DYLLIS BRETT – ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Born June 6, 1960 at Catterick Barracks, Yorkshire; daughter to the garrison’s Welsh Presbyterian chaplain and his wife. Ms Brett spent her formative years tied to her parents’ regimental tours of duty in Germany, Hong Kong, Belize and Belfast.
At the age of sixteen she signed for twelve years as an Army nurse.
Whilst attending to the wounded in a field hospital in Port Stanley during the Falklands War, she met and fell for her now, long time partner, Sister Fidelina Jessie.
After an honourable discharge from the Medical Corps, Ms Brett went on to become a journalist, illusionist, atheist, linguist and feminine socialite.
She can recite Welsh poetry; sing bawdy navy ballads and revels in passionate debates, from the state of Welsh rugby, to the international stars of Moto Cross.
She drinks vodka neat.
She is fluent in Welsh, German and Europanto.
Dyllis Brett and Fidelina Jesse tied the knot in a civil ceremony at the Hells Angels World Run in Pasadena, California in April 1999. The couple now live in a converted barn at Wooten, Kent; a stone’s throw from the Lydden Hill race track.
AUTOGEDDON DAY
REVIEW BY NICK SPURRIER
It took some time to sort out the authorship of “Autogeddon Day”, a recently published book attributed to local author Dyllis Brett but it turns out that the book is co-written by Jack Pound, well-known local musician. I interviewed Jack who told me that the bulk of the ideas came from Dyllis while both of them contributed to the writing. During a final edit Jack tried to tone down some of the more outrageous passages written by Dyllis but, in the face of her opposition, was only partially successful. Jack gave me a contact for Dyllis but I was unable to track her down. Sister Fidelina Jessie, her long term partner, told me that in a sudden change of direction, typical of her life, she had just left for the Democratic Republic of the Congo, to do a study of moths in an inaccessible area of the upper reaches of the Lualaba River and would not be available for at least six months.
“Autogeddon Day” is a page turner from the start to the strange ending as you are carried along on the one day trip by Vincent Pope, the narrator, from Dungeness to Chatham, where he is to do a radio interview about his short story ‘Jezreels Jezebel’. Interspersed in the narrative is the story of his friend Rokka Todd and many other characters, the descriptions of whom bring the book to life. One such is Cheyne Stokes, a disc jockey, described thus “Sat across the room… was a thin, slack faced, gangly grey haired guy in blue jeans and a real-ale T-shirt… He raised himself slightly out of the chair, to shake my hand: he had a drooping bag of a belly and one hell of a limp wrist. Not only could I see why he was affectionately known as “old last breath” but I could smell it too; stale smoke”
On the surface these are semi respectable people with Vincent working on the cross channel ferries, Rokka, a gypsy who has abandoned the travelling community, repairing bikes and writing articles for bike magazines and Rokka’s girlfriend Jude working as a reporter But beneath this that there is drug running, a bent policeman, shady deals, a bike race around the ring road in Ashford, a road trip to Italy and vicious fights all described in vivid detail. Mixed in with this is religious fanaticism connected with the Flying Scroll, the supposed “key, the combination to the portal for everlasting life” and the Jezreelites, a sect who built a huge tower in Gillingham in the late nineteenth century, nothing of which now remains. Jezreel, aka Private James White, gave himself out to be the messenger of God, and claimed to have received direct revelations, contained in ‘The Flying Scroll,’ which he wrote at the inspiration of the Immortal Spirit. His followers believed themselves to constitute the first portion of the 144,000 twice told who will receive Christ when he comes to reign on the earth for one thousand years
Autogeddon Day is in the grand tradition of pulp fiction that started with the cheap magazines published between 1896 and the 1950s, containing stories, amongst other topics, of violence and crime – a seedy society, which Quentin Tarantino brought to the screen In 1994 in his film Pulp Fiction. In essence the violence and crime is so over the top that it cannot be taken seriously and becomes black comedy.
There are a number of reviews at the back of this book from various magazines and individuals. I will quote one. Autogeddon Day is, according to Otis Scruggs, lead singer of Trailer Trash with ten records to his name in Ancestry.co.uk, who apparently read the book in one sitting in his mother’s care home lavatory, a “ripping yarn”. It is a description with which I concur.
So in summing, it is difficult to know what to believe about this book, its authors and its origins and you may have difficulty in believing some of what is in this review but Autogeddon Day is a good read. As I have said I had no trouble getting into it, was never bored and wanted to finish it. Get out and buy a copy or download it to your kindle. One final warning though it is not, as I have intimated, for the faint hearted.