Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Apr 28, 2009 21:00:21 GMT
All this info, I take it this will go in the History Thread, is quickly amounting to something huge, a diverse and enormous amount of football history going on here within these boards, I can almost feel in the not to distant future a book being published. Maybe!  Well, Aussie, who knows? Here's one for you. The book is totally different to its decidedly un-PC title which is a commentary on when soccer was regarded in Australia as a game for Sheilas and, er, others.  After dropping Nick Davies's excellent book about newspapers - Flat Earth News - into the Oxfam skip in the car park of Tesco in Barrow-in-Furness I'm now enjoying Duncan Hamilton's book about Brian Clough: Provided You Don't Kiss Me. I was initially sceptical about yet another book about Cloughie, especially as I feared it would be a worthy but plodding effort written in old-fashioned evening newspaper style. But I was wrong. Mr Hamilton can write. Recommended. |
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Mr_W
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Cripes, Bully gets everywhere! Neighhhhh....
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Post by Mr_W on Apr 29, 2009 19:02:59 GMT
...have just finished "In Search Of The Craic - One Mans' Pub Crawl Through Irish Music" - Colin Irwin Review "'Funnier than Bill Bryson or Pete McCarthy, and also more likeable because Colin is a more generous self-effacing 'smartass tourist' than either' - Teletext; 'Highly entertaining tale of an Irish pilgrimage... Irwin's narrative flips between the past and the present, brimming with anecdotes and running jokes as the most extraordinary characters bustle in and out of the pages, among them some of the giants of Irish music' - Uncut; 'This has to be the funniest book I have read in a long time... Every step of the way you feel as though you're there... A brilliant read' - Irish World; 'A worthy addition to other rib-tickling tomes like McCarthy's Bar and Round Ireland with a Fridge.' - Irish Post; 'Very clever, very entertaining, tremendously enjoyable and at times downright hilarious...Do they find that elusive chimera, the Craic? You'll just have to buy the book and find out for yourselves.' - Folk Roots magazine" Product Description There's nothing quite like hearing Irish music in Ireland. Not in big concert halls or grand arenas, or even the popular taverns on the tourist route, but in the small pubs in remote areas where the locals habitually gravitate for those informal sessions universally known as the Craic. After 25 years visiting Ireland both as a music writer and a tourist, Colin Irwin goes in search of the craic. He talks to some of the leading Irish musicians about their experiences and they direct him to places where the craic is mightiest. This is the story of his journey into Ireland's musical soul. But Ireland, being Ireland, nothing ever goes quite according to plan... extract from www.amazon.co.uk thanx now on "The Long Hard Road Out Of Hell" - autobiog by Marilyn Manson next Stephen Leathers latest - a great thriller writer www.stephenleather.com/ |
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Apr 29, 2009 19:50:15 GMT
Colin Irwin has also written a book on football called Sing When You're Winning.
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Post by ohtobeatplainmoor on May 3, 2009 19:15:19 GMT
I was wandering through Newton Abbot earlier today and I noticed Tommy Tynan's autobiography in WH Smiths.
I picked it up and read the chapter on his time at Plainmoor in the 90/91 season - it wasn't quite as I recalled it, although with all of these books you have to take it with a pinch of salt!
He stated that he was very disappointed that Dave Smith didn't stick-up for him at a disciplinary meeting (he admitted that he hit Wes with the kettle after Wes gave him a black-eye when Tyan broke-up a fight over a game of cards). Why on earth would Smith have been involved in such a meeting - he had left the club a month or two before?
The incident was in the week before the play-off final wasn't it - hence the bandage that Wes was wearing.
I find with many of these autobiographies that these players believe that they can walk on water and the people that pick the team and run the clubs are the ones why they are not picked etc. The Gary Nelson books were the obvious exception that I can recall - I'd also definately buy a Chris Hargreaves memoir of his time here - particualrly if it was no holds barred!
A great read - I also enjoyed "The Dirt" the biography of Motley Crue - while their music is cheesy rock with the giant hairdo's, legendary excess and rock-star hissy-fits, it was thoroughly enjoyable.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on May 9, 2009 8:47:59 GMT
Just finished Hunter Davies' biography of Alfred Wainwright who did the Lakeland fell guides back in the 1950s and 1960s.
He was a right funny bugger by all accounts.
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Post by David Graham's Eighth Pint on May 10, 2009 10:17:12 GMT
Public Affairs for Journalists by James Morrison. I have an exam on Wednesday.
Kill me, kill me now.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on May 10, 2009 19:39:34 GMT
Try Matthew Engel's history of the popular press. Much more entertaining!
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Mark L
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Favourite Player: Paul Baker
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Post by Mark L on May 13, 2009 16:31:40 GMT
"The Motorcycle Diaries" by Ernesto 'Che' Guevara... I never knew what to make of the guy so thought I'd pick this one up as it was only £3 in HMV. A really elegant and captivatingly written(/translated) account of the young Che Guevara and the way a journey around South America formed his political motivations and an insight into the generally trusting nature of indiginous and non-indeginous people of the continent.
I'm half-way through so maybe the second half's cr@p, but I somehow doubt it.
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Post by aussie on May 13, 2009 20:58:28 GMT
Oh my dark past catches up with me! Nice one Barton I`d forgotten about those days. I try to read as much Terry Pratchett as possible, funny mother fecker that one!
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Post by aussie on May 22, 2009 12:55:02 GMT
Waiting for the new League Two Fixture list to come out, now that will make for some interesting reading!
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Mr_W
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Cripes, Bully gets everywhere! Neighhhhh....
