Book Review of Ultra Violence by Mark Barry

From the blog of Ngaire Elder

Ultra Violence by Mark Barry

 Ngaire's rating: 5 of 5 stars


A Remarkable Read, a Winner!

Skilfully written in true Mark Barry style; fresh, honest, REAL writing. From the first to the last page I was captured by the narrator's account of football from the good old days. I could hear the chants, smell the violence and taste their fear. Truly memorable ending. You don't have to be male or a football fanatic to enjoy this incredible novel.


http://adventuresofceciliaspark.blogspot.com/2014/01/top-scorer-ultra-violence.html

Best Years of Our Lives (bullying sequence from Ultra Violence) by Mark Barry featured in Green Wizard Publishing's anthology, Reality Bites

Excerpt from Best Years of Our Lives

You are thirteen and it is your turn today.

You don’t know why it’s your turn today but all you know is that it is.

The atmosphere has been building up for weeks.

Those little incidents.

Brief encounters.

Minor skirmishes.

You’ve never experienced anything like this anticipation before and you’re scared. Your stomach is turning over as if you’re staring down the side of a skyscraper. You are tense and dizzy and you wish you hadn’t had seconds in the dinner hall.

Manchester Tart. 

Two slices.

You’re thirteen, sitting at a large school desk, your satchel packed and blazer on.

Five boys are staring at you. You know it’s your turn.

You’re paralysed. Panic. You cannot move. You’ve never known a feeling like it. Trepidation courses through your veins. Your body is charged and you want to cry. But you don’t. Weeping will only make things worse.

You wish it isn’t your turn today but it is.

You pray.

That’s what they taught you to do at Primary School. Pray. When in trouble. Pray. God will provide. God will save. They taught you to pray before they taught you to read, those nuns. You really need him now but as you’ve long suspected, he isn’t there and somehow even if he is out there, you know he isn’t going to help.

You’re on your own.

Amazon US Link - http://www.amazon.com/Reality-Bites-Green-Wizard-Publishing/dp/1484077113

Amazon UK Link - http://www.amazon.co.uk/Reality-Bites-Green-Wizard-Publishing/dp/1484077113

Violence in Sports: Football hooligans jailed after violence in Lincoln UK

Delve into the mindset of the football hooligan in Mark Barry's Ultra Violence and Violent Disorder.

Does this incident remind you of the Rotherham story from Violent Disorder?  Haven't read it yet?  Pick up your copy today.

 Amazon US

 http://www.amazon.com/Mark-Barry/e/B008479RWI/ref=ntt_athr_dp_pel_pop_1

 

Amazon UK

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Mark-Barry/e/B008479RWI/ref=ntt_athr_dp_pel_pop_1

 Football hooligans jailed after violence in Lincoln

                                    
                   

http://thelincolnite.co.uk/2013/12/football-hooligans-jailed-violence-lincoln/

 

Published December 13, 2013

By Elizabeth Fish

 

Football hooligans who were part of a violent clash before a Lincoln City home game have been sentenced at Lincoln Magistrates Court.
The 11 men were sentenced on December 13 for violent disorder charges at The Ritz Wetherspoons on High Street before a Lincoln v Luton football match in October 2012.
The violence escalated and spilled out onto High Street and Firth Road. Furniture and glasses were thrown around.
In the clash, two women were injured and treated in hospital for minor injuries.
In total, 12 pleaded guilty to violent disorder offences at earlier hearings. All 12 were given 10-year football banning orders.

The 12 men all charged with violence disorder before a football match last October. Photos: Lincolnshire Police

The men charged are:

• Nathan Luke Ashmore (33), of St Catherine’s Grove, Lincoln — three years prison
• Tomas Samways (20), of Jenson Road, Bracebridge Heath — two years four months young offenders institute
• Lee Anthony Oliver Swain (26), of Walnut Place, Lincoln — three years prison
• Daniel Oliver White (20), of St Johns Road, Bracebridge Heath — two years four months young offenders institute
• Marcus Johnathan Greatorex (22), of Geneva Avenue, Lincoln — two years eight months prison
• Phillip Neil Adams (36), of Prior Street, Lincoln — three years prison
• Callum Busby (19), of De Wint Avenue, Lincoln — two years eight months prison
• Ashley Evans (22), of Picton Street, Lincoln — three years prison
• Andrew John Deans (27), Clipstone Village, Mansfield — three years prison
• Jake Sinclair (26), of Vernon Street, Lincoln — two years eight months prison
• Liam Wiggins (18), of Chester Road, Birkenhead — two years one month young offenders institute
• Josh Atter (18), of Matlock Drive, North Hykeham 18 month detention and training order

DI Suzanne Davies said: “This was a protracted police investigation that went to great lengths to track down every single offender involved in the violence on that day. Its success was largely down to the tenacity and professionalism of PC Andy Pearson.
“All of these offenders are thugs who masquerade as football fans. They give decent, law abiding home and visiting fans a bad name and they have rightfully been brought to justice.
“We hope our investigation and the subsequent convictions and sentences send out a very clear message to offenders in Lincoln and those visiting to cause trouble. We will arrest you and put you before the courts.”

