I can’t afford to be sued!) and I hope that reading them might encourage people to think for a moment about ‘Learning Disability’ and maybe, just maybe, buy the book! (Cally Phillips)

Julia Jones Reviews:

This is the story of the No Labels drama group. Most of the member s have learning disabilities of one sort of another but the writers gift is to work WITH the disabilities to make plays that are humourous and also political.It's a campaigning book that doesn't seek to deny the difficulties people encounter if, for instance, they have a problem reading, managing money or speaking clearly but pleads for them to be given the help that the want, not the help that other people assume that they need. It's an important distiction, made here with clarity and compassion. I first read this book in its component sections during learning disability week. It was a lovely idea to offer a section a day for five days but I think the 'omnibus edition' does more that its parts. The additional material (a weekend away with the No Labels drama group) adds depth to the central argument. Although this is a work of advocacy it's also an entertaining and humane read. Try it.

Bill Kirton reviews

 This review is from: A Week With No Labels (Kindle Edition)

These are 5 episodes chronicling the work of a fictional drama group (called No Labels) which are based on real work done by the author in collaboration with a beguiling, attractive, varied bunch of people tagged with the label 'learning disability'. It's a great read - funny, entertaining, but also thought-provoking in the best sense of the word. With each wee adventure, it gently challenges your perceptions of people, labels, and the values on which our society SEEMS TO run. I've just finished reading it and the characters are all still vivid for me. I know they'll stay that way for a long time, too.

Groundbreaking!, Reviewed by ‘the Bub.’

This is a very important book. The author introduces us to the background to the book, inspired by the real 'No Labels Drama Group' funded by an advocacy group run by adults with leaning disabilities. The book however is about a fictional 'No Labels' Drama Group inspired by the real 'Boaloian Drama Group' which the author explains is based on the work of Augusto Boal, founder of the Theatre of the Oppressed Movement.
With an introduction to the cast and with the author as the group's facilitator we are taken on a journey of a week of drama in which the group work out and perform various plays usually those dealing with important issues of the day affecting the group and society in general. These are reworked or reinterpretions of well-known plays or stories. But really you need to read it in order to appreciate the sheer hard work and fun that goes into the plays from the costumes to the characters themselves, to the prompts that bring this series of plays to life.
On Monday the group define themselves and decide 'labels are for tins not people'. This is an important recurrent theme throughout the week. Of course, we soon understand that it is a micro week and one Monday is an amalgamation of many Mondays and so on throughout the week. The No Labels Group decide they want to put on a 'real play' with 'real characters' at a 'real theatre' with a 'real audience'. Something like Shakespeare. No pressure there then for their facilitator! But she and the group rise to the occasion. What follows is a hilarious adaptation of Hamlet (I won't elaborate any further as I don't wish to spoil it). That is Tuesday taken care of. Wednesday is Politics and our group performs to the Scottish Parliament for Disability. They have a message 'politics is rubbish'. Yes, the No Labels team put on a play with a message about reducing, re-using and recycling. The theme of Thursday is about choices - real and informed choices - and again takes the form of a new angle on an old story: The Emperor's New Clothes. Friday is recycling day in the form of a musical: recycling songs in the group's own adapted version of Aiken Drum.
Whereas the weekdays, Monday to Friday, are full of scheduled activities for the No Labels Group their facilitator (the author) is shocked to discover (as we are as readers) that 'for most of the group a care package doesn't include activities on the weekend'. She wants to redress this and one weekend the No Labels Group are invited to put on a play about healthy eating at a hotel. I think this has to be my favourite part of the book as we share in the freedom, spontaneity and novelty of people, most of whom have never been away before. It is like a holiday to them and free of their usual constraints, amazing things happen to all concerned, not least to our facilitator, and new and deeper friendships are forged.
The book is written in a chatty, colloquial style, directed at you as reader. It is a style you either get on with or you don't. Fortunately, I do. I have in fact written a book myself (under a pseudonym) in a very similar style because that book, as this, lent itself to it. Having written in such a style I'm also aware of the diverse reactions it can produce. Mostly it is engaging, immediate and humorous. Wearing my editorial hat for a moment, there were quite a few punctuation issues. I encountered many unclosed quotes and brackets which were a bit distracting but maybe this is just in the print version and I'm sure the author will pick them up on the next printing.
That aside, I learned a lot from this book. It was enlightening, entertaining, fun and carried an important message. This is what you are left with and what you will take away. I have to take my hat off (editorial one and all!) to the author and the No Labels Group. They clearly have bags of imagination, energy and ideas and I'm already missing them.

Who you gonna call? NO LABELS, reviewed by F.Z.Flynn 

I've just spent a week with A Week with No labels. A week in the company of the No Labels theatre group and its inspirational cast as they work their way through a Biblical week of off-beat, touching , and often hilarious theatrical productions never before seen.

I must say right off that this is a good book. Good in both senses of the word. First, as in the sense of entertaining, funny, well-written. But also in the deeper philosophical sense of the word. Of giving to the other. Of the sharing of experiences. Of finding yourself, of finding God in the world. I think this is the heart of the book, the heart of the matter, the heart of all matters. It's making the revolution the only way one can. Day by day, hour by hour, in the midst of the world. I also feel that for Kate, the narrator and guide throughout the week, there is something of Hamlet in the story. To be or not to be. The question of questions. To find yourself in life. To take possession of yourself through using your talents to enrich the lives of others. And in this, this book, and by extension the whole project on which the book is based, obviously succeeds.

