Authors Electric

 Going round the local charity shops with my daughter recently, I picked up a copy of Donna Tartt's "THE GOLDFINCH". I'd read the reviews when it first came out, but never got round to buying it. My daughter, grand-daughter, and their close friend Jon Welch, the playwright, all loved it, so I bought it (couldn't get a higher recommendation that). It is dauntingly long, and physically cumbersome, so I'll probably replace it with the ebook version. I'm also finding it, initially slow, which is my fault as a reader - certainly not hers as a writer. 'Slow' has been the main criticism of the BBC's production of "WOLF HALL", too. I think we're all being conditioned to respond to fast action, and the first episode of "WOLF HALL" was complex, especially for viewers not familiar with the book, and yes, slow. Since then, I've become more and more impressed by it, and will be sad when it reaches its final episode (only tempo...

Recently I had to borrow my wife’s Kindle (thanks to the biggest bugbear in the ebook system – no longer can two people share a simple book without handing over their entire bookshelf. Sort it out, Amazon.) My own Kindle is one of the early models with keyboards, the e-reader equivalent of the brick mobile phone, so at first I could only slam her Kindle Paperwhite against a rock while grunting, ‘Where controls? Me need make words.’  Me have kindle fire! Eventually the rock bumped the ON switch, and I was away. I’d been looking forward to reading Donna Tartt’s ‘The Goldfinch’, partly to dispel my suspicion that Donna Tartt was actually one of those spoofonyms like Eileen Dover or Claude Boddy (respective authors of ‘The Great Descent’ and  ‘Lion Taming For Beginners’). For instance, ‘The Baker’s Hat’  by Donna Tartt… Aaaaaaanyway, I got reading, and soon noticed a nifty little feature boasted by the newer Kindles. A message at the foot of the page said, ‘Ti...