Feeling like I've been run over by a steam tram does have its upside. I like to stay positive. Not just time for music. Time for reading.Here's a confession. Though I read an absolute stack, I've only read two books cover to cover this year. Actually even that's not true. I haven't managed the last three pages of "The Younger Centuries" yet. Pete Brown's "Hops & Glory" is the only book I've finished this year.
It's very entertaining stuff. "Hops & Glory", I mean. "The Younger Centuries" was a good bit drier. Though they did share certain themes. Younger was one of Britain's biggest beer exporters, heavily into the IPA trade. And there are bits of travel writing in it. "The Younger Centuries" I'm talking about now. This is confusing. Even I'm losing track. I'll just stick to discussing "Hops & Glory".
I was going to write something poncey here. About Pete Brown's laconic style and self-deprecating humour. The sort of tosh you see in printed media. I could bang on about the structure and the pace - both dead good. But I don't want to come over all Sunday supplement on you. Laughs. That's what it's all about. And there are plenty of those. For a few hours all fears of pneumonia disappeared over the equatorial horizon.
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2 comments:
Yes,
Hops and Glory is a great read. Part beer book, part travel book, part history book... Oh and very funny. I have embarrassed myself a few times by laughing out loud sat on the drain, in the staff room etc.
Unusually for a beery book it is not only well written BUT well researched AND has references too (well a bibliography anyway)! Blimey.
Yeah, solid research, amazingly fluent style, quite a few laughs... The background bits about East India Company rule in Bengal and then India are very interesting... as in "history doesn't repeat itself, it stammers"...
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