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Bleeding London
The city of London appears as a character in this humorous novel. It is portrayed almost like a human body, displaying signs of renewal and decay, with a clogged digestive tract, bottlenecks and congestion. It is a city of obsessives, of insouciant sadists, of innocents. It is bleeding London.
320 pages, Hardcover
Published October 20, 1997
12 people are currently reading
307 people want to read
About the author
Geoff Nicholson
50 books55 followersGeoff Nicholson was a British novelist and nonfiction writer. He was educated at the Universities of Cambridge and Essex.
The main themes and features of his books include leading characters with obsessions, characters with quirky views on life, interweaving storylines and hidden subcultures and societies. His books usually contain a lot of black humour. He has also written three works of nonfiction and some short stories. His novel Bleeding London was shortlisted for the 1997 Whitbread Prize.
The main themes and features of his books include leading characters with obsessions, characters with quirky views on life, interweaving storylines and hidden subcultures and societies. His books usually contain a lot of black humour. He has also written three works of nonfiction and some short stories. His novel Bleeding London was shortlisted for the 1997 Whitbread Prize.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 46 reviews
September 17, 2018
I received this one as a gift from my mum probably 10 years ago because we both love London. I tried to read it then but I did not manage more than 20-30 pages. I decided to try again and this time it was better. I liked it in a way although it was strange and not something I would normally read.
There are three main characters, one more particular than the other. Nick, from Sheffield, comes to London to revenge her stripper girlfriend who was gang raped by 6 men. He only has the name of the guilty ones but he manages to find them. His choice of punishment is sometimes funny, sometimes grotesque, however it always accompanied by a peculiar conversation between the punisher and victim. Stuart London, is the co-owner of a successful London guided walking tours company, almost retired because he lacked organising skills and his tours became more detailed than a normal tourist would care. He leaves the job to his wife, who does a great job to keep the business going. Due to lack of purpose, he decides to travel by foot on each street from the A to Z London Map and to write about his experience. Judy Tanaka, a Londoner of Japanese origin, decides to make a map with all the places she had sex. The three characters meet with each other at different moments and they influence each others lives.
As you can see from the plot, it involves quite a bit of sex although it is not an erotic novel. There is also a bit of violence and quite a lot of London History and locations details.
I am giving it three stars because it was something new and I enjoyed myself while reading, most of the time. However, I don't think I would recommend this novel to somebody else.
There are three main characters, one more particular than the other. Nick, from Sheffield, comes to London to revenge her stripper girlfriend who was gang raped by 6 men. He only has the name of the guilty ones but he manages to find them. His choice of punishment is sometimes funny, sometimes grotesque, however it always accompanied by a peculiar conversation between the punisher and victim. Stuart London, is the co-owner of a successful London guided walking tours company, almost retired because he lacked organising skills and his tours became more detailed than a normal tourist would care. He leaves the job to his wife, who does a great job to keep the business going. Due to lack of purpose, he decides to travel by foot on each street from the A to Z London Map and to write about his experience. Judy Tanaka, a Londoner of Japanese origin, decides to make a map with all the places she had sex. The three characters meet with each other at different moments and they influence each others lives.
As you can see from the plot, it involves quite a bit of sex although it is not an erotic novel. There is also a bit of violence and quite a lot of London History and locations details.
I am giving it three stars because it was something new and I enjoyed myself while reading, most of the time. However, I don't think I would recommend this novel to somebody else.
November 30, 2023
CRITIQUE:
Stories From the City and the City (or A Tale of Two Cities)
The perspective and style of this novel call to mind authors like Martin Amis, JG Ballard, John Fowles, China Mieville, Michael Moorcock and Will Self, in whose number Nicholson deserves to be celebrated.
Cleverly structured, it's the structure of the novel that tells the story.
The novel focuses on two main cities (one of which obviously being London, the other not being St Kilda Beach (1.) in Melbourne) and three main characters (two of whom live in London).
Set in 1980's England, it contrasts provincial (artless and naive) Sheffield with cosmopolitan (urbane and corrupt) London.
Vengeance Ballads
Mick Wilton, a petty criminal and latter-day Don Quixote, believes his stripper girlfriend has been gang-banged by six "rich posh bastards", while performing at a private party in London.
He catches a train to London and then a taxi to the Dickens Hotel in Hackney, in pursuit of chivalrous revenge on Gabby's behalf.
Unfamiliar with London ("Basically London looks like a big slum with a few famous landmarks scattered through it...He did not find it a sexy city...He found it hard and scruffy and cold and affectionless, a place where terrible things happened or were made to happen"), all he has to go on is a list of the names of the six attendees.
He has to track them down via the phone book and his victims' address books (these are pre-Internet times) and punish them. Once he finds his quarry, he will rip it up and let it bleed.
The London Walker
The second of the three major characters is Stuart London, who runs a walking tour company for tourists and out of town visitors.
Once his wife and staff are able to run the business on their own, he sets out to walk along every street in London (at the rate of ten miles a day), keeping a diary as he goes (which structures much of the narrative).
