mairispaceship's review
5.0
For a non fiction book this one was absolutely delightful and packed with short stories, folklore and tales of the modern urban world we find ourselves in today. I now know more than I ever thought I would about telephone pylons, the spaces beneath motorways, and haunted hospitals. An easy 5/5 for me!
schopflin's review
4.0
Rees is such a good writer that even if you aren't convinced of the mythic power of our everyday urban features, this is worth reading. I am never sure with psychogeography whether there really is anything talismanic in my local business park but actually he makes a good case here, in the fears we have of them and the stories that emerge
tdbrwn's review
Interesting travelogue about some overlooked places in the 21st century British landscape that have developed their own myths and legends. The central idea is that new stories are built upon old histories just as modern structures are built upon ancient sites. An engaging exercise in re-enchantment.
thenarrative's review
4.0
Unofficial Britain by Gareth E Rees
Rating 4 / 5 Stars
Publication Date - 9/17/2020
** Thank you to Netgalley, Elliott & Thompson, and of course, Gareth E Rees, for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.
After moving to the UK 2 years ago, one of the best things I have done has been exploring the parts of Britain which are often overlooked in comparison to those places we know in a global sense (cities, historical sites etc). The places explored are not the most beautiful. We often assume they are ugly, uninteresting and not worth our trip to see them.
Rees gives these places new life. His ability to make them a beautiful piece of folklore and fiction which are a nod back to his roots as a writer of horror and weird fiction. The way he describes these locations is truly incredible.
Rating 4 / 5 Stars
Publication Date - 9/17/2020
** Thank you to Netgalley, Elliott & Thompson, and of course, Gareth E Rees, for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.
After moving to the UK 2 years ago, one of the best things I have done has been exploring the parts of Britain which are often overlooked in comparison to those places we know in a global sense (cities, historical sites etc). The places explored are not the most beautiful. We often assume they are ugly, uninteresting and not worth our trip to see them.
Rees gives these places new life. His ability to make them a beautiful piece of folklore and fiction which are a nod back to his roots as a writer of horror and weird fiction. The way he describes these locations is truly incredible.
amalia1985's review
4.0
‘’After a long trudge over a misty moor, you arrive at the crest of a hill and pause for breath by an oak tree. Initials have been etched into the bark by others who have stood here. Lovers. Friends. Mourners. Your eye follows a drystone wall down to the valley below, where a river meanders through a meadow; a Civil War battle took place there, one so bloody that the water ran red for a week. You smell smoke. Hear the crackle of burning wood. A crow flies out from the spire of a derelict church just visible above the trees. Bells begin to toll but you know there have been no bells in that church tower for decades.’’
A superb introductory chapter paves the way for an exciting reading experience. From 19th-century urban landscape legends (Jack the Ripper, Spring-Heeled Jack, body snatchers and the rise of Spiritualism), we enter a chronicle of the numerous ways Britain has changed over the centuries. Lore, the unofficial and much more accurate and objective form of History, lies in songs and nursery rhymes, legends of dark alleys, witch huts, shadowy forms seen in battle-torn fields, ghostly music and voices. But what of the lore we constantly create within the hearts of our modern cities?
‘’We have the same instinct to seek patterns in the chaos. We still yearn to make sense of the mystery of existence. We still tell stories to help us process the world. We still have an emotional attachment to places and objects. These impulses have not died beneath the concrete and tarmac of the modern world, any more than they did beneath the iron and brick of the industrial revolution.’’
Modern folklore is well-hidden in our contemporary urban reality where legends and myths coexist with our seemingly mundane routine as we make our way through our personal and professional lives. In this book, we travel to Hull, Manchester, Bristol, Glasgow, Birmingham and London.
Through the mysterious, fascinating Scarfolk craziness and the haunting children running around the pylons in Stocksbridge. The secrets of Glasgow and the mystery of urban geomancy. The folklore of roundabouts and crossroads, the haunted estates, the spectral nuns and monks and the faces in the windows. The mystery and danger of the underpasses, flyovers and intersections and their role in the development of urban culture. The strange magnetism of abandoned industrial sites and the sadness of car parks and multistoreys. The pain and agony that remain hidden behind the silent walls of abandoned hospitals.
