Support Your Local* Author

(*"Local" as in "from our neck of the blogosphere".)

After reading the aforementioned Morrissey Autobiography, for a little light relief over the Christmas period, I splashed out on a copy of Drawn To The Deep End by Martin - yes, that Martin - Pond. I've got to say it cheered me up no end...

Martin will no doubt think I mean that sarcastically, but it really did, despite (or maybe because of) the rather downbeat subject matter. DTTDE is a novel Martin serialised while he was writing it on one of his old blogs a few years back , getting feedback as he went along. I remember reading parts of it there and always looked forward to seeing the finished novel. Well, it turned out Martin had stealth-published it a few months ago via Amazon, both digitally and in paper. And because I'm old-fashioned and always prefer to read books on paper (if god had wanted us to read books on kindles, he'd have made tree trunks out of microchips), I jumped at the chance to hold an actual copy in my hands for the ten minutes of reading I manage each night before nodding into unconsciousness.

Except... it actually turned out that Martin's book was so good I didn't nod off at all, and raced through it faster than I've read a book in ages. (Ah, how I remember those days when I used to read a book a week. Before I got a life.)

Drawn To The Deep End is an intense character study of Peter, a man driven to the verge of depression by the death of his girlfriend, trying desperately to claw his way out, grasping at any straw (often straw women) that bends his way. It's a book that has a lot to say about being a lonely 30-something man in this day and age... and as someone who was just that ten or so years ago (and maybe only my age has changed, in some ways), I related to it very much. It's also very funny - shot through with dark observational humour that makes you wince and nod and wish you'd written it yourself. You may end up screaming at Peter. He does make some very unwise decisions. But you'll understand why, every step of the way. What is "happiness", anyway?

Anyway, go read it. Find out more at Martin's other website, here.

Oh, yes, and obviously it goes without saying this book is named after one of the best albums of the 90s. Here's a truly great track from that...