Michael J. Ritchie's Blog, page 33
July 1, 2019
Six of the Best … Time Travel Stories
[image error]Who among us hasn’t dreamed of travelling through time? Not necessarily to change anything, but just to have a look. Many of us would love to leap forward and see the consequences of our actions, or find out what happens to the planet. Maybe we even want to just get a look at the lottery numbers. Similarly, don’t many of us want to head back through time as well, to meet the late, great heroes of history, or maybe just to find out exactly what dinosaurs tasted like. It seems, however, that ti...
June 29, 2019
“Normal People” by Sally Rooney (2018)
[image error] “Marianne answers the door when Connell rings the bell.”
Last year, I read Conversations with Friends which a friend had been gently nagging me to have a go at. I ended up enjoying it much more than I thought I would. This was not the end of the nagging however, as then attention was turned to Sally Rooney’s second novel. So here we are.
Connell and Marianne live in the same small Irish town, but have very different backgrounds. Marianne lives in a large house with her mother and brother, and...
June 25, 2019
“The Fog” by James Herbert (1975)
[image error]“The village slowly began to shake off its slumber and come to life.”
Fog is one of the strangest weather formations the planet throws up. Sure, when you get down to basics, it’s pretty much just a low-lying cloud. Nonetheless, fog stirs up the primal fear – that of the unknown. Fog shrouds our view of the world and has led to numerous disasters throughout history, from ships running aground on rocks, to lives being lost in wars when views are suddenly obscured. It’s not alone, as there are a...
June 18, 2019
“Drunk Folk Stories” by Beans on Toast (2018)
[image error] “If this book is going to start anywhere, then it should start at Glastonbury.”
Music is something that, broadly speaking, has passed me by. Obviously I’m not saying I don’t like music – I think a fondness of some kind of music is a universal human trait – but I’m not someone who pays much attention to what’s going on or particularly worships musicians. The exception is Frank Turner, who is nothing short of a genius. Through him, I encountered Beans on Toast, and although I don’t know much ab...
June 14, 2019
Six of the Best … Opening Lines
[image error]You only get one chance to start a story. When I was studying Creative Writing at university, emphasis was sometimes placed on the first page of a novel. Books have to be engaging throughout because the writer naturally wants the reader to finish the whole book, so every page is a new challenge to make them turn over and keep going. If you can’t even sustain their interest to the end of the first page then something has gone very wrong. Even more so, then, you need a first line that grabs the...
June 9, 2019
“Question Time” by Mark Mason (2018)
[image error] “It’s on nights like this that the pub feels even more womb-like than usual.”
I love quizzes. I’ve long had a desire to consume as much trivia is humanly possible – one of my school reports notes that I have an “unstoppable thirst for knowledge” – and often the only place is comes in useful is in the corner of the pub, two wines down, as the chap behind the bar says, “Round one, question one…” I don’t profess to be a particularly popular person, but I’ve had people beg me to join their team....
June 6, 2019
“The Last Romeo” by Justin Myers (2018)
[image error] “I felt disoriented, and a bit peaky.”
The vast majority of my friends are coupled up, co-habiting and/or married now, so as one of the few singletons they know, any movements in my (by choice non-existent) love life are keenly dissected. They are amused by things like Tinder, having never had to use it, and freely admit that if they were suddenly single again, they’d have no idea how to meet someone new. The dating scene has changed rapidly in the last few years. Internet dating became the n...
June 2, 2019
“Death Of A Celebrity” by M. C. Beaton (2002)
[image error] “Hamish Macbeth did not like change, although this was something he would not even admit to himself, preferring to think of himself as a go-ahead, modern man.”
Four years ago, somehow, I read the second book in the Hamish Macbeth series. At the time, I heaped praise on the man, suggesting that he had been forgotten as one literary’s great detectives, and found the book fun and interesting. At the end, I made a promise to return soon. I did not return soon. My grandfather, however, recently di...
June 1, 2019
Book Chat: Silvia Mazzobel
[image error]Silvia Mazzobel and I met on Twitter after she stumbled upon my novel, The Third Wheel, on The Pigeonhole. Born and raised in Italy, the 37-year-old now lives in Brighton, England with her wife where she works as a translator.
A keen reader and traveller, as well as being fond of “tea, candles, food, art, yoga and cinema”, she powers through books at a rate I’m jealous of. She evidently loves books, as was proven when I asked her a few questions about her favourites and she was eager to tell...
May 30, 2019
“Whose Body?” by Dorothy L. Sayers (1923)
[image error]“‘Oh damn!’ said Lord Peter Wimsey at Piccadilly Circus.”
There were three personalities that really created and gave life to the Detective Club, which is ironic given they they dedicated the rest of their lives to ending lives. Anthony Berkeley, I’ve read a little of. Agatha Christie, I’ve read the lot. That leaves the third – Dorothy L. Sayers. Just as mysterious, macabre and magnificent as the others, Sayers was responsible for gifting the world Lord Peter Wimsey, so I felt it was about ti...