I loved the 70s and 80s references and the writer’s passion and dedication to his theme. His words paint an eloquent and enticing background to the experiences he narrates and the writing is very engaging. You won’t be bored, not even for a moment. However, there were a couple of issues that felt problematic to me.
A woman was supposedly possessed by a demon named Pazuzu? Is this an attempt for the writer to appear smart? I fear all credibility can be thrown out of the window. Unfortunately, pun intended.
A certain interviewee’s convictions were highly problematic, even unacceptable. I mean, ‘’pride in being part of the drug underculture?’’ Since when do drugs consist a form of ‘’culture’’? Or any reason to be proud of? This brings me to the constant references of ‘’boozing’’. Being drunk is nothing to be proud of. It is hideous and dangerous.
So, there were many, many moments of beauty in this book but the attitude of the writer in what I consider sensitive issues diminished my enjoyment. Despite my personal dissatisfaction, you definitely need to try your luck with this book if only for the superb descriptions of the scenery and a world that may already be beyond our grasp.
‘’Witches, ghosts and demons have not been entirely banished to legend- they haunt our homes, shops, hospitals and roads. The churches, forbidden woods and haunted mansions that were once the stuff of our dreams and nightmares have now been replaced in our imaginations by industrial estates, power stations and factories.’’
Many thanks to Allison Menzies, Elliot & Thompson and NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.
My reviews can also be found on https://theopinionatedreaderblog.wordpress.com/
A superb introductory chapter paves the way for an exciting reading experience. From 19th-century urban landscape legends (Jack the Ripper, Spring-Heeled Jack, body snatchers and the rise of Spiritualism), we enter a chronicle of the numerous ways Britain has changed over the centuries. Lore, the unofficial and much more accurate and objective form of History, lies in songs and nursery rhymes, legends of dark alleys, witch huts, shadowy forms seen in battle-torn fields, ghostly music and voices. But what of the lore we constantly create within the hearts of our modern cities?
‘’We have the same instinct to seek patterns in the chaos. We still yearn to make sense of the mystery of existence. We still tell stories to help us process the world. We still have an emotional attachment to places and objects. These impulses have not died beneath the concrete and tarmac of the modern world, any more than they did beneath the iron and brick of the industrial revolution.’’
Modern folklore is well-hidden in our contemporary urban reality where legends and myths coexist with our seemingly mundane routine as we make our way through our personal and professional lives. In this book, we travel to Hull, Manchester, Bristol, Glasgow, Birmingham and London.
Through the mysterious, fascinating Scarfolk craziness and the haunting children running around the pylons in Stocksbridge. The secrets of Glasgow and the mystery of urban geomancy. The folklore of roundabouts and crossroads, the haunted estates, the spectral nuns and monks and the faces in the windows. The mystery and danger of the underpasses, flyovers and intersections and their role in the development of urban culture. The strange magnetism of abandoned industrial sites and the sadness of car parks and multistoreys. The pain and agony that remain hidden behind the silent walls of abandoned hospitals.
I loved the 70s and 80s references and the writer’s passion and dedication to his theme. His words paint an eloquent and enticing background to the experiences he narrates and the writing is very engaging. You won’t be bored, not even for a moment. However, there were a couple of issues that felt problematic to me.
A woman was supposedly possessed by a demon named Pazuzu? Is this an attempt for the writer to appear smart? I fear all credibility can be thrown out of the window. Unfortunately, pun intended.
A certain interviewee’s convictions were highly problematic, even unacceptable. I mean, ‘’pride in being part of the drug underculture?’’ Since when do drugs consist a form of ‘’culture’’? Or any reason to be proud of? This brings me to the constant references of ‘’boozing’’. Being drunk is nothing to be proud of. It is hideous and dangerous.
So, there were many, many moments of beauty in this book but the attitude of the writer in what I consider sensitive issues diminished my enjoyment. Despite my personal dissatisfaction, you definitely need to try your luck with this book if only for the superb descriptions of the scenery and a world that may already be beyond our grasp.