Stuart's wife, Anita Walker (who is known to the staff as Boadicea), discovers his confidential diary on his computer, and tells him, sceptically, believing it to be a work of fiction:
Statue of Boadicea and Her Daughters in London (Source: Wikipedia)
Half-Japanese Sex-Bomb
Tour guide and book-shop worker, Judy Tanaka, was born in South London, but is a half-Japanese Madame Bovary. It's enough to make her a target of occasional sexism, racism and xenophobia. She confesses to her therapist:
Unashamedly sexual ("I want to be fucked everywhere. In every hole. In every position. In every London borough. In every postal district"), she records on a map of Greater London all of the places where she's had sex, in a manner that recalls Tyrone Slothrop from Thomas Pynchon's "Gravity's Rainbow". Stuart describes her as "the best sex, the wildest sex, pure London sex".
Having regard to Anita's view of Stuart's diary, readers have to question whether Judy is just a literary artifice (as opposed to a literal orifice), whether of the character, Stuart London, or of the author, Geoff Nicholson, or of both, it's too hard to tell.
Naive as the characters might be, they know more about the author, the novel and each other than we do.
FOOTNOTES:
1. See the T-shirt Nick Cave is wearing in the video of "More News From Nowhere" in the Soundtrack below.
SOUNDTRACK (HALF-GERMAN, HALF-JAPANESE):
Stories From the City and the City (or A Tale of Two Cities)
The perspective and style of this novel call to mind authors like Martin Amis, JG Ballard, John Fowles, China Mieville, Michael Moorcock and Will Self, in whose number Nicholson deserves to be celebrated.
Cleverly structured, it's the structure of the novel that tells the story.
The novel focuses on two main cities (one of which obviously being London, the other not being St Kilda Beach (1.) in Melbourne) and three main characters (two of whom live in London).
Set in 1980's England, it contrasts provincial (artless and naive) Sheffield with cosmopolitan (urbane and corrupt) London.
Vengeance Ballads
Mick Wilton, a petty criminal and latter-day Don Quixote, believes his stripper girlfriend has been gang-banged by six "rich posh bastards", while performing at a private party in London.
He catches a train to London and then a taxi to the Dickens Hotel in Hackney, in pursuit of chivalrous revenge on Gabby's behalf.
Unfamiliar with London ("Basically London looks like a big slum with a few famous landmarks scattered through it...He did not find it a sexy city...He found it hard and scruffy and cold and affectionless, a place where terrible things happened or were made to happen"), all he has to go on is a list of the names of the six attendees.
He has to track them down via the phone book and his victims' address books (these are pre-Internet times) and punish them. Once he finds his quarry, he will rip it up and let it bleed.
The London Walker
The second of the three major characters is Stuart London, who runs a walking tour company for tourists and out of town visitors.
Once his wife and staff are able to run the business on their own, he sets out to walk along every street in London (at the rate of ten miles a day), keeping a diary as he goes (which structures much of the narrative).
Stuart's wife, Anita Walker (who is known to the staff as Boadicea), discovers his confidential diary on his computer, and tells him, sceptically, believing it to be a work of fiction:
"You realised that writing was much more fun than walking...
"Large parts of your diary are a shade too literary. The passages about that little Japanese tour guide, the sex passages, they really weren't very convincing at all...
"The idea worked as a literary conceit, but not as part of an actual diary..."
Statue of Boadicea and Her Daughters in London (Source: Wikipedia)
Half-Japanese Sex-Bomb
Tour guide and book-shop worker, Judy Tanaka, was born in South London, but is a half-Japanese Madame Bovary. It's enough to make her a target of occasional sexism, racism and xenophobia. She confesses to her therapist:
"Sometimes I feel bombed and blitzed. And sometimes I feel plagued. Sometimes I feel like I'm on fire, and other times like I'm lost in a fog, in a real old-fashioned pea-souper...Greater London, c'est moi."
Unashamedly sexual ("I want to be fucked everywhere. In every hole. In every position. In every London borough. In every postal district"), she records on a map of Greater London all of the places where she's had sex, in a manner that recalls Tyrone Slothrop from Thomas Pynchon's "Gravity's Rainbow". Stuart describes her as "the best sex, the wildest sex, pure London sex".
Having regard to Anita's view of Stuart's diary, readers have to question whether Judy is just a literary artifice (as opposed to a literal orifice), whether of the character, Stuart London, or of the author, Geoff Nicholson, or of both, it's too hard to tell.
Naive as the characters might be, they know more about the author, the novel and each other than we do.
FOOTNOTES:
1. See the T-shirt Nick Cave is wearing in the video of "More News From Nowhere" in the Soundtrack below.
SOUNDTRACK (HALF-GERMAN, HALF-JAPANESE):
October 17, 2015
There are many words that could be used to describe Bleeding London. Eclectic would be at the top of the list. Time and characters jump around from chapter to chapter to such an extent that the book becomes a bit confusing. I found myself wondering where I was in time, at times. However, the book still works and the plot is still convincing.
