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Winchelsea

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Wow, this book went down plot caverns and hidden treasure troves that surprised and sometimes horrified me. But let me say I was never bored!! Winchelsea” is as much a book about the characters in it, as about the land they were living on. I very much liked that the author has put so much effort into painting not just where this book was placed, but also its history. And have done so without ever abandoning Goody or any other characters that were telling her story. It was rather done THROUGH her and what she’s done.

The 43-year-old has written four novels and one memoir to date, each different from the last, with topics ranging from high finance to religion, war to a love of birds. “I don’t understand how people write the same book time and again,” he says. “I want each new experience to be totally novel, and to immerse myself in a new world each time.”It started off with intrigue, a tale retold from another who heard it first hand, of a girl, rescued at birth, raised with intention, but destined to become her own person, strong brave and independent. But just when you are getting into her story, a child she still is at this point, it goes off on such a tangent I was confused what the author was even thinking. It goes from a smugglers tale, based on real people, places, and events, a tale of a girl facing the loss of the only father she ever knew just as she learns he is not all she thought, to being about a child, for she is still a child of 16, exploring her burgeoning love for another woman, and her lust for her adopted brother…oh, and nearly being raped by her true father, and that’s where I lost interest. It is the story of Goody Brown and the corrupt world that she lives in. Throughout the story you are presented with trials and tribulations far beyond your ken that you really do feel like you have been invited into another world.

Winchelsea is no mere rehash of a largely forgotten novel, but rather a vigorous reinvention of the entire genre. Set in 1742, it revolves around the life and misadventures of Goody Brown, a young adopted woman brought up around the marshes of Winchelsea in East Sussex, where smuggling is rife. When she turns 16, her father is murdered. It capsized his life for quite a time,” his older brother says, “but he’s doing really well now, writing hits for Olly Murs, Little Mix and Alicia Keys.” Beaming, he adds: “He’s such a smart, sensitive and generous boy.” Then we switch to another narrator for the ending portion.. At least this was a character we are familiar with from fairly early on in the book but suddenly it feels like now the book is about him and no longer really about Goody at all.He would lose himself repeatedly in his beloved Moonfleet alongside Robert Louis Stevenson and Enid Blyton’s Famous Five series, and so the idea of one day trying to write a ripping yarn of his own always held appeal. “I enjoyed writing it enormously,” he says. The letter from Goody at the beginning says that her true narrative, through the different lenses of the text has turned into something of a novel. I found this destabilising to the text immediately as she talks about ‘the novel’ with the certainties of a modern writer, where the term was still a disputed and nebulous term in 1779 when she is writing. She also makes the point that most of the narrative was told by her to a man and so warns the reader that the book may sound like a man writing as a woman more than the real lived experience of a woman. This caveat seems to have no meaning or purpose within the world of the book but instead refers to the fact the (twenty-first century) novel is in fact written by a man and making excuses for the fact it sounds like a man writing a woman. This is still further complicated by the fact that Goody does in fact live as a man for a large section of the book which sort of makes her a pseudo-male narrator anyway. In regards to censoring this book, which has been suggested (for adults only) I am adamantly opposed. I find this especially abhorrent for the reasons given of same sex coupling and incest. Was it really incest then or now…there is no easy answer to this, which was surely excellent plotting and writing by this articulate and clever author. It made be think, which is a gift from any story.

Medieval climate change: how the ravages of extreme weather, as the Medieval Warm Period gave way to Little Ice Age, laid waste to the cities of Old Winchelsea and Dunwich Goody, who lives in “a time for brazen men”, refuses to conform to gender stereotype. She wants to be living, “out on the ocean, with [a] sword at my waist; to be… full and unconstrained”. In other words, to become a smuggler – and to slay her father’s killers. Pity the fool that stands in her way. I read Winchelsea with a bit of trepidation. I like historical fiction but often find some times or places a bit more difficult to read. I don’t know why this is but its my thing, okay? I am glad that I read Winchelsea though because it is damn good. Museum exhibits include civic regalia, a model of the medieval town, local pottery, paintings, old photographs, and civic seals, along with the silver mace used by the town's sergeant-at-arms. What holds the novel together as much as its driving plot are its incantatory atmosphere and spellbinding language. Nights are noisy with owls and fieldfares, “their lonely twits falling down through the dark”, while meaning oozes via sound and rhythm from antique vocabulary such as “fallalery” and “yelloching”.I greatly appreciated the unfolding of this book, the plot, the characters, the voices, the mysterious and unforgiving sea, the deeply complicated town & the secrets it guards. With the aid of striking maps, prints and photographs, Matthew will resurrect these lost towns and settlements, evoking their unique layouts and describing in dramatic detail the experiences of their former dwellers - many of whom tried, but failed, to resist the tides of change. This class will also explore how and why places are disappearing from Britain’s landscape today and what the past might reveal about the future. Course content Reformation and Renaissance: how places like the half-drowned city of Dunwich, with its ruined monasteries, captured enquiring minds

Goody was a very interesting and often surprising character. Her dramatic beginning in some way or other shaped her for her whole life. Despite being raised as a lady with as much comfort and education as her foster family could muster, she never was one. Always wild, she didn’t care very much about the pressure of social life and it’s rules. She was never certain as to whether she was man or woman, she lived her life as both and neither. I think that was one of the things I liked the most about her: she was living her life the way she wanted it to be. And at the same time, she went through so much at such a young age. The way she was portrayed gave me an inside as to what emotions she felt and through this she felt much more close to me. Winchelsea is an extraordinary town, steeped in history. Every house has a story to tell, and many of them stand on much older foundations. A day spent exploring historic Winchelsea is a day well spent! Getting There I REALLY enjoyed this for the first three quarters; I felt like I was on my own smuggling adventure.

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Lauren Graham: 'Why are men still surprised they like Gilmore Girls?' 24 November, 2023 The 20 best children’s books for Christmas 2023 24 November, 2023 How They Broke Britain by James O'Brien is full of anger - and not much else 23 November, 2023 For my own sensibilities, I cringed and was disquieted by the violence. However, I would not suggest that as reason to read or not to read for others. It is graphically murderous and filled with the baser actions of humankind to destroy lives for profit, power and whim. That, unfortunately is true today and since the earliest times on earth. Enlightenment: how self-sufficient societies, such as St Kilda in the Outer Hebrides, were doomed by philosophical voyagers in pursuit of ‘natural man’ If you aren’t familiar with Winchelsea and it’s smugglers you probably won’t mind this so much. If you like a bawdy tale with sex, booze, sailing and bloodshed then give it a go. Just be prepared for abrupt story changes, unfinished threads, and a feeling that there was so much more to be explored. The building has an oddly truncated appearance. It is unclear whether the original plans for a large cruciform church were never finished, or whether the absence of a nave, tower, and transepts was the result of a devastating French raid on Winchelsea in 1380.

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