August Life Update; Flash back to July part 2. Birmingham bear hunt and London trip

Hi readers,

In July, I went to Birmingham for a night and a day then on to London for two days and two nights. I had visited Birmingham before a few years back whilst on a canal boat holiday and stopped in what's known as the Birmingham basin. This time, I stayed in the city center and I had a really good time. Currently, they have this bear statue hunt on and there's like over 200 bear statues and some little bears to find. I had great fun doing this and it also helped me navigate about the town center. My favorite bear has to be the first one I found; Shakesbear.  

Around the church yard there were lots and I spent time taking photos and looking at the gravestones. It was a nice place to chill. I went inside the church too and saw the pretty stained glass windows.

My favorite bears here where Peony the panda and this love hearted one. There was also a jungle bear and a metal bear called Snowy.

 I then went over to the art gallery and museum which I'd picked to spend the afternoon in. On the way I found some more bears! This moon and star one is so cute.

Everyone loves the Spock bear.

My favorite in this section had to by Olly bear because he was so funny. Lots of people wanted their photo with him.

It was also at this point I helped someone to find a bear. I had a printed out map but it made it easier as I had already seen and taken a photo of the bear she wanted to see. Later, I picked up a real map from the train station and discovered the locations of all the bears!

I also liked this bear with a northern lights theme. Then I went on to the art gallery and museum. They had a lot of the little bears there and I too far too many photos to post up here. I looked round and did enjoy it, but with the weather being so nice and the wanting to find other bears, I left early.

The bear who cares a lot was the first bear on my list but I didn't find her until we had got back to the train station. She was the last bear I found because we then had to leave for London. I did so want to stay and look for other bears though!

I had a good wander around Birmingham city center and I really enjoyed it. There was lots of shops and people, who were all interesting to watch. I found a cool Japan shop and brought some presents for myself and my boyfriend. I found this like hidden cathedral and this cool waterfall, which the water falls over a poem about the city and it's really interesting to watch. I'll miss Birmingham and hopefully I can go back someday. 

London

Next came two nights and two days in London. Sadly, I wasn't feeling well and choice the first day just to stay close to the hotel which was in Blackfriars, so I just had a wander around there. I walked alongside the Thames and I saw the Eye. I've been on it a few years ago and I saw some of the bridges and some boats. It was a nice walk under lots of trees. 

Then, just wondering about, I found St. Bride's church. I think I'd past it last time I was in London but this time I decided to check it out. It's really small and pretty. The old woman at the desk was so nice and happy too. I went down to see the crypt which had some buried headstones inside of it. No one actually knew about the crypt and foundations until the a second world war bomb hit the church. Then they found that it dated back a long time.

This is like a underground chapel that's just off the main crypt. It was really quiet and cool down here. I took a few moments to chill out.

From there I went to St. Paul's and had a walk around the gardens which I'd missed last time. I also saw and went on the Millennium bridge which felt a bit weird crossing. I only went like half way because I had no reason to cross to the other side.  

View of St. Paul's from Millennium Bridge. 

The next day, I was feeling worse, but I couldn't stay in the the hotel as we'd checked out. I went to see The Temple church which wasn't far away. Though I did get lost and had to ask a doorman where it was. There are lots of doorman in London and they may seem scary but they are actually nice and helpful.

You have to pay to get into The Temple church, but its' worth it. Inside is really nice and bright, it's quiet expect from when a load of tourists come in! They had lots of history information up but I was distracted by the knight statues. It actually took me a good few minutes to figure out this was the Knight's Templar church! You can go to the first floor and look down which gives a nice view of the structure of the tower.

There's lots of knights and other important people statues. There are like from the 1300 and have worn a bit. I found that there wasn't much information about them and some of the statues haven't been identified! There are some memory stones too and it was interesting to read some of them.

The Templar's have a thing about Pegasus, I saw a lot whilst I was there in all the designs of the floor and hangings. There was also one in a stained glass window. I should have asked what it meant, but I forgot.  

I also liked all these little faces which came out of the sides of the tower. These two were like the cheekiest as most were sensible. They made me laugh though.  

I also liked all the old Bibles, prayer and hymn books there were in the pews. I took some cool photos of them. This one is my favorite though. 

Temple Church is really nice and if you want to escape the busy flow of London It's a good place to just sit and chill. Though I'd prefer St. Bride's as it's less busy with tourists.

You can't get into the gardens, even though I wanted to. I had to make do with the courtyard. It was nice with this water fountain, though it was really loud. I read my book for a bit and then had to go back to the place my mum was at because I still wasn't feeling great.

I wished I'd been better and bale to travel around London more. There's so much more I want to see there. Maybe next year when I hopefully go for my birthday.

That's all for now anyway. I'm off to Sweden on Thursday, so my next post will be all about that. In the meantime please check out my other blog; https://thestoryfiles.wordpress.com/ I write a new shor story everyday on there.

Thanks for reading and see you soon!

Book Review: The Girl On The Train by Paula Hawkins

Hi readers, 

Please note there's going to be some possible spoilers! Sorry, it was difficult to void it.  

If you're looking for a quick and easy novel without a complicated plot or characters whilst your sat on the beach and/or traveling then this book would fit nicely. I was drawn in by the tagline and the inside blurb when I picked up this book whilst in Waterstones waiting for my boyfriend. In my head I had this idea of a woman being like a spy and knowing details about the lives of a married couple from which she could see from the train. (Which maybe might make a good story or else just wouldn't work). I added the book to my list and asked for it when my birthday came around. 

