In 1970 Andre Blond, a 24-year-old South African, left his home country to experience life in the UK. He became involved in a series of coincidences that finally led to his departure for New York, eventually arriving in Vancouver on the Canadian west coast. He survived a crash landing at JFK Airport and lived with a not so friendly ghost. His English girlfriend joined him in Vancouver, after which they battled with gun toting policemen and encountered an unidentified flying object, as he completed a 10,500 mile trip around North America before returning to the UK. It’s a humorous and fascinating first hand account of life in UK and travelling in North America in the early 1970s, as seen through the eyes of a stranger to the northern hemisphere.
This is autobiographical writing, but in some ways it resembles the novel form much more than the conventional autobiography. It is the personal story of the interaction between the storyteller and his world, and in the course of it we feel we really get to know the writer, and we appreciate what he is telling us. This is a sincere and entertaining personal story. It is not a story of a life, it is a good, pleasing and positive story of part of a life; the sort of thing that could happen to many people.
He is a competent observer of the men, and women, and places, which he encounters and experiences, and his narrative has immediacy. We are there with Andre, and nearly 40 years roll back.
This is life as it is lived and as it is experienced, in today’s world. His writing is intimate and conversational; we are, we feel, for a little while his companions on this journey.
This is autobiographical writing, but in some ways it resembles the novel form much more than the conventional autobiography. It is the personal story of the interaction between the storyteller and his world, and in the course of it we feel we really get to know the writer, and we appreciate what he is telling us. This is a sincere and entertaining personal story. It is not a story of a life, it is a good, pleasing and positive story of part of a life; the sort of thing that could happen to many people.
He is a competent observer of the men, and women, and places, which he encounters and experiences, and his narrative has immediacy. We are there with Andre, and nearly 40 years roll back.
This is life as it is lived and as it is experienced, in today’s world. His writing is intimate and conversational; we are, we feel, for a little while his companions on this journey.