There is something you should know before we go any further, though I have not nor do I plan to comment on this aspect. The author says in the introduction:

"NO LABELS is a fictional drama group. I have worked for ten years with a "real" drama group run "for and by" adults labeled with learning disabilities and many of the experiences fictionalized here happened to us. Many didn't. But in this story I am a fictional character too! If there is any resemblance to real people in these fictional characters I'd say it's only the good bits which are "real". I've made up the bad bits!"

What I most enjoyed in the book was the comedy. And the underlying chaos. The brilliant anarchy. The narrative voice makes you feel like a privileged member of the audience. You laugh, feel sad, want to join in the silly songs, want to spend a weekend with the cast wolfing into anything edible on offer. I loved the Murpyesque mock philosophical debate about fairy cakes and cupcakes. I wanted to join in. Is a cupcake posher than a fairy cake? What the hell is a muffin, then? Why in my adopted language, Spanish, do we call them Magdalenas? (see, I'm joining in already).I heard that they became popular in Spain after Proust wrote about recalling his childhood after smelling a Magdalena soaked in tea. Or was it a cupcake. Or a fairy cake? That's how good this book is, that's the power of No Labels, they lead you from hoovering up tea and cakes (they're good at that, loved that line) to Marcel Proust. Who you gonna call? Yeah, that's right, NO LABELS.
I also really loved the adaptation of Hamlet, Piglet. Sorry, Piglet! This, in my opinion, is the high point of the book and the part where the writer's skill in using her voice to guide the reader through the action, always seeming to be tottering on the edge of some anarchic catastrophe, is at its best. This is another aspect of the book that jumps out at you. The visual power of the narrative. You can see, see, see everything from your privileged seat in the stalls, or in the Gods if you're more of a cupcaker than a fairy caker. I would have loved to see the actual play. Even now, writing this, I'm laughing at the whole mad idea. "Murder most foul", "Somone's had their bacon", "Something's rotten in the state of Denmark" . Horatio Pig, Polony Pig, Ophelia Pig, Queenie Pig (!) and, the best of all, Ghosty Pig.

Piglet is just one of the days and there are six other equally uproariously funny days to choose from. Download this great little book. I can guarantee you won't be disappointed. In fact I'm sure it will leave you wanting more. A Week with No Labels is not only a good read; it's also a sort of antidote to the desensitized little Britainesque sense of humour that seems to have swept down and taken over the UK in the last few years. This is a different read, a breath of fresh air (except during Piglet!) and the only label involved is that of a right good read.

Reviewed by Brendan Gisby.

I downloaded the five episodes of this omnibus as each one was released on Kindle between the Monday and Friday of National Learning Disability Week back in June 2012. I had no idea what the episodes were all about, but I downloaded them anyway out of a sense of duty; my token support for Learning Disability Week, I suppose. Some time later (well, quite some time later, I'm ashamed to admit), also dutifully, I began to read the first episode, "No Labels on Monday", not expecting much from what I regarded as a chore. Boy, was I wrong! That sense of duty turned rapidly to one of pleasure, and pretty soon I was devouring episode after episode, looking forward to the "hit" that each would supply.

These accounts of the work of the No Labels Drama Group aren't just entertaining; they're truly inspirational. You would need to have a heart of stone if you failed to take immediately to the members of the group. They are fictional characters who are based on real people with real disabilities. So yes, of course, they are frustrating and exhausting to manage. And yes, of course, they need to be coaxed and cajoled and bribed with copious amounts of chocolate biscuits, fairy cakes and sticky buns. But that doesn't make them any different from so-called normal people. Observe what happens at a typical management team meeting when a plate of cream cakes is placed in the centre of the shiny boardroom table, and you'll know exactly what I mean.

You would also need to have a hide of rhino if you failed to absorb the messages conveyed in the group's work, to rise to the clarion call, "Labels are for tins, not people!" The messages are clear and unequivocal: don't apply labels to people who are different; enable them to make informed choices about their lives; and never, ever treat them like children.

Then there are the dramas performed by the group. I don't want to give too much away, so I'll say simply that every play is both inspired and inspiring, as well as very, very funny. When the performance of the first one, "Piglet!", opened, I experienced one of those jaw-dropping moments I won't forget for a while. If by the end of each play you aren't singing and cheering along with the fictional audience, then you really are devoid of all feeling, my friend.

But what holds all this together, what makes it so much more than the sum of its parts, is the writing. My hat goes off and stays off to Cally Phillips, whose skill at narrating each performance step-by-step is nothing short of electrifying. I was going to say that reading her accounts is like experiencing a maestro conducting the 1812 Overture, but that would be too highfalutin. It's more like watching a juggler spinning plates - and the number of plates keeps on growing and growing. Or like following Henry Hill's crescendo-like narration in the closing scenes of "Goodfellas". Unlike poor Henry, though, Cally Phillips gets high on words, not coke.

So please don't follow my lead. Don't let this book hang about on your Kindle. Read it now. Meet the No Labels Drama Group. Learn their messages. And stand by to be mesmerised by their performances. To paraphrase Piglet... sorry, Hamlet... the plays are the thing!

You can buy A Week With No Labels as ebook or paperback from Amazon

£6.99 for the paperback and £2.99 Kindle /

The Black Douglas by S.R. Crockett, edited by Cally Phillips

Literature, it seems, is as subject to the quirks of fashion as just about every other area of human activity. S.R. Crockett was a tremendously popular novelist back in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries; now, barely a hundred years later, he’s much less widely known. However, that might perhaps be about to change, due to Authors Electric’s very own Cally Phillips, who has been working flat-out to republish Crockett’s works, and hopefully introduce them to a whole new generation. (Go to the Ayton Publishing website to see the entire collection.)

