Review: I Am the Secret Footballer

I Am the Secret Footballer (2012) is the frank recounting of life as a top-flight footballer by an anonymous voice from within the game. A good amount of material in the book is taken directly from the columns written for the Guardian by the author during an eighteen month period, and deals with issues surrounding the professional game today, as well as the reality of the dressing room and the relationship of the players with the fans. Of course, big money, bad behaviour, and the media are covered too. Far from a tale of unmitigated success, the Secret Footballer reveals his own precarious financial state and his long-term depression, both of which are far from the common perception of the superstar footballer and help form an interesting perspective from which to take in the state of the national game.

What we don’t get here is the glamourous life of a footballer that is so often portrayed in the media – there are touches certainly, but on the whole this is a look at the day-to-day life of a professional – few parties, few women, few episodes of extreme indulgence. Equally, there is little gossip here with next to no names dropped – so again, those hoping for the inside scoop will be left disappointed. What I Am the Secret Footballer is, is a pretty honest look at football from the inside and fans will undoubtedly find certain things enlightening. However, there are so few specifics about the author’s career that it can be really quite hard to fully grasp his own position and the perspective from which he writes. Lost too is some of the drama of the detail – the scoring of important goals, the heartbreak of defeats. What remains is a decent insight into the game (certainly less than one might have hoped and an awful lot of what is valuable here is let slip by the Secret Footballer: unwitting remarks that reveal a great deal about the mind-set of the professional footballer today).

One gets the sense that the Secret Footballer is trying to set himself apart from his colleagues as someone who has not wholly succumbed to the temptations of his celebrity and who sees his profession for what it truly is. The Secret Footballer keeps the reader at a distance and ultimately one feels this is very far from an intimate look at the life of a professional sportsman. There is also a recurring criticism of the opinion of those who haven’t played the game and/or haven’t invested their own money into it, which may well niggle the casual reader.

Towards the end of the book the Secret Footballer reveals that a tax bill from HM Revenue and Customs has left him in a very sorry state financially (and emotionally). However, so few details are provided that one is left entirely bamboozled as to what the tax bill was for and how it managed to bankrupt a successful footballer. Save for some very thin criticism of his treatment at the hands of the taxman, the author offers little and, in light of this lack of detail, one can hardly feel sympathy for a situation where a multi-millionaire is asked to pay taxes that he owes. What the whole episode did suggest was the complete lack of engagement with financial investment and money management on the part of professional footballers. The Secret Footballer’s descriptions of his own dealings are fairly shallow, and suggest someone who takes only a passing interest in how his money is handled.

The titillation of having an anonymous source is played to its maximum in the marketing of the book and one feels this is, perhaps, the largest factor in its success. The nastiness of the footballing world revealed is hardly a surprise but perhaps this in itself is an indictment of our own attitude to the national sport. While he makes numerous attempts at being self-deprecating and tries to offer what he considers a fairly objective view of his world, the author’s responses to certain situations and questions/criticisms speak volumes about his profession and the bubble in which footballers exist. One forgives the Secret Footballer an awful lot, however, as it’s clear that any young man drawn, by virtue of his natural talent, into the huge machine that is professional football is bound to show the scars of adapting to the absurdity of the world.

I haven't read too many sports biographies so didn't have an awful lot to compare this to. It was interesting although probably won't provide too much surprises for anyone who's spent anytime engaging with the game in England.

Useful Links
Reviews of I Am the Secret Footballer on Amazon (UK)
Reviews of I Am the Secret Footballer on Amazon (US)

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Review: Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman

Neverwhere (1996) by Neil Gaiman is a quirky indigenous fantasy, which defamiliarises and plays with the city of London as its centre piece. Richard Mayhew, an unassuming Scot making his way in the City and dominated by his overbearing fiancé, Jessica, is dragged into a whole new world when he helps a young girl named Door, who he finds injured on the pavement one evening. Door is no ordinary girl: on the run from cruel murderers, Croup and Vandemar, she refuses hospital and is left in Richard’s uneasy hands. Leaving his world of London Above behind him, Richard “falls through the cracks” and into the heaving world of London Below, a city beneath a city, packed with fantasy; knights, talking rats, and quests. Unable to return to his own world, Richard is dragged into a mission to avenge Door’s murdered parents, assisted by the caramel-skinned Hunter, a deadly but beautiful warrior, and the Marquis de Carabas, an eccentric and tricksy figure. Battling through the underworld, Richard finds new depths in himself, but whether they will be enough to see him safe and back in his world of London Above is far from certain.

