Little Hitler

It's been a long time. Just logging on I came across some comments that needed moderating which were quite rude and insulting. I don't really mind, people are rude to me and insult me all day every day, online and in the real world. Only comments on older posts are moderated and that is to prevent porn spam, but the chap who has taken a dislike to some of the stuff I said about some our neighbours at the Wychwood festival seemed to think that it was because I am some sort of Stalinist.

Well, he's half right. I would have been happy for his alternative view to appear, including the insults, but if he is going to accuse me of being a Stalinist, well, fuck off comrade, the world will have to remain ignorant of your views regarding my emotional well being.

I say chap, it might not have been a chap because, he didn't provide a name, he was an anonymous poster. So he can fuck off for that reason as well. The gist it of was that I had a little moan, in what I recall as an otherwise very positive and cheerful review, about the lack of consideration shown by some of our neighbours, I think I even outed myself as miserable git because of it. He knew the people I was on about and disagreed with my perception of them. There you go, my perception differed from that of some others. One other, at least. His view has now been shared. Minus the abuse.

Mind you, this is not the BBC, it's my chuffing blog, and while I don't
mind anyone disagreeing with me, if you are going to insult and abuse me anonymously, you can get fucked. I am not Ann Robinson and this is not Points of View.

Talking of festivals, I declined the opportunity to take up early bird tickets for next years End of the Road, which was a schoolboy error as the line up is already looking superb, and they have only announced 6 of 'em.

Have I mentioned that I was in a car crash in the summer and had 6 weeks off work? The week I returned I managed to crack a rib, but struggled manfully in then I caught a dose of the flu and was off for 4 days. When I returned I was bollocked for lacking commitment and threatened with disciplinary action. I pray to any God that happens to be out there, don't let my free spirited nippers become wage slaves, with their prospects subject to the whims and fancies of some psychopath in a shiny suit.

All this time off afforded me plenty of book reading time though. I read The Twelve by Stuart Neville, which is every bit as good as Bob Piper said it would be and I read the new Pelecanos, which is everything you would expect from Georgie Boy. I read the utterly, utterly brilliant Lush Life by Richard Price............I was really pissed off when I finished it, and what else, Christ, I can't remember, loads of books.

I read "The World Made Straight" by Ron Rash. It's one of those trailer trash type novels which document the lives of poor white folk in a depressed America; people who live in communities much like the ones I work in, where the major employers have gone and left little but pollution and decay behind. It's a damn fine novel and sits along other, similar and similarly affecting works by the likes of Daniel Woodrell and William Gay. Bleak, but brilliant, and, frequently, beautiful.

So we have this white trash genre and we also have the Irish crime genre. Some of the best crime novels are coming out of Northern Ireland.........the aforementioned Neville, and Brian McGilloway being to the fore, then you have the likes of the incomparable Ken Bruen, as well as Gene Kerrigan Adrian McKinty and a number of others who I can't quite recall.

It's almost as if literature has it's movements or phases, just like the world of popular music, with it's Mersey scene and Madchester, and Two Tone and (don't laugh) Brumbeat. Maybe it's just tied in with economics and momentous social change. Whatever, it all makes the obsession the English media has with reviewing only novels that reflect middle class angst and insecurity look a bit pitiful.

I have just finished The Long Fall by Walter Mosley. I'm not a huge fan of the bloke generally, but I loved this book and fairly whizzed throught it. His earlier work has grated a bit because to my mind it has been, to some extent, overly concerned with documenting the experience of black Americans...........it has all appeared to be a bit worthy. I might have to take another look, because this last one has got it all.

Started a David Leveine this afternoon. Never heard of the bloke before but early signs are promising; so promising that I am having an early night so I can get stuck into it.