Talisman

Season of the Witch - Arni Thorarinsson When the editors at Reykjavik-based The Afternoon News decide to expand the newspaper into northern Iceland - with their crime writer Einar as its sole reporter on location - the journalist feels as though he has stepped back in time. Compared to the hustle and bustle of the capital, where the nation’s economic and social crises rear their heads on a daily basis, the small town of Akureyri feels slow, quiet, and terribly old-fashioned. So it’s only fitting that one of Einar’s first assignments is to cover a college theatre production of Loftur the Sorcerer, an Icelandic folktale of ambition and greed. But that supposedly ancient history becomes ominously relevant when a local woman dies after falling overboard during a corporate boating retreat. All evidence indicates an accident, but when the victim’s mother cries foul play, kind hearted Einar agrees to investigate. Just days later, the lead actor in Loftur vanishes, leaving the locals reeling- and Einar unconvinced that a single village could be so accident prone. Keenly perceptive and hungry for the truth, Einar begins to chip away at the quaint small-town façade, uncovering a tangled web of power and greed that threatens to devour the historic community for good. This was the second Icelandic book I have read this year, and I am sure will be just one of many more. Like others I have read, I spied this in a Reykjavik book store last year and looked it up on my return to see if it was available on Kindle, when it popped up on one of the regular monthly deals, it was too good to resist, and I was far from disappointed. The book is set in the sleepy backwater of Iceland's second largest town - Akureyri, where I shall very soon be heading myself. It is a town I have not visited for many years, so it was good to renew acquaintances. Einar, the narrator and lead character is a reporter for the Afternoon News who have recently opened an office in this town, and heads north to head up the team, where he soon makes waves. The death of a woman during a corporate bonding retreat and the death of a fledgling young actor may seem unconnected at first, but in such a small town there are no thing as coincidences, and Einar partly through boredom and partly through his own desire to uncover the truth and represent the community that he now works for, sets out to unravel if indeed there are any connections. The book although an easy and pleasant enough read for me will no doubt leave those who unfamiliar with Iceland its deep family ties, not to mention the belief in witchcraft somewhat perplexed, but it is worth persevering with for its gentle humour and easy paced narrative. Personally I enjoyed this book, and will be looking for others written by the same author. I have no idea whether this is his first work or just the first that has been translated into English I very much suspect the latter for no one publishes their first novel), but I will be eagerly awaiting more from his pen. I would probably give this somewhere between three and four stars.

I finally had a letter today from the District Manager at my old job re the grievance I put in. He has basically dismissed everything that I said, which is not altogether surprising, as I was warned by various people that they would try and whitewash over everything. I am despite this still disappointed, as I had hoped this would change things for the better for those that are still there. Having said this, people only change when they are ready, and when they are prepared to admit when it is necessary. Before that happens, they have to also admit when they have been wrong. If there is one thing I have learnt from this experience it has been that they were never going to do that, as to them it would be like losing face. In the end though it doesn't matter, for I still have my integrity intact even if they are prepared to compromise their own.

Ride on Time - Black Box

I am not sure when it opens here - I have seen the trailer though. The last film I saw was Catching Fire, which has just come out on DVD.

prison

I am enjoying four days off from work - I have only been in the new job for 2 1/2 weeks, but the holiday year comes to an end on 31st March, and apparently I will accrue 2 days this month, so as the other housekeeper is off next week (the last week of March) I have to take mine beforehand. Coran and I then drove into Crawley this morning to pick up a new computer for Coran and went for a nice lunch in Pizza Hut before driving back to Dorking to give blood.

stuffed mushrooms with cream cheese and barbecue crisps (one of my own recipes), with brown rice and salad.

