2018: End of year review

2018: End of year review

The hardest working book group in Hove take a well earned break and take stock of 2018

We met at Planet India in Hove on Thursday 6 December 2018 to eat delicious curry, chat shit, and unveil the best of the year.

We agreed to review the scoring process and the methodology for next year after Tristan had established that the best book was, in fact, not the best book at all.

A travesty and a sham, he yelled, whilst gesticulating wildly with a chapati in his hand. 

For now though this will have to do

Our favourite books we discussed in 2018

1/ The English Patient (1992) by Michael Ondaatje - 15

2/ The Handmaid’s Tale (1985) by Margaret Atwood - 12
3/ Black Teeth and a Brilliant Smile (2017) by Adelle Stripe - 7
5=/ Wake In Fright (1961) by Kenneth Cook - 6
5=/ Submission (2015) by Michel Houellebecq - 6
6/ Nightmare in Berlin (1947) by Hans Fallada - 5
8=/ Under Major Domo Minor (2015) by Patrick deWitt - 3
8=/ The Lesser Bohemians (2016) by Eimear McBride - 3
9/ Waterland (1983) by Graham Swift - 2

10/ The Murder of Roger Ackroyd (1926) by Agatha Christie - 0


2. Our favourite musical selections we discussed in 2018

1=/ Thatcher’s Britain playlist - 16
1=/ Max Richter - Three Worlds: Music From Woolf Works (2017) - 16

3. Dog Man Star (1994) by Suede - 11
4. Robin’s Summertime playlist - 5
5. Billy Bragg and Wilco ‘Mermaid Avenue’ (1998) - 3
6. I, Gemini (2016) by Let’s Eat Grandma - 1
7. A Certain Ratio 'I’d Like To See You Again' - 1
8. “All That Glitters…” playlist - 2

10=/ The Birthday Party - The Bad Seed EP (1983) - 0
10=/ Max Cooper - One Hundred Billion Sparks (2018) - 0


3. Our favourite film/DVDs we discussed in 2018

1/ Wake In Fright (1971) directed by Ted Kotcheff - 16

2/ Blade Runner 2049 (2017) dir by Denis Villeneuve - 10
4=/ The Arbor (2010) dir by Clio Barnard - 9
4=/ Kidnapping of Michel Houellebecq (2014) dir by Guillaume Nicloux - 9
6/ Heavenly Creatures (1994) directed by Peter Jackson - 5
7/ The Levelling directed by Hope Dickson Leach (2018) - 4
8/ Shutter Island (1994) directed by Martin Scorsese - 1

Princess Cyd (2017) directed by Stephen Cone - 0
A Company of Wolves (1984) directed by Neil Jordan - 0
Howards End dir by James Ivory (1992) - 0

4. Our favourite unifying themes of 2018

1/ It’s Grim Up North (aka Thatcher’s Britain) (aka Andrea Dunbar) - 15

2/ Descent Into Hell (aka Aussie Noir) - 13
3/ Dystopian Futures - 8
4/ Rural Idylls - 6
5/ Twisted Fairytales - 4
6/ Michel Houellebecq/Max Richter - 3

9=/ A Slice of Old English Sponge - 0
9=/ Criminality and Art / All that Glitters - 0
9=/ Awakenings - 0

5. Best book you read this year

Nigel - Restoration (+ sequel Merivel) by Rose Tremain
Roland - Waterland by Graham Swift
Robin - The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje
Nick - Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind by Yuval Noah Harari
Keith - Alone in Berlin by Hans Fallada
Tristan - All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr


6. What defined 2018 for you

Nigel - No one event or happening (except maybe World Cup 2018) but, the ongoing self harming of Brexit aside, it’s been a really lovely year which I feel privileged to have enjoyed

Roland - Mellowing into older age

Robin - David Byrne gig, Bundesliga match, Holly's exam results, anti-trump march

Nick - Brexit

Keith - ‘I was looking for a job and then I found a job...’

Tristan - Fucking fucking Brexit shitstorm


7. Best thing about Book Group in 2018

Nigel - We’ve upped our game - some really great choices with no real stinkers and even the ones I didn’t necessarily enjoy I was glad to have read/listened/watched PLUS it’s a lovely group and Roland’s fitted right in

Roland - Savouring splendid artistic works I would never otherwise sample + Celebrating our musical differences. Some like droning indie/rock others like melodic jazz and never the twain shall meet!

Robin - Mid summer book club at Devil's Dyke

Nick - A good all round selection this year - good unifying themes

Keith - Continued excellence in our cultural exchanges. My life is richer for it.

Tristan - The "you can choose the venue" innovation. Although not many people have taken up the option.


8. How we make Book Group even better

Nigel - No need to gild the lily aka don’t fuck with perfection

Roland - Maybe some carefully curated/chosen new blood?

