Waiting on a Friend - T.J. Leng

"Paytonville is a quiet town. Nothing ever happens here. The sun beats down, day turns to night, life rolls lazily on."

In a quiet town shit starts going down when a girl goes missing. It hits everyone hard, and Paytonville's Sheriff Dorothy Rosin is expected to get to the bottom of it. Because, well, she's a fucking sheriff and it's her job.

At under 150 pages long, this is a teeny, tiny, treat of a book. I read it on a morning commute to work and really enjoyed it.

Even though it is so short, I managed to grasp enough of the characters within the story enough to loathe one, and to quite like the rest. And even though it is so short, with not many characters at all, I did not know who the ultimate cunt at the end was going to be until I turned a page and the answer smacked me in the face.

A nice little read. And I always love it when people put a post-it in books to me. Thanks Tim.

Treasure Island!!! - Sara Levine

“BOLDNESS

RESOLUTION

INDEPENDENCE

HORN-BLOWING”

A college graduate reads Treasure Island and becomes hooked and obsessed. She decides to redesign her life to live by the book’s core values: Boldness, Resolution, Independence and Horn-Blowing.

I really enjoyed this book. I liked what the completely ordinary life of this girl and her desire to fuck things up a bit, and make her life more exciting. What she became was passionate and heartfelt, and I liked that people still loved her in spite of the madness of it.

Relationships are interestingly examined; between family and friends, and colleagues and bosses. Every character had a huge role to play in the story, there were no secondary parts.

Starting with a major focus on friendships and romantic relationships, the book moves on towards family life, uncovering some deep and dirty secrets as the story progresses.

A fun read – silly and funny, clever and a bit mad at times.

I might experiment with developing an obsession with one of my favourite books to see what happens.

Highly recommended.

Sick Boy

A long time ago I met a Scottish boy. As well as having the hottest accent I’ve ever heard, he was also incredibly beautiful.

The first time he stayed at my house overnight we didn’t get out of bed for three days. We didn’t eat or sleep, just lay there talking and fucking. He’d write me letters everyday and hide them around the house for me to find. He was romantic and I adored him.

One time he came to stay over, he brought his favourite book with him. Trainspotting. We sat up all night and he read it to me. I had no fucking idea what it was about at the time, I didn’t understand how Scottish he’d suddenly become reading Trainspotting. I just sat and listened.

The next day we got up and went for lunch at a Moroccan café nearby. It was raining so we’d ran there both sharing the same umbrella. We ordered green tea and sat and watched people around us.

When we got back from lunch we sat down on my bed and he told me about the time he tried to kill himself. He tied bits of scrap metal to his legs and jumped in the sea, hoping that the weight of said metal would just gently pull him down to the bottom where he could stay. A man had seen him jump in, and he’d only been in the water a minute or two when he was pulled out and taken to hospital.

To say I was a bit shocked is an understatement. How could he have not told me that? I was confused, but talked to him calmly. Is there anything else you’d like to talk about, I said.

He told me that when I went for a shower in the mornings he cried. He cried because he’d made me so dirty that I needed to get out of bed straight away and wash myself.

Fucking hell.

He went into the bathroom and I sat, waiting for him to come back, thinking about what I could say to make it all better. He was gone a long time.

When he came back he was crying. I waited for him to calm down. That’s when he told me that he was bulimic. He’d been bulimic since he was a teenager. Since his Mum died, and he’d found her dead in her flat when he’d gone round to visit.

The rest of the time we spent together that weekend was a lot of him talking and me listening. And him crying and me comforting. It was fine. I felt awful for him, and I hated anyone that made him sad. I hated his dead Mum and his violent Dad and his friends that didn’t have time to talk to him.

Then he went away, went home. While he was there he phoned me everyday and talked and cried, told me how much he hated himself. Then he ran out of money.

He needed to borrow £300. I didn’t have £300. I told him. He went fucking mental. He was too far away for me to go and comfort him in person, so, not seeing anything else I could do, I transferred money from my credit card into my account, and paid the bill that he couldn’t afford to pay.

I love you, he said.

And then I didn’t hear from him for two weeks.

When I did hear from him, it was a text. He told me he’d gone out for a walk, late one night and that he’d collapsed. He’d been taken to hospital and had just woken up. He missed me.

And then I didn’t hear from him for a month. And when I did hear from him, it was on an old social networking site that we both used to be on, that he used to blog on a bit as a kind of online diary. He had written about a girl that he had shared a lot with. A girl that he loved.

It was me, obviously it was me. Except I kept reading, and it wasn’t me at all. It was his girlfriend.

