Something Strange is happening in Finchley

The Girl with all the Gifts is not the type of book that I would usually read. Even back in my teenage days when I was addicted to horror, the novels I read were more likely to have their storylines based in some sort of reality, like The Rats, by James Herbert. In those days, I never read Science Fiction. 

So when I saw a tweet from Jen Campbell, about a new online book club I decided to take part, mainly because I didn't feel I was doing enough reading. I never thought that I would be reading a book about Zombies. Jen also did an interview with the author, Mike Carey where he talks about his writing and where the idea for The Girl came from.

I went to Muswell Hill Bookshop and looked for the book in the fiction section without really knowing what I was looking for apart from I knew it had a bright yellow cover and was about a young girl. When I couldn't find it I was very disappointed, so I asked behind the issue desk.

'Oh, that'll be in the Science Fiction Section,' said the assistant and went off down the shop to get it.

'Oh'. I murmured to her retreating back and wondered what on earth I was buying.

I wished she'd hurry up because I was hungry even though I'd only had my lunch half an hour before.

When I got outside the bookshop, I read the back cover again (I'd already seen it online). I went for a coffee, some sandwiches, some cake and chocolate and I was still hungry. I opened the book and began to read. Almost from the first page, where the reader meets ten year old Melanie who's in some sort of a prison and who is interested in fairy tales, I found myself caring about the character and I was hooked.

"Every morning, Melanie waits in her cell to be collected for class. When they come for her, Sergeant Parks keeps his gun pointing at her while two of his people strap her into the wheelchair. She thinks they don't like her. She jokes that she won't bite, but they don't laugh."

I continued reading. However, I was a bit concerned at my behaviour, just buying a book without really knowing what it was. When I got back to Finchley later that day, I noticed there was a strange smell in the air and I began to feel a bit dizzy. And when I got home, I was so hungry again. But nothing I ate satisfied me. I even found myself sleepwalking and eating food from the fridge and the cupboards. The only way I could forget the hunger was to read.

As I delved further into the narrative, I became quite concerned for my mental health. I felt as if I was in a film that was real, the descriptions pulled me into a post apocolyptic world where I desperately wanted to save Melanie and eat the zombies. I made myself stop reading past 6.00pm because the images in my head needed time to settle down. For the first half of the book, I went to sleep petrified. And all the time, I could hear strange mumblings outside my window at night.

The Girl with all the Gifts deals with a dystopian future in which most of humanity is wiped out by a fungal infection. It's a good plot though it is the characters that drive the story, through Finchley and other north London landmarks including the artsdepot overun with zombies.

Zombies! Why was I reading a book about zombies. There seems to be a lot of interest in Finchley about these strange creatures. Last week the local press contacted the festival organisers for a photoshoot but all they were really interested in was Mike Carey's book. I couldn't attend as I was at work. But the others went along and as our theme this year is supporting local libraries, they met outside Church End Library. Is it me or is there something a bit odd about the photograph? They seem to be lurching from side to side?

Murni who appears on the left, wanted me to be in the photo too and so she took some photos of Lindsay, myself, Mike and Robert a few days ago. But even these seem a little odd, perhaps it's because it was early in the morning and none of us looked our best. There is something happening in Finchley, the earth is rumbling, there's a funny smell in the air, we're all hungry and we're all buying books...the zombies are coming...

                       Lindsay       Rosie          Mike         Robert

Mike and Jen will be at this year's Finchley Literary Festival. Mike will be discussing The Girl with all the Gifts, Wednesday 20th May 7.00pm and Jen will be discussing her latest book The Bookshop Book on Thursday 21st May 6.00pm at Friern Barnet Community Library

Finchley in Fiction - Part Two

Continuing on from last week, I have found some more links to Finchley in Fiction:

Mr. Finchley is a fictional character in three comic novels by Victor Canning (unfortunately no relation to me), a novelist who later gained great success with thrillers. He first appears in Canning's very first book, Mr. Finchley Discovers his England, published in 1934 and as Mr. Finchley's Holiday in the USA in 1935.

Scoop is a 1938 novel by the English writer Evelyn Waugh, a satire of sensationalist journalism and foreign correspondents: ‘That evening, Mr Salter, foreign editor of The Beast, was summoned to dinner at his chief’s country seat at East Finchley.' What a wonderful title for a newspaper, we've had more than enough Beast reporting leading up to and beyond the Election.

Bluebottle, a character in the 1950s BBC radio series The Goon Show, hails from East Finchley. Peter Sellers, who played Bluebottle, lived in the area at one time.

