busy 7th week, excellent piece on facing the strange by sb sweeney, maura dooley at kellogg college, broadwell crocuses

Busy 7th Week of Oxford full term...

Saw this piece about Facing the Strange on the Continuing Education website - it gives an excellent sense of the book and some very good background info about its author, SB Sweeney.

Really enjoyed poet Maura Dooley's talk at the Kellogg College Centre for Creative Writing on Thursday and attending the guest night dinner afterwards.

The crocuses in the pic above are in front of St Peter and St Paul's Broadwell.

snowdrops and aconites, not to mention marsh marigolds, first plotting, mixed feelings about a felled eucalyptus, bs johnson at the finborough, hockney and the nashes

Lovely to see the snowdrops and aconites appearing in the garden and on the verges when I'm walking to work in Oxford and cycling at the weekend. Not to mention the marsh marigolds in the ditches along Calcroft Lane, near Clanfield!

First working half-hour or so on the allotment this year earlier. Pruning blackcurrants. The cut wood smelling of the juice of the fruit. Also harvested some leeks and, after a late breakfast, went to the shed to fetch Desiree spuds from their sack that hangs from the rafters.

Had mixed feelings about the felling of the eucalyptus that overshadowed our plot. It has provided welcome shade from the sun over the years and, now, the allotment field feels awfully bare without it. Yet its roots or its leaves - people tell you different things - was killing the ground.

Just had a heads up from a friend that her productions of three plays by the astonishing, magnificent BS Johnson are on at the Finborough Theatre in March. A terrific prospect!

Wonderful memories of seeing the Hockney exhibition at the Tate a fortnight ago. Went straight from that into the Nash retrospective. The former uplifted, the latter perplexed and fascinated but never quite did it for me. I in any case prefer the work of Nash's brother John. I have a suspicion that this makes me a lightweight - but so be it!

facing the strange by sb sweeney

Official publication

Facing the Strange by SB Sweeney is now officially published and is available from online retailers globally as a paperback and from Amazon as a Kindle ebook.

Now busy planning the launch party at Blackwell's on the 16th March, 7 pm.  Readers of this blog welcome - let me know you'll be there (info@streetbooks.co.uk).

Facing the Strange

A rock musician on the brink, his drunken father and the grieving widow of a murder victim. Facing the Strange is a tale of three lives in free-fall at the end of the analogue age – the lives of three characters that hold the key to one another's redemption.

'One great long drunken rambling guitar solo of a novel!'
Tim Pears

'SB Sweeney writes with a clarity and wit that brings to life the less glossy side of the eighties: a world of squats, bedroom bands and cheap drugs, where a CV most likely meant a pint of cider and Vimto. The intriguing and intertwining tales make an addictive read.'
Deb Googe: My Bloody Valentine and The Thurston Moore Group

'It's La bohème meets Trainspotting, with the structure of a dream; a hole in the wall of the ordinary, an extraordinary landscape beyond.'
Roger Ashton-Griffiths: Actor and Writer

Find out more at the StreetBooks website:
http://www.streetbooks.co.uk.

Explore author SB Sweeney's website:
http://www.sbsweeney.com.

longest january, bug, software nightmare!, samantha wynne-rhydderch at kellogg, sb sweeney's brilliant facing the strange

Am I the only person who thinks that last month was the longest January on record?

Perhaps it was the bug I succumbed to early in the New Year that laid me low or the dark days that seemed to dominate.

Despite the, rhetorical, question at the head of this post, my impression is that a lot of people have been laid low during the weeks since the Christmas holidays.

My experience of last week, with the change of month, didn't altogether lift my spirits. There was the major software failure on my now previous phone to contend with. A choice of reset and lose all your diary and notes data or transfer the info manually ensued.

Ironic that the day before I had been chatting with a colleague about how overmuch we rely on these devices of ours.

On the plus side, the manual transferring of data does force you to make choices. How much rubbish I keep on my phone! Smartphone? If only the operator was as smart!

Not that the week hasn't had its highlights  I very much enjoyed Samantha Wynne-Rhydderch's talk about her wonderfully thought-provoking and entertaining poetry at the Kellogg College Centre of Creative Writing. See: http://www.rhydderch.com.

