New book may be of interest
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Topic: New book may be of interest
Posted By: Richard2
Subject: New book may be of interest
Date Posted: 08 May 2014 at 9:43am
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This is my book Cold Blood, published today. Part nature writing and part memoir, it tells the story of my childhood fascination with reptiles and amphibians, combining that story with observations about these animals in Britain now. One chapter was informed by an interview with Chris Davis about Sand Lizard reintroduction. At very least, I hope the book will raise public awareness of reptiles and amphibians a bit. It was reviewed in several of the papers last week, and will be a Radio 4 Book of the Week in July. Richard Kerridge  |
Replies:
Posted By: will
Date Posted: 08 May 2014 at 1:55pm
| my copy is arriving tomorrow - looking forward to it! |
Posted By: Tom Omlette
Date Posted: 08 May 2014 at 7:00pm
ordered 
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Posted By: Paul Ford
Date Posted: 09 May 2014 at 10:20am
me too
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Posted By: GemmaJF
Date Posted: 10 May 2014 at 11:54am
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My copy has been dispatched |
Posted By: natrix5
Date Posted: 11 May 2014 at 7:47am
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I haven't seen the book + I'm sure it is a good read. Unfortunately some rather negative stories seem to have appeared in some quarters yesterday. Haven't seen these first hand but in the Reptile section of Bird Forums apparently a page shouted "killer snakes on the loose in London capable of crushing small children to death" from the Daily Mirror + also mentioned in the Times. Such nonsense but not good news for the Aesculapian Snakes. It's thought the mention of the 2 colonies of this benign snake in this much reviewed book (including Radio 4) being the source for these ridiculous hysterical headlines.
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Posted By: will
Date Posted: 12 May 2014 at 8:51pm
| I enjoyed it very much Richard; evocative, emotional and resonant of my own childhood visits to Studland, the Cumbrian coast and even to Hayes Common. I hope it gets all the credit it deserves! |
Posted By: Richard2
Date Posted: 12 May 2014 at 10:57pm
| Thank you very much, Will. I am delighted. |
Posted By: Richard2
Date Posted: 13 May 2014 at 11:00am
| My book describes the Aesculapians as 'entirely harmless', so it can't be the source of the scare stories. There have been several press stories about them before, and they have been described in other books as well. As Will points out, the story seems to flare up at some point every year. But, still, if my book has stirred up a general interest in reptiles and amphibians, perhaps I do bear some responsibility. I hope that the effect will now be the emergence of more accurate information, and there is some sign that this is happening. |
Posted By: GemmaJF
Date Posted: 13 May 2014 at 9:08pm
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Shame this should coincide with the publishing of your book Richard. I'm sure all of us here would agree it will do more good than harm. I guess Aesculapian hysteria at least makes a change from the adder scare stories that usually fill the press from Easter to late summer.
Looking forward to getting started on it. I have a feeling it's going to bring back plenty of the magic of my childhood memories from what I have heard so far. |
Posted By: Tom Omlette
Date Posted: 19 May 2014 at 5:44pm
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@richard - broke my finger on sat which has given me the chance to just sit and read the book. wonderful. it had everything. laughs and tears. loved it. i have given it to my 13 year old son to read. he won't of course because he knows i like it. he's just reaching that age lol! thanks tim
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Posted By: Richard2
Date Posted: 21 May 2014 at 8:41pm
| Thank you. I am delighted that you liked it. |
Posted By: Richard2
Date Posted: 26 Jul 2014 at 3:58pm
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Cold Blood will be BBC Radio 4's Book of the Week next week. The first of five 15-minute episodes is at 9.45 on Monday morning.
Richard
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Posted By: Chris Monk
Date Posted: 26 Jul 2014 at 4:09pm
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Hi Richard I see that they have got the actor Robert Powell in to read it on the radio - didn't they ask you if you would like to do it. As an appetiser to that tomorrow (Sunday) morning at 6.35am on BBC Radio 4 Living World is doing a programme on the Pygmy Boa Constrictor from the Turks and Calcos islands. If they have sorted out last weeks problems with their I-player will be able to listen at a more convenient time during the day. ------------- Derbyshire Amphibian & Reptile Group www.derbyshirearg.co.uk |
Posted By: Richard2
Date Posted: 27 Jul 2014 at 7:00pm
| They generally want an experienced actor to read the book. You have all been spared my nasal tones. |
Posted By: will
Date Posted: 27 Jul 2014 at 7:41pm
come on Richard, admit it, you were just more expensive than Robert Powell
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Posted By: will
Date Posted: 28 Jul 2014 at 10:10am
| just heard it now - I thought he read it pretty well! looking forward to the future installments. |
Posted By: Richard2
Date Posted: 28 Jul 2014 at 10:17am
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Thanks. Yes - a strange feeling listening to this different voice. I suspect that like me he tried as a child to make his voice posher. Or, maybe, brilliantly, he chose for the occasion a posh voice that sounded slightly acquired. Richard
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Posted By: will
Date Posted: 29 Jul 2014 at 8:40am
| yes, it must be odd (in a nice way, I hope) to hear someone pretending to be you on national radio.. |
Posted By: Liz Heard
Date Posted: 02 Aug 2014 at 2:17pm
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Still not bought my copy yet Richard - tho' i intend doing so soon. Your blend of lovingly-recalled memoir and herp natural history looks set to capture the imagination and inspire many a young reader. However, i did listen to Thurs' and Fri's Radio 4 instalments while driving and thoroughly enjoyed them. The adder story reminded me of a friend's tale of keeping an adder in his bedroom as a boy in the early '70's. He kept the snake's identity secret from his mother - knowing she would hit the roof if she knew what it was. One day it escaped and he searched the house frantically for it while she was out, eventually locating the snake secreted behind the stair carpet!