The characters that comprise Bleeding London are equally eclectic. They are interesting in many different way. Each character has their own quirky mannerisms and obsessions, but most of all, they are all vulnerable to a reality that is half-manufactured by their minds. But so are we all in one way or another, and from this perspective I found that I could understand their view on life as they saw it. Again, this sounds confusing, bit it still works.
Finally, there is London. This book brings London out of the background and makes the city a part of the story. The city exists in maps and it exists in places. At times, the people of the City simmer and vibrate to illuminate certain places that are unique within London and that uniqueness shines through. While I've read many works of historical fiction, this book is something else: it's a genuine work of geographical fiction.
The characters that comprise Bleeding London are equally eclectic. They are interesting in many different way. Each character has their own quirky mannerisms and obsessions, but most of all, they are all vulnerable to a reality that is half-manufactured by their minds. But so are we all in one way or another, and from this perspective I found that I could understand their view on life as they saw it. Again, this sounds confusing, bit it still works.
Finally, there is London. This book brings London out of the background and makes the city a part of the story. The city exists in maps and it exists in places. At times, the people of the City simmer and vibrate to illuminate certain places that are unique within London and that uniqueness shines through. While I've read many works of historical fiction, this book is something else: it's a genuine work of geographical fiction.
January 12, 2024
I rather enjoyed this but then I'm a Londoner through and through.
I can see how the vignettes of London life described by the Stuart London character might baffle or mystify readers from elsewhere. Personally I loved 'em. In fact when he described a cold January morning on Oxford Street outside Tottenham Court Road station I'd only just returned home from that very place!
I even found it's datedness charming. Almost no mention of mobile phones (this was written in 1997) one character contacts his girlfriend in Sheffield from a phone box and another navigates the city with a good old A-Z
I can see how the vignettes of London life described by the Stuart London character might baffle or mystify readers from elsewhere. Personally I loved 'em. In fact when he described a cold January morning on Oxford Street outside Tottenham Court Road station I'd only just returned home from that very place!
I even found it's datedness charming. Almost no mention of mobile phones (this was written in 1997) one character contacts his girlfriend in Sheffield from a phone box and another navigates the city with a good old A-Z
March 5, 2018
I came to this book after taking part in a project by the Royal Photographic Society. The idea, inspired by the book and named after it, was for participants to help create a collection of pictures of all the streets in London (as per the AtoZ) over one year.
This is a quirky, very entertaining book, with seams of dark humour running through it, but it is possibly a flawed one. It's one of those where all the various, apparently disparate, storylines comes together in the end in a neatly tied bow. Except that in this case the bow is rather sloppily tied. It all feels a little messy and as if the story has lost its original momentum and the author perhaps ran out of ideas on how to bring everything to a satisfactory conclusion.
This means the experience of reading this tome is not altogether satisfying but remains enjoyable for the most part.
This is a quirky, very entertaining book, with seams of dark humour running through it, but it is possibly a flawed one. It's one of those where all the various, apparently disparate, storylines comes together in the end in a neatly tied bow. Except that in this case the bow is rather sloppily tied. It all feels a little messy and as if the story has lost its original momentum and the author perhaps ran out of ideas on how to bring everything to a satisfactory conclusion.
This means the experience of reading this tome is not altogether satisfying but remains enjoyable for the most part.
July 10, 2012
When i bought it it was because they say it was thrilling, amusing, an ode to a great city...well, I should have lernt by now not to trust the critics in having the same taste for literature. I didn't find it neither thrilling, nor amusing....just bad bizarre sometimes, presumptuous, and boring...
September 29, 2009
I love satire. I love London. I love the writing of Geoff Nicholson. With all of that in mind, Bleeding London seemed like the perfect book for me. For those not familiar with the prolific Nicholson, you can expect to find, in his books, lots of black comedy, lots of kinky sex, grim grittiness, and almost unbelievable plot lines. Nicholson has taken on a variety of subjects (foot fetishes, compulsive shopping, Hollywood, VW bugs, and publishing, to name just a few), many of them offbeat, and as he tears them limb from figurative limb, he shows no mercy, something that causes me to like him even more. If you’re going to read satire, after all, you want satire, not some watered-down story that provokes little more than boredom and a desire to finish the book as soon as possible.
In Bleeding London, Nicholson satirizes London, of course, through the eyes of three very different, but equally bizarre, characters, two of them native Londoners, and the third, a visitor from Sheffield.
Mick Wilton, the visitor from Sheffield, is by far, the most highly developed character and the one with the most depth. Mick is an ex-bouncer, but he’s not, by any means, an everyday bouncer. Mick loves books and literature and he is, in many ways, a modern day Don Quixote, for Mick has come to London to avenge the alleged gang rape of his stripper girlfriend, Gabby. Mick has devised what he believes will be a "fitting end" for each of the six men involved in Gabby’s ordeal. Mick dislikes London, at least at first, and lets us know it. He says London is:
...hard and scruffy and cold and affectionless, a place where terrible things happened or were made to happen; and the sooner he could cease contact with it the better.
