Sean's profile

331 ratings | 14 reviews
avg rating: 3.54

#8 best reviewers

Sean's bookshelves

read (329)
currently-reading (7)
to-read (18)
socio-cultural (61)
sci-fi-fantasy (59)
weird-fiction-humourous (48)

music (45)
psychedelia (31)
magick-speculation (27)
everyday-fiction (22)
books-i-read-as-a-young-lad (21)
the-classix (17)

crime-fiction-thrillers (13)
war-history (12)
childrens-young-adult-mystery (12)
body-mind-improvement (11)
art-portfolios (8)
celtic-themed (7)

scientific-speculation (4)
graphic-novels (3)
poetry (2)
myths-legends (1)

cloud shelves | see all bookshelves »

Sean is currently reading

	09/07 Sean is currently reading: Go Down, Moses (Paperback) by William Faulkner bookshelves: currently-reading, everyday-fiction	my rating:
	add a comment
	08/01 Sean is currently reading: Moksha: Writings on Psychedelics and the Visionary Experience (Paperback) by Aldous Huxley bookshelves: currently-reading, psychedelia, socio-cultural	my rating:
	add a comment
	08/01 Sean is currently reading: The San Francisco Oracle / The Psychedelic Newspaper of the Haight Ashbury (Digital Re-Creation) by Allen Cohen bookshelves: currently-reading, psychedelia, socio-cultural	my rating:
	add a comment

Sean's recent updates (rss)

September 11

Sean gave

to:
The Unfinished Clue (Paperback)
by Georgette Heyer
bookshelves: crime-fiction-thrillers

my rating:

read in September, 2008

Sean said: "My wife received this as a birthday gift and I was looking for a bit of a light-relief read.

It's very Christie-esque, this. I could almost picture the Hercule Poirot TV film as I was reading. The usuals are all there...the country-house toffs, th...more "

add a comment

September 07

Sean gave

to:
The Closed Circle (Paperback)
by Jonathan Coe
bookshelves: everyday-fiction, socio-cultural

my rating:

read in September, 2008

add a comment

August 29

New comment on Mark's review of The Encyclopedia of Dead Rock Stars: Heroin, Handguns, and Ham Sandwiches

Sean wrote: "It's possible I did. Amazing to think that was her, working in the bookstore. "

(see all 4 comments)

August 28

Sean gave

to:
The Rotters' Club (Paperback)
by Jonathan Coe
bookshelves: everyday-fiction, socio-cultural

my rating:

read in August, 2008

Sean said: ""The Rotters' Club" was recommended to me by my brother-in-law, shortly after the BBC mini-series was shown on the toob. He had read the book before then and thought I would like it due to the many prog band references.

The story centers...more "The Rotters' Club" was recommended to me by my brother-in-law, shortly after the BBC mini-series was shown on the toob. He had read the book before then and thought I would like it due to the many prog band references.

The story centers around Benjamin Trotter, a public school boy living in Birmingham, England in the 1970s. B'ham seemed like a pretty grim place during that time, with the erosion of the workers' unions, terrorist activity by the IRA, 3-day work weeks, power cuts, etc. Ben mostly hangs out with his erstwhile mates, Philip and Doug, tries to form a prog-rock band, writes articles for the school newspaper and nurses his crush on Cicely Boyd, the typical 'popular girl' that everyone's trying to date. Ben also has a precocious younger brother, Paul, who embraces the Tory takeover in the late 70s, as the socialist ideas of the Labour Party were stagnating.

Ben's sister Lois meets a "hairy guy" called Malcolm, though a lonely hearts ad in muso-mag, Sounds. They get together and Malcolm introduces Ben to off-beat prog like Henry Cow and Hatfield & The North (whose second album gives the book it's title). Lois and Malcolm date for a year and as Malcolm is about to propose to Lois, the pub they are both in explodes, due to an IRA bomb. Malcolm is killed and Lois, who survives, is transformed into a mute recluse for a few years.