‘’Witches, ghosts and demons have not been entirely banished to legend- they haunt our homes, shops, hospitals and roads. The churches, forbidden woods and haunted mansions that were once the stuff of our dreams and nightmares have now been replaced in our imaginations by industrial estates, power stations and factories.’’
Many thanks to Allison Menzies, Elliot & Thompson and NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.
My reviews can also be found on https://theopinionatedreaderblog.wordpress.com/
halfmanhalfbook's review
5.0
We all have our favourite parts of this country, one of my is West Bay in Dorset, it is a beautiful place to visit on the Jurassic Coast at the end of Chesil Beach. Sitting by the sea watching the boats come in and out of the harbour is a lovely way to spend a day. But even in this beautiful spot, there are things that you probably haven’t noticed on the fringes of our society and have stories of their own to tell.
Gareth Rees has been collecting these stories for a while now and placing them on his web site, Unofficial Britain and for the first time, they have been gathered in this book. He begins with the electricity pylon, a mundane enough object that unless you look for them, they will escape your notice. Pylons were designed by the architect Sir Reginald Blomfield. He did a classical design inspired by the shape of Egyptian obelisks; they are far more ornate than they need be. Pylons divide people, a fair number consider them a blot on the landscape but there are others who see them in a very different light. These pylon poets appreciate them for what they are and their presence in the landscape. The pinnacle of this ‘Worship of the Hum’ is best expressed by the author David Southwall and his creation of Hookland, a collection of weird folklore drawn from ancient rituals.
The stone circle is a ritual space that were constructed in from the Neolithic era onwards. They still have a presence in the landscape today and many people are drawn to them. Some people see that circular features in the modern cityscape have a similar draw to those ancient ones, and Rees goes into some detail about Glasgow after seeing a map on the pillar of a flyover. It was a map of the inner ring road filled in black. Known as urban geomancy, people study maps in detail to read and interpret them, much like ley lines. Even a modern-day replica of a stone circle that he visits at the Coul Roundabout in Fife. Even though it is new, it still feels alive.
Anybody should be able to feel a connection with place, no matter where they grew up or where they live, even in the densest concrete jungles or the most monotonous suburban sprawls
If you were to imagine a haunted house, the film world has tropes that spring to mind. It would be at the bottom of a lane, the vegetation would be dark and oppressive, windows would be broken and so on. He is seeking ghosts that can be found in relatively modern homes and he heads to Grimsby to investigate the presence of a ghostly nun and other supernatural events in the town. Poverty and lack of investment have turned estates that were once full of life and people into ghost homes. We can project our fears onto any inanimate object.
Remnants of factories and industrial sites that are shadows of their former glory are other places where their presence is still felt many years after they stopped being the main employers in their towns. He talks about sirens that would sound for no apparent reason at night waking people up and old industrial sites that had sinister and secret uses, places that even now can raise hairs on the back of your neck. Edgelands have a life of their own, some of it is natural, plants that cling onto life in the most unexpected ways and some of it manmade and often slightly unnerving. Offerings that have always been left in spiritual sites can now be found in places that you wouldn’t expect like the underpasses of motorways and interchanges; he is with friends when he finds a vintage doll holding flowers. They have a raft of questions that this inert doll is never going to be able to answer for them.
We know almost nothing of ritual items left by our ancestors, so how will an archaeologist of the future interpret the things that we are leaving behind? Some features of the urban landscape have reached cult status, one of those was the Redcliffe flyover in Bristol; it has been replaced by a roundabout, but its loss was mourned by many. Near the M32 they find a shrine, though which god it is honouring is a mystery. Spaghetti Junction has 1 million vehicles pass along its twisting roads, but most are utterly unaware of the river that flows underneath it and the wildlife that it supports.
Landscapes overlay landscapes and if you know how and where to look you can see the past clearly. Rees is fascinated by the thin places of this country, places where the past and the present overlap and he see this most clearly in the industrial estates that you can find in every town and city and the desolate areas that are there if you know where to look. They walk along Bromley Hall Road, past salvage businesses and knackers yards and stop to look at the fifteenth-century hall that is remarkably still there and is the oldest brick building in London. Concrete multistorey car parks are a bit of an eyesore unless you happen to have a thing about brutalist architecture. When I drive around them, they always feel a bit too small for the cars that they are supposed to be sheltering. Rees is in Bristol to discover the stories he has heard about hauntings in a particular building.