cheese

It's been a beautiful day here on Box Hill, which of course has brought the cyclists and day trippers out in their droves. Coran and I walked up the viewpoint with them late this morning and spent 4 hours sitting on one of the benches reading and watching the world go by. It has been an interesting week for me what with starting the new job. This new place is still in social care, but rather than working with the elderly, it's a facility for disabled adults, where they are taught various life skills. I seem to be settling in well and making friends with staff and residents alike - the residents are a mixture of supported living and those with more specialist needs that are in the 17 bed care home that is on site - there are a lot with Downs and various types of autism. They teach them various life skills for independent living - namely IT, catering, textiles, horticulture and retail (selling the products made in the other categories). During this beautiful weather I have been making excuses to spend time outdoors in the horticulture unit. The staff can buy the fruit and veg that is grown there, and tonight we shall be sampling parsnips from the garden, which I am looking forward to. Having a longer lunch hour also means I have a lot more time for reading, which has to be good. It is lovely though to have all my weekends free.

The Fifth Estate

What a difference a day can make - and what a difference a new job can make too ! This new one seems to be everything the old one wasn't. For one thing, they were actually expecting me, and I wasn't told off for drinking either. Rather than working with the elderly, this is a care and learning facility for disabled adults - the disabilities are right across the spectrum with a lot of Downs and autism and that kind of thing. I have made friends already with three of them though, who the moment they met me gave me a great big hug - something that never happened at the old place ! It will I suspect be hard work, but then the best things always are, and I have never been afraid of that.

I start my new job today - in just over an hour. Normally I will work from 8-4, but during the first week because there is a lot of training, it will be 9-5. I rang my friend from the old place last night and she told me she gave them hell at her own grievance. The woman from HR kept interrupting her and she told her to shut up as this was her hearing and not be so bloody rude ! Well, she is from Yorkshire ... I would love though to have been a fly on the wall.

They were - I got a bit behind with the reviews, and my reading having had more pressing things to deal with of late, hence the fact that 3 were posted in one day. I don't read that quickly !

I think Chrissy that this is really the only way to view things - I have to hold on to the fact that I was and am not the aggressor here and that everything I told was the truth - the truth as they does indeed set you free. I can hold my head up high knowing that I have dealt with this in the best and only way that was available to me. As for the Turkish Baths - wonderful, I would highly recommend them and think I might become a regular user.

In Darkness - Nick Lake In darkness I count my blessings like Manman taught me. One. I am alive. Two. There is no two. Haiti 2010: in the aftermath of the earthquake a boy lies trapped beneath the rubble: terrified, thirsty and alone. Shorty is a child of the slums, a teenager who has seen enough violence to last a lifetime and who has been inexorably drawn into the world of the gangsters who rule his broken city: men who dole out money with one hand and death with the other. But Shorty has a secret: a flame of revenge that burns inside him, fuelling his determination to find his beloved twin sister, stolen from him five years ago. In the darkness the lines between the present and the past begin to blur and, as Shorty fights for life, his struggle becomes part of a two-hundred-year-old story - a story of courage and betrayal, of freedom and of hope. Shorty may not be quite as alone as he believes... This wonderful book which skilfully interweaves the lives of the two leading characters, is set partly during the 2010 Haitian earthquake and partly during the formation of an independent Haiti, the only country to be born from a slave rebellion. The book is narrated by a teenage boy trapped in the wreckage of a collapsed building as he relives his life. This is a short life that has been marred by violence, and the loss of his father and twin sister. The story is skilfully interweaved with tales from the life of Toussaint L'Ouverture, a real life person, who led the slave rebellion that led to independence. It becomes clear that the two characters share a bond - and if you believe in such things, a soul. The author vividly recreates the two Haiti's, both past and present, exploring the birth of this nation and its somewhat violent and troubled present. The Voodoo religion is always present and the book explores many of the myths surrounding this - what Voodoo is and how it works. Like my previous read, this was also a somewhat dark and disturbing book, and perhaps not for the faint hearted, but this is what I love about the Around the World Challenge, the opportunity to explore these themes. I suspect that this is book that will stay with me for a while, and like its predecessor, I would give it 5 stars.