Mick’s plan to summarily dispatch Gabby’s attackers lacks but one essential element, an element made even more essential by the fact that Mick is new to the city...a good map.
The need for a map brings Mick into contact with Judy Tanaka, a London born, half-English, half-Japanese bookseller with, putting it quite mildly, a voracious sexual appetite. As Judy puts it:
When sex is good, I feel as though I’m disappearing, being pulverized…so that I’m nothing, just particles of air pollution, debris, particles of soot and skin floating through the air and settling on the city.
Judy has a need to "know" London, that is, she feels, as pressing and urgent as is Nick’s. Judy’s desires, however, have nothing to do with revenge and everything to do with lust. Judy believes that every square inch of London must, at one time or another, have been occupied by lovers engaged in the act of making love and she intends to replicate this feat, herself. Judy’s views on maps are, to say the least, all-encompassing:
Sometimes, I think I’d like to be tattooed....All across my back. With a map of the London Underground system. Or perhaps not just a tattoo, more of a form of scarification, so that the scar tissue would be raised, a little like Braille, to represent the lines and stations. And I could stand naked in the entrance halls of tube stations and blind men and women would come up to me, and run their hands over me, over the tattoos, until they’d worked out their routes. Maybe they wouldn’t even have to be blind.
Well, I told you it was a little kinky. But, it’s also great fun.
Judy’s carnal desires bring her into contact with another native Londoner, a man most appropriately named Stuart London. Stuart and his wife, Anita, are the owners of "The London Walker," a business that caters to those who want to see London on foot (and really, is there any other way?). Stuart’s and Anita’s walks aren’t just ordinary walks, however. Each one has a theme. There is "The London Crime Walk," the "Art Walk," "The Holmes and Watson Walk," and many more.
While Anita finds this business quite fulfilling, forty-year-old Stuart is experiencing a premature midlife crisis of sorts and feels he needs more. London, he says:
...contains all the data from which the ideal city might be constructed; a visible, hard city of angels.
Stuart sets an ambitious task for himself when he decides to walk every street in London. But, as fate would have it, Judy Tanaka decides to apply for a position at "The London Walker" and her passion and Stuart’s merge...for a time.
The stories of Mick, Judy and Stuart, who are each following a private "life map," intersect, merge, diverge, then intersect again. While all three are bizarre characters, Mick, as stated previously, is the one with the most depth. An as he comes to realize that Gabby’s version of what happened at the bachelor party where she was allegedly raped may have been less than truthful, Mick becomes quite sympathetic as well. Sadly, Judy and Stuart, at least in my opinion, are a little clichéd, but Mick is so wonderfully drawn, I could overlook that.
Bleeding London is filled with all the skewed comedy and elaborate plotting one associates with Geoff Nicholson, but this book is a little more brutal, a little more violent. The book is fast paced (I read it in one afternoon in my back garden and I'm not a fast reader), but never at the expense of substance. The dénouement, however, was a little disappointing for me. While it certainly doesn’t spoil the book, I felt Nicholson could have done better. Still, Bleeding London is one of my favorite Nicholson works, probably second only to Bedlam Burning.
Bleeding London is drenched in the atmosphere of London, itself. As Mick, Judy and Stuart traverse street after street and borough after borough, the reader gets a real "feel" for London and its inhabitants. As Nicholson writes:
London is mythical too, created in the image of each of its inhabitants, newly imagined with each new citizen, with each new attempt to describe it.
While I didn’t find Nicholson’s effort perfect, I did like it a lot and was glad I toured London, bizarre as this trip was, with Judy, Stuart and especially, with Mick.
In Bleeding London, Nicholson satirizes London, of course, through the eyes of three very different, but equally bizarre, characters, two of them native Londoners, and the third, a visitor from Sheffield.
Mick Wilton, the visitor from Sheffield, is by far, the most highly developed character and the one with the most depth. Mick is an ex-bouncer, but he’s not, by any means, an everyday bouncer. Mick loves books and literature and he is, in many ways, a modern day Don Quixote, for Mick has come to London to avenge the alleged gang rape of his stripper girlfriend, Gabby. Mick has devised what he believes will be a "fitting end" for each of the six men involved in Gabby’s ordeal. Mick dislikes London, at least at first, and lets us know it. He says London is:
...hard and scruffy and cold and affectionless, a place where terrible things happened or were made to happen; and the sooner he could cease contact with it the better.
Mick’s plan to summarily dispatch Gabby’s attackers lacks but one essential element, an element made even more essential by the fact that Mick is new to the city...a good map.
The need for a map brings Mick into contact with Judy Tanaka, a London born, half-English, half-Japanese bookseller with, putting it quite mildly, a voracious sexual appetite. As Judy puts it:
When sex is good, I feel as though I’m disappearing, being pulverized…so that I’m nothing, just particles of air pollution, debris, particles of soot and skin floating through the air and settling on the city.
