Tom's treasures of fiction, poetry, literature and more...

It is that time again where I highlight some of the things I have read across the month. Let me let you in one some of the things that I have been throughout March. 1: My French. As per I continue with the various tasks to learn French and that includes reading tasks. I am slowly on my way to eight-hundred days. Eight-hundred! I am not planning to stop yet... 2: My chess. This is another thing that I continue to do. I always have to read the instructions carefully or I get things wrong. I can play chess but I am not the greatest chess player. 3: NW  (2012) by Zadie Smith. As Zadie Smith was author of the month for March, I decided to read her fourth novel, NW  as it was the next novel for me to read. I had already read her first three which I reviewed last year. My review of NW  is on the blog as a post from this month. Have a look if you want to know what I thought of it. 4: Cards. With birthdays coming up I spent some time reading messages in cards to see which ones I l...

Today I am sharing with you a poem which I wrote for my nan's funeral whom I dearly miss to this day. Here is my poem, 'Nan'. Nan: Hello again... Today we say goodbye, not the day to forever cry as I know you would want us happy and you can trust I will try my best, with memories inside my head. I'll never forget the shopping at the weekend or the 'I don't want those browns' Monopoly game that we'd always play once we'd worked together to rid the garden and front drive riddled with weeds, trowel needed in my hand.                            Now the hand is empty, like my words                            when I found out you'd gone to sit and watch with Grandad. Goodnight nan, I send all my love. This for me was a way of showing what Nan meant to me and she was a wonderful women. Until next time, Thomas.

Hello again blog readers. It is that time of the month where I have a bookshop to spill on. This month has seen me amongst the glorious South Downs in the quaint East Sussex village of Alfriston. Let me introduce you to Much Ado Books. Here we have a beautifully designed bookshop nestled in a nice location with a lot to offer. Now the bookshop is not far from Charleston which was the home and studio of artists Vanessa Bell and Duncan Grant. It is also near to Monk's House which was the home of famous author Virginia Woolf who wrote Orlando  (1928) as well as other works. Both Vanessa Bell and Virginia Woolf where members of the infamous Bloomsbury Group who were a collection of artists, writers and intellectuals in the first start of the 20th century that would regularly meet in Bloomsbury. When I visited Much Ado Books I saw stuff about the Bloomsbury group which was fascinating. I read Woolf's Orlando  at university and have been to her home Monk's House once, which is ow...

Today I am back with another review. This time I am reviewing the short story 'Suggestion' (1895) by Ada Leverson which first appeared in The Yellow Book . This was a quarterly limited-run journal focussing on art and literature. Ada Leverson was one of the women writers of the Fin de Siècle  and a friend to Oscar Wilde. The title of the short story - 'Suggestion' sums up the short story well. To me there is a quadruple meaning as the narrator Cecil Carington suggests things for his sister and his sister-in-law. Then there is the second meaning of suggestion in which Cecil and his sister Marjorie try to come up with suggestions on how to make their father a more pleasing man so that their new mother-in-law, Marjorie's friend can find married life a bit more bearable. The third suggestion is that Cecil is gay. He seems to get on very well with his friend Adrian, of whom his sister Marjorie has her eyes on. Cecil already has someone else planned for her and seems dete...

London. North-west. Caldwell council estate. Four people. This is Zadie Smith's fourth novel, NW  (2012)... Set in a north-west postcode of London, NW  follows the busy lives of four people - Leah, Natalie, Felix and Nathan as they try to make something of themselves outside of the estate from their youth - the Caldwell council estate. Here the novel the explores how in one part of a bustling city can have quite varied people from one another. You have those do well, those who do not, people who have a lot while others have very little, hosts and guests. Then there is also everyone else in between in the novel. For some characters, it has been about change. Natalie for example, was not always called Natalie as she grew up with the name Keisha. Various things happened for her to change her name, originally stemming from her mother's wish to seperate her daughter from her best friend Leah. That does not work because as they grow up across the novel, they do not grow apart fully....

Welcome to blog people. Lately I have been thinking about mothers after Mother's Day last Sunday (15th March). Mother's can through a lot and sometimes it can be tough having children. For this reason I understand why some people chose not to have children. There is no right or wrong answer here it is up to each individual person because it their body. But if ever a woman wants to have children, often the man expects her to be this maternal, caring parent. This includes making dinners and dealing with school uniform for example. A ,main reason for this is because society for far too long now has taught men that it is wrong for them to show emotion. Men have been made to believe that men who show emotion are weak and that this is not a good thing, Obviously none of this is true. Men can and should do their fair share. There will be fathers who do which is good because women often work full-time jobs as do men. Women often have it harder too. If a woman was pregnant and she went ...

