Blog Tour – Deadstar – Bookworm Blogger

Title: Deadstar

Author: Nick Griffiths

Genre: Historical Fiction/ Music Biographies

My Rating:

Source: ARC

Synopsis:

What’s it like to reach for the stars, but end up floating in a tin can?

Garth Tyson wanted to be the next David Bowie. He fell short. Waaaay short. Burnt out, he fled the stage at Glastonbury ’85, having been pelted with mud, and was never seen again.

You’re familiar with the stars of this era: the Adam Ants, Duran Durans and Depeche Modes – musicians who successfully navigated punk and New Wave to become icons.

Bet you’ve never heard of Garth Tyson – singer, brother, dreamer. Stallholder.

That’s why we’re here.

Decades after Garth’s disappearance, former bandmates, friends, relatives, lovers, music-biz execs and two fans (you try finding more) reunite to tell Garth’s compelling, tragicomic tale. Can any shed light on what really happened to him?

Not everyone appears willingly. Here’s Garth’s 80-year-old mother, Doreen Thyssen: ‘I don’t like people who dig dirt. Fuck off.’ The charmer.

My Review:

I’d like to thank Zoe from Zooloo’s Book Tours for contacting me to take part in this blog tour.

When I read the synopsis of this one I was intrigued. I too wondered what had happened to Garth Tyson and why he suddenly vanished. This story had a slightly different layout to my usual reads but I found it quite refreshing. The interview style of telling the story gave all of the characters a chance to voice their side of the story. The constant banter between Roy and Gary often had me smirking and you could see how strong their friendship was.

Of all the characters I liked Sally, Garth’s sister, the best. She too had grown up in an awful house with parents that were either absent or abusive. She idolised her big brother and always encouraged his love of music and attempts at fame. Her story planned out in the best way possible and I felt of all the characters she had overcome so big issues by telling her side of the story.

This is the perfect read for anyone craving that nostalgic 70/80’s music vibe. It’s a very well researched story and I had to remind myself quite often that it was a work of fiction.

Author Info:

Nick Griffiths first printed work was a review of The Shamen, in Sounds, dated November 1989. The once psychedelic band had gone house and he simply didn’t understand. After Sounds – his music weekly of choice throughout his youth, so a dream come true – he was headhunted for the launch of Select magazine, for whom he wrote reviews and features, involving a brief but swoonsome meeting with his all-time hero, David Bowie. David gently advised Nick to given Lodger another listen, so he did. Moving on to women’s and computer games magazines by the mid-1990s, Nick settled freelancing for the Radio Times and Daily Mail, reviewing TV shows and interviewing their stars, too numerous to mention. He became Radio Times’ Doctor Who correspondent after the show’s return in 2005, which led to him being commissioned by Gollancz/Orion to write his first book, a memoir about growing up as a Doctor Who fan, titled Dalek I Loved You (2007).

A Whovian travelogue, Who Goes There, followed, from Legend Press, who also published Nick’s comic novels, In the Footsteps of Harrison Dextrose and Looking for Mrs Dextrose. Having also written freelance for several of the national broadsheets, Nick quit journalism in 2011 to move from London to Cornwall (where his wife grew up), with his young family. Since 2014 he has been running the vintage-lighting shop, Any Old Lights, in Fowey, but really missed writing. Hence his first book in ten years: DeadStar. DeadStar, a fictional music oral history, set during punk and New Wave, launches on 25 January 2022.

Follow him at:
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/nickgriffithsauthor

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nickgriffithsauthor/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/NickG_author

Buy Links

Amazon UK https://www.amazon.co.uk/DeadStar-Who-Hell-Garth-Tyson-ebook/dp/B09NGQM5MP

Amazon US https://www.amazon.com/DeadStar-Who-Hell-Garth-Tyson-ebook/dp/B09NGQM5MP