Judy has a need to "know" London, that is, she feels, as pressing and urgent as is Nick’s. Judy’s desires, however, have nothing to do with revenge and everything to do with lust. Judy believes that every square inch of London must, at one time or another, have been occupied by lovers engaged in the act of making love and she intends to replicate this feat, herself. Judy’s views on maps are, to say the least, all-encompassing:
Sometimes, I think I’d like to be tattooed....All across my back. With a map of the London Underground system. Or perhaps not just a tattoo, more of a form of scarification, so that the scar tissue would be raised, a little like Braille, to represent the lines and stations. And I could stand naked in the entrance halls of tube stations and blind men and women would come up to me, and run their hands over me, over the tattoos, until they’d worked out their routes. Maybe they wouldn’t even have to be blind.
Well, I told you it was a little kinky. But, it’s also great fun.
Judy’s carnal desires bring her into contact with another native Londoner, a man most appropriately named Stuart London. Stuart and his wife, Anita, are the owners of "The London Walker," a business that caters to those who want to see London on foot (and really, is there any other way?). Stuart’s and Anita’s walks aren’t just ordinary walks, however. Each one has a theme. There is "The London Crime Walk," the "Art Walk," "The Holmes and Watson Walk," and many more.
While Anita finds this business quite fulfilling, forty-year-old Stuart is experiencing a premature midlife crisis of sorts and feels he needs more. London, he says:
...contains all the data from which the ideal city might be constructed; a visible, hard city of angels.
Stuart sets an ambitious task for himself when he decides to walk every street in London. But, as fate would have it, Judy Tanaka decides to apply for a position at "The London Walker" and her passion and Stuart’s merge...for a time.
The stories of Mick, Judy and Stuart, who are each following a private "life map," intersect, merge, diverge, then intersect again. While all three are bizarre characters, Mick, as stated previously, is the one with the most depth. An as he comes to realize that Gabby’s version of what happened at the bachelor party where she was allegedly raped may have been less than truthful, Mick becomes quite sympathetic as well. Sadly, Judy and Stuart, at least in my opinion, are a little clichéd, but Mick is so wonderfully drawn, I could overlook that.
Bleeding London is filled with all the skewed comedy and elaborate plotting one associates with Geoff Nicholson, but this book is a little more brutal, a little more violent. The book is fast paced (I read it in one afternoon in my back garden and I'm not a fast reader), but never at the expense of substance. The dénouement, however, was a little disappointing for me. While it certainly doesn’t spoil the book, I felt Nicholson could have done better. Still, Bleeding London is one of my favorite Nicholson works, probably second only to Bedlam Burning.
Bleeding London is drenched in the atmosphere of London, itself. As Mick, Judy and Stuart traverse street after street and borough after borough, the reader gets a real "feel" for London and its inhabitants. As Nicholson writes:
London is mythical too, created in the image of each of its inhabitants, newly imagined with each new citizen, with each new attempt to describe it.
While I didn’t find Nicholson’s effort perfect, I did like it a lot and was glad I toured London, bizarre as this trip was, with Judy, Stuart and especially, with Mick.
March 21, 2024
A very strange book but kinda (very kinda) in a good way. Not sure it’s the love letter to London as was intended.
This has 3 stars and not 2 because I loved the character of mick.
May 3, 2021
"Yeah, when I first came here I hated London and I hated the people who lived here; too soft, too rich, too southern. But lately its not been that straightforward. For instance, I like cars, I find them interesting, and London's full of interesting cars ... And obviously its partly a question of money, obviously there's more cash around in London than in Sheffield, but somehow its more than that. People here like things that are a bit different, a bit special ... It's funny but I suppose I've started to like this place. London. I like the money and the variety and the river and the desirable properties. I like the pubs and the architecture and the people and the restaurants. And inevitably a bit of me is envious.
... I've never really felt as if I belonged anywhere ... and it's never bothered me. I'm not sure if I belong in London or not, but now I'm here I don't really want to go back to Sheffield. And its troubling me. How is a person like me meant to fit in to all this?" -p264
... I've never really felt as if I belonged anywhere ... and it's never bothered me. I'm not sure if I belong in London or not, but now I'm here I don't really want to go back to Sheffield. And its troubling me. How is a person like me meant to fit in to all this?" -p264
February 7, 2022
Un 3,5⭐, dar nu pot rotunji la 4, ca mi se pare prea mult.
Am scăzut o stea întreagă pentru greșelile gramaticale, cumulandu-se prea multe pe parcursul povești.
Povestea în sine se învârte în jurul orașului Londra, cu personaje puțin dubioase uneori. Nu am rezonat cu niciun personaj, am încercat să-i înțeleg și chiar așteptam un deznodământ mai interesant, dar parcă toată esența ideii cărții s-a risipit în neant.
Finalul fiecărui personaj a rămas cumva "suspendat la dracu-n praznic".
Ca lectură merită citită, dacă vreți sa ieșiți puțin din zona de confort.
Va urez spor la citit!
Am scăzut o stea întreagă pentru greșelile gramaticale, cumulandu-se prea multe pe parcursul povești.
