• The Predicament by William Boyd [Read by George Blagden]
  I have always enjoyed William Boyd's books - but I was still a bit surprised to find quite how many of them I have read since An Ice-Cream War in 1982. So it was a great delight to realise that he's written some mystery thrillers as well as the excellent narrative adventure stories he is known for - and unsurprisingly they are very good. This story is a classic spy thriller set in the early 1960s - the second novel featuring his protagonist Gabriel Dax - the unwilling "agent". This time Gabriel's adventure begins in Guatemala where his "mission" is totally misrepresented and (as usual it seems) he is just being used in a bigger game that is never fully explained to him. It is during this experience that he is schooled in "assassination plot theory" 101. In Guatemala, he is involved with the CIA, and then later, when the action moves to West Berlin, he is disquieted to find the same characters mysteriously present there also - all supporting the protection detail for the visit of President John F. Kennedy...
  Gabriel is not a "lost soul" hero - and turns out to be quite a competent spy, retaining a fair degree of cynicism and suspicion - even though he is constantly being emotionally manipulated. However, you never lose the sense of endangerment and underlying menace in all the situations in which he finds himself. Outside of the spy plot, the characters are all very interesting in and of themselves, with Gabriel's own strange history, his relationship with his friends and colleagues, and his obsession with his enigmatic handler Faith Green - not to mention his psychiatrist - a whole volume of intrigue in her own right!
  I love the sense of time and place for these retro spy thrillers, especially when seeded with real facts and events in history (although it is rather surreal for me to have to refer to this period as "history" now - even though it indisputably is!). With these novels, Boyd is filling a John Le Carre/Len Deighton gap for me, and I certainly appreciate the slightly less poignantly miserable conclusions.
  If you enjoy a good traditional thriller, these are definitely for you. Boyd shows himself yet again to be not only an excellent but also a very versatile writer.
  [On a more trivial note - I also love the choice of the name "Dax" - it reminds me of badgers...]


• The Man in the Queue by Josephine Tey [Read by Karen Cass]
  Not known to me at the time, I was first introduced to Josephine Tey through The Daughter of Time as a radio play in the 1970s. I could never remember the author, the title or the detective, just the fascinating reinterpretation of the fate of the Princes in the tower, and the rehabilitation of Richard III (about whom we have since learned lots more - and even discovered his original burial place - which still seems surreal even now!).
  However, back to this story: The Man in the Queue is the first book in Josephine Tey’s series of detective novels featuring Inspector Alan Grant of Scotland Yard. Set in London in the 1920s, there is a packed theatre queue waiting for a popular musical comedy to open its doors, and as the crowd surges forward, a man falls to the ground, stabbed with a small silver blade. None of those near him in the queue notice him until he collapses, and none of them appears to have means or motive for killing him.
  I was surprised to find how good an author Tey is. I should not be, of course, but having found Margery Allingham and Georgette Heyer such heavy going with their brittle dialogue and period slang, I was expecting much the same. Not a bit of it. I think had she lived to a similar age, she might easily have rivalled Christie in mass popularity (being already well-recognised by her peers). Caroline Crampton (SheDunnit) has several episodes in her (terrific) podcast about Tey and I would thoroughly recommend them - as well as all the other episodes in fact ...
  

Posted by Christina at 6:50 pm | Category: Art and Culture, Books of the Month | Permalink

I can't say enough good things about this film and I predict it will become a classic in the future alongside Close Encounters or ET - although having said that I think it rather exceeds them. It has drama, wit, pathos, charm, and splendid visuals. And not to mention Ryan Gosling - we already know he's lovely but he excels in this role. The film is largely carried by his character - despite the array of other great actors and the (almost) cute alien.
I would recommend a big screen cinema viewing for the initial experience - followed by many Sunday afternoon reruns once it hits the TV screens.

Posted by Christina at 8:21 pm | Category: Art and Culture | Permalink

Janice Lawrence gave the talk at the Dorking textile group this month entitled Fine Feathers, Featherwork and Birds in Pre-Columbian Design.
Janice supported her informative talk with photographs illustrating the amazing use of feathers in the art of these ancient peoples and their and general fascination with birds in woven textiles and ceramics. Among the feathers used by the craftsmen were scarlet macaw, roseate spoonbill, green parakeet, heron, hummingbird, and flamingo. The techniques for creating the feathered fabrics were also amazing - and quite non-intuitive - involving stringing them on fine threads.

Janice herself is a talented textile artist with all the "vibrant colours and pre-Columbian imagery” providing her with her inspiration; her work appears in books and magazines, and she has exhibited widely in the UK.

Posted by Christina at 5:02 pm | Category: Crafts | Permalink

An outing for lunch with Alison and Nigel then on to the Apollo for the delightful final episode (penned by Jonathan Lynn) in the life and times of Jim Hacker - now retired and the Master of an eponymous Oxford college. Lord Hacker reunites with his old sparring partner Sir Humphrey Appleby for a last attempt to outwit the political forces uniting against him within the college.
It stars Griff Rhys Jones as the generally baffled Jim Hacker, and Clive Francis as the ever devious Sir Humphrey.

[I was amused (at myself) to note that although we have had to come to terms with the sad fact that none of the three main TV cast members are still with us, it saddened me apparently even more (!) that within this story Bernard himself had also passed away. "One of those irregular verbs: I have an independent mind. You are eccentric. He is round the twist."]

Posted by Christina at 8:05 pm | Category: Art and Culture, Days Out, Friends | Permalink