{"product_id":"pondlife-9781408841020","title":"Pondlife","description":"\u003cb\u003eBook Synopsis\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cu\u003eFrom the author of \u003ci\u003eThe Savage God\u003c\/i\u003e, a unique memoir of growing old, and a lesson in not going gently into that good night\u003c\/u\u003e\u003c\/b\u003eThe  ponds of Hampstead Heath are small oases; fragments of wild nature  nestled in the heart of north-west London. For the best part of his life  Al Alvarez  poet, critic, novelist, rock-climber and poker player   has swum in them almost daily. An athlete in his youth, Alvarez chronicles what it is to grow old with humour and  fierce honesty  from his relentlessly nagging ankle which makes daily  life a struggle, to infuriating bureaucratic battles with the council to  keep his disabled person's Blue Badge, the devastating effects of a  stroke, and the salvation he finds in the three Ss  Swimming, Sex and  Sleep.As Alvarez swims in the ponds he considers how it feels  when you begin to miss that person you used to be  to miss yourself.  Swimming is his own private form of protest against the onslaught of  time; proof to others, and himself, that \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eTrade Review\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe adrenalin still flows in lively extracts from 11 years of journals * The Times *\u003cbr\u003eA beautiful unfolding of a story, told in deceptively simple prose but with a great power to move * Sunday Times *\u003cbr\u003eA marvellous book. Even the title \u003ci\u003ePondlife\u003c\/i\u003e is spot-on: unlaboured, light and right. But it has no business to be as invigorating and absorbing – its success is against the odds * Observer *\u003cbr\u003eAl Alvarez is a writer’s writer whose brilliant insight has illuminated everything from suicide to his love of poker ... A miniature classic of a man’s defiant assertion against ageing * Metro *","brand":"Bloomsbury Publishing PLC","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":48866816885079,"sku":"9781408841020","price":10.44,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0817\/1739\/5799\/files\/9781408841020.jpg?v=1722280137","url":"https:\/\/bookcurl.com\/products\/pondlife-9781408841020","provider":"Book Curl","version":"1.0","type":"link"}