A Boy in the Water by Tom Gregory

The poignant, life-affirming story of a determined boy, a visionary coach, and how the dream of a record-breaking Channel swim became reality

Eltham, South London. 1984: the hot fug of the swimming pool and the slow splashing of a boy learning to swim but not yet wanting to take his foot off the bottom. Fast-forward four years. Photographers and family wait on the shingle beach as a boy in a bright orange hat and grease-smeared goggles swims the last few metres from France to England. He has been in the water for twelve agonizing hours, encouraged at each stroke by his coach, John Bullet, who has become a second father.

This is the story of a remarkable friendship between a coach and a boy, and a love letter to the intensity and freedom of childhood.

This book is fabulous, I need to be completely honest and say that I hadn't read the description of the book and as it was an advance kindle copy that I read, I hadn't spotted that the cover said 'a memoir'. So I'm reading the book and just thought it was brilliant... it had me gripped and I finished it in less than a day as I just couldn't put it down!! It was as I got to the end that I thought 'maybe this is a true story' and indeed it was. 

The way in which it was written was really moving, Tom has clearly retained the emotions from that time and they come across perfectly, I will admit that I did cry towards the end. 

It truly is an amazing story.

Review - Finding Gobi

I work at Tesco (it's not a secret) and had seen the 'Finding Gobi' book on the shelves in store, I considered buying it but a lovely colleague had already got it and said I could read her copy.... I'm so glad that she did....... WOW!

So I after reading the book I must admit that I was slightly concerned.... The book was based upon a true story which had been widespread across the media last year and I genuinely have no recollection of hearing about it... its very unique so I'm sure I'd remember if I had, I'm disappointed that I hadn't heard about it at the time as its most definitely a story that I would have followed.

Finding Gobi is based on a true story of a little dog finding an ultra marathon runner during a race and then the marathon runner finding the dog.

I couldn't put this book down, I had no idea of the background to this book but from partway through the first chapter I knew it was a story that I couldn't wait to find out the ending to and I had to read it over two nights as sadly I had to go to work in between reading and it was all that I thought about for days after, I loved the way it was written and loved that there was so much love between the author and the gorgeous Gobi. It also showed the difference between the cultures and the laws about transporting animals between different countries. 

I don't want to giveaway any more spoilers but must say it's well worth reading even if you did see coverage of the story in the media as it is a brilliantly written book and I'm convinced that it will also make a great film at some point in the near future too.