The Monty Python's Flying Circus comedy sketch, The Funniest Joke in the World (1969), is set in Finchley. The premise of the sketch is that the joke is so funny that anyone who reads or hears it promptly dies from laughter. Please don’t laugh while reading this!

The Russian poet Joseph Brodsky wrote a poem c 1978 with the title 'East Finchley', but it's been quite difficult to find a copy. Finchley Boy, Allen Ashley leads a poetry workshop with an astronomy theme. Sun, Moon and Planets is aimed at writers of all levels. Find out more here.

In the 2005 film The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, Susan Pevensie says that she and her siblings, Peter, Edmund, and Lucy, are from Finchley, despite no mention of Finchley being made in C. S. Lewis's book

In Ben Elton's Blind Faith (2007), loosely based on Orwell's 1984, the setting is a flooded London: '[Finchley] was not an easy place for Trafford to get to, as it involved crossing Lake London with his bicycle and disembarking at the Paddington jetty …'

Two for Sorrow (2011) by Nicola Upson takes place in East Finchley being about the notorious Finchley baby farmers and is a traditional detective novel using Josephine Tey, a real writer(!), to investigate a modern day killing. A bit odd to use a real writer as your fictional detective and I do wonder if she pulled it off.

At last year's Finchley Literary Festivel, we were very lucky to have Caitlin Davies as one of our speakers. The Ghost of Lily Painter (2012) is also about the baby farmers of East Finchley. Davis' exhaustive research shines through all her novels, plunging the reader into a literary time machine. You can find out more about her research and writing here.

One summer’s night, while drunkenly crossing Trent Park Golf Course, Hal Maybury, errant husband, ale drinker and Finchley resident, finds in a canyon where the 17th hole should be something that will change his life forever and something that London will never forget. (And no it wasn’t Brian Coleman) Hal is the protagonist of The I AM, (2012) by Robert Samuels.

Foul Deeds And Suspicious Deaths In Barnet, Finchley And Hendon (2009) Nick Papadimitriou chooses over 20 notorious cases that give a fascinating insight into criminal acts and the criminal mind. It seems as if there has been a lot of murder in Finchley both in real life and in fiction. If you'd like to find out about crime writing join Murder in the Library, a Finchley Literary Festival workshop that stimulates your imagination, gets your plot in a twist and kills all your enemies on paper only.

Another crime and another writer, Mark Billingham mentions Finchley in Bloodline (2010). Emily Walker is found beaten and suffocated with a plastic bag in her Finchley home, she appears to be the victim of a domestic dispute.

Moon over Soho (2011) by Ben Aaronovitch mentions Finchley, “Jerry Johnson was one of the latter type of non-Londoner, born in Finchley in 1940 by the grace of God and died in a bungalow on the outskirts of Norwich…”

Finchley wouldn't be the same without a mention of John Betjeman, who was the first Patron of The Finchley Society. Betjeman, along with Spike Milligan fought to save Hawthorndene, the historic house at the entrance to Strawberry Vale Estate. When congratulating the society on saving the building, Betjeman wrote: “Long live Finchley and its sudden steep hills, tree-shaded gardens, and memories of a civilised prosperity.”

Spike Milligan lived in Finchley and Finchleyites hold him in very high esteem, I really can't do justice in a few lines, but join Paul Baker, a qualified City of London guide, who leads a special Finchley Lit Fest walk to find out more about this Finchley hero. More details here.

Kate Atkinson mentions Finchley numerous times in 'Life After Life' (2014). The protagonist, Ursula’a sister lives in Finchley. We have a huge amount of literary talent in Finchley, if you'd like to listen to some local authors reading their work, then join us in Finchley's only literary cafe, Cafe Buzz for a Celebration of Local Writing

Wonder Women (2013) by Rosie Fiore-Burt, mentions Finchley nearly twenty times, possibly because the protagonist, Jo lives there! Rosie joined Caitlin at last year's festival along with Miriam Halahmy and Alex Wheatle. Alex is back this year, appearing at Waterstones to discuss his highly acclaimed new YA novel Liccle Bit (2015). Alex will be joined by two other YA writers, find out more here.

And finally, Mike Carey’s Girl with all the Gifts (2014), has what is soon to become a famous scene as well as a re-enacted scene, artsdepot in North Finchley, overrun with zombies, filming began this week. If you want to find out more about this unusual book, come to the Finchley Literary Festival, taking place in Finchley with lots of Finchley authors and possibly a few zombies....

If you’d like to learn more about literary Finchley, do come along to one of the FLF events and say hello.

Finchley in Fiction - Part One

After reading Lindsay Bamfield’s blog about the Finchley Literary Festival and how we came up with the idea for the event, and how it was the first literary festival in Barnet, I felt inspired to investigate just how much fiction really took place in Finchley.