The Black Douglas revolves around a cast of actual historical figures, including William Sixth Earl of Douglas (“The Black Douglas” of the title), and Gilles de Retz, the loopy French nobleman who fought alongside Joan of Arc before (allegedly) embarking on a life of occult rituals and murder most vile. The story unfolds against a backdrop of mediaeval Scotland (in particular, Crockett’s native Galloway) and France, and is frequently told through the eyes of the Earl’s sidekick and knight, Sholto MacKim.

And what a story it is, involving murder, blood-drinking, witchcraft and werewolves, no less. The Black Douglas was published in 1899, two years after Dracula first appeared, and I’d be surprised if it hadn’t been influenced by that novel to some extent. Many of the elements of Dracula are also present here: a sinister, intriguing nobleman who lives in a castle with such a blood-curdling reputation that very few people dare go there; the curious command that said nobleman has over animals, and in particular wolves; and the significance of human blood, particularly as a means of prolonging life. Indeed, anyone who has read Dracula may experience a strange sense of déjà vu when reading a particular passage in The Black Douglas, in which a woman whose child has been abducted hammers, screaming, at the castle door, pleading for his return: “Give me my boy, murderer! Restore me my son!” All that is missing is Stoker’s curious psychosexual take on his material – that, and the vampirism.

For de Retz is not actually a vampire, though his physical appearance brings Stoker’s Count to mind: “The upper lip was retracted, and a set of long white teeth gleamed like those of a wild beast.” Indeed, it may be that he’s simply a deluded madman, though Crockett himself suggests that there’s something genuinely supernatural underlying the story. De Retz is a curious, complex figure: unashamedly villainous, yet given to moments of charm, and even of tenderness. At times he seems to be driven by a desire for knowledge: “I have in secret pushed my researches beyond the very confines of knowledge . . . Evil and good alike shall be mine.” Despite worshipping a demon, and carrying out blood sacrifices in its honour, he is also strangely devout, to the extent of allowing a community of monks to live in his castle and spending hours at his devotions. Crockett describes him as a “good Catholic and ardent religionary.” (This, interestingly, is a feature of much Gothic fiction: a deep suspicion and dislike of Catholicism. More on this in my contribution posts for the Edinburgh Ebook Festival this summer. . .)

The Black Douglas also tells two love stories: the happy one between Sholto and the mischievous but ultimately sweet-natured Maud, and the altogether less happy one between William and Sybilla, the niece of Gilles de Retz, and an integral part of de Retz’s plan to ensnare William. There are traces of La Belle Dame Sans Merci in Crockett’s description of Sybilla. However, there’s also a robust streak of humour in the novel. During a tournament in which Sholto has performed well, a spectator (an armourer by trade) cries: “Well done, Sholto MacKim – well done, lad! . . . Ye shall hae a silken doublet for that! . . . At little mair than cost price!”

I suppose there is a sense in which it is unsurprising that The Black Douglas is less well-known these days. It’s not due to any lack of ability on the part of the author: Crockett was clearly a talented writer. It’s just that fare such as The Black Douglas is perhaps more morally earnest and melodramatic than is currently fashionable. The Black Douglas portrays a world of fair maidens, foul fiends, and unblemished heroes; but you shouldn’t let that put you off reading it. It struck me as being a little like the literary equivalent of a Pre-Raphaelite painting: a little sentimental, perhaps, but ultimately a colourful, adroit, and highly entertaining creation.

Go to Ayton Publishing or Amazon to buy a copy.

Mad Sir Uchtred of the Hills reviewed by Cally Phillips

S.R.Crockett the 'Vanity Fair' celebrity 

Tomorrow  as you will most likely be completely unaware, is the 100^th anniversary of the death of author S.R.Crockett.  Some of us will be at the Laurieston memorial for 11am and then going off on a walk/picnic/outdoor ‘reading’ of his work – and those who survive will make their way further west to Wigtown for the publication ‘launch’ of The Galloway Collection, which brings Crockett’s Galloway based fiction (all 32 volumes) back into print in a commemorative edition.

So it seemed fitting to put up a review.  I’ve selected Volume 30 which is actually two of his shorter works;  ‘Mad Sir Uchtred of the Hills’ and  ‘The Play Actress.’  

Crockett was a prolific writer (the Galloway Collection only touches about half of his published output) and these two ‘shorts’ which were originally published in serial format and then as novellas, offer something of an insight into the variety of his work. Of course when someone has published over a 30 year career it can be hard to typify their work. With Crockett the underlying elements are History, Adventure and Romance (in various combinations).  You’d think that offered something for everyone then, but why is he no longer read?

Well, in order to be read it helps if your books are in print and people know you ever existed.  And if a weeks a long time in politics, a hundred years is a long time in publishing. Times change. Fashions change. Marketing strategies change.  Writers, yes, even great writers, fall by the wayside. And this is what has happened with Crockett.