The Shock of the Fall - Nathan Filer I’ll tell you what happened because it will be a good way to introduce my brother. His name’s Simon. I think you’re going to like him. I really do. But in a couple of pages he’ll be dead. And he was never the same after that.’ There are books you can’t stop reading, which keep you up all night. There are books which let us into the hidden parts of life and make them vividly real. There are books which, because of the sheer skill with which every word is chosen, linger in your mind for days. The Shock of the Fall is all of these books. The Shock of the Fall is an extraordinary portrait of one man’s descent into mental illness. It is a brave and ground-breaking novel from one of the most exciting new voices in fiction. My own family has been touched by mental illness, with a sister who experiences schizophrenia, and a father (now deceased) who had severe depression, so this for me was a much read, and a poignant one at that, having recently re-established contact with said sister. It was for me then a somewhat difficult and challenging read, written as it is from the perspective of the experiencer. I choose to use this word rather than sufferer because of its negative conations. We are introduced to Matt and his brother Simon, who has Downs syndrome at the beginning of the book, on a typical family holiday. The title of the book comes from what happens next when Matt encounters a young girl who is burying her doll - it later turns out this doll is symbolic of the girls mother who has recently died. Matt reaches out to comfort the girl and falls, and the story goes on from there. I will not say too much more as it would only act as a spoiler. The book though focusses very much on the effects that Matt's illness has on him - its symptoms and its causes, most of which only become clear towards the end. This is why I found it as times such uncomfortable reading, but I persevered and am glad that I did. There is no happy ending for Matt, and he does not get miraculously better, but he does in his own way come to terms with what happened to his brother and the role that he played. In the process of doing this he also manages to mend relationships with the rest of his family and help them. I can see exactly why this book won the Costa Prize and cannot think of a more worthy winner. This for me would also unhesitatingly be 5 stars.

Maya Angelou - I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings A classic coming-of-age story In this, the celebrated, bestselling first volume of her autobiography, Maya Angelou beautifully evokes her childhood with her grandmother in the American South of the 1930s. She learns the power of the white folks at the other end of town and suffers the terrible trauma of rape by her mother's lover. As a black woman, Maya Angelou has known discrimination and extreme poverty, but also hope and joy, celebration and achievement; loving the world, she also knows its cruelty. This is one of the truly inspirational books, and Angelou a truly inspirational woman. Well known for her works of philanthropy and a spokeswoman for black rights across the United States, this is the first of her six part autobiography. It tells of humble beginnings with her grandmother and beloved brother in the deep south and later move to the north, where she suffered terrible abuse at the hands of her mothers lover. although much of her story makes difficult reading and is not for the faint hearted, this is as much a tale of triumph as adversity. The underlying theme is one of hope, and of how both Angelou herself and those around her rise above and learn to overcome the prejudice and lack of power that is foisted upon them. It is also a tale of community and how during times of difficulties, those communities band together to help each other. Despite what was clearly a difficult childhood, there are no signs of bitterness about any of the things that happened to her - this book can be seen in many ways as part of the authors spiritual journey, for ultimately that is what life is. I would recommend this to anyone wishing to know more about American history, particularly with regard to our darker cousins. It should be compulsory reading in American classrooms. This is most definitely worth five stars. The remaining volumes have been added to my wish list and will be read in due course.

