NOTHING TO WRITE HOME ABOUT Compiled By Michelle Abadie and Susan Beale

I have always loved postcards.

I have collected postcards for years. Every time someone is travelling somewhere, I always ask them to bring me back a postcard. They're cheap, light, take up no room whatsoever and give me a glimpse of somewhere far away.

To me they represent places that I long to see, that I long to visit. More than that, they're really pieces of time caught on cardstock, thin little time capsules that can hold all manner of things: music, laughter, conversation.

Postcards manage to capture the imagination with a picture and then retain something of the moment they were bought; perhaps a holiday or a business trip or a wedding. The postcard becomes marked with secrets when it is bought and when it is written upon.

In reality, postcards are markers of time. They are an instant in our past and present, a second of time or the few minutes one has spent scribbling away on the back. Postcards are magic; they let us see into the lives of others, just for a second, and see things we may not have seen.

In Nothing to Write Home About, Michelle Abadie and Susan Beale have compiled a collection of John Hinde postcards. From the sixties to the eighties, John Hinde postcards flourished in popularity, their dream like images transporting you to somewhere different, somewhere magical.

The pictures on the front of the cards are many and varied and Abadie and Beale have collected what must be every John Hinde card known to mankind. The images are colourful, bright, and incredible. The pictures sing to you and you want to breathe in the fresh air, the blue sky.

What's more, they showcase the talents of a photographer who is widely unknown because he chose to focus on postcards. This collection of postcards is an amazing tribute to an incredible photographer and an amazing artist.

But, really, what Abadie and Beale have collected are pieces of time. They have created the ultimate time capsule, the ultimate look at other lives, other moments. Along with each full colour reproduction, they've also included the message that has been written of each of the post cards.

How can we not read? How can we not peek at words written by someone else? I loved the images but was utterly fascinated at the words, the emotions on the backs of these postcards.

I have a lots of favourites, but there were a few that stuck with me :


23 May 1967, sent to Porthcawl, Glamorgan
Dear E., Just a P.C. of a place you may remember. Had 2 letters from your solicitors, will let you know my requirements. Hope you are O.K. Walter


12 Sept 1974, sent to Wifeliscombe, Somerset
Dear Mr. Greedy, just a note to say that I shall be in London in time to discuss a letter I had from a Mar. Capon from Budapest. See you soon. Ben.


1 July 1966, sent to Malvern, Worcestershire
Tried to call you. It was a last minute decision…best wishes Gordon


1988, sent to St. Martins Infant School, Bedfordshire
Tell Jesus You Love him.

29 Jan 1971, sent to Cockermouth, Cumberland
This is a very nice hospital and everybody is kind but I'll be glad to see the back of it soon. Love mother.



The more I read, the more I was struck silent. What must have been happening during the lives of these people? What mysterious thing were they writing about? Who did they send their postcard to?

My brain was filled with gorgeous images but hundreds of questions. The more I read, the more I wanted to know about each person that wrote each of the postcards. All the cryptic writing reminded me of spies or perhaps star crossed lovers communicating? Or maybe a separated husband and wife going through a divorce?

My questions will never be answered. That, I think is the beauty behind Nothing to Write Home About. Each page is a piece of time, a snapshot of a moment. A glimpse into a second that has passed us by. But Abadie and Beale have gathered them up for us and compiled them into minutes, hours, days and weeks. They have given us a magic book and I was spellbound with every page.

There is one last postcard I would like to share with you if I may and here it is:


Date unknown, sent to Bolton-by-Bowland, Yorkshire
Snowing like man, skiing not bad altho' I think I'm taking it too seriously - must laugh when all over. Nothing to write home about. Love Kate and Keith


Indeed, it is something to write home about.

Michelle Abadie and Susan Beale have shown us that, while we may think our words worthless, our memories unimportant, what they really are is magic.

One postcard at a time.

GENTS by Warwick Collins

Meet Ezekiel Murphy.

Needing work, he takes a job working as a toilet attendant at a men’s washroom in the London Underground. Working with two other men, Reynolds and Jason, he figures this will be just one more run of the mill job.

He’s mistaken.

One day while cleaning the bathroom, he watches as two men leave a cubicle together. Another time, he watches as someone kneels on the ground while the other man stays standing.

Appalled, he asks Reynolds and Jason what is going on. “It’s the reptiles.” Jason says. Apparently the bathroom in which they work in is a popular spot for “cottaging” or gay sex. Many men cruise the washroom looking to get off.

What shocks Ez the most is that these are seemingly normal men. He observes one gentleman he saw in a cubicle with another meet up with his family. “Took your time,” the wife observes. He wonders if he should say anything; wonders if it’s his place.