Crockett was quite a ‘celebrity’ in the 1890’s – bursting onto the ‘scene’ in 1893 with ‘The Stickit Minister’ ( a collection of short stories from the previous 10 years he’d spent writing for magazines)  This was published by T.Fisher Unwin who was a champion of ‘new’ writers in the 1890’s.  Something obviously clicked, because in 1894 T.Fisher Unwin published Crockett a further 3 times.  ‘The Raiders’ is a smuggling/adventure/romance very much in the vein of R.L.Stevenson (who died in 1894 and who had a friendship by correspondence with S.R.Crockett) and is the one novel anyone who has heard of Crockett might have read.  But T.Fisher Unwin did what all publishers worth their salt do when they put their money behind a ‘new talent’ and in the same year published both ‘Mad Sir Uchtred’ and ‘The Playactress’ in separate editions – talk about flooding the market?! Crockett had already 'proved' himself in the popular magazine market but T.Fisher Unwin gave him the step up to the 6 shilling novel.  In 1894, Crockett was everywhere in the public consciousness – he was the ‘next best thing’  of the late 1890’s. It meant he could get out of a ‘safe’ but somewhat restrictive career as a minister and become a full time writer. Living the dream? He certainly had his day in the sun, but that sun has long set. A hundred years on I think it's time for a new dawn. And like T.Fisher Unwin, I've put my money (and more importantly my time) where my mouth is. 

Writers reading this will appreciate the years that go into becoming an overnight success and will not be surprised that a writer could turn out 4 books in one year. Remember Ian Banks/ Iain M.Banks? And there are numbers of other writers who use pseudonyms when their output is either prodigious or cross genre.  So Crockett’s ‘stats’ are not that unusual. It is true that Crockett was a prolific writer and in the 20 years from his first success in 1894 to his death in 1914 he managed on average 2-3 publications a year.  He loved to write, was a natural storyteller and he of course had bills to pay. He generally wrote one Galloway (or Scottish) based novel (or collection/short stories) a year and one ‘European’ based novel.  His output might seem prodigious but it’s worth remembering that he had a ‘bank’ of writing from the 1880’s to draw from. Yes he worked hard, and yes he worked fast. And yes he wrote to order – he got his ‘break’ and he made the most of it – and yes he wrote in a style that is not ‘fashionable’ today but none of these are reasons NOT to read him.  I come to praise Crockett, not to bury him.

I believe there are a huge number of people who will enjoy reading Crockett’s fiction and the difficulty is in trying to find a place for them to start.  I won’t say that ‘Mad Sir Uchtred of the Hills’ or ‘The Play Actress’ are paradigm examples of his work but they offer a view of the range and, since they are early career works, the promise of what was to come. As such, they are a good place to ‘dip a toe’ into the Crockett stream.

Without more ado:

‘Mad Sir Uchtred of the Hills’ is short and shocking. Originally serialised in a popular magazine in 3 episodes it offers, in its thirteen chapters, a Gothic style story set in Covenanting Times. This in itself is intriguing.  The basic story is of Sir Uchtred who is cursed by a Covenanting Minister (Alexander Renfield.) We are swiftly taken into a world of allegory and symbolism (though you can ignore all this and simply read the fast paced and gruesome story) The curse is that of King Nebuchadnezzar  - which sees him cast out as a beast on the hills.  Crockett’s great strength in writing was his power of natural description and ‘Mad Sir Uchtred’ opens our eyes to this in an immediate fashion but the heavily laden symbolism of the popinjay and the wounded white mountain hare, ensure that for those who want to read a little deeper than the blood and guts and madness, there is much food for thought.

In Crockett’s day there was a furore about his title character’s name. And charges of plagiarism. For the T.Fisher Unwin edition he offers an ‘advertisement’ which points out that the character is not based on William McDowall of Garthland.  It is fiction not fact. The contemporary ‘dispute’ illustrates something that was to dog Crockett all his career – arguments over the nature of ‘historical fiction.’  It was a relatively ‘new’ thing in the 1890’s and Crockett could certainly be credited with an involvement in the emerging ‘genre’ of historical fiction.  Thus reading Crockett is of great interest both to  those who like historical fiction and those who are interested in the development of historical fiction. 

Crockett stated that he wrote ‘Mad Sir Uchtred’ complete in one sitting, on waking from a dream, and it certainly has that nightmare, chaotic quality one would expect from such a work.  Shades perhaps of Coleridge’s ‘dream’ poem Kubla Khan – but in prose form.  While not thoroughly typical of Crockett’s historical or adventure writing, it is a good place to start an exploration of the writer – if you like to be gripped and hurled along a story from beginning to end.

The new Collection, published April 16.

In ‘The Galloway Collection’ edition ‘Mad Sir Uchtred’ is followed by the other ‘short’ work published in 1894 by Unwin’ ‘The Play Actress.’  This is on the surface a completely different kettle of fish.  The obvious  biblical analogy it is that of the prodigal son (daughter or even grand-daughter in this case) but it is a contemporary story which travels between the rural world of Galloway and the urban poverty of London.  As  an author, Crockett writes about social history but is also himself a part of a social history. Another good reason to read him. 

Gilbert Rutherford is preaching locally and at the end of the service a woman dressed in black brings him a grand-daughter (Ailie) he never knew of. This is the child of his now deceased son which Bessie (the child’s aunt) has taken from her dissolute mother (the dead son’s wish)and brought to be reared by his grandfather.  This presents Gilbert with all sorts of emotional and practical challenges.  He does not shirk his duty but he also determines to challenge his prejudices and, once Ailie is set up happily in Galloway, he travels to London to find out what is behind this ‘story’  and deal with the family issues. He is drawn into what he has always believed is the immoral world of the theatre and finds himself both facing the reality of urban poverty, and challenging his views of ‘goodness.’   This is an urban reality we might recognise from a Dickens novel and is every bit as good.  Crockett developed this story theme several times in his later work (most notably in ‘The Moss Troopers’ where he considers the ‘evils’ of London and in ‘Sandy’s Love’ where he delves into ‘the theatre’ and London life once again.)