Violence in Sports Continues to plague sporting events

Football hooligans fighting in Brazil 8 December 2013

Read Mark Barry's excellent novels about football hooligans - Ultra Violence and Violent Disorder, for an insight of the hooligan mindset.

 

Amazon US

http://www.amazon.com/Mark-Barry/e/B008479RWI/ref=ntt_athr_dp_pel_1

 

Amazon UK

 

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Mark-Barry/e/B008479RWI/ref=ntt_athr_dp_pel_1

 

 

Read UltraViolence by Mark Barry unless you prefer listening to the album UltraViolence by singer Lana del Rey.

For Readers -
http://www.amazon.com/Ultra-Violence-Mark-Barry-ebook/dp/B00EA82L5A

 

This is the second edition of Ultra Violence: Re-released to coincide with the release of the sequel, Violent Disorder.

Easily the publisher's bestseller, the book has 10 5* reviews so far and has been praised for its quirkiness and it's original approach to the genre.

It is new and improved. Minor re-editing has taken place, as well as a new cover (in symmetry with the sequel, featuring some of the characters featured in both books). Otherwise it is the same book.

Keep the original in good nick - it might already be a collector's item!

****

Forty. Receding pate. Dental problems. Failing marriage. Delinquent son. Psycho boss parachuted in to cut the big earners.

A few lost marbles.

It hadn't always been like this.

He used to be a Face. A Player. A Terrace Celebrity. Now he’s just another faceless nobody on the brink of despair in a world he no longer recognises.

Yet, one freezing winter’s day, a chance meeting with a face from the old days at Notts County changes everything.

Especially when there’s an intriguing proposition on the table. One he may find difficult to refuse.

****

Ultra Violence is the thrilling, humourous, nihilistic and sometimes moving story, told partially in flashback, of one man’s journey from idealistic young fan to major football hooligan set against the shadow of a grim and soulless middle age in the bustling English city of Nottingham.

For Music lovers -
http://www.theguardian.com/music/2013/dec/05/lana-del-rey-new-album-title-ultraviolence

Lana Del Rey announces new album title: Ultraviolence

US singer shuns her doubts about continuing with music career and confirms plans for second album

•                  

'My muse is fickle' … Lana Del Rey had given mixed messages about the future of her career. Photograph: Jason Laveris/FilmMagic

After a year of hinting at retirement, Lana Del Rey has revealed that her second album will be entitled Ultraviolence.

Speaking at a the premiere of her short film, Tropico, at the Cinerama Dome in Hollywood, the singer told the audience: "I really just wanted us all to be together so I could try and visually close out my chapter before I release the new record, Ultraviolence."

While there are no further details regarding the followup to 2012's Born to Die, the word "ultra-violence" was used in Anthony Burgess's 1962 novel A Clockwork Orange in reference to the droogs' favourite pastime of crazed sprees of brutality and mayhem.

News of Del Rey's second album comes at the end of a year of mixed messages from the singer. In February she suggested that she might be finished with music altogether. "What would I say?" she told Vogue when asked about a new album. "I feel like everything I wanted to say, I've said already."

When announcing her short film Tropico this summer, the star described it as her "farewell project" and also told Nylon magazine in November's issue that she was unsure she could make a second album: "When people ask me about it, I just have to be honest – I really don't know," said Del Rey. "I don't want to say, 'Yeah, definitely – the next one's better than this one,' because I don't really hear a next one. My muse is very fickle. She only comes to me sometimes, which is annoying."

Tropico is a film based around stories from the Bible: "It's Elvis and Jesus and Marilyn and extraterrestrials all in one." Lasting almost 30 minutes, the Anthony Mandler film stars albino model Shaun Ross alongside the singer, and is available to stream from Vevo.

Fantasy and Thriller Writer, Sarah JP White, discusses violence in sports with Mark Barry, author of Violent Disorder

Violent Disorder – Mark Barry

Posted on September 28, 2013 by SarahPJWhite

Further to my recent interview with Mark Barry, as part of my Author Spotlight section (if you haven’t yet read it, you can do so by clicking here), I’ve gleaned some extra information about his newly released book ‘Violent Disorder’ and Mark’s thoughts behind it.

What genre do you consider your latest book – Violent Disorder?

Violent Disorder – Mark Barry

Sport fiction, crime and its own genre, colloquially known as Hooliporn.
How did you come up with the title?
It’s the sequel to the first book, Ultra Violence, and it is one of the most common offences in football hooliganism. It is also extremely catchy. I am surprised no one has thought of it.
What are your expectations for the book?
Well, I sold an awful lot of copies of the first book and I would like to repeat that. I would also like sales on both titles – and my other mainstream titles – to continue to rise.