Near where I grew up was a huge mental institution called Brookwood Hospital. Most of the residents were gone by the mid-1980s, bar a few inside a 6m high fenced-off building. Before the rest was flattened to build homes on we used to play in the partially derelict buildings on the site. I don’t remember any ghosts at the time, but it could be creepy. Rees recounts stories of those that have seen movement behind windows of hospitals in Manchester and of shrieking that disrupted filming in an establishment in Nottingham. To close he heads north on the M6, an almost ritualist journey that he remembers well from his childhood and it is fitting that he ends up in Tebay South Service station where there are standing stones that that fit in even though they shouldn’t.
Sometimes the present can haunt the living as much as the past
I thought that this was an excellent book. I like his curiosity in anything and everything that he sees, be it modern or ancient and he searches for meaning in some form in his subjects. It is a heady mix of folklore, history, landscape and cityscape writing and all built on the foundation of psychogeography. He writes well too and gets the balance just right between being fact and unease with his subject matter. If you have the slightest interest about the place that you live and want to find out what goes on in those tiny triangles of land which most people avoid, then this is a good place to start. Can also recommend these books that pick up on similar themes:
[b:Scarp: In Search of London's Outer Limits|15706528|Scarp In Search of London's Outer Limits|Nick Papadimitriou|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1339758071l/15706528._SX50_.jpg|21370304]Scarp by [a:Nick Papadimitriou|4082820|Nick Papadimitriou|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-632230dc9882b4352d753eedf9396530.png]
[b:Edgelands|10480664|Edgelands|Paul Farley|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1328035282l/10480664._SY75_.jpg|15386089] by [a:Paul Farley|179373|Paul Farley|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1554529611p2/179373.jpg]and [a:Michael Symmons Roberts|523632|Michael Symmons Roberts|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1554530090p2/523632.jpg]
[b:The Unofficial Countryside|8491353|The Unofficial Countryside|Richard Mabey|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1332592075l/8491353._SX50_.jpg|3522438] by [a:Richard Mabey|225958|Richard Mabey|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1298912138p2/225958.jpg]
[b:Strange Labyrinth: Outlaws, Poets, Mystics, Murderers and a Coward in London's Great Forest|33300968|Strange Labyrinth Outlaws, Poets, Mystics, Murderers and a Coward in London's Great Forest|Will Ashon|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1481327694l/33300968._SY75_.jpg|54033903] by [a:Will Ashon|848799|Will Ashon|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-632230dc9882b4352d753eedf9396530.png]
Gareth Rees has been collecting these stories for a while now and placing them on his web site, Unofficial Britain and for the first time, they have been gathered in this book. He begins with the electricity pylon, a mundane enough object that unless you look for them, they will escape your notice. Pylons were designed by the architect Sir Reginald Blomfield. He did a classical design inspired by the shape of Egyptian obelisks; they are far more ornate than they need be. Pylons divide people, a fair number consider them a blot on the landscape but there are others who see them in a very different light. These pylon poets appreciate them for what they are and their presence in the landscape. The pinnacle of this ‘Worship of the Hum’ is best expressed by the author David Southwall and his creation of Hookland, a collection of weird folklore drawn from ancient rituals.
The stone circle is a ritual space that were constructed in from the Neolithic era onwards. They still have a presence in the landscape today and many people are drawn to them. Some people see that circular features in the modern cityscape have a similar draw to those ancient ones, and Rees goes into some detail about Glasgow after seeing a map on the pillar of a flyover. It was a map of the inner ring road filled in black. Known as urban geomancy, people study maps in detail to read and interpret them, much like ley lines. Even a modern-day replica of a stone circle that he visits at the Coul Roundabout in Fife. Even though it is new, it still feels alive.