Despite the fact that they exist side-by-side, in parallel if markedly different worlds, the inhabitants of London Above do not notice those from London Below, even when they are mere feet apart. This state of indifference extends beyond the fantasy world and into our own. The dark tunnels beneath the City, which collect the unwanted debris (human or otherwise) from the world above, are indicative of a society which discards that which it deems unnecessary - something as prescient to the real as the fantastic.

But London Below is not just a place for the discarded waste of London Above, it is full of fantastic and mythic inhabitants and customs. The distinction between the two worlds, the relative blindness of the citizens of London Above, relates too to the line between fantasy and imagination, and reality. It’s not until Richard accepts and embraces the fantasy of London Below that he begins to master and understand it.

While Richard’s is a fairly simple adventure story about a man dragged into a quest he never asked for, Gaiman infuses it with dry humour and wonderful creations. However, many of the ideas aren’t fully explicated within the novel but rather exist with a presumed back story to support them; this is by turns frustrating and reassuring. There could have been more development within the novel, and its absence is disappointing, but nevertheless there is a sense of longevity to London Below, a permanence that only an ever-evolving city can have; an admirable quality for a fantasy world. The weakness of plot is never quite compensated for however, the wonderful imaginings of the author only part reparation for this deficit. The prose, too, is occasionally sloppy and the descriptions aren’t as strong as they should be.

Neverwhere, though, boasts some good ideas and memorable characters; a particular highlight is the comic and sinister double-act, Croup and Vandemar, wonderfully quirky criminals with something of the Victorian undertaker about them, never less than bleakly menacing but always engaging. Perhaps the most brilliant examples of imagination though, are the re-imaginings of parts of London, which are literalised by Gaiman, so Blackfriars becomes the Black Friars; Knightsbridge, the Knight’s Bridge; …and so on. London is a significant character in the book and its geography and spirit are captured and played with wonderfully.

The aptly, if not rather simplistically named Door, who draws Richard into London below and has the ability to open even locked things, is not the only symbolically named character. Hunter hunts, and the Marquis de Carabas draws his name from the fairy tale Puss in Boots (Le Maître Chat, ou Le Chat Botté). As a character, Richard barely acclimatises to London Below and even by the novel’s end his development has been minimal (although critical). One can’t help but feel that more could have been done with him.

Neverwhere has its flaws, some of which might spring from the fact that it started life as a television programme, and yet it is fun and funny. The fantastic world of London Below with its distinctly Victorian feel and brilliant innovations is full of pleasures, and there’s much to enjoy here. While the plot is rather basic, the ideas are really strong and the book’s (forgivable) failings are, perhaps, more down to execution than imagination.

I've never been much of a fantasy fan, dipping in now and then. My problem often, as it is here, is that the story should be strong enough to stand on its own, without the fantasy elements. Here it's not, so I was left feeling fairly ambivalent about the book.  

Useful Links
Reviews of Neverwhere on Amazon (UK)
Reviews of Neverwhere on Amazon (US)

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Reading Plan: May 2013

I've been loping through April, happy in the knowledge that I'm on top of the review situation. So it came as a bit of surprise to me when I discovered over the weekend that April was all but over! Cue major panic and hasty writing of reviews. Thankfully, I've maintained my steady pace of four reviews per month, even if it was all a little last minute this month.

So, with the sun beginning to make an appearance in these parts (much to the annoyance of us drizzle-chasers), it seems like we ought to be looking towards some lighter, beach reads. My first effort in this direction is going to be I Am the Secret Footballer, which is the writings of an undercover professional footballer, who has been submitting columns to the Guardian for a while (in fact, I think he wrote for them during 2012 and no longer does so). The identity of the secret footballer has always been a secret, although there has been plenty of online activity from those who would love to uncover the mystery. After a recent interview for the BBC, it would seem the current favourite is Dave Kitson. Whoever it is, I'll dive in and see if this is a serious contender for a light read this summer.

Next up is a book I was supposed to review a while back. Having read Northanger Abbey a couple of months ago, I have been putting together some thoughts on it since then. With May looking a little clearer at present, I'm hopeful that I'll be able to finally put out a review of one of Jane Austen's most intriguing novels.

Another author I've been wanting to try for a while is Neil Gaiman. I occasionally read his blog and know he's been involved in things (notably Doctor Who, Coraline, and Stardust) which surely make him an author a lot of us would enjoy reading. I'm going to give Neverwhere a whirl this month, a book which started life as a television programme, and which seems quirky and very 'London'. Surely a winner then?