Is there a message in ‘Violent Disorder’ that you want readers to grasp?

No. I’m not much of a message writer. My books are madness.

Which of your characters is your favourite and why?

I like the narrator in the book. He’s the complete liberal writer, ironic, laid back, with no experience of the fighting.  He is slowly drawn into the violence going on around him through his friendship between two nutty brothers who are supposed to be going straight. He’s a nice man. Vulnerable, clever, a decent writer and you get the sense that he doesn’t know why he’s writing these books, but also that he cannot quite stop himself.  Order into chaos…

Which of your characters is most unlike you?

Any of the characters in the book who work for the Police or the Judiciary.

Are experiences based on someone you know, or events in your own life?

It’s a complete work of fiction. I made it all up. None of the characters exist in real life and none of the stuff ever happened, guv.

Can you share a little of your current work with us?

Adjacent to the courthouse opposite, a wagonload of yellow-jacketed Police watched the situation develop on canalside.  Twenty years ago, it would already have gone off down here, Coventry on one side, Notts on the other. A blaze of colour, a flurry of fists and boots. A berserker cry (c’mon then, c’mon then), back and forward, back and forward, twenty-on-twenty, fists connecting with shallow sockets, thumbs in eyes, teeth parting from gums, yelps, cries, boots upside your head, trainers stamping, conscious, unconscious, running about, always running about.
Not today.
Not down here, in 2013, the regenerated canalside, full of upmarket brasseries selling champagne at a hundred quid a bottle. Chain wine bars, chain eateries, chain charcuteries, chain hairdressers where grown men spend thirty seven pounds on a Danny Craig haircut; student chain comedy clubs full of tedious student comics taking the piss out of people in wheelchairs and making prehistoric observations about the Battle Of The Sexes. One hundred and thirty five quid a month gyms with mixed saunas.
Running through the opulence is the reanimated canal, once biologically dead; stinking of death and shit, and the lethal chemicals that fuelled the British industrial revolution, won us the Second World War and left behind a toxic disaster area replete with piles of unguent, softened, semi-dissolved hybrid fish.  Once a waterway bursting with the rusting detritus, and the vile leftovers of the narcissistic sixties generation (our parents and grandparents, who took all the money for their houses and pensions, and thus, looted our futures, swapped our future well-being for idleness and a non-stop retirement holiday abroad), now, in 2013, scrubbed, scoured, eviscerated, defenestrated, strained and drained, pristine blue, full of frolicking fish.
The occasional brightly painted barge passing by. A  cyclist wearing an ill-fitting rose-pink helmet rode past on a mountain bike costing four thousand seven hundred quid. Young, self-assured, self-aware, politically neutral, trans-metropolitan, fit, with communication skills honed at a redbrick university, empathetic, health conscious, green, gender sensitive, racially relaxed and already a three star cook in his own fitted kitchen (with metallic oven and granite worktops), he was heading toward Trent Bridge on the tow path running all the way past the heat station and the old caves. 
Past Meadow Lane.
The canal is his. The world is his.

Where to Buy Mark Barry’s Latest Novel – ‘Violent Disorder’

Mark’s latest novel, entitled ‘Violent Disorder’ is available now on Amazon – just click on the links below!
Amazon.com
Amazon.co.uk
My thanks to Mark Barry for agreeing to be interviewed. If you’d like to find out more information on Mark, you can check out his website at:
http://www.greenwizardcarla.blogspot.co.uk

On violence in sports - Seahawks: Undercover Cops Hired To Wear Opposing Team’s Uniform

http://theridgewoodblog.net/seahawks-undercover-cops-hired-to-wear-opposing-teams-uniform/

Seahawks: Undercover Cops Hired To Wear Opposing Team’s Uniform
September 11, 2013 7:19 PM
RENTON, Wash. (CBS Seattle/AP) — The Seattle Seahawks announced that the organization has hired undercover cops to wear San Francisco 49ers gear and patrol Sunday’s game in order to curb unruly behavior.
“We have great fans,” said Seahawks president Peter McLoughlin. “Our goal is to ensure a safe environment for all in attendance, including visiting team fans.”
The Seahawks announced Wednesday they will have the undercover police officers wearing opposing team apparel beginning with Sunday night’s highly anticipated matchup, saying the goal is to ensure a safe environment for all fans, including those supporting the visiting team.

Author Mark Barry's novels sheds light on violence in sports in his novels, available on Amazon

 

Amazon UK

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Mark-Barry/e/B008479RWI/ref=ntt_athr_dp_pel_1

 

Amazon US

 http://www.amazon.com/Mark-Barry/e/B008479RWI/ref=ntt_athr_dp_pel_1