I’ve always thought that not much literature was based here. It’s not the sort of place where much ever used to happen apart from Thatcher's fiction (though in the last few years, we have become hot-pot of political activism). So why would anyone, in the past, want to use it as a location or place their characters here. As I began to delve, and with a little help from friends, I realised that I had in fact been mistaken. There are so many references to Finchley in Fiction, that I am having to split the information into two blogs, part one and part two, though each reference could have been a blog in itself.

Back in the mid 1800s, there used to be a Finchley Literary Society, this closed in 1892. There would be monthly performances by elocutionists and others. One such man, Mr Brandram whose ‘extent of his exper-toril’ was apparently, simply astonishing, had memorised all of Shakespeares plays, as well as stage plays by Sheridan and others, innumerable selections from Dickens, Colman, and other writers.

Things come full circle, and at this year’s festival, Lindsay, expert elocutionist, is using her 37 years speech therapy experience to run a Voice Skills Workshop, so there should be quite a bit of excellent elocutionary exper-toril.

Written 1840-1841, as a serial, Master Humphrey’s Clock, later to become, Charles Dickens’ The Old Curiosity Shop (1841), features Mr Garland, one of the principal characters, who lives in Abel Cottage, Finchley. In 1843, whilst writing Martin Chuzzlewit, (1844) Dickens ‘in order to concentrate on the writing and planning of the novel’, found a retreat in Finchley: Cobley’s Farm, where John Forster, biographer and friend remembered ‘walking and talking in the green lanes [of Finchley] as the midsummer months were coming on’. (Writers understand the need to get away and concentrate without the everyday paraphernalia. See our Summer Writing Retreat if you want the space and freedom to write)

The above description, says Theresa Musgrove, a local celebrity blogger and researcher, has echoes in the lesser known works of a Victorian female poet called Jane Rutland, who lived in Finchley and published a book of quite popular verse, Poems Grave and Gay from the Finchley Woods (1865). One of the poems mentions a laburnum flowering by a Squire's back wall – which is most likely Finchley Manor House, now the Sternberg Centre.

Published between 1795 and 1797, Hannah More, wrote a series of moralistic tracts. Of these, the most successful was 'The Shepherd of Salisbury Plain', nothing to do with Finchley. However, it was satirized by Thackeray in Vanity Fair (1847-1848) as 'The Washerwoman of Finchley Common', written in the novel by Lady Emily, daughter of Lady Southdown, and used as a way to ridicule Evangelical Christianity.

There was a one-act farce performed in London in 1861 That Affair at Finchley, by Joseph Stirling Coyne, featuring characters like Sir Courteney Jinks and that wonderful quote: “... the pure air of Finchley - a locality so proverbially healthy that no doctor was ever known to live, and no donkey was ever known to die, in this neighbourhood.”

English comic novel, Diary of a Nobody (1892) by brothers George and Weedon Grossmith records the daily events in the lives of a London clerk, Charles Pooter, his wife Carrie, his son Lupin, and numerous friends and acquaintances over a period of 15 months. The Diary mentions Hampstead and Finchley: “At three o’clock Cummings and Gowing called for a good long walk over Hampstead and Finchley…” We must suppose to get from Hampstead to Finchley, they went via the brook. 

As part of the Finchley Lit Fest, I too have organised a walk via the brook, going further towards Whetstone with a stop at Finchley Golf Club and then lunch at the Redwood Cafe. The Walking Writer workshop is all about nature and writing. Many writers including Virginia Woolf, Ernest Hemingway, and Frank O'Hara used walking as a way of stimulating their writing. Walking is not just good for the physical body; it is good for the mind too. For William Blake and William Wordsworth, writing was a way to leave the outside world behind.

There is possibly a mention of Finchley in H.G. Wells’ The War of the Worlds (1898); I’m still waiting for confirmation of this. (If anyone knows, do let me know, details below)

Henry Charles Stephens, son of Henry Stephens- founder of the Stephens Ink Company, lived in Avenue House which he left, in 1918, as a bequest to the ‘people of Finchley’, along with its grounds. Inky Stephens published books on a wide-range of subjects, including Parochial Self-Government. (This I know is not fiction, but it could be! Plus I have to mention Inky Stephens and the many writers who would have used the wonderful Stephens Ink from Finchley)

At the turn of the century, repairs were strictly the preserve of the tradesman. Hilaire Belloc wrote this funny little verse called 'Lord Finchley', written in 1911, in protest of DIY:

Lord Finchley tried to mend the Electric Light
Himself. It struck him dead: And serve him right!
It is the business of the wealthy man
To give employment to the artisan.

