We're the last people allowed into the hall, late apparently. The organisers are getting a bit huffy actually, impatient to start the show and shut us all in. I wasn't aware that a jam was this intense. I wish they hadn't shut the doors, its like a sauna in here. If saunas held seances, the room is almost entirely lit with pillar candles, but I suppose thats to create the right kind of intimacy. People are always talking about 'intimate atmospheres' right?
Not going to lie, I'm feeling pretty trendy sitting at the Hootenanny in Brixton tonight, the dive bar/venue has been taken over by all manner of literary people for the Brixton Book Jam. The room is completely full, but then again I do pride myself on being able to source bar stools from even the most crowded of drinking establishments. Becky and I manage to squeeze ourselves onto a table right at the front with three other girls, a press agent, a PR girl and Zoe Pilger, author of Eat your Heart Out. They all work with Becky on Elizabeth Aaron's hilarious novel, 'Low Expectations', and we're here to hear her read.
I've never been to a Book-Jam before and to be honest I'm feeling a bit skeptical about the whole thing. I realise that its probably best to approach these things with an open mind so I try and put aside my general prejudices (lets not pretend I don't have them) about readings being pretentious/stuffy/uptight/awkward/[insert prejudice here]. As an English student I've heard a fair amount of god awful poetry red by very earnest speakers, but I'm feeling a little safer in the knowledge that the Brixton Book Jam will be far less amateurish than anything I've seen before. Looking at the writers waiting on the side of the stage, I notice that they actually seem just as nervous as the average student writer, the only difference is that they've got proper books sitting on the stall in the corner, and they're properly for sale.
The people I'm with seem beyond excited by the fact that BBC 4 have turned up to cover the event. I love publishing for that. We're all nerds.
Aside from our group, its a 'carefully considered' mix of people in the Hootenanny tonight. Lets just say that most of the audience have opted for the 'bohemian' look, and also that over the course of the evening I overhear no less than three different conversations about Brixton's tragic 'gentrification issue', one a particularly passionate, not to mention loud, protest from a couple with lets face it, the most expensive looking dreadlocks I have ever seen. Now that I'm here I also start to wonder if I'm giving off a bit of a literary virgin vibe, like an unculturoma. I'm also overcome with a genuinely curious and overwhelming desire to count the exact number of fedoras in the room. Though, again, I'm so not being judgemental.
Elizabeth is apparently a dream to work with, firstly because she's really sweet, and secondly because she's just got so many brilliant ideas. I'm excited to meet her, I love how honest her writing is - I feel like Low Expectations is basically about being a young woman at times where you just feel like a bit of a mess. I suppose I am Aaron's target audience, but I definitely related to her tales of late night misadventures a lot more than I would like to admit. I actually spoke to another blogger about the book a while ago, but she had just dismissed it as chick-lit (due to the commercial cover no doubt) and said that she didn't read 'that kind of thing'. My immediate thought when she said this was, What a shame! Snobbery really does make you miss out on some incredible things. Besides, I reckon your average Nicholas Sparks reader would be pretty surprised to pick up Aaron's book to find her heroine, Georgie, having sex on sheetless mattresses and drunkenly insulting the man of her dreams.
Not going to lie, I'm feeling pretty trendy sitting at the Hootenanny in Brixton tonight, the dive bar/venue has been taken over by all manner of literary people for the Brixton Book Jam. The room is completely full, but then again I do pride myself on being able to source bar stools from even the most crowded of drinking establishments. Becky and I manage to squeeze ourselves onto a table right at the front with three other girls, a press agent, a PR girl and Zoe Pilger, author of Eat your Heart Out. They all work with Becky on Elizabeth Aaron's hilarious novel, 'Low Expectations', and we're here to hear her read.