I emailed him and told him that I needed my fucking money back. He didn’t reply. His girlfriend did, though. She told me that she knew what had happened with me and him, and it was a ‘mistake’ on his part. They were in love and I needed to leave them both alone. He didn’t owe me anything, what a manipulative bitch I was for suggesting that he would ever take money from me.

And that was that.

I heard through a mutual friend that he moved to London a little while ago. I wonder what he’s doing, and if he’s still fucked up, or if he was ever actually fucked up.

I still have his copy of Trainspotting. It reminds me of how sick people can be.

Writing Therapy - Tim Atkinson

"That's what we do - we're storytellers. Humans always have been. What we do is make up stories."



A young girl wants to be in a book, squashed between the pages as a character. She wants it so much that she believes that she actually is a character in a book.

It doesn't take long before she is chucked in a madhouse where she writes as a therapy for herself, throughout which the reader is able to learn more about her life, as well as the lives of the patients and staff around her.

 

This book was very different from any other that I've read before. The ideas that it chucks at you from every angle mean that you have a lot going on in your head as you read - it demands a lot of you, not in a bad way, but it does make sure that you are paying attention and thinking about what you are reading.

As the story goes on, the lines between what is happening and what is a story become increasingly blurred, I suppose the confusion that I felt at times may be something simililar to our central character, as she tries to gain control of her mental health.

Interesting and thoughful.

A Hell on Earth

 

I met a man in India who had been through hell.

I was sat in a café and there was no space for anyone else to sit down. He asked if he could sit down next to me and, of course, I said he could.

I was sat drinking some tea and having a rest from a trek up through the mountains I’d had that morning. He talked to me, about what I was doing in India, and about what my plans were for the afternoon.

I told him that after lunch I planned to walk to the Dalai Llama’s pad and have a look around. He was very interested in me then, and asked me if I was interested in Tibet.

Now, when you are alone in Dharamshala and a man who may or may not be Tibetan asks you if you are interested in Tibet then you are in a bit of a pickle. I took a gamble, and said yes. Told him that I understood the issues between China and Tibet, and that I was firmly on Tibet’s side. In truth, In Dharamshala, everything was so anti-China that I’d not been able to read anything giving me the other side of the story.

He seemed happy with my answer. He went into his bag and rummaged around for a long time, saying “I want to give you something ...”

To my relief, it was not anything weird or sinister. It was a book. I like books. I know how to work them.

He handed it to me, and as I took it I looked at the front cover. On the front cover there was a picture of him.

I waited for an explanation, and that was when he told me that he was a monk who had been tortured by the Chinese. This book was his account what happened.

My jaw dropped to the floor then. He laughed and ordered us some momos and tea and we sat and ate and drank and chatted about nothing in particular for an hour or two.

When it was time for me to go, he took the book from me and wrote something in the front. Then he told me what it meant. I kept his words stored carefully in my head all afternoon, and then promptly forgot them, so I now no longer know the translation of his message.

If you can read it, please let me know.

April

 

The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
There is a quote on the front of this book by an author that I love that says something along the lines of 'This book was so shit-your-pants amazing that for a long time afterwards, all other books seemed wank in comparison.' That is not an exact quote, but I was expecting a bit more from this book than it delivered. Could be a problem with me, or the fact that I hate children, or the fact that I have no soul. Dunno. Was a bit bored.

 



A Storm of Swords: 2 Blood and Gold by George R. R. Martin
This book actually is shit-your-pants amazing. Easily my favourite in the series so far. Some of the characters make me weep with joy at how fucking cool they are. I've heard that the next two books are (to quote a dear friend) '... a bit long and shit.' Hopefully she has lost her mind and they will be continue to be fantastic.






Star Fish by Nicola May
A refreshingly not shit, not twee, not fucking annoying chicklit-type book that didn't make me want to punch people in the face as I was reading it. I liked the main character, Amy, because Amy likes cock, like me.
Full review here.








The Wrong Boy by Willy Russell
This book was recommended to me by someone on Twitter, who bought and read my favourite book and loved it. This is one of her favourites and I thought that it was fucking brilliant. I've recommended it to lots of people and cannot wait to re-read.








Waiting on a Friend by Tim Leng
A nice little crime read, buy it for your commute. It made mine whizz by.
Full review to follow.






 

 

Sorry, But Has There Been a Coup? by Steve Lowe & Alan McArthur
Short but brilliant book examining the Knobs and Knobesses of British politics. Made me make this noise on the tube: "GRAWWAAAHHAHAHAAAWAHAHAHAPAHAPAPPPAAHHH."
Piss-your-pants funny. No prior knowledge of politics needed.
Full review to follow.