Povestea în sine se învârte în jurul orașului Londra, cu personaje puțin dubioase uneori. Nu am rezonat cu niciun personaj, am încercat să-i înțeleg și chiar așteptam un deznodământ mai interesant, dar parcă toată esența ideii cărții s-a risipit în neant.
Finalul fiecărui personaj a rămas cumva "suspendat la dracu-n praznic".
Ca lectură merită citită, dacă vreți sa ieșiți puțin din zona de confort.
Va urez spor la citit!
August 8, 2012
ok so maybe to a few people the shelves i chose for this book would seem weird, but to me they really make sense, after reading the book.
i was surprised at how good this book is, beacuse the first time i tried to read it i actually found it really dull and i felt nothing was special about it! i was wrong, oh so wrong. now i'm kind of torn between giving it three or four stars, but i think i'm gonna settle at three and half, though i can't atually give that grade.
i truly enjoyed the main character, a potentially deadly bodyguard with a set of principles that he applied any way he cared, at any time. of course, i wouldn't want to meet a guy like that, or be one of his enemies. Mick was nicely created, really straight-forward, i kind of bonded with him the most, from the three principal (or what i think were principal) characters.
Stuart didn't really impress me, but i do have to say that he has been met with a kind of a weird ending. i mean, when it first started, i took Stuart as he was, i listened to his story, i tried to understand it. up untill the end, he got to be really annoying and i just wanted for it to get over, all his blabbering and his londoneer obsessions.
judy - cute gal, she can really hold grudges. must be beacuse she's half japanese. or half londonese. or who cares what.
gabby - what. a. bitch.
sooo, i should recommend this to a few friends. really enjoyed it. hope i'll read something else from this author.
i was surprised at how good this book is, beacuse the first time i tried to read it i actually found it really dull and i felt nothing was special about it! i was wrong, oh so wrong. now i'm kind of torn between giving it three or four stars, but i think i'm gonna settle at three and half, though i can't atually give that grade.
i truly enjoyed the main character, a potentially deadly bodyguard with a set of principles that he applied any way he cared, at any time. of course, i wouldn't want to meet a guy like that, or be one of his enemies. Mick was nicely created, really straight-forward, i kind of bonded with him the most, from the three principal (or what i think were principal) characters.
Stuart didn't really impress me, but i do have to say that he has been met with a kind of a weird ending. i mean, when it first started, i took Stuart as he was, i listened to his story, i tried to understand it. up untill the end, he got to be really annoying and i just wanted for it to get over, all his blabbering and his londoneer obsessions.
judy - cute gal, she can really hold grudges. must be beacuse she's half japanese. or half londonese. or who cares what.
gabby - what. a. bitch.
sooo, i should recommend this to a few friends. really enjoyed it. hope i'll read something else from this author.
October 24, 2025
This book was published in 1997 and wouldn't work now. Mick, a violent northerner seeking revenge, needs to find 6 men with only their names to go on. Nowadays you'd look them up on Facebook or since these men are city traders, actors, restaurant reviewers, then search them out on LinkedIn. But this is the '90s, so Mick goes to a bookshop for an A-Z and inveigles the shop assistant and 2nd protagonist, Judy, to explain different areas of London to him so that he can estimate which of the "John Smiths" he is looking for, then finding their details in the phone book. Now no-one has a phone book and those who do still have a landline are ex-directory, to avoid salespeople and angry exes. Now that our lives are online, it's all about privacy. And of course Mick could Google "is Hackney a posh area" (it's kind of amusing to see Hackney, Walthamstow and Peckham derided as crap places when they have changed so much in 25 years). He could find the addresses on Google maps. The bookshop would probably be a coffee shop.
June 4, 2022
I want to re-read this book because I'm writing the review several weeks after finishing it, and the details are already blurry to me (brain sad => memory bad, apparently).
The characters have complicated relationships with London: we have Mick, a Yorkshire boy on his first extended spell in the city, Stuart London, a provocatively named middle-aged man who wants to walk every street in London, and Judy, a younger woman who wants to have sex on every block in London. If you think these latter two would make a good couple, you'd be half right. There's a lewd, beautifully written moment where she induces him to orgasm onto a map of London—his seed is spilled in a manner reminiscent of the Blitz and it's really the high point of the novel in that it's the only moment that transcends the gritty-90s-lit-fic milieu and ascends into high camp.
It's very funny, to me, to read accounts of Hackney from 10-20 years ago, which uniformly describe Hackney as a sort of hardscrabble, grim wasteland, where life is a constant struggle to survive, etc. etc. For me, Hackney had better healthcare than the US, 3 outstanding coffee shops and a world-class bakery within 10 minutes' walk, really bougie restaurants, etc. It's kind of mid-gentrification: there's still a diverse population, plenty of immigrants, good food from around the world, but the food is getting more expensive, rents are rising (except for our l*ndlord, who for some reason has forgotten to raise it, may he live forever), the gimmicky instagram-friendly restaurants are starting to invade, etc. Also, Stuart doesn't like the Tube, which—my brother in Christ, how much is the tax on your damn car? count your FUCKING blessings, mate, imagine if you had a midlife crisis in P*lo *lto and tried to walk every street here?
