As my army of Followers on Twitter swells to a humbling five hundred (for which I am truly honoured and grateful!) it is time for a look at how The Journal of a Georgian Gentleman is doing. It was after all launched a full nine months ago – and it has been a fascinating learning experience. To be honest, sales have been slow, but my hope is that people will take pity on me and buy the book as a Christmas present – otherwise it may be a stuffed canary rather than a turkey for this particular Georgian Gent on Xmas Day!

      versus          Tweetypie        

                                         WHICH IS IT TO BE?  YOU CHOOSE!

First the reviews: I was delighted to be reviewed in two of the main family history magazines in August, as well as by an online review magazine called e-vue (which I had never heard of, but as they were extremely flattering, who cares that my children assume that I wrote the review myself!)

Lucy Inglis kindly did a review in The Georgian from which I have extracted some of the nice bits and summarised them later on. Mike Paterson  at London Historians gave me a most helpful plug,and I am very grateful to both Lucy and Mike. It really helps to have such comments from 'real historians' ! Several purchasers  have also left appreciative comments on Amazon. Here are some of the reviews:

Brian Clough on eVue: “I loved the book’s illustrations and its elegant colouring and lettering. This fine presentation is an example of a book being as good as its cover. Open up and enjoy….It may prompt you to burrow into your own family archives and do the same…. Author Mike Rendell has done what many have dreamed of doing before him, he has traced his roots and made its history sing.”

Paul Gaskell in Family History Magazine: “Rendell’s sympathetic editing of his ancestor’s words has created a volume that gives a real insight into ordinary life throughout the Eighteenth Century.”

Mike Paterson of London Historians: “The value of this book is that it helps one “live in the clothes” of the mid to late-Eighteenth Century. We get a real sense of what things cost, how people dined and entertained themselves, what were their fears and daily concerns...

These, then, are the brush strokes. The wider canvas of the book gives us much context. We learn, for example, about how the Enclosures Acts affected Hall’s farming interests. We discover how Hall coped with the Gordon Riots of 1780. We are reminded how hostilities with France at the end of Hall’s story caused economic problems – income tax, burgeoning national debt, acute inflation – and was felt most acutely, as usual, by those on the very bottom of the heap.

There is a strong current trend for historical examination of the life of the aspirational middle class. Historians Amanda Vickery and Lucy Worsley have both recently blazed a trail across our screens.  Not for them the rich, the famous, the powerful. This is the history of the street, the shop, the office, the family and the home. Mike Rendell’s excellent book makes a noteworthy contribution to building the picture of Georgian middle-class merchant domesticity.

The book is richly illustrated with photos, maps, contemporary illustrations and, of course, facsimiles of pages of Hall’s own writings. It has generous and interesting appendices”.

 Lucy Inglis in The Georgian: 

"...For all this, Richard comes across as an engaging character and Rendell does a thorough job of pulling out the fine detail of his ancestor’s education, friends, business and marriage.….It is well-produced and pleasingly illustrated, altogether far superior to the usual run of ‘family history’ books. Hall’s story…. does supply a rare glimpse into a self-confessedly ordinary man’s life in the eighteenth century." 

What is clear is that it is the sort of book which will never sell itself – it isn’t going to battle itself into the front row of the display at Waterstones or other main bookstores. In the few cases where I have managed to get stores to stock the tome (“I’m a local author –can I wheedle a favour…’) I was told that merely sticking it on the shelf wasn’t going to get anywhere unless I was able/willing to attend readings etc. My local library at Totnes has kindly agreed to do a local author promotion in December, which is great. I have also given talks (and sold quite a few books on the back of them)  both in Spain and in the U.K. I thoroughly enjoy doing the talks and intend to do many more in the months to come. What is obvious is that for every one book I sell online at Amazon there are a dozen I can sell in person after a talk, so I suspect that a lifetime of talks to W.I.’s and U3A’s is beckoning!

But, if you are about to start your Christmas shopping and have no idea what to get Uncle Richard or Great Aunt Edith, here is the easy answer: check out my book on-line and  get out the plastic!

 For orders from the UK go to Amazon at:  http://www.amazon.co.uk/Journal-Georgian-Gentleman-Richard-1729-1801/dp/1846245230

For the States go to Amazon at http://www.amazon.com/Journal-Georgian-Gentleman-Richard-1729-1801/dp/1846245230/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1297641370&sr=1-1

And for the rest of the world try the Book Depository because they offer free worldwide delivery via:  http://www.bookdepository.co.uk/book/9781846245237/The-Journal-of-a-Georgian-Gentleman?selectCurrency=USD&currencyChange=%3CSPAN%3E%3CEM%3EChange+currency%3C%2FEM%3E%3C%2FSPAN%3E

There are a number of other links to on-line sellers at my website at:  http://mikerendell.com

So, thanks for following, thanks for reading my blogs, and if you buy my book – thanks a hundred-fold!  

Today I nervously await the arrival of the postman - it is six months since my book was published and I can expect a royalty cheque to drop through the letterbox. Will it be enough for a deep-water cruise through the blue Pacific, I wonder? No, probably enough for a pedalo trip around Poole harbour - but one way only, not a return ticket...

More to the point it will give me a breakdown of who has sold the book and I rather suspect that it will be dominated by online sales - I cannot glean from the publishers whether they have even persuaded a single UK bookshop to carry the title. It is ironic that I seem to have had rather more press coverage of the book in Spain than here in the UK. But I shouldn't complain - there have been good reviews of it this month in two family history magazines, but it remains to be seen whether this is translated into sales.

