Hannah: Woman of Iron by Barbara Sowood


Hannah: Woman of Iron is more of a novella than a full story book. It was an intriguing look at the life of a woman who lived during the 19th century and who took on the task of managing her husband's ironworks, while bringing up several young children. Sowood's fictional tale was particularly interesting to me having recently read about the 'prophet' John Wroe by Jane Rogers, another historical fiction, as this same man also appears very many times in Hannah: Woman of Iron. I was disappointed to find out very little about the running of an ironworks during the industrial revolution, either by man or woman. This novella was much more about the effects of John Wroe upon the town of Ashton-under-Lyne and Hannah's family, especially her grown-up children. When Sarah, her daughter, says that she has been chosen by Wroe to give birth to the new Messiah, called the Shiloh, it causes great consternation. Hannah's strong courage and determination, reputably a trait of Lancashire women of the times, is explored by the author in a very understandable and credible fashion. The conversations and arguments; Hannah's innermost thoughts and fears for her family's reputation; and her generous attitude towards others are explored well by Barbara Sowood - if a little simplistically at times. My last comment about the narrative is because much of the writing style reminded me of the style found in a children's book, of a book meant for early teens. Indeed there is nothing tackled here that could not generally be understood by a clever child of about 12 or 13 years.

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Peterloo: The Story of the Manchester Massacre by Jacqueline Riding
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This fascinating "book of the film" - Peterloo, directed by Mike Leigh - gave some wonderful and equally disturbing insights into the events that led up to, and resulting consequences of the traumatic hustings in St. Peter's Field, Manchester, on Monday 16th August 1819. The descriptions of the many main characters, such as Henry Hunt, Samuel Bamford, Lord Sidmouth, Joseph Nadin and various magistrates, gave the reader some kind of balance to the context but did not change my overall final emotions of sadness and outrage on behalf of the needlessly slain and injured people who had gathered in Manchester.

Whether the local and national governments' statements and various "Acts" later on were all part of a massive kind of cover-up is still debatable but I have no doubt that the whole event (incident?) was disgracefully mishandled by all of the authorities involved, including the military and various administrators. The mere fact that they employed several, later (in)famous, spies who also acted as agents-provocateurs seriously undermines any case of justification put forward by the Home Secretary Sidmouth and his lackeys. The book is incredibly revealing in lots of those sort of details and Jacqueline Riding is to be highly commended for the amount of research done for this very readable account.

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Black Hat Blues by Gene Kendall
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This was one of the strangest books I’ve read this year. I loved The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Universe but, unfortunately, not this book. It was OK, since much of it reminded me of Douglas Adams’ style of writing. But I found most of it hard to understand probably because the comic book style plot and genre was something that I left behind some 50 or 60 years ago. For me the pace was breathless at times, especially the dialogue and, as a UK reader, there were too many USA idiosyncrasies. However, there was a lot to appeal to my sense of humour and expectation in the novel. There is a hero and a villain and thus plenty of ‘Good versus Evil’, and action involving different universes. Maybe there were a few too many stereotypical characters and situations, for me, in the story? That said, when an old ‘avant-garde’ cartoonist’s creations come to life and begin to influence his ‘real’ world then anything can happen – most of it does in this well-written tale. Black Hat Blues will appeal to fans of the comic book genre, even, probably, to those who were reading ‘Mad Magazine’ long ago as I did, but with a slightly less jaded outlook nowadays. Recommended.

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