#6Degrees of Separation – A book chain from Flashlight to The Huntingfield Paintress

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It’s the first Saturday of the month which means it’s time for 6 Degrees of Separation.

Here’s how it works: a book is chosen as a starting point by Kate at Books Are My Favourite and Best and linked to six other books to form a chain. Readers and bloggers are invited to join in by creating their own ‘chain’ leading from the selected book.

Kate says: Books can be linked in obvious ways – for example, books by the same authors, from the same era or genre, or books with similar themes or settings. Or, you may choose to link them in more personal or esoteric ways: books you read on the same holiday, books given to you by a particular friend, books that remind you of a particular time in your life, or books you read for an online challenge. Join in by posting your own #6Degrees chain on your blog and adding the link in the comments section of each month’s post.   You can also check out links to posts on X using the hashtag #6Degrees.

This month’s starting book is Flashlight by Susan Choi which was shortlisted for the Booker Prize in 2025. As is often the case, it’s a book I haven’t read so I’m just going to use its title as inspiration. Links from each title will take you to my review or the book description on Goodreads.

A flashlight is useful when there are no street lights, as was the case during the Second World War. In The Great Darkness by Jim Kelly, Inspector Eden Brooke, whose eyesight was damaged during World War One leaving him sensitive to light, investigates a murder with the help of a group of fellow ‘nighthawks’ including the night porter of one of Cambridge University’s colleges.

Another academic institution features in The Eights by Joanna Miller. The novel tells the story of four young women who are among the first female students admitted to Oxford University. A real life figure, the writer and pacifist Vera Brittain, makes an appearace in the book.

Vera Brittain’s novel The Dark Tide is the story of a young woman called Daphne Lethbridge who returns to Oxford University after a stint of volunteer work during the First World War.

The character of Daphne is thought to be based on Vera Brittain’s longtime friend Winifred Holtby whose most well known book is South Riding set in a small town in Yorkshire.

South Riding is a fictitious place. (Although there are North, West and East Ridings, there’s no South.) Another invented place is Barsetshire, the location of Anthony Trollope‘s Barchester Chronicles. In Framley Parsonage, the fourth book in the series, a young clergyman accepts the living of Framley Parsonage from the wealthy Lady Lufton.

There’s another clerical appointment in The Huntingfield Paintress by Pamela Holmes. William Holland, accompanied by his wife Mildred, arrives in a small Suffolk village to take up the post of Rector. Together they embark on renovating and decorating the village church.

My chain has involved educational and religious institutions. Where did your chain take you?

An excerpt from Baked Tapes by Bob Christenson

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My guest today on What Cathy Read Next is author Bob Christenson. Bob’s debut novel Baked Tapes was published by Mint Condish Publishing on 30th December 2025 and is available to purchase in hardback or paperback.

Bob describes Baked Tapes as ‘a story of obsession, regret, and love. Think: the setting of High Fidelity but the thoughtfulness of Plainsong‘ and reckons it will resonate with musicians, writers, and ‘anyone who has carried a private project through years of doubt, wondering if the result was worth the cost’.

You can read an excerpt from Baked Tapes below.

About the Book

Time has a way of warping everything it touches — songs, friendships, and especially love.

For Lyle Bass, the remnants of his past still live on a reel of tape he can’t stop replaying. But recordings carry more than sound; they carry what’s been lost, what’s been forgotten, and what can never be repaired.

Spanning decades of creation and collapse, Baked Tapes is a meditation on memory, regret, and the ghosts that live on in the things we try to preserve. Nostalgic, haunting, and quietly redemptive, it’s the story of how our lives keep playing long after the recording stops.

Find Baked Tapes on Goodreads

Excerpt from Baked Tapes by Bob Christenson

The recording session was going surprisingly well. It wasn’t even midnight yet and they already had two songs recorded. Mark was drinking Gatorade instead of beer and Jack was sitting on a stool — concentrating on his fretboard — instead of standing and spinning in circles, which was how he normally played his basslines. Lyle was a compassionate dictator. They took plenty of snack breaks and he made sure the guys were liking what they heard during playback.

“One more song, guys. Then you’re done,” Lyle said during a break in the control room.

“I gotta give it to you, Fish. This was a great idea,” Mark admitted. “I wasn’t sold at first. I thought it was going to be an uptight, very non-rock-n-roll disaster. But we’re moving right along. Record it live, allow you to capture my raw drumming genius, mix it quick, and get it out to the masses. That’s the best way.”

Lyle nodded. “For once, I completely agree with you, Mark. The faster you move on a project like this, the more magic it has. Now we’ve got one more. Let’s nail it down.”

