A Book to Read When You’re Moving To London

Posted By Daisy

 

www.marcjohns.com

 

LAST year, I decided my life needed a shake-up. I was getting far too comfortable. A close friend got sick, and I found a list of aspirations from five years ago with 'Move to London' being one of them. Plus, 'All my friends are getting married (and I'm just getting drunk.)

For inspiration, I found this Stefan Sagmeister Ted Talk, and printed out lots of inspirational sayings - ('If You think Adventure is Dangerous, Try Routine, it's lethal) And had a few sleepless nights.

But somehow, it all came together. Last month, I got a job in London starting in August, and my friend’s dad decided to rent my house for the year. No brainer, huh?

The dream: Spending weekends eating chocolate brownies in Borough Market and writing in the British Library. Looking suddenly svelte and sophisticated as I jog alongside the riverside near Putney Bridge. Standing outside a packed pub in my suddenly uber-fashionable work clothes chatting to my colleagues during after-work Friday drinks. Lolling against a tree in Hyde Park on a Saturday contentedly reading my book. Writing lots of short stories in café’s. Waking up in my new bedroom on a Saturday morning and realising that this move was exactly right for me. Reading my book on the tube to work every morning. Browsing Primark on Oxford Street on a random Tuesday morning. Having my pick of antique and curio shops to trawl through on a Sunday afternoon.

The reality: A bedsit in Hackney. A job that’s less glamorous than I imagine. Babysitting for my sister and her husband every weekend. Crying into my coffee every Sunday morning wondering what the heck I’ve done.

The stress and strain of an adventure is worth more than a thousand peaceful days’. Too right, Paolo Coelho, too right. Bring it on.

Last Friday evening I had a magical date with Tall Guy with Glasses (we went to Amsterdam together in April). We sat on a beach wall in Kinsale as the sun set, eating calamari in garlic mayo and drinking beer, and chatted for hours. I smiled when I saw he was wearing a long-sleeved, freshly-ironed shirt with his shorts.

Elevator Pitch: A wacky, unique family live in a tumble-down house in an otherwise pristine neighbourhood. Problems with neighbours, thwarted ambitions and a failing marriage lead to the disappearance of the mother, Bernadette, and it’s up to her daughter to try to find her.

It’s Salmon Fishing in the Yemen (or any other book which is narrated through letters, emails and reports) meets The Royal Tenenbaums.

It’s one of the most unique books I’ve read in years – be prepared to suspend disbelief at some parts though.

A Book to Read in Seville: Summer Holiday Idea #2

Posted by Daisy

 

 

I've been to Seville three times and absolutely love it. I've been jostled in the streets during the Semana Santa, watching the white-masked, pointy-hat celebrants struggle under the weight of huge gilt statues, swaying to the endless piping music. I've got lost more than once on the maze-like streets, and am in awe of anyone who can find their way home without knowing any Spanish. My friend lived there for years, and used to try fruitlessly to make me get up early to have a Sevillian breakfast - one weekend, I capitulated and made it to the cafe in time for churros and freshly squeezed orange juice - amazing!

 

(I wrote this travel feature for a newspaper a few years ago.)

 

 

A FRIEND who lives in Seville once told me that that every time she steps out onto her street in the Macarena district, it feels like she’s walking onto the set of a movie. People move purposefully through the cobbled streets, the pastry-shop puffs out sweet scents, an old lady with piled-up hair puts a perfectly round orange on the top of a display outside the greengrocers, and locals chat garrulously, inclining their coffee cups towards their mouths or dipping deep-fried pastry ‘churros’ into hot chocolate outside the corner café.

 

www.seville-traveller.com

Even being lost in the old Santa Cruz area of Seville in torrential rain feels slightly glamorous. Around every corner is a huge stone church door under which to shelter and read a soggy map by the dim light of a street-lamp. Little clusters of oranges sit in puddles at the base of the trees which line the cobbled streets.

 

www.hotel-alfonsoxiii.com

For Seville is simply gorgeous. In the 8^th Century, the Moors came across the sea and conquered the city. They built tiled palaces, and mosques with intricate lace patterns carved into marble, and narrow, stony streets with dead ends. Seville owes a lot to the Moors. Their influence is everywhere. In the architecture of the cathedral and its tall Giralda tower. In the churches dotted all over the city. And in the shops where Moorish tea-sets with ornate little gold rimmed glasses and highly-decorated tin tea-pots are on sale.