Finally, I'm going to pick up Howard Jacobson's collection of essays, Whatever It Is, I Don't Like It. Clearly a title that strikes that sort of dismissively grumpsome tone is bound to strike a chord with me. Added to this, I heard Jacobson talk last year and found him very engaging. Amongst other things, his derisory comments about bloggers and their way of writing about books was of particular interest (and wasn't something I'd wholly disagree with). Coming from someone that was taught at Cambridge by F. R. Leavis, it's hardly surprising to find that his Leavisite sensibilities are somewhat offended by the unashamedly uncritical, but comfortable discussions book lovers often share.

Notable Posts from April

Review: Keep the Aspidistra Flying by George Orwell
Review: The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry by Rachel Joyce
Review: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J. K. Rowling
Review: Orwell's Victory by Christopher Hitchens

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US Bestsellers: April 2013

Looking at the bestsellers in the US, I'm often amazed/impressed with how, seemingly, engaged people are with current issues. Recently ObamaCare was a big topic in the top ten, now we have Control - a look at gun laws - at the top of the charts. Further down, we've still got Lean In featuring in the top ten. A colleague gave me a little overview of this when I saw she was reading it recently. The gist, as far as I understand it, is that it's simple enough to be a mouthy feminist, provided you work for Google. That's about right, yes? Finally, I've got to say, I'm loving items 9 and 10 on the list - only one is tongue-in-cheek. I'll let you decide which one is straight.

The top ten bestselling books in April, according to Amazon US:

1		Control Glenn Beck	$9.73 from Amazon
2		The Great Gatsby F. Scott Fitzgerald	$8.49 from Amazon
3		The One Thing Gary Keller	$15.09 from Amazon
4		Lean In Sheryl Sandberg	$19.89 from Amazon
5		The Beauty Detox Foods Kimberly Snyder	$9.86 from Amazon
6		It's All Good Gwyneth Paltrow	$17.39 from Amazon
7		A Song of Ice and Fire, Books 1-4 George R. R. Martin	$19.78 from Amazon
8		Inferno Dan Brown	$17.49 from Amazon
9		Let's Explore Diabetes With Owls David Sedaris	$14.49 from Amazon
10		Becoming a Supple Leopard Kelly Starrett	$35.98 from Amazon

Prices correct on 30/04/2013

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UK Bestsellers: April 2013

This Fast Diet thing is obviously taking off - we've all got to look trim, slim and utterly fabulous in our bikinis this summer, right? Sadly my own 'Go on, have another slice' diet hasn't really done much for me, but hey ho. Charles Moore's biography of Margaret Thatcher is the first off the mark to cash in on The Iron Lady's passing - it's a hefty tome too, and only the first volume! Beach read anyone? Inferno is slowly creeping it's way up the chart: expect to see it firmly ensconced at the number one slot next month. Still hanging on in there is The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry - a book I've only just read and one that I would recommend (see my review).

The top ten bestselling books in April, according to Amazon UK:

1		The Fast Diet Recipe Book Mimi Spencer	£8.39 from Amazon
2		The Fast Diet Michael Mosley	£5.03 from Amazon
3		Gone Girl Gillian Flynn	£3.99 from Amazon
4		Paul Hollywood's Bread Paul Hollywood	£10.00 from Amazon
5		Inferno Dan Brown	£9.00 from Amazon
6		The 2-Day Diet Michelle Harvie	£5.00 from Amazon
7		The Great British Sewing Bee Tessa Evelegh	£10.00 from Amazon
8		Margaret Thatcher Charles Moore	£19.20 from Amazon
9		The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry Rachel Joyce	£3.84 from Amazon
10		The Hairy Dieters Hairy Bikers	£7.00 from Amazon

Prices correct on 30/04/2013

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Review: Orwell's Victory by Christopher Hitchens

Orwell’s Victory (2002), Why Orwell Matters in the United States, is a passionate defence of one of the twentieth century’s most important writers by Christopher Hitchens. The book explores Orwell’s legacy in terms of his political writings, novels, and wider essays, and seeks to restore his reputation where necessary and illuminate the issues surrounding him. Hitchens approaches the subject from his own perspective and writes a lively polemic against Orwell’s appropriation and misinterpretation by various political and intellectual groups.

Attacking the likes of Claude Simon and Raymond Williams and, on the right, Norman Podhoretz, Hitchens successfully picks off the targets he chooses for himself with great erudition and startling potency. Interestingly, Hitchens appears more venomous towards those on the left who denigrate Orwell, than those on the right who seek to claim him as their own, where a simple dismissal will do, it seems.