So, my dedicated followers of this blog, it looks as though I will be continuing to delve the treasure trove that is the Eighteenth Century, trying to whet your appetites and lure you to visit my website at http://mikerendell.com where you will be earnestly requested to spend your spondoolies on a book which was described thus:

"By ...seemlessly incorporating historical details and additional sources the author has written an entertaining account, not only of his ancestor's life, but the period as a whole. Clearly a chip off the old block!" (Family Tree Magazine, July 2011)

I'm not actually sure that I want to be described as a chip off Richard's block  - I think I preferred the review in Family History Monthly which says that "Rendell's sympathetic editing of his ancestor's words have created a volume that gives a real insight into ordinary life throughout the 18th Century". That's good enough for me! 

 I hope you enjoy reading  the book as much as I enjoyed writing it. Thanks!

It is now exactly four months since publication date, and a time to look at how the book has been received. I am delighted to pass on a review of the book written by Mike Paterson of London Historians. Their web page is at http://www.londonhistorians.org/

And if you are at all interested in London through the ages have a look at the London Historian blog at http://londonhistorians.wordpress.com/   You can also see their their membership details and get the chance to meet other like-minded people!

Review: The Journal of a Georgian Gentleman

23 May, 2011 by Mike Paterson

"Mike Rendell is a retired lawyer who lives in Spain. His direct ancestor, Richard Hall, was a stocking maker, haberdasher and farmer who lived in the mid-Georgian period. Hall kept a meticulous diary, wrote many letters and hoarded hundreds of documents and objects that particularly interested him.  Much of this – and other directly related material – is in the possession of the author. Rendell has compiled it, made sense of it, related it to the contemporary historical landscape and produced this book: The Journal of a Georgian Gentleman: The Life and Times of Richard Hall, 1729 – 1801.

Hall was born and spent his formative years in Red Lion Street,  Southwark – an only child. He followed his father into the stocking making trade.  Father and son were without benefit of livery membership, so business was tough.  But Richard worked hard, married well and eventually bought himself a shop and respectability in the Square Mile, expanding his wares to general haberdashery, by which time the City establishment  readily embraced him at no little cost: money talks. Simultaneously, he minded, nurtured and developed his small-holding interests in rural Berkshire in partnership with his wealthier brother-in-law.  Having made his eldest son an equal partner in the London business, friction between them was a probable cause of Hall moving permanently to Bourton in the Cotswolds, nonetheless visiting the capital frequently for the remainder of his life. Hence, for the historian, this man’s story has valuable depth, embracing as it does substantial periods of life lived both immediately south and north of London Bridge, plus giving us a good look at how a modest country squire spent his time at the fag-end of the 18^th Century.

Hall was a Baptist, and suitably God-fearing; he appeared to have a wide circle of friends; he enjoyed a drink; he was keen to keep up with the Joneses; he was a conscientious if possibly not especially affectionate parent (although this is difficult to judge from the written word alone); he was careful with money yet not above ensuring that his house was well appointed with the latest fixtures, fittings and comforts, or that his children were well shod and went to good schools.

Not especially an original thinker himself (why should he be?), Hall nonetheless had an enquiring mind, being deeply interested in the natural world, notably astronomy, fossils, flora and fauna. He took meticulous notes of all the latest discoveries. Almost daily he tells us about the weather. He records the costs of every single transaction, from tipping a gateman to visiting a museum to re-roofing his house. He relates whom he travelled with, where they stayed, what they ate. We share every ache, pain and  malady which befalls him, and what remedies he employs.  There is nothing too mundane for Hall to get down on paper.  We might consider him a fussy man, a bore even. But so estranged are we in time from just 250 years ago, these jottings give a fascinating insight into life lived then.  A banquet for the historian of Georgian daily life.

Exceeding Sharp; Snow, froze very Hard. Froze the water in the Chamber Pot.

Went to the Chapel Royal. Saw the King and Queen, afterwards the zebra (two shillings) and elephants (three shillings).

The  value of this book is that it helps one “live in the clothes” of the mid to late-Eighteenth Century. We get a real sense of what things cost, how people dined and entertained themselves, what were their fears and daily concerns. How long it took them to travel from A to B; basic medicine and dentistry; how precarious life could be (his partner’s wife died within seven hours of falling ill). I was interested to discover that Hall and his ilk liked to visit stately homes, something I took to be a 20^th Century past-time: far from it.

These, then, are the brush strokes. The wider canvas of the book gives us much context. We learn, for example, about how the Enclosures Acts affected Hall’s farming interests: extremely directly as it happened. Hall and his brother-in-law, both upstanding Christian gentlemen, connived in gerrymandering the local election in order to get a piece of the action, that is to say to get their hands on public land. We discover how Hall coped with the Gordon Riots of 1780: he holed  up at a friend’s house until  the violence dissipated. We are reminded how hostilities with France at the end of Hall’s story caused economic problems – income tax, burgeoning national debt, acute inflation – and was felt most acutely, as usual, by those on the very bottom of the heap.  No radical, Hall was nonetheless on the abolition side of the slavery argument.

There is a strong current trend for historical examination of the life of the aspirational middle class. Historians Amanda Vickery and Lucy Worsley have both recently blazed a trail across our screens.  Not for them the rich, the famous, the powerful. This is the history of the street, the shop, the office, the family and the home. Mike Rendell’s excellent book makes a noteworthy contribution to building the picture of Georgian middle-class merchant domesticity.

The book is richly illustrated with photos, maps, contemporary illustrations and, of course, facsimiles of pages of Hall’s own writings. It has generous and interesting appendices."