St Petersburg

Outside the Winter Palace

I’ve spent the last few days in St Petersburg, Russia. It’s my second trip here; the first came in late November/early December 2007 when I visited the city while writing THE HOUSE OF SPECIAL PURPOSE. I researched quite a bit of the novel here, writing many scenes in the Winter Palace itself, and despite being here during the coldest time of year, I fell in love with the city.

I’m back here now, almost 2 years later, on a promotional trip courtesy of my Spanish publisher Salamandra. The novel is published in Spain on October 22nd and I came here with a Spanish television crew to film an interview and programme in the Winter Palace itself, in which we were lucky to be granted permission to film. We spent much of the day filming in various rooms of the palace and conducting an interview in Tsar Nicholas II’s private library where I wrote a scene in the book that appears at the opening of the chapter titled ‘The Prince of Mogilev’. In the scene, the young hero Georgy Daniilovich Jachmenev finds the library and is examining the bookshelves when he is surprised by the Tsar himself. The library is an extraordinary place and it was wonderful to write the scene in the room and even more special to return a couple of years later to film an interview there.

Tsar Nicholas II's library

The Spanish language newspaper El Pais also accompanied us on this trip and conducted an interview later in the day. Both the television programme and the newspaper interview will run closer to publication date in Spain and I’ll post the links then.

I absolutely love this city. I’ve said before that this is the only novel I have written which has made me want to write another one set in the same location, simply because I want to spend more time here.

Getting Ready To Film

Wigtown

A busy few weeks of festival appearances continued this weekend with a trip to Wigtown in Scotland for the Wigtown Book Festival. Wigtown is Scotland’s National book town, the equivalent of Hay-on-Wye in Wales. It was an enjoyable few days, particularly because there was a strong Irish writing contingent present, including Glenn Patterson, Roddy Doyle, Carlo Gebler, Claire Kilroy and myself. A day back home today and then tomorrow I’m off again… somewhere much further away.

Aspects

I went to Bangor yesterday for the 18th Aspects Irish Literature Festival. It was my second time there; the first time I visited, in September 2005, I had intended reading from my third novel, CRIPPEN, which had been published the year before, but before leaving Dublin for the North I received the proof copies of THE BOY IN THE STRIPED PYJAMAS, which was due to be published three months later in January 2006. On a whim I decided to take a copy with me and rather than reading from CRIPPEN as intended, I read a section from the new book, the part where Bruno walks along the fence and meets Shmuel for the first time. It was the first occasion I ever read from that novel to an audience and I had no idea that I would be reading from it, and from that section, hundreds of times over the years that followed. It was quite appropriate therefore that I engaged in one of the most interesting festival discussions I’ve ever been part of last night, when the writer Carlo Gebler interviewed me in front of an audience about my work and we inevitably ended up discussing my experiences with that book. In fact, I didn’t even read from THE HOUSE OF SPECIAL PURPOSE as I had originally planned but remained in interview format instead. Aspects always brings surprises, it’s a great festival. And it’s running for a few more days yet if you’re near Bangor.

Clifden Arts Festival

To the most western point in Ireland last night, Clifden in County Galway, for the annual Arts Festival. A great night at the Station House Theatre and then in to visit some of the children at a local school this morning. It’s a busy time at the moment for festivals. I’ll be in Bangor on Thursday night for the Aspects festival and Scotland over the weekend for Wigtown.

The Afternoon Show

I was a guest on The Afternoon Show on RTE Television yesterday to talk about THE HOUSE OF SPECIAL PURPOSE and the Clifden Arts Festival, which began yesterday and which I’ll be reading at on Sunday night.

You can watch the interview using the RTE Player – my bit kicks in around the 1 hour 18 minute mark.

Mountains To Sea

with Patrick Gale backstage at the Pavilion Theatre

The first Mountains To Sea festival is taking place this weekend in Dun Laoire, County Dublin, with a host of international authors taking part. I was delighted to read with English novelist Patrick Gale yesterday at the Pavilion Theatre in a very enjoyable event. I’ve been a fan of Patrick’s novels for a few years now; I read from THE HOUSE OF SPECIAL PURPOSE, he from THE WHOLE DAY THROUGH.

SW11 Festival

with Rosie Alison at the SW11 Festival

To Clapham last night for the start of the SW11 Literary Festival, which runs until the end of the month. I read from THE HOUSE OF SPECIAL PURPOSE at Waterstone’s on St John’s Road and was joined by debut novelist Rosie Alison, whose book THE VERY THOUGHT OF YOU is a moving and evocative story of a young girl transported to a country house at the start of the Second World War and who becomes a witness to the many disturbing and dramatic events that take place there.

It was great to read with Rosie as, in her other life, she is a film producer at Heyday Films and was co-producer of the film adaptation of THE BOY IN THE STRIPED PYJAMAS. If I remember correctly, Rosie’s phonecall to me was the first communication about a potential film of my novel, way back in 2005 when I was Writing Fellow at my old university, the University of East Anglia.

‘Friends of mine get calls like that all the time,’ one of my former UEA writing buddies sniffed at the time. ‘It’ll never happen.’