One finds that Hitchens’s combative style steers him towards seeking out opponents with whom to disagree, and this means he perhaps fails to emphasise the full extent of Orwell’s unchallenged legacy. There is a preoccupation too, with being ‘right’ (correct) that weighs Orwell’s Victory down, and this need to be right is not restricted to the subject himself. It might be indicative of Orwell’s central principle of seeking that which was true, but it still proves cumbersome to the text.

Notably, Hitchens claims that Orwell got the three big questions of the twentieth century right: imperialism, fascism, and communism. Certainly, one of Orwell’s greatest achievements was rendering in fiction, and understanding instinctively, the nature of totalitarian societies, where dictatorships disregarded culture, civilisation, and history, forcing on its people a grim reality. But, in a century that saw startling change, one might wonder at the exclusivity of this list of the ‘big questions’. Undoubtedly, Hitchens tailors his argument to promote Orwell in the best light possible, shaping the issues of ‘most importance’ and Orwell’s own responses to them, to provide a rather subjective portrait of a controversial writer.

But, of course, Orwell himself was a conflicted individual, and ‘Orwell’s Victory’ might refer as much to Orwell’s own personal journey of self-mastery, in which he suppressed the more unpleasant impulses in his nature, and forced his opinions towards a modern liberalism, as to his impact on a global stage.

Although Hitchens touches on Orwell's negative points, he too often acknowledges them and moves on. This is more a book to laud Orwell and shoot down his detractors, than to consider his genuine, objective value. In this vein, Hitchens perhaps speaks too briefly of Orwell’s distaste for homosexuality or Jews, and dismisses feminist critics of Orwell’s treatment of women by reminding readers that Orwell enjoyed the company of intelligent women – a laughably reductive dismissal. So too, he fails to fully explore Orwell’s blind-spot for America as the burgeoning world power of the twentieth century. No matter what Hitchens might suggest here, Orwell was not right on everything.

As with all of Hitchens’s writing, this is not an overly scholarly appraisal, but rather an enjoyable conversation about Orwell’s work in context. Far from objective, one senses that a broader view of Orwell is needed if one is to begin to master his importance and place in twentieth century history. However, whilst perhaps not the most illuminating look at the Orwell’s work, it is certainly an enjoyable and impassioned introduction to Orwell and his critics.

Hitchens, who so often used his command of the English language to expose and critique those he opposed, is less assured when describing one of whom he is all too evidently fond. In enthusing about Orwell, Hitchens argument spills over into a too exuberant attempt to co-opt a personal hero, and sees his prose slipping into mawkish praise at points. Indeed, there are times when Hitchens could be describing what he considers admirable and worth aspiring to in an author (and in the process inferring these qualities upon himself), rather than dealing with the reality of his subject: Hitchens creates the hero he wants – in his own image, and one senses that Hitchens infers too much from Orwell’s writing, perhaps injecting his own thoughts into the gaps.

Orwell always claimed that the time in which he existed pushed him away from fiction and towards the essay form, which he so mastered. This is, one feels (as Hitchens would agree), not quite right, but the world is nevertheless a better place for Orwell’s essays, whatever prompted him to produce them. For all that Hitchens enthuses about Orwell’s writing, one can’t help but feel that the greatest clarity about the man can still be found in his own essays and writings, stark and accessible as they are.

In truth, one wonders how dramatically different from the mainstream conception of Orwell many of Hitchens’s ideas truly are. He is, perhaps, more willing to ignore some of Orwell’s missed steps than less fawning admirers might, and on the whole he goes about creating his own ‘Saint George’.

What must be said is that Hitchens writes with an enthusiasm that, inevitably, transfers itself onto the reader. Orwell continues to be claimed by both right and left, and Hitchens explores this engagingly, while always forcing Orwell towards the left. So much has been written about Orwell that it is hard to add anything meaningful to the canon of criticism, yet Orwell’s Victory is an enjoyable discussion of the author’s legacy, and while less than objective is still a stimulating introduction to his work.

I quite enjoyed this. At times Hitchens gets a little bogged down in making a point and also loses a little objectivity, but generally a lively discussion of Orwell's legacy.  