Hello all, yesterday (Sunday 15th March) was Mother's Day here in the U.K so I just wanted to say that I hope everyone had a good day. Whether you are a mother, a single mother, not a mother anymore, someone who lost a mother, someone who chose not to be a mother, someone who cannot be a mother or anyone else who feels they have a motherly role. Until next time, Thomas.

Today's blog post is a shoutout to some women who lately have inspired me or those who I have admired for what they have done, are doing and will probably continue to do. This list is not necessarily  exhaustive but it certainly highlights some incredible women. 1: Paloma Faith - singer-songwriter and actress. Paloma Faith is a British musician who has risen to fame with singles including 'Stone Cold Sober' (2009), 'Picking Up the Pieces' (2012), 'Can't Rely on You' (2014), 'Guilty' (2017) and 'Gold' (2020) which were all from her top singles from her first five studio albums. Her sixth and most recent studio album  The Glorification of Sadness  (2024) was introduced with the lead single 'How You Leave a Man'. This catchy and powerful track offers Faith's opinion on how to leave a man, even if just for the weekend. I love how she has tracks on the album to signify resistance against men. Paloma also has a recently new podcast ...

For today's blog post I am diving back into a review. This time I am reviewing Zadie Smith's article 'Mind the Gap' (2012) that she did for Guernica Magazine. The whole article is about reporting on schools around the world in an essence. What I liked about the article was how she detailed her visit with the charity Oxfam to Liberia and how that different things can be to a person's own life. Seeing how different people live is fascinating because sometimes it can make you think about how lucky you are with your own life. The other thing that I liked was this style of  ‘ non-professional reportage ’ ¹ as she mentioned. Normally the news is filled with headline stories that are there to shock or grab attention, often being stuff that news companies deem important for people to know. However, sometimes I find that news companies do not always publish or broadcast news without being bias and often miss things on purpose. To see something like this is refreshing. Furthe...

It came and it went? Or did it? Why does celebrating women happen one day a year? Women face bigger challenges then men in society. I mean I cannot speak as a women, only as someone who is non-binary. But I know plenty of women who have had struggles that men could never have faced... This International Women's Day I want to shout out to some of these women... First and foremost, I have to give a big shout out to all the trans women in the world. It is tough to be non-binary in society so I can only imagine how demanding and gruelling society makes it for trans women. I see you all and I accept you as you are. You should be able to be your authentic selves and live freely without fear or judgement, or horrific people trying to ruin your lives bit by bit. Next up I want to mention all the women who are POC (people of colour). I see stories of racism and have heard racism from people, which I never agree with. Whether this is institutional racism, unconscious bias or just plain racis...

Spring has sprung and I am here with my first review of the month. I decided I would read Zadie Smith's  ‘The Waiter's Wife ’. It was only until I starting reading it did I realise that the characters in this short story are in her debut novel White Teeth  (2000). Then I realised that most of the short story ends up in the novel anyway. It is not completely the same though. Because of that and as I had read it I chose to review it anyway. I liked this short fiction: seizing the button labelled "my funny bone" and firmly pressing down. I loved reading about Alsana clashing with her niece as per, I loved Samad and Archie reconnecting after years apart, I loved the vivid description Zadie Smith adds in just to build up her fictional North-West London world. This short fiction seems real, it well-thought out and convincing. When Samad Iqbal decides to move from Whitechapel to Willesden, his wife Alsana finds she has reservations once they are there. Money is tight, she is...

Hello all. Winter has departed and Spring has arrived. For March and April there will be a new theme of the month. That theme will be women writers to tie in with International Women's Day being this month. I also have a new author of the month, who will be Zadie Smith. She is known for her novels that include White Teeth  (2000), The Autograph Man  (2002) and On Beauty  (2005) - all of which I have read and reviewed. After having read On Beauty  last year it became my third favourite book ever! That and the fact that someone recommended her fourth novel NW  (2012) to me, [which I have], are the reasons why I decided to pick her as author of the month for March. I love reading anything by Zadie Smith as so far she has failed to disappoint! This month also sees Mother's Day, here in the UK so I that was also why I decided to pick women's writers. I am looking forwards to reading some new stuff this month including Zadie Smith. So here we are to March people. Unti...