Pied Piper

I’ve written the introduction for a new edition of Nevil Shute’s 1942 novel PIED PIPER, which is published this week by Vintage Classics as part of their re-issue of his work.

It’s a terrific novel, following the fortunes of an elderly man who finds himself in France during the Second World War and in charge of an ever-growing group of children, each of different nationalities and each orphaned by the war itself. Shute is probably best known for A TOWN LIKE ALICE and ON THE BEACH but PIED PIPER is really worth a read. You can buy it from Amazon or Waterstone’s or other bookshops.

Audio edition of House

The audio edition of THE HOUSE OF SPECIAL PURPOSE has just been published by Isis Audiobooks. It’s available on cassette, CD and mp3 from Isis and Amazon. It’s read by actor Richard Teverson.

August Reading

August began with Robert Dinsdale’s novel A HARROWING, a Cain and Abel-type story with the First World War as a backdrop. It’s a strong debut, well written and engaging. The story trails off a little towards the end but he’s certainly a writer worth watching. I wasn’t as sold on Clancy Martin’s debut HOW TO SELL, an American comic novel about a young man who gets up to no good in his brother’s jewellery business. It has shades of Douglas Coupland but I found the writing quite self-conscious at time, desperate to be hip, and I’m afraid it wasn’t one for me.

Lynn Barber’s memoir, AN EDUCATION, is often very funny – Barber examines herself with as cool and detached an eye as she does everyone else – but ends on a moving note after the death of her husband. The title chapter has, of course, been made into a film, with an adaptation by the great Nick Hornby, and I’m looking forward to seeing it.

I’d never read any of Caryl Phillips’ books until his month but his excellent new novel, IN THE FALLING SNOW, has made me want to go out and buy everything he wrote. An intense and thoughtful novel about a middle-aged man dealing with the mixed demands of an ex-wife, teenage son and ageing father, this is a novel filled with truth about relationships and some very powerful writing. I’m a little surprised it didn’t make the Booker longlist, it’s that good.

A couple of page-turners for the flight to Australia – Claire Letemendia’s THE BEST OF MEN, a historical novel set during the time of Charles I and Luis Miguel Rocha’s THE LAST POPE, a DaVinci Code style thriller, didn’t make much of an impression – but Anne Tyler’s NOAH’S COMPASS is a wonderful novel by one of my favourite writers. Set over the course of a year, it examines the effect that retirement and injury has on a late middle-aged man. Although it lacks some of the dramatic urgency of the best of Tyler’s work, it’s still a polished and thoughtful novel from a great storyteller.

Having heard so much hype – not least from my niece – I read Stephenie Meyer’s TWILIGHT – just the first one – and didn’t like it at all. The emphasis on physical beauty throughout the story, an obsession with what Edward What’s His Name looks like, is almost pathological in its relentlessness, and the narrator is so unbearably shallow and self-involved that it’s painful to read. Every 100 pages of so, Meyer sends Bella to a bookshop, presumably to show that she’s smart, but it’s ridiculously cliched. I don’t get it at all. The movie’s crap too.

I’m a big fan of Philippa Gregory’s historical novels and her latest, THE WHITE QUEEN, which begins a new series set around the Wars of the Roses, is her best since THE OTHER BOLEYN GIRL. It’s hard not to feel that having been released from Tudor times, Gregory has a new lease of life. The narrator, Elizabeth Woodville, wife to Edward IV is a fascinating character and the pacing and energy of the novel are fantastic. I can’t wait for the next installment.

On to Australia and a bunch of excellent Aussie novels, starting with Murray Bail’s THE PAGES, the story of two women who travel to a small farm to read the work of a recently dead philosopher. Very much a novel of ideas, it bounces between two time periods in a clever way and I found the small cast of characters fascinating in their contradictions, their belief in a life of the mind and, at times, their extraordinary selfishness.

Another novel which uses dual narratives is Richard Flanagan’s excellent WANTING, which moves between Charles Dickens in London and a settlement in Tasmania. This is one of the novels of the year, compelling and hypnotic; the scenes of Dickens on stage are so unsettling as to be almost spooky. A very rich and thought-provoking book.

Every so often, well once every few years, a novel comes along that is so brilliant it reminds me why I love reading and writing. These reading experiences are few and far between but the reason I read so much is I’m always looking for the next one. Christos Tsiolkas’ novel THE SLAP, which will be published in the UK during 2010, is just such a novel. A simple but brilliant premise – at a suburban barbecue where a group of friends and acquaintances are gathered, a man slaps a child who isn’t his own – opens up into a complex and fascinating multi-charactered story of contemporary Melbourne and, by extension, Australia. It challenges prejudices, reveals hypocricies, examines ambitions, thwarted and otherwise, and has a central cast of 8 fascinating characters who together slowly reveal the story. Quite simply one of the best novels I’ve read in my life.

And finally, I read Tsiolkas’ earlier novel DEAD EUROPE on the flight home. A dark and brooding story of a young photographer in Europe it’s hypnotic in its intensity and the passion of the language. What a writer.