Robin - An extra week to read the book - no surprise there!

Keith - Bring back Hamish

Tristan - Don't include the ratings per-person per-month in the poll. That way people are not influenced by their previous ratings, and you can reveal the comparison when you announce the poll to show the difference between votes-in-the-moment and end-of-year.


9. What else..

Nigel - Keep on keeping on
Robin - Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious!!
Keith - TBA
Tristan - Keep up the great organising and documenting


OPTIONAL EXTRAS

ALBUMS OF THE YEAR
Nigel - Confidence Man - Confident Music for Confident People (another brilliant year with so many super duper songs and albums)

SONGS OF THE YEAR
Nigel - Confidence Man - Catch My Breath / Portugal. The Man - So Young / The Vaccines - I Can’t Quit

GIGS OF THE YEAR
Nigel - Idles at The Concorde / John Cooper Clarke at The Dome
Nick - Sons of Kemet
Tristan - Baloji

CULTURAL HAPPENINGS OF THE YEAR (best of the rest - books, TV, films, festivals etc)

Nigel - Better Call Saul (TV) / End of the Road 2018 (Festival) / World Cup 2018 (Football) / Irvine Welsh - Dead Men’s Trousers (Book)

Nick - Widows (Film)

Tristan - Screening of La Haine, with live soundtrack by Asian Dub Foundation

Waterland (1983) by Graham Swift

On Thursday 15th November 2018 we met to discuss Roland's choices

BOOK: Waterland (1983) by Graham Swift

Murder, incest, guilt, insanity, Ale and Eels. Hard to imagine not loving a book with themes like that eh? Or is it?

Roland had chosen Waterland as part of his Rural Idylls theme

Roland was, to use the modern parlance, blown away.

Graham Swift's Fenland of the mind spans more than 200 years in the lives of its haunted narrator and his forebears. Just as Tom Crick, the passionate teacher, tried to inspire his pupils, so Roland, eyes gleaming, tried to persuade the Hove Book Group of its merits. It’s a fantastic book that is imbued with the atmosphere of its surroundings. It does for the Fens what Hardy does for Wessex, or Daphne Du Maurier does for Cornwall. Come lose yourself among the eels and reeds of eastern England, exalted Roland.

Some were less convinced by the books merit’s. All agreed it was undeniably an impressive and ambitious novel which ruminates upon the relentless tide of change and humanity’s subsequent shifting fortunes. It’s also firmly rooted in the watery world of the East Anglian Fens, the rich and fertile flood plains, in which its inhabitants are forever locked in an ongoing battle with water, and which can never be comprehensively won by either side and yet for all the book’s watery pleasures some were unable to stay immersed. Its charms never truly grabbed some: the non linear structure, multiple narratives, and contrasting styles, were just too jarring. Clever, ambitious and diverse, but for some it was a book we admired more than enjoyed. As dull as the River Ouse? Well, for some, perhaps yes….

Tristan 8/10 - Nick 6/10 - Keith 9/10 - Roland 10/10 - Nigel 6/10 - Robin 7/10

MUSIC: Max Cooper - One Hundred Billion Sparks (2018)

Roland recommends headphones and mind altering substances to truly appreciate One Hundred Billion Sparks. Hove Book Group, being a straight edge outfit, eschew chemical shortcuts when it comes to musical appreciation.

According to Max, every track on the LP is a score to a visual story stemming from this system of one hundred billion sparking neurones, which create us. Few picked that up from listening to it however it is all very pleasant. There’s a lot of this electronica knocking about. At one time some of us were quite taken with it. Four Tet and their ilk. We're slightly less enamoured of it now, having swung back towards hooks and lyrics and groove but, yeah, most were happy to have it playing whilst we went about our business.

Nick dubbed it “a poor man’s Boards of Canada” - take that Max

FILM: The Levelling (2017) directed by Hope Dickson Leach

Somerset, England. Trainee veterinarian Clover Catto returns to the farm where she grew up after hearing news that her brother Harry has died in what appears to be a suicide. Finding the family home in a state of horrendous disrepair following the 2014 floods that devastated the area, Clover is forced to confront her father Aubrey about the farm, the livestock and, crucially, the details surrounding Harry's death. Clover's discoveries send her on an emotional journey of reckoning with her family, her childhood and herself.

Most in the group concluded we’d far rather watch something like this than a blockbuster, or an action type film. Meditative, low-key, English, unusual, interesting context, enigmatic.

That said, not ideal content for a non meat eater

ENDORSE IT

They Shall Not Grow Old (Film)

Cider With Rose by Laurie Lee (Book)

Sons of Kemet (Jazz group)

Widows (Film)

Baloji (Pop group)

Killing Eve (TV show)

David Byrne (Live)

Go Go Penguin (Pop group)

Golem (BBC TV programme)

Oliver Burkeman podcast