The Five People You Meet in Heaven by Mitch Albom
Quite liked this. Nice idea. Nice little story, Fairly interesting. Much better than The Kite Runner. Probably won't read it again.



 






The Chequebook & The Cruise-Missile by Arundhati Roy
I think that books like this are wasted on me. See above: no soul, black heart, etc.

 







The Boy in The Striped Pyjamas by John Boyne
This book is fucking gash. An unconvincing child-narrative driven bollocks story where nothing really happens until right at the end, which was the best bit for two reasons: 1. Something happened; 2. It was the end. I have heard that the film is better, though I will probably not bother to watch it.







Big Sur by Jack Kerouac
Jack Kerouac is a cunt.













Books read:10
Shags had: I cannot tell you


... But let's just say that I am neither overtly thrilled nor suicidal. I'm doing alright.

As for the books: this month really has made me realise that I lack a soul and the basic ability to empathise with anyone/anything. Instead it appears that I much prefer the books that I read to rip seven shades of piss out of everyone whilst containing a gratuitous amount of cock-in-cunt fun.

That's fine with me, though.

Wetlands

When this month's Guest Cunt emailed me and asked if she could write something, I creamed my knickers and then went off for a victory wank. I am a fucking huge fan of her blog. It is intelligent and filthy and wonderful. You probably shouldn't click that link if you're at work.

I had the pleasure of meeting her on World Book Night. She came and got a book off me and had a couple of pints and was frankly, a shitting brilliant human: a citizen of high moral worth and a wonderful cunt. I adore her. I know you will, too.



Here is @girlonthenet talking about Wetlands.

___________________________________________________________________________________

I love the smell of my cunt. It's fantastic. It smells like sex, and wanking, and the promise of future fucks. 

I always prefer to fuck when my cunt smells like cunt. Not when I've just jumped out of the shower, smelling of roses and shampoo, but when I've been up a while - when I've had time to go through the regular cycle of arousal/distraction/arousal a few times. When I've had time to get just slick enough that the scent is one of fucking and goodness and joy.

When I go to sleep at night I put my hand up near my face. Depending on the night it either smells like cock or like my post-wank, post-girlcome cunt. And it's lovely.

Does that disgust you?

If it does, I urge you to read Wetlands, and discover just how utterly disgusting girls can be. We're gross - we grow hair in odd places and leak juices all over the shop, and are generally a walking factory of ickiness.

Wetlands is all about not just accepting those things but embracing them. It's about the beautiful smell of cunt, it's about rejecting notions of femininity that are based on hygeine and cleanliness and fucking talcum powder. But most importantly it's about a girl called Helen who has a massive anal lesion and a penchant for leaving used tampons in lifts. 

The story starts when Helen accidentally cuts herself while shaving her arsehole. You might think this is just careless, but actually it's difficult for her to shave her arsehole because she has large protruding haemmorhoids, which she likes to get guys to push their face into when they're eating her out doggy-style. 

I know. Brilliant, right?

There are things in this book that make me wince, things that make me feel queasy, and things that make me want to punch myself in the temple in the vain hope that I can give myself temporary amnesia to forget what I've read. 

You won't read this book and come out feeling good, but because it's so extreme you might come out of it feeling halfway normal. 

We're all freaks and perverts in our own special ways, and what gets you wet might make me either giggle or spew up my lunch. But that's a good thing. We're all beautifully different, and disgusting. You might prefer the scent of 3 day old cocksmeg to the arousing olfactory delights of my vagina. You'll probably find some of Helen's behaviour repulsive, and some hot, and no doubt we'll disagree on which parts hit the right buttons. 

But whatever you think of Helen, when you've read the book you'll certainly be less likely to judge me. If my cunt-sniffing disgusts you now, after a quick go on Wetlands suddenly it'll seem like cute behaviour - the sort of thing that everyone might do. And I like that. I like the idea that we can normalise our slightly odd sexual behaviour to the point where we become less judgemental about other people. 

It's hard to be horrified at your girlfriend's mid-menstrual-cycle brown vaginal discharge when you've read about Helen's detailed cataloguing of all the different types. You'll happily put up with someone who smells a bit sweaty when you've read of a girl who eats all of her bodily delights - from blackheads to the pus that's leaked from a surgical wound. It's hard to squirm away from discussion of toiletary functions when you've read about a girl trying to shit through an anal tear. 

Read this book, raise your threshold for disgust, magically become more accepting of the fetid, pervy mass that is the whole of humanity. 

Then have a wank. And sniff your fuck-slimed hand.