 

The cathedral dominates the city, spanning an entire block. Inside are vast gilt altars and ostentatiously adorned statues of the mother of God. The remains of Christopher Columbus are purportedly kept there in a mausoleum and locals recommend the cathedral tower, the ‘Giralda’, as providing the best view of the town.

 

www.tripadvisor.com

 

I visit the magnificent Real Alcazar palace, a stone’s throw from the cathedral. Marble-floored and cool, it is full of enormous tapestries, intricate carvings, lush gardens, long multi-coloured tiled benches and gently rippling pools. Built for King Pedro the Cruel in the 1360’s, it is one of the best surviving examples of Mudejar architecture in the city. King Juan Carlos 1 and his Queen, Sofia, still stay here whenever they are in town, reportedly sending down to the local bakery to get their breakfast ‘churros’ on the Calle Arfe.

 

Seville also owes much to the two international Expositions it held in 1929 and 1992. The pressure to impress was high, and this cash-strapped city rose to the challenge, building bridges and futuristic edifices, constructing the magnificent Plaza Espana and the grand pavilions of the participating countries, and even diverting the city’s river Guadalquivir to flow under a specially constructed bridge.  It is well worth taking the city bus tour simply to grasp the importance of these Expositions to Sevillian architecture.

 

www.flickr.com

Seville teems with people. On a sunny spring day, the locals are everywhere, drinking half glasses of beer at high tables outside bars, sitting at coffee-tables, talking loudly, eating fast,  whilst cutting tapas in half with forks to share. And the tapas are everywhere. I find the freshest cheese and ham croquettes in the award-winning modern Cava Del Europa, Santa Cruz, and perch at the corner of the bar in El Rinconcillo, the oldest tapas bar in Seville, in Santa Catalina. Here, locals and tourists alike stand at tables, sharing plates of cheese, huge green olives, and lightly battered cod, ripping pieces of bread apart and rolling chewy pieces of Serrano ham between their fingers.

www.puertacatedral.com

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For €32, the multi-level Arabic baths (rumoured to be the best in Spain) are mine to explore. I languish in the Jacuzzi-like bath, swim from room to room, float in the salt-water bath and paddle dazedly through the aromatherapy bath. Immersed inside the womb-like terracotta-coloured walls, I hear nothing but the sounds of gushing water, and catch a glimpse of daylight under huge wooden doors. A fifteen- minute massage and a snooze on the heated marble benches in the relaxation room complete the experience. Afterwards, I revive myself with a glass of mint tea and some sweet baklava in the upstairs cafe, strewn with coloured cushions and couches.

 

Seville is a city fit for a king. Or at least a pop star. Heads of State and Madonna stay in the huge Hotel Alfonso X111, yet another stunning example of Mudejar architecture. I attend a wedding here, where we are treated to cool glasses of Manzanilla sherry in the tiled atrium, tapas served on Chinese rice spoons and dinner on silver platters.

 

It’s no wonder that Seville is the setting for so many opera’s, including ‘Don Giovanni’ and ‘The Barber of Seville’. As I wander home in the early hours of the morning, jumping neatly out of the way of a street cleaner’s hose, I’m sure I hear him whistling the theme tune from ‘Carmen’ as his truck moves slowly through the empty streets.




For her wedding guests, my friend recommended the following hotels:

www.hotelpuertadesevilla.com
www.hotelamadeussevilla.com
www.yh-hoteles.com
www.imgfernandoiii.com
www.hdmaria.com
www.vinccilarabidahotel.com
www.fuenso.com
www.emehotel.com

She advised against staying in the Hotel Alfonso 13, emailing 'for anyone who wants to stay in the hotel where the wedding's taking place, its €300 a night.....I wouldn't bother.'

'The Moment' by Douglas Kennedy

Elevator Pitch: An American author divorces his wife, narrowly avoids suicide and buys a cottage in the country on a whim. When he receives a box postmarked Berlin, memories of his time there as a young man come flooding back, and he allows himself to think about the beautiful woman he left behind.