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Post by Mr_W on Jun 14, 2009 14:32:56 GMT
......just finished Stephen Leathers latest - "Live Kill" - Dan "Spider" Shepherd - he da man............... ...strongly recommend this dudes books - esp the Spider Shepherd series - if you like your undercover heroes to be well hard and qualified in a huge amount of weaponry with an SAS background, this is ya man!!!! www.stephenleather.comnow on "Achtung Schweinehund - A Boys' Own Story Of Imaginery Combat" ....by Harry Pearson - yup, he who writes for quality footy rag "When Saturday Comes"........ (born in 1961 like me - so another one whose closeness to Spacehoppers, flares, klackers, Poldark, Subbuteo, "Blood On The Tracks" by Bob Dylan and Airfix models, to name a few is frankly a little worrying..........) www.amazon.co.uk/Achtung-Schweinehund-Harry-Pearson/dp/0349115680/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1244887916&sr=1-4Review 'His war-obsessed childhood is so warm and funny and true you might be tempted to hug yourself with delight' SUNDAY TELEGRAPH 'Funny, perceptive ... Pearson has you laughing throughout with guilty recognition. You learn a lot of quirky facts and a fair bit of military history from this endearing memoir' SUNDAY TIMES 'He has a very good line in comedy' DAILY MAIL 'A funny, perceptive book about men and their ineradicable love of war ... Harry Pearson has you laughing throughout with guilty recognition' Christopher Hart, SUNDAY TIMES 'Funny, scourgingly honest and sometimes affecting ... even more fun than Escape from Colditz' Mark Simpson, INDEPENDENT ON SUNDAY 'A gloriously hilarious account of how much fun it can be to play war games' Michael Gove, THE TIMES 'A fascinating document of an unusual life' OBSERVER 'A witty and engaging book' Nicholas Tucker, INDEPENDENT 'Will set the blood coursing through the veins of countless fans of comics celebrating fictional wartime heroes' Christopher Matthew, DAILY MAIL 'So warm and funny and true you might be tempted to hug yourself with delight' Marcus Berkmann, SUNDAY TELEGRAPH 'Offers keen historical interest, cracking trivia and a vital sense of self-awareness as he discusses his peers on the gaming scene' Peter Watts, TIME OUT 'An intimate, vivid and hilarious biography' Andy Milne, HERALD 'This spiffing, biffing book will reload the memory banks for generations of kids who formed the make-believe cadet section of the Home Guard and were still flushing out Germans from behind the bikeshed more than 20 years after the Second World War ended' Aidan Smith, SCOTLAND ON SUNDAY Observer 'He writes hilariously ... fascinating' A Random Review now A very enjoyable voyage round everyman's psyche. This brought back many forgotten memories and almost prompted a nostalgic tear. I never kept a diary when I was a kid, but Harry Pearson has kept one for me. His book takes us through comics, Action Man, cap-guns, airfix modelling, an obsession with historical military uniforms, and much, much more. These are things that most men have long left behind, but they remain in the memory. And once "grown out of", they are things that cannot even be referred to without seeming uncool, unmanly or unhinged. This is because men have to be seen to be men, and cannot show that they are still boys at heart. Pearson is excruciatingly embarrassed about his hobby (wargaming with miniature metal soldiers), but he bravely refuses to disown it. He delves into it, telling a history of "boys' toys" which shows that the love of all things military has long been a big part of boys' lives in Europe. Seen from this perspective, it is amazing that the hobby has been pushed into such a corner now, and it seems only freaks and geeks are doing it. If you feel you have these kinds of skeletons in the closet, Pearson will make you feel like a man again. thanks to www.amazon.co.uk for all the info....  |
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Jun 14, 2009 15:54:54 GMT
I struck a rich vein of reading with Stuart Maconie's Adventures on the High Teas - his look at Middle England - and two volumes of diaries written by Nella Last, a relatively ordinary middle-class citizen of Barrow-in-Furness, covering the period from 1939 to 1948.
Since then it's been Marcus Trescothick's autobiography which - to be blunt - I thought was a great story in the hands of the wrong ghostwriter and Have a Nice Day, Justin Webb's book about the United States which I'm finding rather disappointing.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Jul 7, 2009 15:38:54 GMT
Matt Frei's book on America is worth a read (8.5/10). I can't say the same for Justin Webb's (5/10).
Marc Bennetts' look at Russian football - Dynamo - should be on your list if you read five or six football books in a year. It covers all the right topics but is rather leaden in places. Not sure about the reliability of all of his witnesses - some of whom seem too much on the edge of what he's trying to discover - but, if he spoke to the key players, he may well be in a box in the ground by now (7/10).
Now reading Jim Riordan's Comrade Jim - the spy who played for Spartak (or did he?). An enjoyable read although I'd suggest there's a clue is in his statement about the memory playing tricks over the years.
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nigep
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Post by nigep on Jul 7, 2009 18:01:14 GMT
Just finished 'We Don't Know What We're Doing' by Adrian Chiles
Well worth a read.
If you like crime fiction then the Inspector Banks series by Peter Robinson comes highly recommended. Have just finished his latest in between reading Adrian Chiles.
Back to lurking.
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merse
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Post by merse on Jul 7, 2009 18:39:17 GMT
 I know this is "cheating"......................Anthony's reporting instructions and car parking pass for the All Arsenal 3v3 finals that his team recently won through to. This is for all the Arsenal Soccer Schools and Development Centres from around the country and will be played at the Arsenal Academy this Saturday afternoon and the age group winners will get presented with their trophy on the Emirates pitch before 60,000 prior to the first home Premier League game of the season. Is he excited? Not really, just the usual shrug of the shoulders and "we haven't won anything yet" that he always comes out with.
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