A truly delightful read. Light and cheerful, but serious and peculiar at the same time. I’ve read this book many times in my life and it never fails to lift me.

The heroine, Mouche, is desperate for comfort and very nearly resorts to the time honoured solution of suicide. However, she is brought back from the brink by an intriguing range of fantastical characters- the seven puppets and their elusive master. Times are still tough, but Mouche now has a purpose and her honest determination to fulfil it as well as possible is a heartwarming and charming experience.

The writing and imagery is divine. The flickering characters of these seven dolls provide an outline for the plot; the ropes of a boxing ring for our two mismatched lovers to fight their unique fight. We are fooled, along with Mouche, into taking these boundaries as real and defined whenever they shimmer into existence. Of course, the puppeteer holds all the strings, although Gallico goes a very long way towards convincing us otherwise.

The hardback dust cover of this hand-achingly huge novel is shot through with fuscia bullet holes, and that’s a bit how you’ll feel when you read it: emotionally punctured but simultaneously tickled a heartwarming shade of pink.

A son narrates the story of his dad, ‘the most hated man in Australia’, and his uncle, ‘the most loved man in Australia’. It’s a long read, but it whips along and you’ll come out wanting more. If you like novels that drag you inside the characters’ heads and shine torches in places you haven’t even explored inside your own, read this book. ‘Empathy’ doesn’t come close to describing how invested I felt in the leads by the inevitably ‘back-to-reality’ ending.

The worrying thing? These are some seriously messed up characters. In some ways, it’s a treacherous read: convictions of immortality, self-indulgent fantasies, over-thinking, the very temptation of insanity and despair bellow from the pages, beckoning you closer. However, Toltz’s genius isn’t just that he makes you spot these traits in yourself, but that he makes you point and laugh at them on sighting.

Yes, it’s a self-indulgently long book (one of those I wish I had the guts to wield a cleaver on), and yes, from time to time, it makes you want to tear out the pages and try to suffocate yourself with them, but did I love it? Absolutely.

My latest blog post on Project Dirt, outlining a few Green Events in London in the week ahead.

I can’t really tell you much about this here. I have done a bit - not much, but enough to know how it works. Get in touch if you’d like to know more.

(Thanks to creepyhalloweenimages for the picture)

I used to contribute to this travel website: here are a couple of my favourite pieces: Volcan Acatenango, Elephant Trekking in Pai, An adventure in the Dales: From Buttertubs to Blakethwaite.

I was also responsible for managing a lot of the other contributors to the site.

I worked as a “Texpert“, a company similar to AQA and 118118. This involved countless hours of research and synthesis across the web for fast, compact and informative answers to customer inquiries. It was a lot of fun!

Moss Green Books- A regular blogging gig for a green children’s books websites. My most popular posts so far include: Stylish and Sustainable Wrapping For Your Books, 5 Things You Didn’t Know About Fairy Tales and 11 Children’s Book Awards to Look Out For.