Audiobook Review: The Road Not Taken, by Paul Dodgson

• Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: Unbound (22 Aug. 2019)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1783527757
• ISBN-13: 978-1783527755

Amazon: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Road-Not-Taken-memoir-about/dp/1783527757

BLURB

On the Road Not Taken is a memoir about the transformational power of music. It begins with a boy growing up in a small town on the Kent coast in the 1970s, who learns to play the guitar and dreams of heading out on the open road with a head full of songs. But when the moment comes to make the choice he is not brave enough to try and do it for a living.

Time passes but the desire to explain the world through music never goes away. And as the years go by it gets harder and harder to risk looking like a fool, of doing the very thing he would most like to do, of actually being himself. Eventually, thirty-five years later, when it feels like time is running out, he walks out onto a stage in front of 500 people and begins to sing again.

What follows is an extraordinary period of self-discovery as he plays pubs, clubs, theatres and festivals, overcoming anxiety to experience the joy of performance.

My Review

Thanks to Anne at Random Things Tours for organising this blog tour and to the author and publisher for the audiobook option, since I’m struggling with ebooks at the moment.

We all have a path we wished we’d taken but didn’t, usually in favour of the safe road; not everyone gets the chance to try again. When he found himself divorced and alone in 2014, the author, a successful voice actor and writer of stage and radio drama, found himself drawn back to his guitar and his troubadour dreams.

Paul has a very good voice for storytelling, which given his employment as a voice actor one shouldn’t be surprised about. In this memoir, he tells his own story in punchy, music-themed chapters. The short chapters, only 3 to 5 minutes in length, meant the narrative moves backwards and forwards in time fairly rapidly between John’s adolescent dreams and present reality.

I found this memoir fascinating for the social history and moving for the personal history. Highly recommended.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Paul Dodgson is a writer, radio producer, teacher and musician. Paul joined the BBC as a studio manager and went on to become a producer making programmes for all BBC Radio networks. In 2001 Paul left the BBC and has since written 16 plays for BBC Radio 4 and been a member of the Eastenders writing team. In the theatre Paul has written several plays for young people and been commissioned to write music and lyrics for five musicals including The Nutcracker at Theatre Royal Bath and Nuffield Southampton. Paul has taught creative writing around the world, has been writer-in-residence at Exeter University and a Hawthornden Fellow. Paul has a particular interest in teaching techniques of memoir writing and three of his BBC radio plays have told life stories including On The Road Not Taken, which began life on BBC Radio 4.

Twitter @pauldodgson