Coastalblog

An so it came to pass that with two thirds of the year boxed off your humble correspondent threw up his hands and declared that all the year's lofty aims were coming a horrible cropper. Which, of course, they were always going to. However, it's hard to get too down-heartened about failing in the tasks I've set myself when the attempt contains gems like this. It's stretching the no re-reads rule a trifle, because I have indeed read this book before, but it was that long ago I reckoned an exception could be made, and I'm very glad I did. What seemed to me to be unnecessarily tricksy when I was a tedious undergrad who wasn't half as clever as he thought he was has turned over time into a glorious flight of fancy (or rather, I've turned into someone who can get his head around it). Concerning the adventures of Jordan, an abandoned child discovered on the banks of the Thames (two rivers already, with all the intimation of travel and impermanence that they imply