Infectious reading

Been quite busy but a chest infection has laid me low. Well, slowed me up. So I am reading, short bits of each book in between whinging and knitting.

(Remember when library books had stickers about reporting the presence of infectious illnesses in the house when returning the books so they could be fumigated.)

I am currently reading

• Melissa by Taylor Caldwell
• It's Lovely to be Here – The Touring Diaries of a Scottish Gent by James Yorkston 
• http://www.jamesyorkston.co.uk/?page_id=125
• Bad Vibes : Britpop and My Part in Its Downfall by Luke Haines (contrasting review in the Observer)

Haines is vitriolic, Yorkston is gentle. I know I would prefer to hang out with Yorkston, especially as he is vegan. I think Haines is the better writer. What they have in common is that they show touring as a musician to be awful. I hate travelling anyway so it is nice to have it confirmed that it sucks.

Mental health connections: Haines hears voices due to drink and drugs and his behaviour and attitude suggests there is something shit going on under the surface. He does say at the start that he is writing as he was thinking back then, implying that he isn't like that anymore, or not so much anymore.

Melissa is the daughter of a psychopath, not the serial killer kind, but the kind who manipulates those around him in very destructive ways. Her reactions after his death, and that of her mother and her relationships with her siblings, show that she is still under his spell. My partly digested reading on object relations is helping me make sense of her behaviours. Caldwell was one of the first adult writers I read circa 1980, though I didn't read Melissa. It's readable.

Of course, I am currently reading these three books so who knows what I will think of each of them by the end. But so far, they are all good reading for me in my current state.

(BTW, Caldwell was a right wing anti-semite and had a FBI file because she was forever reporting people for involvement in the Kennedy assassination and other things. The FBI seemed to take it all with a pinch of salt.)