I've loved Douglas Kennedy since reading 'The Pursuit of Happiness'. I really enjoyed 'The Moment',  and if nothing else, it was an excellent recap on the history of the Berlin Wall and what life was like before it fell.

A Book to Read When You're Having a Crap Day

Posted By Daisy

 

www.marcjohns.com

 

TODAY somebody projectile vomited beside me, and I had to clean up a river of puke while holding my breath discreetly and trying not to gag. My long-time day-job boss gave me a disappointingly formulaic written reference. My car started to make farting noises and after dropping it to a garage in town, I discovered that the exhaust pipe is rotten and it will cost €200 to fix. And the guy I’ve been on two dates with is now blowing hot and cold.

But…..nothing can ruin the excitement of going to Eason’s bookshop this afternoon and picking up a copy of my first glossy magazine feature - and poring over it proudly on the bus home.

Daisy opened the magazine ostentatiously on the bus, wondering if anyone realised they were sitting next to a magazine writer (albeit a small magazine that no-one in her family had ever heard of).

 

It only takes one nice thing to turn the whole day around - and now I feel like this!

 

 

 

Elevator Pitch: A seven-year-old girl puts her teenage brother behind bars after witnessing the brutal murder of her family. But what really happened that night in the blood-spattered farmhouse?

After the birth of my very sick nephew three years ago, I gave up reading violent thrillers. There was simply too much real-life suffering to bear. Despite it being compelling, I almost renounced ‘Dark Places’ as being too disturbing. But couldn’t stop myself from reaching for it in bed every night. Gillian Flynn is a brilliant writer whose writing style makes me gasp at times.

 

In her acknowledgments at the back of the book, Flynn writes: 'Thanks to my brilliant, funny, giant-hearted, super-hot husband...What do I say to a man who knows how I think and still sleeps next to me with the lights off?'

Not for the faint-hearted, although the ending is fairly unbelievable.



A Book To Read On The Camino - Summer Holiday Idea #1

Posted by Daisy

Summer's coming and with it thoughts of holidays. Why not try the Camino de Santiago - a holiday where you rise at 5 a.m., walk all day, rarely drink alcohol, sleep in the same room as hundreds of strangers every night, and regularly feel blisters popping inside your shoes - what's not to like!

 



'I'll always dream of this' (Miriam)

 

'Would ye ever get up, Miriam and Daisy, it's 6am and we've 35km to walk today' (Lou)

 

'I'll never have buns of steel' (Daisy)

 

All amazing photographs by Lou, Director of summer festival, Vantastival

I walked the Camino de Santiago in 2005. Starting at Roncesvalles (just over the border of France), we walked 750km in five weeks.  We trained by walking around the Lough in Cork twice before we left.

Roncesvalles

On the first day, we emptied our rucksacks out in the middle of a park and realised we’d have to dump all non-essentials - fake tan, make-up and earrings. That night, we slept under gothic chandeliers in a converted monastery with a hundred other pilgrims in double bunkbeds – and were treated to a cacaphonic symphony of snores and grunts all night. If you bring one thing on the Camino, make it earplugs.

 

The first day we walked 22kms through fields and forest paths, running up hills and congratulating ourselves on our marvellous fitness levels. The pain came the following day.

We rose at about 5am every day, and walked towards the nearest town for breakfast. One morning, we stumbled upon a running of the bulls in Puenta La Reina – at 8:30 a.m.

We slept in a hostel in Estella that resembled a Thai prison. Thirty triple-decker bunkbeds, one window, and one windowless shower. My waking view was the long arm of a stranger dangling from the bunkbed above.

 

We were lucky to meet Pablito, a well-known Spanish man of the Camino, who showed us how to use our wooden sticks properly. By the end of the five weeks, my stick-bearing arm was Michelle-Obama-like toned.This juggling man tied a different bell to his rucksack everyday, so he could make his own music as he walked. He was walking from Spain to Scotland, and back again.

 Every morning saw us hunting for the yellow arrows spray painted on walls, and the yellow and blue Camino markers.