In part one we learnt about societies, elocution, electrocution, green lanes, retreats, walking, war and ink. In part two, we meet Mr Finchley, The Beast, The Goons, Monty Python, a Russian poet, baby farmers, and a few more murderers and ghosts all with fictional connections to Finchley. In the meantime if you know of any literary Finchley connections, do let me know.

Follow me on Twitter: @rosie_canning
Or email: finchleyliteraryfestival@gmail.com

World Book Night 2015

This is the fifth World Book Night and my fourth year of volunteering. I work at the North Middlesex University Hospital in the medical library and decided to get them involved this year as an 'institution giver' as well as my usual homeless organisation in Finchley. Plus I do love a bit of fiction in amongst all those gruesome medical books. 

So this year, I got to choose two titles - I didn't get my first choice but that didn't matter because all the WBN books are brilliant. Usually, I like to choose Quick Reads because my reasoning is as follows. If you're homeless, in all likelihood you won't have access to many books and quite likely will find it difficult to read because concentration levels, due to the trauma of not having a home, are quite simply all over the place. So I feel that a Quick Reads book is a perfect way to reintroduce anyone to the wonderful art of reading.

Quick Reads sets out to show that books and reading can be for everyone. Each year they commission big name authors to write short books that are specifically designed to be easy to read. They are the same as mainstream books in every respect but are simply shorter and easier to tackle. The books are then sold through major retailers, online booksellers and are loaned from libraries.

A few years ago I ordered a set of Quick Reads for the library and they've proved very popular with the staff.

If you work in a hospital, chances are you are very busy. I wanted to create a small haven of giving within our hospital cafe for World Book Night. I made posters to advertise the event and organised a table with the cafe manager. I chose lunchtime even though I knew it would be busy because I wanted to capture as many people that didn't or rarely read. I set up my table with copies of Dead Man Talking and Custard Tarts and Broken Hearts. I felt sure the WBN organisers wouldn't mind if I mixed and matched a little. I was especially pleased to have Dead Man Talking, as it is the first book by a Booker Prize Winner to be published as part of the Quick Reads.

I gave books to patients and staff. The event was a great success though of course *free* anything is always very popular. However, I made sure all those who took books, promise they would pass them on, preferably to somebody that didn't read very often. I was very pleased to find out that some of the books I gave away last year, ended up in Sierra Leone, where they are still fighting the Ebola epidemic.

The only blip of the day was caused by our communications department who monitor everything that goes out via the hospital information cascade. I'd sent details of the event only to find that when it appeared, World Book Night had been changed to World Book Day. Apparently this was because the manager couldn't get his head around an event that included the word 'night', happening in the day! 

The Walking Writer

As part of Finchley Literary Festival 2015, I am running a practical workshop for writers who like walking, like writing, and want to be more creative.  

A 2014 study from Stanford University in the US has shown that people are much more creative when they are walking as opposed to when they are sitting still. The study involved 176 college students as they completed certain creative thinking tasks. They found that when people were walking, they were 60% more creative that when sitting around. This works by the increased blood flow all around the body including the brain which then becomes stimulated. On average we sit down for almost 10 hours of the day. This can lead to flabby behinds, heart disease, diabetes, and a large number of cancers. However, just 30 minutes of walking each day is enough to reduce your risk of heart disease, colon cancer, breast cancer and dementia.

The Walking Writer workshop is all about nature and writing. Many writers including Virginia Woolf, Ernest Hemingway, and Frank O'Hara used walking as a way of stimulating their writing. Beethoven was an avid walker too, he always took pencil and paper to write down anything that struck him. Walking is not just good for the physical body; it is good for the mind too. For William Blake and William Wordsworth, writing was a way to leave the outside world behind. And another walking enthusiast was Charles Dickens, sometimes up to 30 miles a day or night. He created some of his most remarkable and memorable characters when out walking and so can you!

We will be retreating from the busy everyday into our own particular creative worlds with an emphasis on sight, sound, smell, touch and hearing and there will be some readings. We will be writing and walking in the wooded areas of Finchley. We will meet at Finchley Central and make our way down to the beautiful Dollis Brook where we will write among the trees. You will have a chance to discuss your latest writing project, make new writing friends or meet old ones. We will stop for lunch at The Redwood Café in Swan Lane Open Space.

Where and when:

Sun 24th May, 11.30am 

West Finchley Station, 
London N3 1NR

The Walking Writer Workshop: 

 As part of the Finchley Literary Festival this workshop is offered on a donation basis, suggested donation: £5.00 

No need to book just turn up
Bring paper and pencil/pen