by Administrator | Dec 22, 2019 | Quick Reads
Sillitoe’s follow-up to Saturday Night and Sunday Morning (SNSM) is a strange beast, a chimeric compromise spawned from his publishers wanting another sensational ‘Angry Young Man’ book, against Sillitoe’s desire to broaden his palette and show that the literary...
by Administrator | Dec 21, 2019 | Quick Reads
Volume one of ‘Howitt’s Journal’, edited by William & Mary Howitt, opens with the married couple setting out their aims. “For years it has been our resolve to devote ourselves by such a periodical to the entertainment, the good, and the advancement of the public.”...
by Administrator | Dec 20, 2019 | Quick Reads
The first masked hero in literature was Barnoess Orczy’s The Scarlet Pimpernel, appearing in 1905. It was written after Orczy’s stage play of the same name enjoyed a long run in London, having first opened in Nottingham. The scarlet pimpernel refers to a group of...
by Administrator | Dec 19, 2019 | Quick Reads
Any book that opens with the lead character necking eleven pints and seven gin chasers before plunging headlong down the stairs is a book that isn’t interested in moderation. From boozy start to bruised end, Alan Sillitoe’s debut is a book familiar to anyone who has...
by Administrator | Dec 18, 2019 | Quick Reads
Nottingham’s Geoffrey Trease was a prolific and popular author whose first novel was ‘a seminal work of socialist literature for children’. ‘Bows Against the Barons’ sees the rich and poor clash in medieval England, a time of harsh winters and starvation, not a place...
