The Bedside Crow

The Little Book of Nits. First review.

Justine's book, The Little Book of Nits gets its first (early) review in the London Evening Standard

We will be launching it on publication day 24th May at 7.00pm. Book a (free) ticket here.

Also joining us to celebrate will be our good friend Richard Guard author of Lost London - An A-Z of forgotten landmarks and lost traditions.

Richard also happens to be the lead singer of the brilliant Dulwich Ukulele Club, some of whom, if perhaps not all eleven, will be in attendance for a glass of cider a sing song and a general rock of the house.

 

 

 

Pre-order a signed copy of The Little Book of Nits

Buy a signed copy of Lost London.

Hardcore daddyporn and make no mistake.

79 pages on the basic loaf. Oh yes. Oh yes.

and if you came to this page via the offices of google or bing, then take a moment to reflect; breadmaking, it's a very good use for idle hands.

House Held Up By Trees.

A new picture book from former United States Poet Laureate (and Jim Harrison collaborator) Ted Kooser beautifully illustrated by Jon Klassen of I Want My Hat Back fame.

It's a book for a slightly older readership than Hat that conveys the passage of time with a melancholy grace.

Lump. Throat, dear reader. Lump. Throat.

an even darker menace lingering on the inside.

Taken from the simply beautiful Our Garden Birds by Matt Sewell.

One of our books of the year so far.

 

Depressing message from a friend in Melbourne.

News here is that Am*zon are scouting locations for megawarehouses (sorry, "fulfillment centres") around Melbourne. They have no physical presence here in Australia and independent bookshops still survive and thrive (is there a correlation do you think?). That deadly virus will thin out their ranks soon enough. I'm sure the comments sections of newspapers will be delighted (the tone of hostility against indie bookshops is staggering on those forums).

We were discussing Peter Temple in the comments of this post. If you like a crime novel and you haven't read him you really should.

My inbox is full of praise for The Sea on Fire, too. (Over there on the left.)

Jubilee Hitchhiker the life and times of Richard Brautigan

Genius does what it must, and talent does what it can.

Epigraph quoted from a fortune cookie at the front of the book.

Twenty years in the writing and 850 pages fat.

With some great photographs.

Tom McGuane, Jim Harrison Philip Caputo, Tim Cahill, Peter Fonda, Jeff Bridges, Michael McClure, Don Carpenter, Jimmy Buffett, not to mention the author himself, the gang's all here.

 

 

The English Monster - Lloyd Shepherd. Signed Copies available now.

The English Monster is a stonking good read, and Shepherd truly knows how to hook you into his tale. The storyline weaves through the centuries but is largely set in the docklands of old London. You can expect pirates and ghosts and all manner of colourful characters, and the pages are imbued with a restless creepiness which I had hitherto thought that only Peter Ackroyd could conjure.

Reviewed by Sally Butcher author of Veggiestan, proprietor of Persepolis and our guest for a great evening of Middle Eastern vegetarian food last Friday. I don't know what Lloyd's cooking skills are like but I feel he really should return the favour.

Signed copies of The English Monster.

A few signed copies of Veggiestan left too.

South London,as they sing down at Selhurst Park, it's wonderful isn't it?

Itchy and scratchy. The Little Book of Nits.

If you have school-age children then the chances are you will have come across this little fella. And If you tell me that you haven't, then you're a liar. The little buggers are everywhere, whilst advice on how to deal with them is both erratic and often downright eccentric - put your child's head in a bucket of vinegar anyone?

Help, however, is at hand.

Justine, the Crow of this very parish, and her co-author Richard 'Bugman' Jones have been hard at work these past many months at what will surely come to be recognised as the vade mecum par excellence of head louse wrangling. I shit you not.

Justine does the funny, as anyone who has ever read her FamiliesSE book reviews will know, while the 'Bugman' brings on the cold hard science. It is a marriage made in heaven.

The book is published by A and C Black on May 15th and costs £4.99.

Why not pre-order a signed copy.

 

Guy Clark - Hemingway's Whisky

We saw Guy Clark live a few years ago. It was the most irascible performance I've ever seen, and quite wonderful.

This new CD is the bits. More here.

This book too.

What I read. #fridayreads

The Sea on Fire by Howard Cunnell. Howard is an old friend who at one time when we ran wild and free was my almost brother-in-law, and his book is a beauty. Imagine if you will, a cross between The Long Good Friday and Point Break both thrilling and original in its portrayal of a diving trip gone wrong. With echoes of early Richard Ford, Tim Winton and particularly the surfer noir novels of Kem Nunn. It probably won't sit too well with the pale boys worrying over Thomas Bernhard, but that's no bad thing.

It's published by Picador March 15th and you can order a signed copy from us here.

I also comfort-read for the nth time the first two chapters of Couples by John Updike on a Knidle with the font ramped up for my ailing eyes, which in turn buggered the kerning so that it became the visual equivalent of radio interference, but no matter, it was nice to be home again. Not enough Updike is being read at the moment and this must change.

Lastly I am reading Alys, Always by Harriet Lane a particularly breathless novel of literary north London that I have so far found nothing to disagree with Jilly Cooper's assertion that it is 'utterly brilliant.' I'm pretty sure that the main character Frances is going to shag someone soon and I think I know who. I have written their name on a piece of paper and sealed the envelope. We will see if I am right. Not, I grant you, the kind of service you get from the TLS.

Buy Alys,Always and see if I'm right.