If you cheat in London on a long-distance partner, does it count? I don't know if Mick ever really resolves this question for himself, although the empirical answer, "Not if you break up with her ASAP," is one I strongly endorse.
I really find the novel engaging. It's graphic, messy, violent, lurid, and it doesn't end in a satisfying manner, which, apart from the violence, largely describes my time in the city. Four stars.
The characters have complicated relationships with London: we have Mick, a Yorkshire boy on his first extended spell in the city, Stuart London, a provocatively named middle-aged man who wants to walk every street in London, and Judy, a younger woman who wants to have sex on every block in London. If you think these latter two would make a good couple, you'd be half right. There's a lewd, beautifully written moment where she induces him to orgasm onto a map of London—his seed is spilled in a manner reminiscent of the Blitz and it's really the high point of the novel in that it's the only moment that transcends the gritty-90s-lit-fic milieu and ascends into high camp.
It's very funny, to me, to read accounts of Hackney from 10-20 years ago, which uniformly describe Hackney as a sort of hardscrabble, grim wasteland, where life is a constant struggle to survive, etc. etc. For me, Hackney had better healthcare than the US, 3 outstanding coffee shops and a world-class bakery within 10 minutes' walk, really bougie restaurants, etc. It's kind of mid-gentrification: there's still a diverse population, plenty of immigrants, good food from around the world, but the food is getting more expensive, rents are rising (except for our l*ndlord, who for some reason has forgotten to raise it, may he live forever), the gimmicky instagram-friendly restaurants are starting to invade, etc. Also, Stuart doesn't like the Tube, which—my brother in Christ, how much is the tax on your damn car? count your FUCKING blessings, mate, imagine if you had a midlife crisis in P*lo *lto and tried to walk every street here?
If you cheat in London on a long-distance partner, does it count? I don't know if Mick ever really resolves this question for himself, although the empirical answer, "Not if you break up with her ASAP," is one I strongly endorse.
I really find the novel engaging. It's graphic, messy, violent, lurid, and it doesn't end in a satisfying manner, which, apart from the violence, largely describes my time in the city. Four stars.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
January 26, 2022
I first visited London in 1997, and did a semester abroad there in 1998; this book came out in the fall of 1997, so it slotted in perfectly. Not that my experiences in England can easily fit into this book, although I am a big fan of London Walks (presumably the inspiration for Stuart's "London Walker" tours). The book centers around three people: Mick, who has come to London to get revenge on a group of men who raped his girlfriend; Stuart London, who started a walking tour company, got successful and bored, and now is walking every street in London; and Judy, who creates maps of where she's had sex (and where the people she's had sex with have had sex).
This is not my normal type of book; I tend to stick to nonfiction and chick lit, with some classics and trashy romance thrown in. Contemporary fiction is not my forte, but I did somewhat enjoy this foray into it. I didn't like or care about Judy at all, but found Stuart and Mick both to be interesting characters; I think Nicholson particularly enjoyed subverting some tropes with Mick. His female characters, unfortunately, are disappointing. I did enjoy this glimpse into the pre-millennial angst of the late 90s, which seems somewhat quaint in retrospect; Stuart's diaries as he walked London were particularly enjoyable for me.
An OK read; I don't feel the need to read any of Nicholson's other work, and I'm fairly confident I'll forget this book entirely rather quickly. I actually had to look up Judy's name to write this review, despite having finished the book less than 12 hours ago.
This is not my normal type of book; I tend to stick to nonfiction and chick lit, with some classics and trashy romance thrown in. Contemporary fiction is not my forte, but I did somewhat enjoy this foray into it. I didn't like or care about Judy at all, but found Stuart and Mick both to be interesting characters; I think Nicholson particularly enjoyed subverting some tropes with Mick. His female characters, unfortunately, are disappointing. I did enjoy this glimpse into the pre-millennial angst of the late 90s, which seems somewhat quaint in retrospect; Stuart's diaries as he walked London were particularly enjoyable for me.
An OK read; I don't feel the need to read any of Nicholson's other work, and I'm fairly confident I'll forget this book entirely rather quickly. I actually had to look up Judy's name to write this review, despite having finished the book less than 12 hours ago.
January 5, 2019
This wonderful novel is ideally enjoyed while living in or visiting London, seeing as how the city is a central character in it. With his typical offbeat humor, Nicholson weaves together the lives and stories of three of its denizens. Stuart is the owner of a company that does walking tours of London; burned out, he has decided to walk every single street in London in a quest for fulfillment and meaning. Julie is a native Londoner, although half-Japanese and thus is constantly being forced to prove herself a native. She keeps detailed maps of the locations of all her sexual encounters, as well as those of her partners. Mick is a Sheffielder whose stripper girlfriend was gang-raped by six well-to-do Londoners. He's come down to the unfamiliar city he hates in order to mete out some revenge. Both these and the supporting cast are wonderfully drawn characters, their paths through London are a treat.