Mark picked up his half-empty Gatorade bottle and went through the door to the live room, Jack followed right behind.

After a few minutes of getting re-adjusted, Lyle pushed down the talkback button — his voice crackled into his bandmate’s headphones. “OK, fellas. Let’s make it count.” He hit “Record” on the multitrack’s remote. “We’re rolling.”

Mark counted them in with four stick-clicks and they were off and running. It was sounding good, but as the band neared the second verse, Lyle was distracted by something out of the corner of his eye.

There it was again.

Something kept flashing past that little window in the hallway door. He hoped it wasn’t Professor Cooke, coming to tell them about a noise complaint of some kind. He ignored it and tried to keep playing.

As they neared the end of the song he caught sight of something that completely derailed him. Two large brown eyes, looking through a pair of thick black-framed glasses, were peering through the window. They were staring right at him. As soon as he realized what he saw they were gone.

Determined to make it to the end of the song, he stared straight ahead — trying to re-connect with the guys in the other room. But then he saw it again. He looked longer and the window framed a bit more of a face this time. There was a bird’s nest of curly hair piled above the black glasses and a pair of red lips below. It was definitely a girl and she was definitely interested in what they were doing. He started to daydream about going into the hall after this take to play rock star. Then he heard a frustrated scream pouring through the control room speakers.

It was Mark, sounding like he was just stabbed in the leg with a rusty fork.

“FIIIIISH. Man! What are you DOING?! We’re supposed to do the turn-around one more time before the last chorus. We almost had it, first take! I was on fire, dude, and you screwed it up. Quick, let’s run it again before I lose it.”

Lyle had forgotten they were even playing when Mark started to read him the riot act. He really needed to concentrate. Don’t look over there. Pay attention to the song. Just one more.

And then, of course, he looked again. But the face was gone.

“OK, guys, sorry — that one was on me. Let’s try again.” He got the multitrack back to the beginning of the song and pushed the record button again, then the talkback mic.

“Rolling.”

This time there were no distractions and they nailed the take.

The guys burst through the control room, all hi-fives and smiles. Mark, wiping sweat from his neck with a Ninja Turtles beach towel, grabbed Lyle by the shoulders and shook him mercilessly. He was yelling now.

“That was it, Fish. That was the two minutes and thirty-three seconds that will make me the most famous drummer in the world!”

Jack laughed a little, looked over at Mark, and just couldn’t help himself.

“Sellout.”

Mark smiled and gave him the finger.

With the instrument recording done, Lyle needed to cut his lead vocal tracks. He wanted to do them without anyone watching so he sent the guys out to buy some beer. He’d let them drink while he recorded vocals and started the mix.

“I’ll go, but you’re buying,” reasoned Mark.

“But I got us the studio time. Don’t you think you could buy the beer this time?” Lyle pleaded.

“OK, OK. We’ll compromise. Jack will buy the beer.”

Mark laughed, put Jack in a headlock and dragged him into the hallway.

Over the next hour, Lyle sang, screamed and growled into a microphone while standing in the control room. During each take, he was constantly keeping tabs on that window to the hallway, but never saw the face reappear. Then, just as he was about to sing the very last chorus he saw movement outside. He hit “Stop” and decided he was going to get up the nerve to open the door and invite this mystery girl into the control room. Maybe she wanted to hang out while they mixed.

A shadow fell over the door and he saw the unmistakable texture of skin through the window. But it wasn’t the smooth, makeup-caked skin he had seen earlier. It was uneven and pimpled.

The door suddenly swung open and he was treated to the sight of Mark’s bare butt, shorts pulled down around his knees and Jack bent over in hysterics in the hallway behind him.

“Brought you something, Fish!” Mark yelled as he shook his backside at Lyle.

Despite the fact that he was being interrupted by the opposite of what he expected to see, Lyle started to laugh. He just couldn’t resist. He forced a straight face again, and angrily yelled, “You idiots! I ordered beer. Not rear!”

They all fell down from laughing so hard.

Over the next three hours they mixed their first demo to a quarter-inch reel of analog tape.

But all Lyle could think about was the girl in the thick black glasses.

About the Author

Bob Christenson has been making music since the early ‘90s, recording and mixing indie records in his home studio. By day, he works as a web developer. By night, you can find him sipping cocktails and spinning vinyl in his home tiki bar. 

He lives in the suburbs of Detroit, Michigan. His second novel is a story revolving around a small town tiki bar in the 1940’s. It’s called Twin Palms and will arrive in late 2026.

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