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Posted By: GemmaJF
Date Posted: 02 Aug 2014 at 6:37pm
My Dad found mine, had to release it soon afterwards.  Shame he knew exactly what it was, as I had got away with keeping just about everything else I found
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Posted By: will
Date Posted: 03 Aug 2014 at 6:24pm
| Cold Blood was just selected on R4's 'Pick of the Week', too - 'full of gorgeous description' was the phrase used about the book by the presenter! |
Posted By: Wrynn
Date Posted: 01 Sep 2014 at 10:46am
Ordered and I am awaiting it's arrival. Awesomness. I am very excited :)
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Richard2 wrote:Posted By: GemmaJF
Date Posted: 08 Oct 2014 at 10:16am
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Finally started to read your book Richard. Was hoping to sit down by the pond and start it but with the delays in construction I had to settle for the sofa on a wet October day. Fortunately your writing is transporting me back to wonderful summer memories of childhood so that hasn't worked out so bad after all. I must take exception though to reference of what I can only think is of myself when writing about the licensing of torch surveys for GCN. I'm not a 'conservationist', god forbid. I'm an ECOLOGIST |
Posted By: Richard2
Date Posted: 08 Oct 2014 at 10:42am
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My apologies, Gemma. Yes, you were certainly one of the people I had in mind, though I have had this debate with others as well. Surely you are an ecologist AND a conservationist. They are not incompatible callings. I am very pleased indeed that you are enjoying the book; I wondered what your feeling about it might be. Richard
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Posted By: GemmaJF
Date Posted: 08 Oct 2014 at 11:02am
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I always think of conservationists as those trying to stop time or wind the clock back. Sadly there is often more harm than good done in the process I'm far more interested and focused in the now attempting to preserve/extend current ecosystems and look at the possibilities of creating new ones. I think that makes me like a toad focused in the now! My comment was very tongue in cheek in any case.
 Really enjoying the book, so many shared experiences and love the thoughtful way you have approached conveying your own relationship with wildlife. I've been accused a lot of being sentimental about wildlife. The fact is I'm really not, I just find it exciting and fascinating. I think it would be a great shame if others never had the chance to discover it, when it is just beyond their back door step and one only has to take the time to look. Pleased to read also that toads grow from mud and slime. I should have plenty in the spring judging by the state of the wildlife garden after the pond restoration. |
Posted By: Iulia
Date Posted: 08 Oct 2014 at 12:21pm
| must get a copy |
Posted By: GemmaJF
Date Posted: 08 Oct 2014 at 7:39pm
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Brilliant read Richard, been a long time since I couldn't put a book down and I've made every excuse to sit down and read it through from start to finish. I had a very similar relationship with my Father, who passed away when I was 19. Towards the end we did get closer but he was extremely ill. I do remember though one day during his illness, him coming in and saying 'grass snakes behind Canons' this statement meant plenty to me as Canons was a local factory backing onto a complex of flooded gravel pits where for many years I had suspected grass snakes to be. I hadn't thought about this for years, or how it meant that even in his illness he still knew this was vitally important information to me. He had been talking to a local by the factory and clearly had made his way home briskly with the news, almost as if it were of military importance! Reading your book brought back so many memories and parallels it is almost spooky. Lucky we are to have our love of reptiles and amphibians, and lucky is the reader who picks up your book and gains an insight of why they are so important to us. |
Posted By: Chris Monk
Date Posted: 08 Dec 2014 at 7:57pm
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On the train on Saturday on my way down to the ARC/BHS Scientific Meeting in Bournemouth I picked up a bit of an abandoned newspaper. It was The Guardian's Review section for Saturday 6th December which had some reviews of 2014 and on page 9 they had Stephen Moss reviewing the best nature writing. The penultimate paragraph of the article states: The flourishing genre of nature-based memoirs is represented by Cold Blood by Richard Kerridge (Chatto & Windus). Subtitled "Adventures with Reptiles and Amphibians" this is a funny, moving and compulsively readable account of the author's boyhood obsession with these often neglected creatures. ------------- Derbyshire Amphibian & Reptile Group www.derbyshirearg.co.uk |
Posted By: Chris Monk
Date Posted: 27 Feb 2015 at 10:28pm
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In the end I bought two copies of Richard's book and kept one for myself to read and donated the other for a prize in the raffle at the Herpetofauna Workers Meeting in Newcastle earlier this month. ------------- Derbyshire Amphibian & Reptile Group www.derbyshirearg.co.uk |
Posted By: Richard2
Date Posted: 27 Feb 2015 at 11:11pm
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Many thanks. I would love to come to a meeting like that and give a reading, if people would be interested. Richard
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