So, the book that made me cry?
Well I read it in mid 1993 according to my reading journal, and looking back I read some interesting books that year
Turtle Moon by Alice Hoffman
The Mist in the Mirror by Persuasive of Longbarn
A Seven Day Journey with Thomas Merton by Esther De Waal (there's a coincidence, mentioned him elsewhere yesterday)
Glamorous Powers by Susan Howatch (I remember being engrossed by this series)
Paddy Clarke Ha!Ha!Ha! by Roddy Doyle (won the Booker that year)
The Absolution Game by Paul Sayer ( as I recall, a psychiatric nurse who became an excellent novelist)
To my certain knowledge none of these made me cry memorably but then I picked up Skallagrigg by William Horwood and as they say, I think rather effusively, in the blurb on the cover of Jim Lynch's The Highest Tide,
"If you reach the last page without having laughed out loud or felt tears well up...then you may, quite simply be inhuman".
I didn't feel the tears well up for Jim Lynch's book but William Horwood had me bawling for England. If you don't cry when you reach P622 (in my edition) I won't go so far as to say you're inhuman but you may perhaps need some help getting in touch with your emotions.Perhaps on the other hand I'm just a blubbering old squidgepot.
However I've just discovered a March 1994 newspaper cutting on William Horwood stashed in my copy. That's almost had me in tears again.
William Horwood walked out on his disabled daughter when she was two, scarred by the experience he wrote a book about it
"Horwood has a habit of speaking his every thought into a portable tape recorder.One day...he asked himself a question:was there anything in the world he dared not say? He thought for a moment and then he burst into tears. The thing he dared not say was "I think I love my daughter". Up to then the point was debatable"
See now we're all crying. The article is insightful and poignant and I'm wondering if I can possibly cope with reading the book again as I'm almost in tears just looking at it now.
A quick check on Amazon
and I see that 26 reviewers had exactly the same reaction and also that
the book is now very hard to come by, seemingly out of print, and those
of us who have a copy are clearly not parting with them for any amount
of money, just two available at £25.
Check out your charity shops NOW!
Recent Comments