And, of course, I'm looking forward to the release of SB Sweeney's brilliant novel, Facing the Strange, which is officially out on Thursday 9th February, but the publication of which is spread over the coming two months - Oxford launch at Blackwell's on Thursday 16th March, for example. See http://www.streetbooks.co.uk.

frosty fields, day full of hope and life, facing the strange by sb sweeney - paperback live on amazon uk, roger ashton-griffiths, launch of jane draycott's the occupant

Amazing walk across the frosty fields! I was up early because I have work to do today - till 4 pm, that is. Then I can enjoy the rest of the weekend properly.

Though the walk was certainly enjoying the weekend properly! Much colder even than yesterday, although somehow the day seems full of hope and life. The birds are much more active - friskily playful, in fact (the great tits in particular - chasing each other round the rose bush outside the back door!).

The paperback edition of Facing the Strange has just gone live on Amazon UK! 'It’s La bohème meets Trainspotting, with the structure of a dream; a hole in the wall of the ordinary, an extraordinary landscape beyond.' Roger Ashton-Griffiths: Actor and Writer.

Meant to say in yesterday's post that I really enjoyed attending the launch of Jane Draycott's new collection of poetry The Occupant at the Albion Beatnik in Oxford on Thursday. Lovely to hear her read and to see so many old friends.

thin chill, trees seared gold, beating the lingering pull of mid-winter torpor..., facing the strange by sb sweeney on amazon!, deb googe

A cold few days, despite the welcome sun. With daytime temperatures only a few degrees above freezing, the air and land gain barely any warmth and a thin chill pervades.

Beautiful lights, beautiful scenes, though, such as the time, earlier in the week, when I was walking to work and the trees beyond the mouth of Tumbling Bay were seared gold briefly by the not-long-risen sun.

Oxford First Week and the University bursts into life, despite the lingering pull of mid-winter torpor.

Excited that SB Sweeney's fine first novel, Facing the Strange, showed on Amazon and other online retail sites throughout the world a few days ago!

Although not officially published in the UK till the 9th February, it can be pre-ordered on Amazon. (And is available from the StreetBooks website at a pre-publication discount!). The paperback is already on sale in the US and other territories. The Kindle ebook is available in both the UK, the US and elsewhere.

For more information about this outrageously good book, see the Facing the Strange page on the StreetBooks website.

'SB Sweeney writes with a clarity and wit that brings to life the less glossy side of the eighties: a world of squats, bedroom bands and cheap drugs, where a CV most likely meant a pint of cider and Vimto. The intriguing and intertwining tales make an addictive read...' Deb Googe: My Bloody Valentine and The Thurston Moore Group.

the irrepressible gold of lichen, fresh new-year grass

The days alternate:
Vivid, beautiful sunlit ones,
When the landscape cannot but be alive;
Ones when the grey sky appears to leach
All colour from the countryside.

This morning, I cycled through this dead land -
Yet here was the irrepressible gold of lichen,
The bright burgundy of brambles and, yes,
The unnoticed emerald of fresh new-year grass.

brrrr!

Brrrr! This morning. But rather dazzling.

beauty and the chill‎, reviving trad beetroot soup, slug attack, quiet night in, meeting friends, happy new year!!, touch

The, at times, quite beautiful misty walk along the Thames led to a chill and a couple of somewhat lost days of holiday...

‎Though I was revived by bowls delicious beetroot soup which has been a staple of our Christmases and New Years since we first took an allotment in 1989.

This year's crop of beets took a long time to get going but in August suddenly grew full and strong. The vegetables kept healthy right up to about ten days before Christmas. I went up to the allotment to attend to something and looked across at the crop - only to see that about two-thirds of it had been chomped, well and truly, by slugs. The surviving beets were immediately harvested and J's soup is one of the best ever.

A quiet end and beginning to the New Year last night, spent at home, watching episodes of Mr Selfridge on DVD.

It was lovely to meet with old friends this lunchtime.

Happy New Year!‎!

--

Touch

The infinity of touch
Reassures that all will be well.
As much of an illusion, perhaps,
As everything good in this world,
Which seems tilted
Towards evil and madness.
Yet can anyone deny the transcendence
Of touch?
And that has to be good.