January 6, 2019
Drie mensen, met elk hun boeiende verhaallijn, hebben een totaal verschillende krankzinnige missie uit te voeren in een stad waar ze ooit hopen mee 'klaar' te zijn.
Plezante page-turner, ideaal voor mensen die al net iets te vaak in London zijn geweest.
Niet vies zijn van wat bizarre seks- en geweldscènes kan ook geen kwaad.
February 16, 2024
I enjoyed this. A lot of the obsessive London stuff felt forced. But overall the book is never dull. All of the characters are wacky and interesting and full of their own demented energy. I liked Mick as the intelligent thug. Stuart as the luckless walker. Even Gabby the stripper is interesting if somewhat dense.
Good but a little flawed. Read while on vacation in Bolivia.
Good but a little flawed. Read while on vacation in Bolivia.
March 10, 2025
Dunno where I got the recommendation to read this book, probably another Guardian review where the the description bears little relation to the book.
It's an interesting story I guess if you haven't anything better on the go....
It's an interesting story I guess if you haven't anything better on the go....
December 20, 2018
aspects of this book were entertaining but it didn’t really hang together
Read
August 3, 2020Gave up.
November 28, 2020
Surely only of interest to someone who knows London well, or one who likes the naughty bits. It was OK, but I wouldn't necessarily recommend it for everyone.
November 18, 2022
Nu m-a impresionat subiectul și acțiunea alambicată
May 22, 2025
I thought this would be a fun novel about London and map enthusiasts, but it was actually a pulpy, noirish novel with creepy sex scenes and unlikeable characters. From the 90's and dated.
June 17, 2009
This book started out with tremendous promise, but it really fell through for me in the last 150 pages or so, and the ending didn't redeem this for me. I love cities and walking through them, and I liked the urban-rural and racial tensions that Nicholson touched on, but overall I would have liked to see Bleeding London's metaphorical side go in a different direction. It wasn't necessarily superficial or one-dimensional in its characters, its just that some parts felt incomplete (i.e. character or plot development) and others unnecessary (dragged out descriptions of otherwise meaningless observations jotted as diary entries).
Worth a read if you like (or dislike) London, otherwise I'd say look elsewhere. I'm staying positive and giving it three stars, because I don't want the negatives to detract too much from what I liked about it. And it started off great.
Worth a read if you like (or dislike) London, otherwise I'd say look elsewhere. I'm staying positive and giving it three stars, because I don't want the negatives to detract too much from what I liked about it. And it started off great.
March 3, 2009
closer to what i've been looking for in non-boring london/UK history and insight; bryson's 'notes from a small island' was too complain-y and too few with the good stuff, 'bleeding london' covered more but quickly and the fiction bit was only so-so. going to take my chances next with 'london: the novel' with fingers crossed.. 1152 pages? TOME. ugh.
adendum: the character of the london walker would today poop at google maps' london street view 360. HE WOULD POOP.
adendum: the character of the london walker would today poop at google maps' london street view 360. HE WOULD POOP.
May 31, 2007
Another really hilarious british social satirist (I think that might be my favorite kind of fiction). All his novels are pretty funny,I especially love Everything and More, but Bleeding London is aweseome because it is all about my favorite city. Through several different characters Nicholson explore's the social, emotional and physical geography of London and it's meaning to different residents. Sounds boring but it is actually quirky and funny.
August 25, 2014
I am now a Geoff Nicholson fan. I loved this book.
I first heard about via the Royal Photographic Society Bleeding London Project, and was intrigued enough to buy the book, and I'm so glad I did. I thought it was witty, well written, and had great characters (and one of those being London itself.) Loved how each of the narratives overlapped in to a gripping conclusion.
Would definitely like to see a Channel 4 series made of this novel. Will re-read it in the future too.
I first heard about via the Royal Photographic Society Bleeding London Project, and was intrigued enough to buy the book, and I'm so glad I did. I thought it was witty, well written, and had great characters (and one of those being London itself.) Loved how each of the narratives overlapped in to a gripping conclusion.
Would definitely like to see a Channel 4 series made of this novel. Will re-read it in the future too.
August 25, 2009
Mick Walton heads to London with a list. A list of men; all of whom he believes took part in the sexual violation of his girlfriend. Problem is, Mick hates London. And London couldn't care less. ...Nicholson keeps the action flowing and the narration unreliable. As unreliable as a sixty-year-old map of The Big Smoke.
September 26, 2014
I actually really liked this book but, for some reason, it took me forever to read it! The writing is excellent and the story is compelling mystery. Interesting characters but they did not draw me in enough to want to keep turning the pages. Glad I finished it, though, because there's a clever twist in the end!
March 24, 2015
It was okay, with some good ideas. Nicholson's depiction of London never really resonated with me and despite the promise of a thriller with comic moments it was too focused on, err... more carnal themes. The ending also didn't seem right for the story. However, for Londoners (even reluctant ones like myself), there's fun to be had spotting some of the more off-beat areas of the city.
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