The three men are dealt a further blow when they are given an ultimatum: cut down on the amount of gay cursing in the washroom or the London council will shut it down. Suddenly, the three men find themselves in between a rock and a hard place having to confront an enemy they know nothing about.

They decide to take matters into their own hands. They start to observe the “reptiles” and their habits; they start to fight back. But what are they fighting most?

Their own prejudices or the rights of others?

Gents may be a small novel but it packs a mean wallop. Clocking in at only 172 pages, many would under estimate the power of this slim volume. They would be unwise to do so. Gents take an in your face look at many issues that other writers would cheerfully avoid: homosexuality, washroom sex, cruising, races, culture, prejudice and racism.

Gents has so much power because it looks at all these issues and more in such brutal, unashamed honesty. You never feel for an instant that you are reading something that should be shocking or scandalous; though, looked at separately, many of the books subjects do indeed cause scandal.

Collins has also created some of the most likeable, wonderful characters I've ever encountered in literature today: Ezekiel, a West Indian immigrant worried about providing for his wife and son. Jason, the Rastafarian who has two wives. Reynolds, their supervisor, who tries to remain distant from their situation but can't help getting drawn in.

These people breathe. I don't think I can say it clearer than that; they are people I know, people I talk to every day. They are real and honest and true people. It takes a talented writer to create characters with such finesse; characters that I feel I've known for years. It takes not only a writer but a magician to create with such simplicity.

Gents is written in simple, precise words. You won't find any purple prose here; because of the writing style, the issue is right there, out in the open, waiting for you to acknowledge it. Though the language is simple, the words have power. The book doesn't take a political or social stance. It sets everything on the table for you to read and makes no judgments.

Though many would argue that this is a book about homosexuality, it isn't. This is a book about people who are forced to confront something within themselves and make a decision that affects others. It's not about gay cruising. It's about the power of the human heart when you are asked to confront something you don't understand.

Gents is a treat, a joy and a pleasure. I am reading it again for the second time. I was moved, swayed and held by the power of Collins words and Gents is a novel that will haunt me for some time to come.

IN SEARCH OF ADAM by Caroline Smailes

When she is seven years old, Jude finds her mother dead from an overdose. A bottle of pills lay scattered on the bedside table and there is a note. Jude approaches her mother carefully, slowly. The note says: Jude, I have gone in search of Adam I love you baby.

Jude doesn’t understand. She climbs into bed with her dead mother and curls up beside her, taking in the last of her mother’s warmth. Taking in the last of her mother. She does not understand that her mother can’t come back. She doesn’t understand that she won’t be coming back, Adam in tow beside her.

Her mother’s death starts Jude on a downward spiral. Floating through a sea of emotions, she is adrift and without her mother, there is nothing to anchor her. She tries to find love from her father only to have him look at her strangely. There is no acceptance there; there is no love.

Jude begins to keep a book, a diary of sorts, where she collects anchors, where she gathers information to keep her grounded, so that she has something to hold on to. Something to mark time. She collects the number of coloured doors on the street, the number and colour of cars. The names Information on the neighbours, some nicer than others.

Something happens to Jude shortly after her mother’s funeral that shatters something inside herself. Having no one to turn to for guidance, all Jude can do is collect, gather, observe.
And wait for her mothers return.

In Search of Adam is flat out incredible. We’re only part way through 2007 and I can state without a doubt that In Search of Adam is the best novel of the year. Hell, it may very well be the best novel I’ve read in years. I don’t have enough words to describe how good, how amazing, how mind blowing this novel is. I can’t find the words, they escape me.

In Search of Adam left me breathless. Jude is an incredible protagonist. She is the ultimate observer, taking in all and everything around her; you live through Jude, you breathe through her. This is her world and her life and you are looking through her eyes. She has been drawn so beautifully, so completely, that I found myself looking for her when I wasn’t reading the book.

She haunts me. While reading the novel I wanted to wrap my arms around her and hold her close to me. It has been an incredibly long time since I’ve been so moved by a book.

This is a grim book but never have child abuse, suicide, rape, emotional issues and death been written about so beautifully. Caroline Smailes is no mere writer; In Search of Adam is no mere book. She is a wordsmith, an artist and In Search of Adam is a moving, changing, gorgeous piece of word art; a tapestry that lives and breathes beyond its pages.

In Search of Adam is not just a novel you read. It’s a journey you take with Jude, holding on to her hand for dear life and watching, feeling everything that happens to her. Are you brave enough to take her hand? This is a book you don’t want to miss, a story that will move you and a journey that will touch your heart in its darkest places.

I am staring at the book as it sits on my coffee table and I can hear Jude calling to me. She still haunts me though I have closed the book; but I will pick it up again soon. Now, though, I run my fingers over the cover, over the image of Jude and know that, when I meet her again, I will know her.