J L Carr

I was in my local Waterstones a while back when I saw a table of novellas. I had read some few and some few were knew to me. I noticed one of them was How Steeple Sinderby Wanderers won the F A Cup by J L Carr, whose name meant nothing to me, I thought. Anyway about a week ago I bought this novella. I think the recent Leicester City success had an influence. Being a short book I had it read in no time and enjoyed it immensely. A book like this writes itself but the author shows good skills in telling his story.

Being a little obsessive and having noticed that Carr also wrote A month in the country, a title that rang a bell with me but not a loud one (it was made into a play and a film) I decided to look out for that one. Well, I was in Belsize Park and I noticed Daunt Books so I went in and found they had a copy of A month in the country. It is only 84 pages so I had that read even more quickly. It is even better than the other one and indeed a real classic.  Set in 1920, it is about a man who restores murals in churches. This set up allows Carr to give us a simple but multi-layered story over the month he allows himself. These are the fourth and fifth novels of the late writer's eight novels. Perhaps the others may be worth reading.

The introduction to the Steeple Sinderby book reveals that he gave up his job as a headmaster to produce little booklets under the Quince Tree Press logo being on poets and artists, etc. I remember buying some of these in the past. I'm not sure where they are at the moment.

Oh yes