The opening chapter drew me in and I know it's bad, but it remind me of Fifty Shades Of Grey (Which I'm actually planning to go back and look at again next month). I think it was the style of writing, that boarding on older teen to twenty-some adult language, which means a simple vocabulary is used and thus making the novel easier and faster to read. I'm not saying there is anything wrong with this, but it does make for repetition and a 'dumbing down' within the story.   

I really liked the opening idea of abandoned clothes on the train track because its' something that happens and people question in real life. I thought this would be a key point in the story - you know like someone getting rid of evidence- instead though it's used very briefly to aid the main character -Rachel into remembering something about someone towards the end of the novel. Actually, before the first chapter -narrated by Rachel- the book opens with two excerpts from the novel itself, which of course you don't realise nor put into place until you're read them in their context. These two paragraphs do help to draw you in. How couldn't they? When a woman has been 'buried beneath a sliver birch tree' and magpies mock another person with they 'raucous cackling' as the person recites the nursery rhyme One for Sorrow. 

Rachel's life and background story seem interesting enough; she's an alcoholic who has blackouts. That has led her to the state she is in now; divorced, jobless, depressed, boarding on homeless and bankrupted. Every day she takes the train to work to trick her friend, who she's currently stays with, into believing that she still has a job. Really she spends the days hanging around in London. Also, it allows her into the lives of 'Jess and Jason'. With the train having to almost always stop right behind their house, Rachel gets this window shot of the couple and seems to have become very knowledgeable and interested in them. 

Now, here's where it all fell a part for me - Rachel has daydreamed this whole thing up. The couple who live there are really called Megan and Scott and Rachel doesn't know anything about them. Okay, I know that everyone -especially writers-do this all the time and it does work to flag up Rachel as a unreliable narrator, but I just didn't like how it was done and I do think I would have preferred if Rachel had been stalking them or something like that. The other thing that caused me to have issues was the time and dates. I get that most people won't have been effect by this, but for someone who's not very good at keeping such a vast change of time and dates in their mind it starts to grate on you. Plus, it doesn't help the flow of the story. I've big issues with how stories flow and I so don't like narrative structures that stop/start. 

This story also flicks between two other narrative voices Megan's and Anna's- who is Rachel's husband's new wife and daughter to his child. After awhile, I struggled to tell all three voices a part, there didn't seem much difference between them and at one point I wondered why the writer had decided to give us the same point of view told by two people in the same way. I think that if it had been Rachel's voice throughout everything would possibly have worked better. I think it was at this point that repetition started to get to me, I noticed how many times the characters made and drink cups of tea and coffee and alcohol drinks. Every other page they seem to do this and it's just lazy writing to give the characters an action to do.  

To be honest the only reason why I carried on reading was because I wanted to find out what had happened to Megan and then who had killed her. There was nothing else after that first chapter that made me want to read on. I didn't really care what happened to Rachel or any other the other characters because I just didn't connect with them. The characters weren't that interesting over all nor did they do much development, except at the end where everything felt rushed anyway. The ending plot twist did kinda work, because I didn't get it till close to the reveal. I guess if you're into crime/thriller stories then you'd have got it sooner. Even on reflection though, it does seem weak and I wanted the killer to be more anger and have more motive. The police characters are just terrible, they never felt realistic and they are too far in the background to physical do anything. Maybe a flip on this story with them telling it could be another option? 

Overall, I didn't much like this book. There were problems with the plot, characters and the narrative structure. I just can't be wonder if it had been told in a better way that maybe it could have been a better book? Still, I stand by what I said before at the start, so it's up to you decided to like it or hate it. For me though, I'll be passing this book on to my mum to see what she makes of it.     

Till next time. 

Formby Woods

Its been too long again, but I seem not to be able to find the time, of late anyway. Hopefully I'll have some time now because very little is currently happening. Everything seems to be winding down to summer and the holiday plans. I should be glad for the break, but I feel lazy not doing anything, so I've been reading the set novels for my 3rd year, I'm on my third one now- The Moonstone by Wikie Collins and unlike Oliver this one is more hard to read. I'm not getting into it and so far its taken me just over a week to read 166 pages....but there must be 200 words per page, as the writing is so small and a great many things are happening within them. I must push on though and it might get better later on.

Anyway, I've chosen to write about Formby woods today because I've photos for it and it was the highlight of last week. Its a national animal reserve in-between Liverpool and Southport and is a pine forest really. There are lots of trails through the trees and you sometimes can go off the path, but they are led to the sand dunes and to the beach.

Its less then an hour away from my student house by train and since the weather was okay and we were bored, it seemed a good place to go for lunch. We took sandwiches and ate them on the dunes whilst playing in the sand and joking about moving dunes. That's what most of them are-still growing dunes but it was funny to picture a dune getting up and moving around.

Pine trees

Then we walked back across the beach and drew somethings in the sand, as you do. We got back to the train station and decided to go for tea in Southport....how that place has gone down hill is shocking. I've been before, but this time we went to the pier and all the seaside places. It seems you can do very little there now and what's left is just an empty shell of by gone days. There are things where you can picture the place being once alive with people on holiday and having fun, but now and I guess like many places around Britain, it has fallen prey to the growth of aeroplanes, package holidays and the British peoples' urges to 'escape the country/weather'.

One of the walks at Formby

So many people are missing out and what England has to offer! So what if the weather isn't so good as Spain or the USA? Many places in England are soaked in history, most of it very exciting and you don't have to dig so deep-even in your pockets! to find it. That's why this year I'm grateful that once again I'll be holidaying in England, a place in Cornwall I've never been before and who knows what I might discover there?

Train map To Formby