So, with ‘Mad Sir Uchtred’ and ‘The Playactress’ the reader has the opportunity to see Crockett’s take on history, adventure and romance and hopefully the two short stories will whet the modern  reader’s appetite for more. The good news is that now there are plenty of Crockett novels to choose from in ebook and paperback format.

You can buy The Galloway Collection ebooks direct from the publisher HERE and paperbacks (as well as Kindle ebooks) are available from Amazon.   If you want to find out more about S.R.Crockett (and why wouldn’t you?) you can join The Galloway Raiders – a free online society founded  on the 100^th anniversary of his death to bring him back to life at least in the only form of immortality currently available – fiction.  If you join The Galloway Raiders this week there are special deals on ebooks and you could have read ‘Mad Sir Uchtred’ and ‘the Playactress’ by the time everyone is gathered at the memorial to pay their own tribute.  You may become a fan. You’ll certainly have found a whole new library of books to read. Let’s hope it’s a long, hot summer. 

Raiderland by SR Crockett reviewed by Julia Jones

S.R. Crockett describes  Raiderland as “a garrulous literary companion for Galloway lovers and Galloway travellers.” It was first published by Hodder and Stoughton in 1904 by which time Crockett had been a best seller for ten years. He'd already produced eleven of the novels that will soon be re-published in Ayton Publishing's Galloway Collection  and there would be a further fourteen before his death in France in April 1914. "Bear in mind," says series editor Cally Phillips, "that he was writing professionally in magazines for some ten years before he became published in book form and you will see that [Raiderland] is indeed no more than a snapshot of his work . But a beautiful and valuable snapshot it is."

The bare bones of Crockett's biography are fascinating. He was born in Balmaghie 1859, the illegitimate son of a dairy maid. For the first eight years of his life he was brought up by his maternal grandparents at their farm in Duchrae and was then educated in the small town of Castle Douglas. In 1876 he gained a Galloway Bursary to Edinburgh University where he began writing as a way of supporting himself as he studied. This seems to be an impressive educational trajectory and I rather wonder whether it could have been replicated in England at the same period? It's certainly a tribute to the moral and serious approach to life fostered by rural Scottish Presbyterianism. Crockett's grandparents were Cameronians - a section of the Scottish Covenanters who became a separate church after the religions settlement of 1690, refusing to take oaths of allegiance and continuing to object to the union between England and Scotland.  Scottish religious dissent and factionalism forms a major part of Crockett's fiction – especially where it's aligned with political resistance to the age-old enemy, England. It may be that there is a current political message in the republication of Crockett's oeuvre at a time when the Union is again under scrutiny. Whether or not this is so, Raiderland offers a wonderful opportunity to glimpse dissent from the inside. After his time at Edinburgh Crockett spent the best part of ten years as a Free Church minister himself, resigning in 1895 to concentrate on his writing.

Much of the early part of Raiderland is autobiography through landscape. Crockett recreates his childhood self (“the Boy-who-Was”) in a somewhat Wordsworthian way, mentally revisiting the landscape of his childhood and using it to rekindle memories of “those bright days when the sun had not long risen and the feeling of morning was in the blood.” 

Here's his introduction to his grandparents' Duchrae farmhouse: "The farm I know best is also the loveliest for situation. It lies nestled in green holm crofts. The purple moors ring it half round, north and south. To the eastward pine woods once stood ranked and ready like battalions clad in indigo and Lincoln green against the rising sun – that is until one fell year when the woodmen swarmed all over the slopes and the ring of axes was heard everywhere. The earliest scent I can remember is that of fresh pine chips, among which my mother laid me as she and her brothers gathered kindling among the yet unfallen giants.”

His first indoor memory is of lying in his cradle in the farmhouse kitchen aware of his grandmother “padding softly about in her list slippers (or houshens), baking farles of cake on the girdle, the round plate of iron described by Foissart. The doors and windows were open and without there spread that silence in comparison with which the hush of kirkyard is almost company – the silence of a Scottish farmyard in the first burst of harvest.” 

There is no sense that Crockett suffered any stigma for his illegitimacy or that he was anything other than a loved and cherished (though lonely) child experiencing a particular rural mixture of freedom and discipline. Raiderland proves that his senses remained wide open to natural beauty throughout his life and his imagination ranged freely backwards and forwards in historical time. That small detail of the girdle being “as described by Foissart” is indicative of Crockett's awareness of the living history that surrounded him.

The Galloway novels are set variously from the 15^th century onwards and Crockett finds many of his characters within his native landscape. Sometimes he is explicit, linking the solitariness of his childhood to his development of imaginary people – who were often  not imaginary at all but based on the adults around him, as in the following passage: “Chiefly I love the Crae Hill because from there you get the best view of the Duchrae, where for years a certain lonely child played and about which, in after years, so many poor imaginings have worked themselves out. Here lived and loved on Winsome Charteris – also a certain Maisie Lennox, with many and many another. By the fireside night after night sat the original of Silver Sand, relating stories with that shrewd and becoming twinkle in his eye which told of humour and experience as deep as a draw-well and wide as the brown-backed moors over which he had come.” 

