Tales from the Bedroom Floor

London: Abacus, 2000 Why is this book on the bedroom floor? - I used to own a copy of David Baddiel’s debut, Time for Bed , because Frank Skinner described it as having “at least one belly laugh per page”. I don’t recall any of those, if any, but nevertheless when I saw this for the princely sum of 50p, I thought it was worth a bash. About the author - one of the UK’s best-known stand-up comedians, David Baddiel graduated with a double first class degree in English from Cambridge University and immediately began a career in comedy. As part of The Mary Whitehouse Experience team, Baddiel found fame, which only increased when he and partner Rob Newman broke away to write and perform Newman and Baddiel in Pieces . The partnership dissolved acrimoniously in 1993 following a headline gig at Wembley Arena. Baddiel then enjoyed a second fruitful endeavour with Frank Skinner, hosting Fantasy Football League , leading to a number one single, ‘Three Lions’. Baddiel has recently returne...

London: Profile, 2014 Why is this book on the bedroom floor? - I spotted this in a charity shop. It was the spine which caught my attention, proving that you can’t judge a book by its cover but you can certainly get arrested by it. About the author - Gaston Dorren is a language writer from the Netherlands. He speaks six languages and reads in a number of others. Lingo was based on his book Language Tourism , published in Dutch in 2012 and subsequently published in different languages. He continued the theme of Lingo by writing Babel , about the twenty most spoken languages in the world today. He seems like a very engaging and enthusiastic bloke, at least based on his website at https://languagewriter.com/. The English edition was translated by Alison Edwards, and there were contributions by Jenny Audring and Frauke Watson. Plot - Around continental Europe in sixty languages, Lingo tells us something interesting beyond the vocab for each and every one. Review - In my seco...

N.B. This is not my copy. Mine is in much better condition but I haven't got a decent scan of the cover. London: Secker & Warburg, 1936 (this ed. 1954) Why is this book on the bedroom floor? - I must admit this is a bit of a cheat - I’ve read this book several times already, but not since I was at university. But my wife gave me a gorgeous copy of the book on the morning of our wedding as a present, and I just had to read it again. It came from the estate of Harold Whitaker, an animator who worked on Animal Farm , When the Wind Blows and The Twelve Tasks of Asterix , all of which I adore, and also The Poddington Peas , which I merely admire. This edition originally cost 12 shillings and 6. Worth every penny. About the Author - Eric Arthur Blair, better known by his pen name of George Orwell, is one of Britain’s most-admired literary figures. A novelist, journalist and essayist, his adventurous life took him from Imperial India, Revolutionary Spain, and many ...

London: Allen Lane, 2016 Why is this book on the bedroom floor? - It was a birthday present from my wife. About the Author - Norman Ohler is a well-known German writer and screenwriter, partly responsible for the 2008 Wim Wenders film Palermo Shooting. His literary fame is based around his City Trilogy, but Blitzed is his first work of nonfiction. Plot - Nazis on drugs! Not just a dodgy plot in a straight-to-Netflix, but apparently true. Ohler blows the lid off the National Socialist pill-pot, exposing just how off their mash the silver medal winners of the Second World War actually were. Review - It’s been estimated that the only person with more words spent on him than Adolf Hitler is Jesus Christ. In the seventy-four years since Time ’s ‘Man of the Year’ for 1938 bit the big cyanide capsule in the sky, it’s almost improbable that a year will go by without a startling new biography or study of Hitler and the National Socialist regime being published. At t...

London: Picador, 2015 Why is this book on the bedroom floor? - I first came across a review of this in Nick Hornby’s Stuff I’ve Been Reading , a collection of reviews for The New Yorker . It sounded interesting and I filed it away at the back of my mind, until coming across it in a Blue Cross shop about a year ago. About the Author - Ryan Gattis is a novelist who lives in LA and is part of a street-art crew. He’s written half a dozen books. All Involved is the product of Gattis’ two and a half years of research and interviews with eyewitnesses to the 1992 LA riots. Plot - Set over six days of the infamous LA riots of 1992, the book loosely charts the fall-out from a revenge killing on the brother of a member of Big Fate’s crew, drawing in family, deadly rivals, bystanders and the emergency services. Review - Imagine you’re sitting there, one evening (say, May Day or something), watching television. Then, without knowing why, your nice suburban street or the...

London: Victor Gollancz, 1994 Why is this book on the bedroom floor?  - I spotted in in a charity shop, and paid an extortionate price for it because I've wanted to read it for years. So given the slimness of the volume and its relative value, I waited for a couple of years before pulling it out and giving it floor space. About the Author - Don Watson wrote extensively for the NME during the 1980s, becoming a section editor and departing in 1989. After continuing to write across various publications, he now works in marketing for the British Council, the UK’s international organisation for cultural relations. No, me neither. Plot - ex-music editor goes to World Cup, meets people, describes. Review - First of all, I should declare a prior interest. Some thirteen years ago, at the start of my own professional writing career, I decided my first book-length project would be to go to a World Cup finals and experience fan culture, trying to find the single answer...