We walked through many different regions; the beautiful Rioja and lush green Galicia. In the searing heat of the treeless Meseta, we plodded on, blisters popping inside my shoes until the village of Hontanas appeared like a mirage in the distance. Would it take an hour or five to reach it? Hard to tell. Everyone shouts ‘Buen Camino’ or ‘Animo’ or ‘Ultreia’ as they pass – new pilgrims were obvious by their lack of greeting.

 Even though I had proper footwear and high-tech ‘1000km socks’, I got blisters on every toe. Every morning I dosed myself with painkillers and walked on. Every evening, I sterilised a needle and threaded string through new blisters to pop them, and plastered them up. In bed at night, it was common to wake up in pain and feel the throbbing of blisters old and new.

Other pilgrims knew we had arrived at a hostel when they saw our three pairs of Asics lined up outside the door. One morning, one of my shoes was missing from the doorstep, and after an hour of running around the tiny village, I found it in a dog's kennel!

 

Opening the wrong door at the outhouse toilets in Manjarin - arghh
The lovely lady who found us a bed for the night - serendipity!

We usually stayed in the pilgrim hostels, where bed and board was about €10 per night. In Arzua, there was no room at the inn, and just as we were about to sign up to sleep on the ground of a sports hall, we met a friendly Spanish lady on the street who found a lovely apartment for us.

We heard about the cool ‘hippy’ hostel in the middle of a deserted village at Manjarin and decided it would be a fun experience, man. On arrival, we were told there was no food and shown to our beds - ten dirty mattresses pushed together in the attic of a cowshed. We sunbathed for a few hours (with flies buzzing constantly around our heads) until we realised that we were lying in the dogs’ toilet area. At last, one of us nervously suggested leaving, and as the sun set, we hotfooted it down the mountain to the nearest B&B.

Pilgrims place stones from their home country at La Cruz de Ferro - apparently one man lugged a 3kg stone all the way from Switzerland.

Most days we walked together. We sang lots. Some days, without needing to discuss it, we split up and walked alone. 

We dragged our feet for the last 5km to Santiago, no-one really wishing to reach the destination. Pilgrim's Mass at the cathedral and receiving our certificate was lovely, but bittersweet.  After a few days relaxing in Santiago, we took a bus to Finisterre – the end of the Earth – and had paella on the beach where pilgrims used to throw their boots into the ocean.

I currently know two people who are walking the Camino solo right now. And my friend Grace will walk for ten days next month with her 72-year-old mother. A definite bucket-list experience.

'The Camino taught me that everything seems impossible at the beginning, but if you break it into small steps, you can achieve anything' (Miriam)

 

'A Rural Affair' by Catherine Alliott

 

Having arrived at the tail-end of a two-month manic work stint, I don’t have the energy to read anything at the moment. ‘A Rural Affair’ proved ideal sleep-time material after emailing yet another feature to my editor at 2 a.m.

Poppy Shilling is always fantasising about her prissy husband’s death. When all her friends were getting married, Poppy panicked and ended up with boring, anally-retentive Phil, who insists on wearing Lycra and going on cycling holidays to France. Now she wants him and his trophy cabinet and ghastly brown leather sofas gone. But be careful what you wish for , Poppy….

I loved this book and the descriptions of ‘Valley of the Squinting Windows’ English country life. The friendships amongst the women is lovely, and the description of the hunt ball sounds fabulous. However, a friend recently went to a hunt ball in Adare with an ex-boyfriend, and described it as ‘fierce country-ish’.

Next Monday: Farting lambs and lame chat-up lines in Galway.

Books to read after finding fish fingers

Posted by Jenny

 

 

 



My son is a little monkey. All my kids are monkeys, but this week he is particularly a monkey. He’s adorable with his red hair, brown eyes and sallow skin. He’s gentle, sensitive and enjoys problem solving. He loves his family, loves his friends and loves going to school. One of his favourite tv shows is a programme called “Finding stuff out”. Every episode kids can send in why-does-this-happen/how-does-this-work questions and a kid called Harrison will “find the stuff out”. Very annoying, if you’re an adult.

