Life Backwards

Posted off some books and a single this morning, although still have a few to post off including some albums, which I will do tomorrow.

I have been reading “Stuart, A Life Backwards” by Alexander Masters (Fourth Estate), which was one of the books given away from the World Book Night last March. I have just got through the next chapter of “The Crimson Petal and The White” , after an initial devouring. This was due to reading other books or catching up with the news. I rarely finish a book in one go. I tend to hop from one book to another, like a magpie, picking up things and then chucking them away as they are not shiny enough.


Tne story of Stuart Shorter is the story of a person nobody wants to know- the homeless 'nutter', the beggar, the addict, the offender. Nobody that is, except, for reasons that aren't at first clear even to him, Alexander Masters, a hostel worker who stumbles across Stuart begging in Cambridge. Their relationship is unique in literature, one is an illiterate yob and the other is an ex-boarding-school pupil and do-gooder. Somehow they immediately connect and as their touching relationship unfolds and Stuart's life is rewound, you realise that this nutter is a truly amazing human being. His biographer brings him to life so brilliantly it is impossible not to howl (mentally at least) with laughter at their adventures at the Home Office, Stuart's incisive insights, and then at the agony of the inevitable tragedies. Brilliant, buy it, be moved and then wonder how much potential is in all those homeless 'scum' asking for change from downtrodden commuters on their way to and from work

Lunch consisted of meatballs and a red pasta sauce with spaghetti. The meatballs remind me of the ones I love to scoff at the Northern Lights. I feel quite stuffed.