Anybody should be able to feel a connection with place, no matter where they grew up or where they live, even in the densest concrete jungles or the most monotonous suburban sprawls
If you were to imagine a haunted house, the film world has tropes that spring to mind. It would be at the bottom of a lane, the vegetation would be dark and oppressive, windows would be broken and so on. He is seeking ghosts that can be found in relatively modern homes and he heads to Grimsby to investigate the presence of a ghostly nun and other supernatural events in the town. Poverty and lack of investment have turned estates that were once full of life and people into ghost homes. We can project our fears onto any inanimate object.
Remnants of factories and industrial sites that are shadows of their former glory are other places where their presence is still felt many years after they stopped being the main employers in their towns. He talks about sirens that would sound for no apparent reason at night waking people up and old industrial sites that had sinister and secret uses, places that even now can raise hairs on the back of your neck. Edgelands have a life of their own, some of it is natural, plants that cling onto life in the most unexpected ways and some of it manmade and often slightly unnerving. Offerings that have always been left in spiritual sites can now be found in places that you wouldn’t expect like the underpasses of motorways and interchanges; he is with friends when he finds a vintage doll holding flowers. They have a raft of questions that this inert doll is never going to be able to answer for them.
We know almost nothing of ritual items left by our ancestors, so how will an archaeologist of the future interpret the things that we are leaving behind? Some features of the urban landscape have reached cult status, one of those was the Redcliffe flyover in Bristol; it has been replaced by a roundabout, but its loss was mourned by many. Near the M32 they find a shrine, though which god it is honouring is a mystery. Spaghetti Junction has 1 million vehicles pass along its twisting roads, but most are utterly unaware of the river that flows underneath it and the wildlife that it supports.
Landscapes overlay landscapes and if you know how and where to look you can see the past clearly. Rees is fascinated by the thin places of this country, places where the past and the present overlap and he see this most clearly in the industrial estates that you can find in every town and city and the desolate areas that are there if you know where to look. They walk along Bromley Hall Road, past salvage businesses and knackers yards and stop to look at the fifteenth-century hall that is remarkably still there and is the oldest brick building in London. Concrete multistorey car parks are a bit of an eyesore unless you happen to have a thing about brutalist architecture. When I drive around them, they always feel a bit too small for the cars that they are supposed to be sheltering. Rees is in Bristol to discover the stories he has heard about hauntings in a particular building.
Near where I grew up was a huge mental institution called Brookwood Hospital. Most of the residents were gone by the mid-1980s, bar a few inside a 6m high fenced-off building. Before the rest was flattened to build homes on we used to play in the partially derelict buildings on the site. I don’t remember any ghosts at the time, but it could be creepy. Rees recounts stories of those that have seen movement behind windows of hospitals in Manchester and of shrieking that disrupted filming in an establishment in Nottingham. To close he heads north on the M6, an almost ritualist journey that he remembers well from his childhood and it is fitting that he ends up in Tebay South Service station where there are standing stones that that fit in even though they shouldn’t.
Sometimes the present can haunt the living as much as the past
I thought that this was an excellent book. I like his curiosity in anything and everything that he sees, be it modern or ancient and he searches for meaning in some form in his subjects. It is a heady mix of folklore, history, landscape and cityscape writing and all built on the foundation of psychogeography. He writes well too and gets the balance just right between being fact and unease with his subject matter. If you have the slightest interest about the place that you live and want to find out what goes on in those tiny triangles of land which most people avoid, then this is a good place to start. Can also recommend these books that pick up on similar themes:
[b:Scarp: In Search of London's Outer Limits|15706528|Scarp In Search of London's Outer Limits|Nick Papadimitriou|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1339758071l/15706528._SX50_.jpg|21370304]Scarp by [a:Nick Papadimitriou|4082820|Nick Papadimitriou|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-632230dc9882b4352d753eedf9396530.png]
[b:Edgelands|10480664|Edgelands|Paul Farley|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1328035282l/10480664._SY75_.jpg|15386089] by [a:Paul Farley|179373|Paul Farley|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1554529611p2/179373.jpg]and [a:Michael Symmons Roberts|523632|Michael Symmons Roberts|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1554530090p2/523632.jpg]
[b:The Unofficial Countryside|8491353|The Unofficial Countryside|Richard Mabey|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1332592075l/8491353._SX50_.jpg|3522438] by [a:Richard Mabey|225958|Richard Mabey|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1298912138p2/225958.jpg]
[b:Strange Labyrinth: Outlaws, Poets, Mystics, Murderers and a Coward in London's Great Forest|33300968|Strange Labyrinth Outlaws, Poets, Mystics, Murderers and a Coward in London's Great Forest|Will Ashon|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1481327694l/33300968._SY75_.jpg|54033903] by [a:Will Ashon|848799|Will Ashon|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-632230dc9882b4352d753eedf9396530.png]
annarella's review
5.0
An excellent and well written books that helped me to discover new places and appreciate new to me places.