Anyway, to get back to why my son is a monkey, surprise surprise, it has to do with him implementing a thought process that clearly has had results in the past during or just after dinner time. My son is a good eater. However, his diet is very limited. At least it’s limited to the good stuff (and so far I’m not complaining), carrots, broccoli, sweetcorn, potatoe waffles and fish fingers. This is all he eats. Every day. For dinner. Except Saturdays, that’s Pancake Day in our house, a sacred tradition. As is Daddy Dinner Day on Fridays (nutella sandwiches!).

He’s not too keen on the fish fingers, but we insist he eats it. Better then nothing, right? Right. Well, let me take you back to the bit where I said that he’s enjoys problem solving. “If mummy doesn’t see me hide the food, she thinks I’ve eaten it, even when I didn’t.”

I’m not claiming that his reasoning is flawless. He’s only 7 years old. But he has clearly thought about it in enough detail for it to lead to an execution of a plan. I started to find fish fingers in his pockets…. Clearly he hadn’t taken into consideration that mummy eventually will find the food and that it was a very short term solution to an obviously longer term problem with a fairly significant consequence as mummy is now AWARE.

Last week I had taken a much anticipated week off work. I had no plans made, other than be mum for the week, which I don’t get to do that often as I work full time. I’m not complaining, merely stating a fact. I was really looking forward to doing school runs, homework, chatting and playing, cooking and yes, cleaning. Our “old” au pair was leaving on the Monday and the “new” au pair was arriving on the Thursday. So while I was doing my chores I was compiling a list of “things” in my head that I had to organize for the “new” au pair. The list usually contains vague items like:

·         make a new time table,

·         show her around here and there,

·         do the how-to-disipline-a-3-year-old talk,

·         do the how-to-discipline-a-5-and-7-year-old talk,

·         do the child-safety-don’t-take-the-widow-chains-off-in-your-bedroom-when-you-open-the-window talk and the

·         keep-your-make-up-locked-away-because-my-3-year-old-will-rob-you-blind talk

While I was industriously vacuuming the floors, I discovered a new talk. I pushed away the toy box, which I admit with shame (not), happens only a few times a year and found 1, 2, 3….. 12 fish fingers! 12!

I have added the watch-my-son –when-he-eats talk to my au pair list. And my son? Well, he has to go back to the drawing board. I am honestly looking forward to finding out what he’ll come up with next.

 

 

 

I have recently read my way through six Sookie Stackhouse books. Charlaine Harris, you got me hooked! They were great pieces of entertaining escapism and kept me reading book after book. I’m preparing to get my hands on the next instalment and I can’t wait.

The books are different from the tv series. The story line has obviously been adapted for television and in my opinion both work within their own medium. Box-set heaven! For viewing when the kids are in bed though, as they’re a bit explicit on the sex side of things. Series 6 is due out soon, I believe….

A Book To Read After Seeing The Great Gatsby (2013)

                                                                   A shiver-inducing tribute to the emptiness of the Jazz age

Posted By Daisy

‘I hope she’ll be a fool – that’s the best thing a girl can be in this world, a beautiful little fool’. (Daisy Buchanan)

WHAT can I say? I saw the film last night and the characters, story and music are still swirling in my head.

The film is a perfect tribute to the booze and party orgy of the 1920’s prohibition era – all dancing girls with green eye-shadow, and champagne sloshing in vintage coupes, and a thousand tinsel threads raining down upon the party goers who dance a super energetic Charleston.

But behind the great American dream is dirt and poverty. The Valley of Ashes is a no-man’s industrial wasteland between Manhattan and Long Island, its people bored and black with soot, perpetually watched by Dr TJ Eckleberg’s tarnished spectacles on a faded advertising hoarding. Myrtle is exactly as I had pictured her, and the scene in her rented apartment is in stark contrast to Gatsby’s polished parties; grubby feather pillows split open and stick to sweaty bodies, couples have sex in an adjoining bedroom, and drugs are passed from tongue to tongue and washed down with whisky.  As he gazes down onto the street below, Nick realises he neither belongs here nor in West Egg.

Luhrmann ensures that none of the women in the film are portrayed as being classically beautiful – Myrtle (I didn’t even realise it was Isla Fisher) is a pathetic, sleazy creature with an artificial painted rosebud mouth, and Daisy (Carey Mulligan) is ten-a-penny pretty. The dancing women are older and plumper than expected, and Jordan Baker (Elizabeth Debicki) the young golf professional is a sexless beanpole in her long dresses. I like Daisy in the beginning. She’s bright and breezy, floating through life as if behind a gauze curtain, her money shielding her from reality. Gatsby tries to mirror this by smothering her with silk shirts in an odd display of carelessness, but ultimately he tries too hard.