At other places in the book Crockett simply segues into a relevant passage from one or other of his novels, usually with the briefest of historical notes. (I am assuming that the helpful titles in brackets have been added by the editor, Cally Phillips.) He tramps the hills and gazes down into the lochs of both East and West Galloway and takes the reader with him, delightfully. All of this is accessible to the English reader with no prior knowledge of the area or of Crockett's fiction. There are occasional moments when one reaches for a glossary or when he delves a little too deep for the ignorant southerner. I admit that my eyes glazed over the c18th century diary of landowner William Cunninghame but I apologise for this as a sign of my own English weakness.  Raiderland must be supremely rich for those with the relevant knowledge and I look forward to being able to access the original illustrations by Joseph Pennell on the Galloway Raiders website. I hope Raiderland will be carried in backpacks as an explorers' field guide as well as providing an oblique and fascinating glimpse into the hinterland of a prolific, confident and successful novelist. Ayton Publishing are clearly right to put Raiderland as the final volume, number 32, of their forthcoming collection yet it also serves as an introduction to whet the appetite for the fiction that has made Crockett's name.        

For more information about S.R.Crockett and his books click HERE or to join 'The Galloway Raiders' click HERE 

The Beauty of Psyche reviewed by Cally Phillips

The Beauty of Psyche by Andrew Staniland

This is an unusual and unique work of fiction. It’s certainly not going to suit everyone and I don’t for a minute think I’ll be able to do justice of it in a review. But I do think it’s an important work, and an important work of contemporary art.  It’s a modern prose poem but such a description does little to indicate its true depth.  Staniland is in control of his medium throughout and challenges the reader to go along with him. The overt stance of the author is refreshing. He points out fairly early on ‘I am free to write whatever I imagine’ and reading The Beauty of Psyche is like being allowed to connect in a deeply personal way with another persons imagination.  I both respected that and enjoyed the experience. He sets up his stall early by pointing out that he’s painting with his imagination but the whole impact of that statement takes the entire work to fully comprehend.

He is a poet, I can spot that straight away – I think only poets have the commitment to and command of language in its pure form. In its entirey The Beauty of Psyche is beautiful; throughout the work he draws pictures with words.  You roll the paragraphs round in your mouth like fine wine. You drink in the words with your eyes. It begs to be read out loud. The sum of a prose poem seems here to be so much more than the combination of the parts. It’s a fusion of art forms. A juxtaposition of writer, artist, actors, mythmakers and theatre. A collision of creative worlds all imagined by the writer. And I relished it.

Reading this I felt the excitement and pleasure of those long Romantic poems by Keats, Shelley and Byron or even Pope and Milton but it’s not ‘like’ any of them. It is not a modern version of a classic, it is a modern classic. I felt like I’d spent an afternoon on the sofa with Shelley himself.

But he deals with contemporary issues as well. There’s descriptions of the publishing industry, and the expressed belief  that good literature engages with your imagination. The ever present author explains that ‘I paint clothes on the human characters. But gods are gods. I dramatise their divinity.’ The compelling analogies between painting, writing and theatre were an absolute revelation to me. Staniland paints with the imagination. Deliberately. And explains his process to you, drawing you into a consideration of the creative process in all its dimensions.  I have never read anything like this in my life – and it really excites me. His comment on art is Any work of art aspires to an absolute realism. To be its own reality. It is fatuous to reduce this work of art to a subject of debate, but one feels that one is studying literature rather than just reading it.

He turns his consideration to how we ‘spend our lives’. It’s very deep. It’s something for people who like to STUDY literature. It’s not a ‘page turner’ in the conventional way. It’s something you want to savour, to think about and to ponder at every turn. He sets up a dynamic model of narrative which then presents an ending which is dynamic rather than dramatic. A blank ending. Playing with form. Showing us that Our lives are also outside us. It is all our own work.

It’s working on several different levels, and then some. The interrelatedness of the creative processes employed – from the mythic ‘tale’ to the ‘authorial’ role to the contemporary reportage of the ‘actors’ perspective, give a depth and uniqueness to this incredible creative statement.

It’s as far removed from genre fiction as it is possible to get. It’s a genuine literary work of art. A true contemporary classic. It’s beautiful, it’s intelligent and I don’t imagine I’ll ever read anything like it again.

I loved it. It’s hard not to put a personal slant on it because it engages you in such an intimately person way. I don’t know who else this will appeal to – it has the poetic charisma of making me feel he is speaking only to me. Of course it’s an acquired taste. It’s intellectual marmite, or truffles.  If you’ve ever been moved by long Romantic poetry, if you’ve ever been captivated by classical theatre, if myths and classical forms and imaginative beauty attract you, I urge you to read this.

They all die at the end Reviewed by Cally Phillips

They All Die at the End by Peter Tarnofsky

I have to confess that it took me only the first line of the first story to decide I was going to review it.

I’m generally not a fan of banana skin jokes (or indeed bananas) but the first story in this collection begins thus‘It was the banana that got him in the end.’ For some reason I found this utterly compelling. And seriously funny.  I thought a writer would be going some to keep me laughing from this high start point. But this opening certainly set the tone for the whole collection. Tarnofsky is effortless in his humour throughout and his unique angle on the short story – where we ‘know’ the ending of each story- is very clever and does not in any way detract from the stories he tells.

