And Now for Something Completely Different

“And Now for Something Completely Different!”

This catch-phrase, that kicks off many a Monty Python show, is the perfect description for Jude Southerland Kessler’s new researched, augmented biography on the life of John Lennon, Shoulda Been There. The book was documented over 20 years with seven trips to Liverpool, and includes not only extensive footnotes, an “Encyclopedia of Historical Characters,” and a “Scouse Glossary” of Liverpudlian terms, but also spends time with the reader at the end of each chapter discussing the historical facts and myths surrounding that particular event. Shoulda Been There is not, however, simply another factual, dry book of dates, places, concerts, and events. It is something completely different…

Written like any other “good read,” the book contains living and breathing characters – John Lennon, his Aunt Mimi, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, Richard Starkey, Pete Best, Bob Wooler, Allan Williams, Cynthia Lennon, and John’s mother, Julia – characters whose unique Scouse lingo must be captured down to the “Ta” for “Thank you” and the “T’rah!” for “Goodbye.” The characters must speak words that the Beatles and their friends actually spoke using terms that the Beatles actually used. And the scenes of Liverpool must sound, smell, feel, and taste like Liverpool. As a novel, the book must breathe and live. But Shoulda Been There is not a book of make-believe. It is also a factual, scholarly work.

Wedged half-way between the world of vivid imagination that a novelist creates and the world of responsible scholarship that a non-fiction writer creates is Shoulda Been There. Bill Harry, John Lennon’s close friend and the author of over ten books on the Beatles, wrote that Jude Kessler “got it right.” He says that her “fly on the wall approach” to John Lennon’s biography “breathes life into the story.” In Shoulda Been There, the “same ole, same ole” anecdotes and events jump off the page into existence as the characters move, speak, sing, and think.

When John learns to play his first 5-pound mail-order guitar, the reader is there. When Aunt Mimi takes the boy into City Center, Liverpool to purchase his first real guitar at Hessey’s in Whitechapel, the reader rides the double-decker bus right along with them. When The QuarryMen perform at the Sixth Form Dance…when The Beatles accompany Johnny Gentle to Inverness, Scotland…when John asks Cynthia Powell to dance at the End of Term Bash, the reader tags along. John’s life and the days of the early Beatles become the reader’s world for 795 fascinating pages.

Shoulda Been There is the first in a trilogy of books on Lennon’s life that Kessler has contracted to write. This first volume takes the reader from John’s birth in 1940 up to the day that The Beatles form a managerial agreement with Brian Epstein and step onto the world stage. It traces not only John’s tragic childhood but the formation of his fledgling band and his struggle to find love and acceptance through the rock’n'roll group.

However, “the real story of Shoulda Been There,” Kessler said, “is not just John’s story. It’s the story of every child who is abandoned or unloved. John’s parents, through a series of complicated circumstances, were not there for John, and he spent the rest of his life reaching out for something to fill that hole in his heart. His manager called John’s endless searching ‘the next big thing.’ John was always looking for something – fame, power, money, drugs, alcohol, meditation, the peace movement – to fill his emptiness.”

First published in late 2008, Shoulda Been There sold out in its first edition, but a revised edition was released in 2009, and the new publication includes a one-hour interview CD with The Beatles first manager, Allan Williams. Additional footnotes and factual information have also been added to the revised book.

The book may be purchased via Kessler’s website, ontherockbooks.com or at the festforbeatlesfans.com at a discounted rate. Those purchasing via Kessler’s website will have their books autographed and inscribed.  It is also available via Amazon.com.

Kessler’s second book, Shivering Inside, is due for release on 9 October 2010, and she will be a Featured Author at the Fests for Beatles Fans in Chicago this August.

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