Luhrmann makes the heat another character in the room  at the Plaza hotel, irritating everyone and niggling already-fraying tempers. Cigars and cigarettes sizzle as they are lit and sweat trickles on the back of necks as a busboy chips ice off a huge block to fill the cut-glass whiskey tumblers. For the first time, Gatsby, in his creased pink pin-striped suit, loses control and reveals his true self, if only for a moment, a lock of Brilliantined hair tumbling onto his forehead as he rages at Tom and Daisy and his inability to be a part of their world.

Luhrmann also portrays Nick’s otherness perfectly - he is always behind curtains, listening at partially closed doors or watching from above, always on his own unless someone needs a favour from him.

 

I watched the film with a continuous nausea, from the swooshing camera pans to Gatsby’s roaring yellow motor car squashing water melon on the road, and the crowds of party-goers swaying in their cars as they roar their way up Gatsby’s lit-up driveway.

I’m going to see it again next week – this time in 3D. I can’t wait.

 

                                                                                                 Time for a re-read, I think.

A Book To Read When You Know You're Just Being Silly Now

Posted By Daisy

 

    

www.marcjohns.com

 

I’VE been up the walls recently. Freelance work is like that. Some weeks there’s nothing, and then all of a sudden your inbox pings with seven feature commissions. So the past few weekends have been spent either interviewing or writing. My kitchen has become a tedious office space, with scribbled papers spread all over the surface of the table, and Post-Its stuck randomly about, saying ‘Las or Los Angeles?’ or ‘Check what year the burning of Cork happened.’

But I knew I loved writing when, after spending twelve hours typing a glossy magazine feature (my first-yippee) one day, and sitting exhausted at midnight on Sunday, with my full time day job to go to the next day, I realised I’d actually do it for free as long as I was published.

Having worked steadily on Friday night and all day Saturday, I had a glint in my eye as I got ready to meet my friends in town on Saturday night. I had been too serious for the past few weeks, and needed to kick back, let loose, and have some fun.

So I kissed a man at a party in my friend’s house after the nightclub. And I now realise that I will be single for the rest of my life. Because I’m still irrevocably, immaturely attracted to bad boys and messers who make me laugh. He entertained us into the early hours, dancing and waltzing and jiving and just having good, clean fun. He made a stupid face in front of the camera when we were trying to take a nice girls-only photo, and insisted on playing such gems as the theme song from ‘China Beach’ (!) and ‘Something’ by the Beatles.

But I knew we were compatible when he held out his hand to silence us, reverentially pressed play on his iPod and ‘Lola’ by The Kinks came on. Lola, the song I played constantly on my Walkman during three weeks of summer camp when I was 15, walking around in my dyed purple flares and checked shirts and long chains and nose-ring. It's the only song (besides Bruce Springsteen’s 'The River') that I know all the words to. We sat delightedly facing each other across the coffee table, singing the words - ‘I met her in a club down in Otto-ho, where they drink champagne and it tastes just like Cherry Co-la’.

Twinkle-toeing it out the door of the party at 4:30am, he took my number. And two days later, he texted.

‘X here. How are you. Did you go out Sunday night.’

Even though I know he’s bad for me, I have been composing a witty reply in my head for the last few hours. Let the games begin.

Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn

Elevator Pitch: A doting wife disappears one day after moving to Missouri with her out-of-work husband to help care for his ageing parents. But nothing is as clear-cut as it seems.

It's 'Douglas Kennedy meets Fifty Shades of Grey.'

My friend gave me this book with the caveat that it was 'rubbish'. It took me a few weeks to open it, and I was immediately hooked. It's clever, and depressing and has a great twist. The portrayal of marriage is sad - Nick and Amy were so in love in the beginning and then it normality impedes and it all turns to dust. I liked reading about the beginning of their love, as sometimes I think I am addicted to the excitement at the start of a relationship, and run for the hills as soon as it all begins to fade.