‘Suicide Thursday’ by Will Carver

I think Will Carver is a great writer – read a couple of brilliant thrillers in the past – this is another dark thriller that is well worth a read.

It follows a fella called Eli Hagen who struggles to finish anything – his friend’s suicide changes everything. Eli struggles with everything, even knowing what is fact and what is fiction. His relationship with his girlfriend Jackie is desperate, tragic and hilarious. In fact, that describes the book perfectly: desperate, tragic and hilarious.

Will Carver has once again managed to put the crazy into reality. You can use that on the poster!!

If you remember, March’s challenge was a daily plank.

As you can see it didn’t go particularly well…

Started off absolutely fine, made great progress. Then things started to get in the way: Ofsted, weekend away, nights out and tiredness.

Also, breaking the 5 min barrier gave me a sort of ‘done it’ mindset.

All I can say is we move on and go again.

April’s challenge: Tarot Card Reading

‘You Can’t Run Away From This’ by Damian Hall

A book that explores the impact of running in our climate and ecological emergency.

Definitely a book that makes you think. Full of lots of research and insights from experts from all fields.

It is impossible to read this book and not make changes to your life.

It has taken 17 days but the 5min plank has finally been surpassed. It’s amazing how by simply repeating the same exercise you can get better and stronger. I took the decision yesterday to give myself the day off – I felt like it was needed.

Not sure how far this can go, the last minute or so of these planks are full on. We keep going…

‘The Girl who broke the Sea’ by A. Connors

This was a World Book Day purchase from school – teenage fiction – the blurb sounded interesting!

It was a good book (although it does only get 3 stars on 2023’s harsher ratings system).

It follows Lily, a troubled teenager, who goes with her mum to an underwater mining thing. The feeling of tension and claustrophobia was a constant in the novel.

Worth a read, as long as intelligent floaty bacterial life forms and slightly implausible and incredible underwater rescues don’t bother you too much.

After seven days of daily planking I can report progress.

So, in one week I have improved by just over a minute – that’s not bad going. It’s amazing what your body can do just by regular exercise. I’ve done nothing to get better at planking, I’ve just done one a day.