Useful Links
Reviews of Orwell's Victory on Amazon (UK)
Reviews of Why Orwell Matters on Amazon (US)

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Review: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J. K. Rowling

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (2007) is the final instalment of J. K. Rowling’s hugely popular series. Having lost his great mentor, Harry must now set out to destroy Lord Voldemort with but the small amount of information Dumbledore imparted before his passing. The world is an increasingly perilous place, and the supporters of the Order of the Phoenix and those opposed to Voldemort in general, are hunted and marginalised. With Ron and Hermione in toe, Harry chooses not to return to Hogwarts, but to go on the run, collecting and destroying Horcruxes in an attempt to end the reign of Lord Voldemort definitively. As the three pursue this quest they are introduced to the idea of the Deathly Hallows – a set of three objects that, in combination, make a wizard all but invincible. With Voldemort seemingly seeking these items, Harry must choose whether to chase down Horcruxes or Hallows. Conflicted and without support, the young hero will have to fight his way through numerous dangers to set up one final battle with He Who Shall Not Be Named.

Malicious lies, loose gossip, and orchestrated misinformation all distort any concept of truth that remains for Harry and he must turn inwards, trusting on his own instincts and the few people on whom he is still able to rely, to help him navigate his final adventure. But as Dumbledore’s memory is appropriated and corrupted by various parasitic elements, Harry struggles to retain faith in his fallen mentor. Where faith in one’s friends had been so important to the young hero in previous books, here Harry is faced with the possibility that his faith may have been misplaced, and that Dumbledore might not have been all that he appeared.

It is not only Dumbledore whose legacy lives on after his death; across the series characters have fallen and here the shadows cast by the departed stretch, crucially, across Hogwarts as Harry and Voldemort meet for one final battle. Dumbledore advocated the affordance of a second chance to those who do not always appear worthy of one. As the characters come together to define the fate of the world in which they live, this faith in the potential for redemption is never more important.

With Harry, Ron, and Hermione on the run for more than half the book, one feels very acutely the absence of the full cast of characters, which bring the world to life, and one realises quite how important Hogwarts itself is to the Harry Potter series. In the wilderness, both Rowling and her characters seem a little bereft of ideas. The author’s style too, further exposed by the plot, fails to develop into the more sophisticated style that the series deserves. However, what should never be forgotten is the speed with which Rowling produced her series, allowing a generation to grow with their beloved characters. This prodigious creative output cannot be disregarded when considering Rowling’s style as a whole.

The clues leading to this final instalment have been deftly inserted into the previous six books, and one must be impressed with Rowling’s foresight in this respect. The complex family histories and mythology demonstrate the work that was put into the plotting of the series at its inception, but nevertheless, one senses that the purity of this vision adapted as Rowling’s audience grew and demanded different things of Harry and Hogwarts.

There are few real surprises here, and even the finale feels undercooked and lacking in the real drama that could so easily have been created here. The Deathly Hallows themselves somewhat detract from the search for the Horcruxes and become, very rapidly, the central fixation of the book: a slightly jarring sea-change. More could have been made of the final book and of the ending, with a whole host of storylines left unresolved or unexploited to their full.

Death, which Voldemort and his followers seek to master, permeates the story, dished out by the villains without hesitation, and with little regard for human life. The ambition to master or reverse death is shown to be more than perilous. Indeed, the Deathly Hallows themselves are false treasures (in at least two cases), which offer no true protection from death and violence. Again, the consequences of death are dealt with only briefly, and for a series that has become increasingly sophisticated, this feels like a significant omission.

Harry’s generation are charged with saving the world for their adult counterparts, and it is clear that Rowling relishes the youthful exuberance and naïve readiness to do right that her young heroes demonstrate so regularly. The scene which sees Harry, Ron, and Hermione break into the Ministry of Magic, now a totalitarian nightmare, is particularly well done. So too is the deeper consideration of peripheral characters like Neville Longbottom and the Malfoys.

With the series drawing to a close, this addition sees a strange juxtaposition in J. K. Rowling’s style, in which she appears happy to flick from dark, adult themes to sugar-sweet junior fiction and stretching the reader’s credulity to breaking point with the simplicity of some elements of the story. However, while the ending might be a bit kitsch, it is happy and works perfectly well, considering this is junior fiction.

While not the finest writing available to the junior audience, the Harry Potter series and J. K. Rowling inspired a generation of young readers – exposing them to the wonders of literature and solid morals in the face of adversity through the actions of the series’ young characters. This service will benefit communities worldwide for years to come, and no matter what one has to say about the books, great thanks must go to Rowling for this gift.

Just a fantastic series that got children all over the world reading. Some of the later books became a little flabby, but it's hard to criticise works that have proved the value of literature to generations who have seemingly infinite alternatives.

Useful Links
Reviews of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows on Amazon (UK)
Reviews of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows on Amazon (US)

Film adaptation of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows on Amazon (UK)
Film adaptation of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows on Amazon (US)

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