I have written a long blog post about what happened yesterday, for which rather than writing it all again, will simply post the link. I trust that this is okay. Suffice to say that it has now been dealt with and I await the outcome. As it turns out, the District Manager who heard the case is a good man who will I think look at things fairly. He said that many of the things that had happened were wrong, and should not have happened. What knocked me for six though was that one of my fellow housekeepers gave a signed and written statement (the day that I left - she probably wrote it the moment I walked out the door) in support of our boss, basically saying the exact opposite of everything she had told me. She though has her own conscience to deal with - I know that what goes around comes around, and it most surely will. The woman from HR who was note taker said that they will only read the bits from my diary that relate to the things I am complaining about, but I get the feeling that the District Manager will in fact read all of it. I hope so, for if he does, he will blown away by some of what I have talked about. They both commented on the quality of my writing, and said they had never seen a letter that was so well written - they are not the first ones to have said this. I have to though wait for the outcome, for which I have no attachment - what happens happens. I am out of there now for good and have to look to the future. I have an appointment at the Turkish Baths in Epsom this afternoon which will get rid of all the tension and Coran and I will have a quiet day in together, maybe going for a walk up the viewpoint. So, today then is the first day of my new life !

I have my grievance hearing later on today (my friends is at 10.30am), and am nervous as hell. My tummy is in knots and I have been tossing and turning since about 2am. A cup of coffee has taken the edge off some of it, but the feelings are still there. I am all ready though - Coran and I spent most of yesterday afternoon printing out all my evidence - a 40 page diary, plus statements from both Coran and my friend. I have also of course written one for her. One of the Senior Carers had said that she was also going to write something, but I haven't heard from her. I am hoping she may be there when I go in later on today, but if not, we will have to manage with what we have. I will be bringing a present for my friend with me - my old copy of the TUC Know Your Rights at Work Handbook - she is going to need this if she is to stay there much longer. I have recently bought a new copy which is bit more up to date, but if my old one can help her, all well and good. It means an awful lot to have her support and also of course support from The Union. Depending on what time we finish, Coran and I will be going out for a celebratory cake afterwards.

Welcome to rip off Britain !

Thank you - it was nice to have a lie in this morning, knowing that I no longer have to work there. Of course it won't really be over until Friday. My friends hearing has been put forward from 10.30 to 11am the same day, as Sheila from the Union (GMB in case anyone who is wondering - they really have been brilliant, and I wish I had joined years ago) has a dental appointment at 4pm and needs to finish early. She said she didn't know what was worse - having her teeth pulled out or meeting my bosses ! It helps to have a sense of humour. I have a few finishing touches to put to all my paperwork before printing it out ready for the big day. One of the things that Sheila wants to press upon them with both meetings (she is also representing my friend) is that this is institutionalised bullying. My friends case has been dragging on one way or the other for 18 months now. Sheila has experience at dealing with similar things in other homes with the same company though and has seen this many times before. She says that all of their homes are like this, but the one I worked at is the worst of all. That is what I mean when I say that in some ways this could be seen as whistle blowing. This could have potentially very damaging consequences for the Managers concerned - but they should have thought about that before they did it.

I finally finished my toxic job today - although not before I shed a few tears. I will miss the residents and at least some of the staff, as they are not all bad, and was really touched by some of the comments made. In the meantime, I have my grievance hearing on Friday, where the District Manager will decide (probably not on the same day) whether I have been a victim of bullying by the Managers and decide what if anything to do about it. My friend who works in the laundry has her own grievance a few hours earlier, on the same day, and we have agreed to help each other by writing statements. The Managers have all kept out of my way since they realised what I have done, which has been mildly amusing to say the least. Most of the staff there are not aware that I have done this, but when they see me back there on Friday in a meeting with the District Manager with a Union rep in tow, they will soon work it out, and it will not be long before it gets round the home, not that I care. They should have thought about that before they did it. I have then 2 days off in which to finalise my case. I then have the weekend off before starting the new job on Monday, which I am thoroughly looking forward to. Once it is all over, I will breathe a very big sigh of relief - and so I think will Coran.

The Railway Man - a few weeks ago

There was an email waiting for me from the District Manager when I got in just now with a date for my grievance - Friday 28th at 1pm. I am waiting for the Union Officer to confirm her availability before emailing him back to confirm. They are holding it at my place of work, where all the problems took place - what a bunch of idiots, as this is going to go round the home like wildfire !

Seven Days in Sunny June - Simply Red