I've never been to a Book-Jam before and to be honest I'm feeling a bit skeptical about the whole thing. I realise that its probably best to approach these things with an open mind so I try and put aside my general prejudices (lets not pretend I don't have them) about readings being pretentious/stuffy/uptight/awkward/[insert prejudice here]. As an English student I've heard a fair amount of god awful poetry red by very earnest speakers, but I'm feeling a little safer in the knowledge that the Brixton Book Jam will be far less amateurish than anything I've seen before. Looking at the writers waiting on the side of the stage, I notice that they actually seem just as nervous as the average student writer, the only difference is that they've got proper books sitting on the stall in the corner, and they're properly for sale.
The people I'm with seem beyond excited by the fact that BBC 4 have turned up to cover the event. I love publishing for that. We're all nerds.
Aside from our group, its a 'carefully considered' mix of people in the Hootenanny tonight. Lets just say that most of the audience have opted for the 'bohemian' look, and also that over the course of the evening I overhear no less than three different conversations about Brixton's tragic 'gentrification issue', one a particularly passionate, not to mention loud, protest from a couple with lets face it, the most expensive looking dreadlocks I have ever seen. Now that I'm here I also start to wonder if I'm giving off a bit of a literary virgin vibe, like an unculturoma. I'm also overcome with a genuinely curious and overwhelming desire to count the exact number of fedoras in the room. Though, again, I'm so not being judgemental.
Elizabeth is apparently a dream to work with, firstly because she's really sweet, and secondly because she's just got so many brilliant ideas. I'm excited to meet her, I love how honest her writing is - I feel like Low Expectations is basically about being a young woman at times where you just feel like a bit of a mess. I suppose I am Aaron's target audience, but I definitely related to her tales of late night misadventures a lot more than I would like to admit. I actually spoke to another blogger about the book a while ago, but she had just dismissed it as chick-lit (due to the commercial cover no doubt) and said that she didn't read 'that kind of thing'. My immediate thought when she said this was, What a shame! Snobbery really does make you miss out on some incredible things. Besides, I reckon your average Nicholas Sparks reader would be pretty surprised to pick up Aaron's book to find her heroine, Georgie, having sex on sheetless mattresses and drunkenly insulting the man of her dreams.
The Book Jam really wasn't half as bad as I thought it would be. A little dry at times, but the audience were really engaged, laughing and applauding in all the right places, so it didn't feel awkward at all. In terms of the actual books read, there was no real theme to the night's curation. There was a real mix of genres, everything from a woman's sobering account of a youth spent in Apartheid South Africa to a conceptual cookbook inspired by the foods of Brixton Market. Though this did mean that the audience were having radical mood swings, I thought that it was actually kind of a good thing, as was the fact that no one read for more than 10 minutes, it kept the energy up throughout the night.
Aaron's reading was something else though. Hilarious from start to finish, she chose an extract from my favourite chapter, about picking up an extraordinary amount of cocaine from her 'friendly neighbourhood dealer man' in preparation for what might possibly be the messiest New Year's Eve East London has ever seen. No doubt the audience were surprised to see this beautiful blonde woman explain, with incredible comic timing, just what it is about the terribly obvious, cash -substance exchange that has otherwise intelligent women suddenly having extremely dirty thoughts about their dealer's gold teeth. She won everyone over.
In addition to the release of her debut novel 'Low Expectations', she's going to be performing the unpublished raw material at the Edinburgh Fringe this summer. She's also written a play called 'Death Row Reality Show,' which sounds amazing, the title's fairly self explanatory, its about a reality show that takes place on death row. Becky has been raving about it, she says that its kind of like Jerry Springer the musical.
I'm actually really glad I went to the Jam tonight and even if you think its not really 'your thing' I would recommend going anyway, particularly if you hear of a good writer who you know is going up to read. If you've already read their novel, its a whole different experience hearing it out loud and if you've not, there is so much variety, you'd be hard pushed not to find something that engages you.
Plus its totally FREE.
Sorry if you missed it and wanted to go, but good news is that keen beans can still listen to the event on Soundcloud here.