We Will Breathe Again
Richard Brock
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We Will Breathe Again
by Richard Brock
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Other Formats: Hard
Cover
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A collection of short stories of
romance, violence, bigotry, self-discovery and therapeutic genealogy set
over a century-and-a-half of British industrial history!
Visit the author's website at www.wewillbreatheagain.co.uk
Book Description
A macho struggle for supremacy over a barbecue; a young boy’s daydream carved on a wall; a snatched moment of passion in a cramped tunnel deep underground; two obsessive genealogists united by a century-old tragedy; and one man’s bizarre newspaper-buying habits.
These unforgettable moments chronicle the lives of a diverse range of characters, played out against a backdrop of over 150 years of British industrial history. The author explores the effects—both protective and oppressive—of industrial communities on those who live at the heart of them. His lucid prose vividly depicts the humanity of the individual struggling to gain a footing in this world of mass-identity, and the devastating consequences of the industrial decay of the late Twentieth Century on those whose lives have been built around it.
This finely crafted short story collection introduces a fresh and youthful new voice in fiction.
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“The hardship people have had to suffer here has always been economic rather than ethnic. It’s the kind of hardship that breaks communities and families apart rather than drawing them together. That kind of tragedy is just too fractured, I’m afraid. There’s no poetry in it.”
With a wry yet urgent style that will appeal to fans of Dornford Yates and Colum McCann, Richard Brock makes full use of his varied cast of eccentrics, misfits, daydreamers and romantics, to tell intensely personal stories in the most impersonal of settings.
These stories, of peculiar gifts, forbidden romances and revolutionary aspirations, squeeze every last ounce of poetry from the often stark situations in which the characters find themselves, resonating throughout with the optimism implicit in the promise “We’ll breathe again.”
About the author
Richard
Brock was born in 1981 and grew up in a small village near Barnsley, where
his family still lives. At present he divides his time between the family
home and Leeds, where, when he is not dreaming of winning the Nobel Prize
for Literature, he is studying for a degree in English and Linguistics.
Available from the following on-line bookstores:
Article on Richard Brock and We Will Breathe
Again by Hayley Broad (Dec 5, 2003)
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