Tarnofsky justifies his title with a personal comment which explains what is to come. Yes, we know they all die at the end, but it’s how we get to that point which is important. The ending is not what a story is about. Tarnofsky’s collection is thus an important comment on narrative itself and one that makes you think more carefully about narrative as a whole. It also acts as an introduction to the ‘character’ behind all the characters.  In his off-hand, self-effacingly humorous way, Tarnofsky builds a relationship between writer and reader before he even begins the stories and this is clever. It made me aware of a unified narrative ‘voice’ behind all the specific stories. I knew someone was in control of all this anarchy. The writer ‘God’ of this chaotic world was paying attention and was cleverly teaching a valuable lesson.

With titles as diverse as: Yellow Banana Smile, Shopping Basket Crown, Ukulele Cradle King, No Second Swing, Rogue Santa, Noctural Crème Bulee, Head Stand Ascension, High Thumb Cuticle, Soft Shoe Kick and Two Sole Certainties;  one never knows what one is going to experience next, but the wit and humour provide a through line which holds the attention.

In some stories the central character seems more obvious and the point of view and narrative voice shift around between stories, which provides a nice variety, keeps the ‘joke’ fresh and prevents any ‘samieness’ from setting in. I’m impressed that the author found ten very different ways (from the sublime to the ridiculous) to kill off his characters but I was also became clearly aware that the stories are about much more than the endings and this is a valuable lesson to the reader (and aspiring writers). Don’t rush to the end point, savour the journey.  I’m not going to go into detail about any specific story because I don’t want to spoil the experience for the reader. I can’t pick out a favourite. I can tell you there are no turkey’s.. each story is self contained while connected to and serving the aims of the whole and I for one was sorry when the final death occurred.

Tarnofsky dovetails several of the stories together (in a fashion similar to John Altman’s film Short Cuts) which adds depth and interest for the reader as well as reminding us that one person’s ‘moment’ can affect other people’s stories in a way they never know about.  This realisation heightens the reader’s awareness of the journey that each story takes. We don’t care about the ‘ending’ as such because it’s simply a point in the story. We want to know the WHOLE story and that is encapsulated within each narrative. The ten stories in this collection are funny but the humour is not in the punchline. They are also thought provoking, sad and well observed. The ‘worlds’ Tarnofsky creates for his characters are interesting and realistic and there is plenty of variety.

I can’t pick a ‘favourite’ because I found the whole to be greater than the sum of the parts but each ‘part’ was played out. From the opening line of  Yellow Banana Smile to the last story Two Sole Certainties  (where the author seems to be implicated in the narrative) Tarnofsky takes you on a journey, on many journeys and I loved every step of the way.

Peter has a companion volume out titled 'Everything Turns out Just Fine' Watch out for my review of it... soon. 

A Cleansing of Souls, reviewed by Cally Phillips

A Cleansing of Souls by Stuart Ayris

Stuart Ayris is an immensely powerful and talented writer.  His writer’s mission if you like is to ‘bring hope’ and he tackles difficult subjects with humanity and insight.  I first read Tollesbury Time Forever (which will be reviewed here next month) and was blown away. Immediately I finished it I picked up A Cleansing of Souls, knowing it had been written some 20 years earlier and expecting it to be good but not as good.  I was blown away all over again. Okay maybe the energy is more raw, maybe the writing style less completely original but the unique voice is there and the fact that he wrote this in his twenties (and then waited another twenty years for a follow up) is incredible. If  a publisher had picked up A Cleansing of Souls twenty years ago, Stuart’s life course might have been very different. And then, then maybe he’d never have written Tollesbury Time Forever! These sort of conjectures are actually quite germane to an understanding of Ayris’ writing.

A Cleansing of Souls opens to the scene of a seventeen year old Michael waking up next to his dead fourteen year old sister (you can tell immediately this is not going to be a happy clappy read) with the conjecture:  ‘What do you honestly do at times like this? What do you honestly do?’ and if  the response,  ‘Well Michael, he just grinned. And he kept on grinning’,  doesn’t hook you, then you’re probably not ready to read this book. It requires an open, questioning mind to fully appreciate it. It blows genre fiction out of the water.

Michael’s story  sometimes runs parallel and sometimes in the background to the central character Tom Sparrow, a young man who has his own troubles. And his own story. With its own complications.  A shifting of perspective is a feature of Ayris’ work I particularly like. It can make things complex but it’s always purposeful. I loved the central narrative voice. It put me in mind of Orwell’s Down and Out in Paris and London. The narrator stands outside Tom but is clearly for much of the time giving us an interior view of Tom.  I love the way Ayris experiments and plays with ‘voice.’ I love the way Ayris uses language in general. He is poetic and even when he is telling us the most grim things he manages to use language not to distance but to draw us in and make us complicit in the emotional story of his characters.  Michael should not be a sympathetic character but as the story progresses we really begin to understand how and why his life has turned out the way it has – yet Ayris keeps the suspense going and in the process teaches us that you can’t judge a person when you have insufficient evidence to do so. Because the end is a surprise. A shock. Unexpected and yet makes such sense of a life and the devastation caused to lives that it is heart-rending.

Ayris chooses very difficult areas to write about and he rocks it. His work can be truly enlightening for anyone genuinely interested in issues of mental health.  There is no gratuitous darkness, though darkness is there aplenty. Ayris is not buying into thriller/horror genre fiction. He’s telling you something more important. Something real. Something people need to know.  And the understanding and self-reflection he exhibits as a young writer is both incredible and devastating.  He should never have waited twenty years for the follow up. But then, life has to be lived. Life gets in the way. All I can tell you is that if you read A Cleansing of Souls and appreciate it (I can’t say ‘like’ it because Ayris is so far beyond the cheap five star, ‘like’ share culture it’s ridiculous) then you will be absolutely transformed by The Frugality Trilogy.