It's well researched and engrossing.
Highly recommended.
Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for this ARC, all opinions are mine
It's well researched and engrossing.
Highly recommended.
Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for this ARC, all opinions are mine
kingjason's review
5.0
Well this book was certainly an eye opener for me, it wasn't long ago that I found out the kid from Home Alone was 40 and I felt really old...now I find out the the buildings of my youth are old enough now to potentially be haunted, I feel positively ancient now.
In this book Rees explores those places that are right in front of us but at the same time are almost hidden, Multi-storey car parks, industrial estates, pylons, flyovers and hospitals. These are the sort of places we take for granted, we have grown up around them and think of them as landmarks only, not many people realise there is so much life happening around or under them. To me the spaghetti junction is a nightmare of a road to navigate, but there are many who have found peace living beneath it, the way Rees describes things, it almost feels tranquil.
As a young lad I was a scout and we used to go exploring a lot, night-time walks into the countryside to find a farm, it was so eerie, large structures and abandoned machinery gave us a great time. Quite often we'd find ourselves pulled towards a large pylon, usually to listen to it's crackle and pretend we could hear voices. I have not explored like that in many years, my focus is usually looking for a bit of quite and some wildlife spotting, but after reading this I do fancy a walk around the local industrial estate and maybe a trip to the town centre to check out the car park.
One very interesting side of this book is Rees' many references to music, film and books which have all been inspired by these structures, most notable is the books by J.G. Ballard and any movie with a young lady being stalked in a car park. Rees meets many interesting people and manages to get some great stories from them.
My favourite part of the book was his trip up the M6, I have travelled that road many times on journeys up to Scotland and so far have missed out of so much....next time it will be different.
Absolutely loved this, such a strange idea for a book which makes perfect sense when you get to the end. Give it a go because Rees' words can be quite beautiful at times.
Blog review: https://felcherman.wordpress.com/2020/09/26/unofficial-britain-journeys-through-unexpected-places-by-gareth-e-rees/
In this book Rees explores those places that are right in front of us but at the same time are almost hidden, Multi-storey car parks, industrial estates, pylons, flyovers and hospitals. These are the sort of places we take for granted, we have grown up around them and think of them as landmarks only, not many people realise there is so much life happening around or under them. To me the spaghetti junction is a nightmare of a road to navigate, but there are many who have found peace living beneath it, the way Rees describes things, it almost feels tranquil.
As a young lad I was a scout and we used to go exploring a lot, night-time walks into the countryside to find a farm, it was so eerie, large structures and abandoned machinery gave us a great time. Quite often we'd find ourselves pulled towards a large pylon, usually to listen to it's crackle and pretend we could hear voices. I have not explored like that in many years, my focus is usually looking for a bit of quite and some wildlife spotting, but after reading this I do fancy a walk around the local industrial estate and maybe a trip to the town centre to check out the car park.
One very interesting side of this book is Rees' many references to music, film and books which have all been inspired by these structures, most notable is the books by J.G. Ballard and any movie with a young lady being stalked in a car park. Rees meets many interesting people and manages to get some great stories from them.
My favourite part of the book was his trip up the M6, I have travelled that road many times on journeys up to Scotland and so far have missed out of so much....next time it will be different.
Absolutely loved this, such a strange idea for a book which makes perfect sense when you get to the end. Give it a go because Rees' words can be quite beautiful at times.
