The best possible ragbag

I love books like this. A writer writing about what he knows and what he loves and things he has done, with absolutely no thought as to the marketability of the book when it comes out. This very slight lack of focus has already been reflected in a couple of reviews. What is it, fish or fowl? The publishers, probably scratching their heads and wondering which shelf it’ll be put on, will no doubt classify it as ‘music’ or maybe ‘autobiography’, as all the chain bookshops like their non-fiction easily categorisable.

I love books like this. A writer writing about what he knows and what he loves and things he has done, with absolutely no thought as to the marketability of the book when it comes out. This very slight lack of focus has already been reflected in a couple of reviews. What is it, fish or fowl? The publishers, probably scratching their heads and wondering which shelf it’ll be put on, will no doubt classify it as ‘music’ or maybe ‘autobiography’, as all the chain bookshops like their non-fiction easily categorisable.

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Brendan O’Neill

The moment in the ‘grooming gangs’ debate that shamed Jess Phillips

I have to admit that this is an old beef of mine. While a history book is clearly a history book, and Jordan’s latest memoir goes on the big table for thickies near the door, too many interesting non-fiction titles don’t quite fit into any obvious categories, so that in most bookshops you can never find them. It’s what we might call the Geoff Dyer Problem. Is Out of Sheer Rage, his wonderful book about not writing a book about D. H. Lawrence, literary criticism? Biography? Humour? Travel? Psychology? When you go into a shop like Daunt’s in Marylebone High Street and see its ‘General Non-Fiction’ section, full of things you have failed to track down elsewhere, you almost want to weep with relief.