Lennon: The Man, the Myth, the Music - The Definitive Life by Tim Riley

 

Liking this so far - great writing and namedropping on music from the Beatles era that influenced/was influenced by them. The later biographical material itself is mostly familiar to me from my other recent readings. The early biographical material about Lennon's childhood is vivid and dramatic.

Enter the Aardvark by Jessica Anthony

 

Promising premise falls off in second half.

More aardvark! Less Republican yuppie 2nd person address!

Shout! The Beatles in Their Generation by Philip Norman

 

okay. filling in the gaps from my previous Beatles' readings.

Up Against It by Joe Orton

 

Familiar Orton ground - the unusual nature of this treatment is that it was (allegedly) considered by Brian Epstein and the Beatles for their follow-up film to HARD DAY'S NIGHT. Would have been amazing to see - although Orton cut the main characters from four to two. The action is predicatable - damaged, violent, crime-focused young men attack - and are attacked by - a damaged, violent, criminal society.

The Likeness by Tana French

 

I love Tana French's work, find it addictive, and this one eventually worked its way under my skin. But it was way too long. The premise was cunning if farfetched - an undercover detective has her (undercover and abandoned) identity stolen by a young woman who looks exactly like her, and ends up murdered. The detective infiltrates the group home the victim lived in (with four close friends) to try to find out clues toward the identity of her murderer.

High-Rise by J.G. Ballard

 

Struggling to get through this. Ballard has an odd, clinical, detached narrative style that fits his futurism - but is none too pleasurable. 

A gigantic modern high-rise in Britain in an unnamed future begins to distintergrate as its 2000 inhabitants begin violently attacking each other, first by sector (bottom, middle, top) and then by floor.

Paul McCartney: Many Years from Now, with Barry Miles

 

Pretty good, lots on insights, a little annoying in Miles insistence on his own place in the Beatles history, but that's a small point. The chapter on the London cultural and arts scene - when McCartney had bought a house in town, while the other three Beatles had retired to the suburban countryside - is interesting, although McCartney (as always) sound a little glib and fey when discuss art that's not pop and rock songs.

Good source of McCartney's assigning "percentages" of authorship credit to himself and Lennon. Who knows what actually went on? Their whole career was magical and creative and, I'm sure, chaotic. But they wrote 180 songs the likes of which had never been seen before - and won't be seen again.

Confidence by Denise Mina

 

Really underwhelming. A disappointment. Two podcasters on a wild goose chase. Phoned in plot, insubstantial characters.