Blog review: https://felcherman.wordpress.com/2020/09/26/unofficial-britain-journeys-through-unexpected-places-by-gareth-e-rees/
samhouston's review
3.0
Gareth Rees’s Unofficial Britain: Journeys Through Unexpected Places certainly lives up to its title. Despite having lived in the U.K. for a number of years, and the thousands of miles I’ve driven there, Rees took me to some places I never even got close to exploring (not that I would have likely explored them even if I’d known about them), some truly “unexpected places.”
Picture if you would a study of the country’s electric pylon networks, its ring roads and roundabouts, its abandoned housing and industrial estates, its underpasses and flyovers, its “concrete castles” (otherwise known as multi-story parking garages), and its abandoned hospitals. My personal favorite chapter in the book is its last, one titled “An Emotional Life of the M6,” in which Rees details his still very strong attachment to that particular motorway. This is the chapter that readers will most easily identify with, especially if they have their own memories tucked away of some long highway or interstate they once traveled regularly with their parents.
Gareth Rees visited multiple cities and towns in England, Scotland, and Wales in search of weird stories “about the lore of everyday urban life.” He traveled to major cities like Manchester, London, and Birmingham as well as to lesser known towns and villages such as Harlow, Grimsby, Greenock and Kirkintilloch. You might think that he was only looking for “haunted” spots in each location he stopped to explore. After all, how easy must it be to convince yourself that an abandoned hospital – complete with beds and other left behind equipment – or a long abandoned factory that looks like everyone just decided never to return one after work one day, is haunted? It would be particularly easy to do so at dusk, exactly the time of day Rees most often visited such places.
But Unofficial Britain is not a book about ghost hunters or one written for them. Rees has a much deeper observation than that to share with his readers. Rees reaches the conclusion that even though everything about a place changes over the years, very little that matters actually changes. He maintains that a certain place tone and spirit is maintained forever despite what is overlaid on any place through the centuries – that each use of a place leaves something behind forever in an “ever-turning cycle.” He uses examples such as these:
“The flyover where a viaduct once stood. The Victorian workhouse that became a hospital. The steelworks on the site of a monastery. The burial cairn surrounded by a busy interchange. Motorway earthworks that rise alongside their Stone Age predecessors.”
All places that Rees visits in Unofficial Britain” – all places where he feels the pull of the past so strongly that it gives him goose-bumps.
Picture if you would a study of the country’s electric pylon networks, its ring roads and roundabouts, its abandoned housing and industrial estates, its underpasses and flyovers, its “concrete castles” (otherwise known as multi-story parking garages), and its abandoned hospitals. My personal favorite chapter in the book is its last, one titled “An Emotional Life of the M6,” in which Rees details his still very strong attachment to that particular motorway. This is the chapter that readers will most easily identify with, especially if they have their own memories tucked away of some long highway or interstate they once traveled regularly with their parents.
Gareth Rees visited multiple cities and towns in England, Scotland, and Wales in search of weird stories “about the lore of everyday urban life.” He traveled to major cities like Manchester, London, and Birmingham as well as to lesser known towns and villages such as Harlow, Grimsby, Greenock and Kirkintilloch. You might think that he was only looking for “haunted” spots in each location he stopped to explore. After all, how easy must it be to convince yourself that an abandoned hospital – complete with beds and other left behind equipment – or a long abandoned factory that looks like everyone just decided never to return one after work one day, is haunted? It would be particularly easy to do so at dusk, exactly the time of day Rees most often visited such places.
But Unofficial Britain is not a book about ghost hunters or one written for them. Rees has a much deeper observation than that to share with his readers. Rees reaches the conclusion that even though everything about a place changes over the years, very little that matters actually changes. He maintains that a certain place tone and spirit is maintained forever despite what is overlaid on any place through the centuries – that each use of a place leaves something behind forever in an “ever-turning cycle.” He uses examples such as these:
“The flyover where a viaduct once stood. The Victorian workhouse that became a hospital. The steelworks on the site of a monastery. The burial cairn surrounded by a busy interchange. Motorway earthworks that rise alongside their Stone Age predecessors.”
All places that Rees visits in Unofficial Britain” – all places where he feels the pull of the past so strongly that it gives him goose-bumps.