Category: TikTok

Therapy for characters in under sixty seconds

5/5/2022

There's nothing about TikTok in my 2022 reading and writing plans. Why would there be? I'm far too serious for that kind of stuff. Yet a couple of weeks after I posted those plans I'd signed up for an account. Now I'm addicted.

Why? Because I've sold a few books, although not as many as I'd like to. But mostly because it's a fun place to be.

6 Comments

If you read only one of my reviews, make it this: Patience by Toby Litt

29/4/2022

4 Comments

A reader does need to be patient with this novel initially but the rewards are great take it from one who generally finds textual quirks an irritant you quickly accommodate to unpunctuated paragraphs that perfectly encapsulate the narrator’s voice not voice as in audible speech he Elliott barely able to move due to cerebral palsy is using some kind of device to relate the great adventure of his childhood when in the late seventies without communication aids he made a new friend.

If you’re daft enough, you can watch me unwrapping this book on TikTok.

4 Comments

No two people will read the exact same story

20/4/2022

8 Comments

Although many of us read for relaxation, our brains are far from passive as we do so. We actively process the words on page or screen through the filter of our own experience. Because everyone is different, we won’t find identical meanings in the same text.

8 Comments

Mourning a marriage: The Chosen & So Long a Letter

15/4/2022

6 Comments

These two novels depict a character’s reflections on their life following the sudden death of their spouse. Both the male writer in the first novel and the female teacher in the second are mourning not only the loss of a partner but of the promise of their original romance.

6 Comments

Kinds of caring: Marzahn, Mon Amour & Here Again Now

8/3/2022

6 Comments

Here are two books featuring different kinds of caring: the first a translated memoir about a healthcare professional who looks after people’s minds along with their feet; the second a novel about an actor who opens his home to his struggling father and to his childhood friend.