If the reader really buys into Ayris work, and reads it as intelligently as it’s written, he/she finds that Ayris always allows, no indeed encourages the reader  to ask questions throughout his work. This can be uncomfortable and the reader cannot escape the spectre of child abuse, lurking underneath, and yet the blind alleys you take yourself up in coming up with ‘the answer’ are all controlled (rather than manipulated) by Ayris clever narrative in order to teach you something about your own preconceptions and prejudices.

The Bookies Runner reviewed by Cally Phillips

The Bookies Runner by Brendan Gisby

The Bookie’s Runner

It’s not that I doubted the reviews. People whose opinion I respect have raved about this book. It’s not that I doubted Brendan’s talent – in one week I’ve consumed his short stories and family saga and been deeply moved by both.

It’s just that I couldn’t begin to imagine what one could write about such an ordinary dad. Brendan admits it, more than once ‘he was just my dad.’ Not a hero. Not unusual in any obvious way, ‘just my dad.’ So I found it hard to imagine what could make any book on the subject as good as people have said about it. That’s why I didn’t read it sooner. I should have.  I started reading. I was choked by paragraph 2. Lesson 2 learned. It’s not just what he writes about it’s how he writes. It’s brave, honest, open, poignant and compelling

By Chapter Two I already knew I had to give this my full and undivided attention – and expect to cry. And I don’t do crying. Especially not about fathers.  Having long since had mine abandon me, I tend not to think that fathers can be heroes.

But this is Brendan’s story, not mine. And a fifteen year old Brendan narrates his thoughts on the longest bus journey on earth – his first day back at High School after the death of his father. Each chapter is another story in the course of his dad’s life and it works so well because the adult holds himself in the background, while offering a subtle awareness of the depths beyond the boy’s immediate grief. He shares the reflexive stance of the reader and draws our empathy not only to the boy but to the man the boy became.  It is man and boy telling the story.

The 15 year old feels raw emotion and unbridled hatred for a world which has treated his dad so unfairly and everyone (including himself) who has ever wronged his dad are the target of his furious grief.  The tribute to the adult is that he has channelled this into a story which is a true tribute to his father.

F.Scott Fitzgerald said ‘write because you have something to say, not because you want to say something.  Gisby wants to say something – boy and man – but he also HAS something to say. Something very important about human relationships and interaction. About truth and lies and trust and failure and love.

The boy experiences hopelessness and vows never to be as gentle and soft as his dad.

‘Who can you trust?’ is his dad’s poignant question and Gisby learns that you can’t trust anyone –except your dad. And without him, you have nothing left. I empathise with that feeling.

Structurally the work is understated but very clever. One doesn’t find out the full symbolic importance of the bus journey until well into the book and it hits one as yet another sideswipe. You want to go and wring the neck of the woman who cheats them at their gardening job. You want to hunt down the Bookie who cheats them (I hope this isn’t too much of a spoiler) It isn’t though because the episodes themselves, well written, remembered with the rawness of real emotion, are the stepping stones towards the greatness of the story which is a picture of how ‘ordinary’ people become what they are.  The hopelessness. The fierce determination not to be cheated or lied to or tramped on are vivid and real. After finishing this I have the deepest respect for Brendan Gisby. I mourn for the boy he was and the dad he lost and I hope that he got the life he deserved. He certainly deserves the utmost respect for being able to tell this story with the power of pain and vividness of emotion and yet all of that is controlled, constructed and managed with a level of reflective awareness that is little short of incredible.

Reviewed by Cally Phillips

This Book Does not Exist reviewed by Cally Phillips

This Book Does not Exist.  Mike Schneider. 

In looking for a frame of reference for this gem of a story, I can only note that I was underwhlemed by Catcher in the Rye when I read it, couldn’t work out what the fuss was about, either when I read it as a teenager in the ’70′s or as an adult last year. I guess in its day it was worth reading TBDNE is, in my opinion much better than Catcher. For me, it is what Catcher promised but didn’t deliver.  I like Douglas Coupland, but I like this a whole lot more because the characters are that much more appealling, more vulnerable and I care about them in a way I don’t care about any of Coupland’s characters.

The realness is really this books master stroke. The simple yet elegant and earnest prose draws you into the world of the writer and you believe him even when the most bizarre things happen  - you believe they are happening to him and so you accept the most ludicrous possibilities. That’s a really difficult thing for a writer to achieve. The prose equivalent of watching a really good dancer or ice-skater.

The writing is clever, compelling and the voice real. The emotion is palpable and the angst genuine. The narrative is well constructed and pacey. People overuse the phase ‘can’t put it down’ but in my case this was the literal truth. I really couldn’t put it down. I was glad for the first time I had an ereader so I could take it everywhere with me. If this ebook doesn’t become a classic – and I don’t mean a cult classic, I mean an honest to goodness true classic of modern American writing, it’s down to the shortsightedness of the mainstream media. I’d sign Mike Schneider up tomorrow if I could.  He’s far too good a writer to be a one-trick pony and I can’t believe he’s not ‘made it’ as a screenwriter yet, but then maybe he’s too real for the Hollywood system.  I implore you though, Mike, write us another novel and/or work on a screen version of TBDNE because I would pay good money to go and see a film version of this story.

Reviewed by Cally Phillips