This sort of bittersweet quality informs most of the book. The kids' parents have unfulfilling affairs, Ben has a religious epiphany, but later returns to his initial ambiguity about the topic. Phil's prog band dream crashes around him, only this leads to the others in the band forming a punk group, meeting with some local success. Ben goes out with a girl for a short time, but his unhappiness leads him to seek out Cicely again. There are lots of other plot threads, some get resolved...others don't.

I really enjoyed this book, it brought back memories of being an awkward teen. Some themes seem universal and location and points in time are just details. I deducted a star for the episode where Doug travels to London to visit the NME office, ends up at a Clash gig and beds a 20-something woman he met earlier in the day. That bit just seemed thrown in as a cheap device for character development--the way films do when a character will just "go to Vegas" on a whim.

For that small complaint, though, I still stand by "The Rotters' Club" as an enjoyable read. Any book that describes Henry Cow as "The Yardbirds getting into bed with Ligeti, then driving through the ruins of a divided Berlin", has two characters calling their prog-rock band "Minas Tirith" and name-checks Gryphon is just alright with me.

...less "

add a comment

Sean joined the The Reasons Why you wrote your book or books group.

August 01

Sean gave

to:
Northern Lights (His Dark Materials, Book 1)
by Philip Pullman
bookshelves: sci-fi-fantasy, weird-fiction-humourous

my rating:

read in July, 2008

add a comment

Sean is currently reading:
Moksha: Writings on Psychedelics and the Visionary Experience (Paperback)
by Aldous Huxley
bookshelves: currently-reading, psychedelia, socio-cultural

my rating:

add a comment

Sean is currently reading:
The San Francisco Oracle / The Psychedelic Newspaper of the Haight Ashbury (Digital Re-Creation)
by Allen Cohen
bookshelves: currently-reading, psychedelia, socio-cultural

my rating:

add a comment

Sean read and liked Mark's review of The Encyclopedia of Dead Rock Stars: Heroin, Handguns, and Ham Sandwiches:

"What a genius idea: arrange these hundreds of musical corpses by date of death! This not only makes the book a fascinating morbid chronology, but you also get to see odd synchronicities such as the deaths of Gram Parsons and Jim Croce within t...more "

4 comments

July 30

New comment on Sean's review of I Hope They Serve Beer In Hell

Sean wrote: "You're welcome, Claudia--thank you for the kind words and for reading my review. "

(see all 4 comments)

see all 329 of Sean's books »

Sean's groups (recent posts)

Oxford on Goodreads — 9 members — last activity 05/09/2008 12:08AM
For anyone who lives, or has lived in and around Oxford....And if you just so happen to love the city and it's authors, then please fell free to join ...more

Spare Time Activities — 34 members — last activity 07/27/2008 08:15PM
There is a lot of emphasis on what kinds of books people tend to read, but I would like to see what people do in their spare time, if you have any!!! ...more

Philip K Dick — 171 members — last activity 10 days ago, 12:36AM
Welcome to the Philip K. Dick discussion group, a lively place where you can kick off your kittens and indulge in a little furry waxing, lyrical.

progrock-dt — 19 members — last activity 08/12/2008 05:26PM
Goodreads-group of the german-language progressive rock eCommunity [progrock-dt:]: It's all about unicorns and jesters in here ;-)

"We are the...more

The Reasons Why you wrote your book or books — 339 members — last activity 16 days ago, 05:05AM
People write books for many reasons, so why did you write yours?

see all of Sean's groups »

Sean's friend comments

(add a comment | view all)

No friend comments yet...

block this member *

Sean's friends (16)

	Mike Philbin 239 books 1002 friends
	Jennifer 220 books 2016 friends
	Mark 624 books 55 friends
	Massimiliano 303 books 1869 friends
	Bill 462 books 226 friends
	Amelia 354 books 69 friends
	Beverly 3784 books, 2504 friends Friend details Online, Through Goodreads
	Naomi 350 books 77 friends
	Steven 26 books, 714 friends Friend details Through Goodreads "Hi Sean, its a pleasure to meet you. Best Regards Steve"
	John 1164 books 93 friends
	Jason 488 books 2534 friends
	Bryn 67 books 293 friends
	Riah 276 books 17 friends
	Latif 23 books 1366 friends
	Creative 1448 books 64 friends

see all 16 friends »

polls voted on by this member