What books are we reading at the moment ?

[citoyen]

Twenty Thousand Streets Under The Sky by Patrick Hamilton

Wonderful. Just wonderful. Beautifully readable. But bleak. Oh so very bleak... I remember watching the TV miniseries a few years ago but I've forgotten most of what happens. Although there's a painful predictability about it all anyway. Human nature, eh? You just want to grab Bob by the lapels, slap him about the face a few times and ask him what the bloody hell he thinks he's playing at, though you know there's nothing you can do to prevent the inevitable unhappy ending.

I couldn't even remember who was the actress who plays Jenny in the TV series, so I looked it up - it's Zoe Tapper, who has recently been on telly again as Ellen Love in Mr Selfridge - a strangely similar kind of character. Maybe I do remember her subconsciously because I read her lines with Zoe Tapper's voice. Or maybe it's just that she's ideally suited to the role.

Sexually, I'm more of a Switzerland.

<adds to To-Read list>

[billplumtree]

Remember when all this was open fields, and you could go out and leave your door unlocked? Woman, 24. Inherited her mother's unreasonable and utterly unfounded nostalgia (and her father's hirsute back). WLTM barber with fondness for Sherbet Dib-Dabs and Parma Violets. Box no. 8486.

OMG! This magazine is the shizz. Seriously, dudes. Awesome! LOL! Classics lecturer (M, 48). Possibly out of his depth with today's youth. KTHX! Box no. 2680.

This advert is about as close as I come to meaningful interaction with other adults.  Woman, 51.  Not good at parties, but tremendous breasts.  Box no. 5436.

[LindaG]

The World According to Garp. By John Irving.

This book is so good I hardly know where to put myself. It's very, very good indeed.

One of the best books I have ever read.

Reading some books is a life experience in itself, and only people who have had a similar experience have a chance of understanding it. This book is like that.

Or maybe I've met this book, the way you meet some people - at exactly the moment you are supposed to meet them.

Anyway. It's a great book.

[L CC]

It's not as good (IMO) as A Prayer For Owen Meaney or A Widow For One Year. So you can read those next.

It's pretty good though. Just that I liked those others of his better.

[citoyen]

Funnily enough, I only recently put all three of those books on my Kindle wishlist. Can't remember what made me do it but it was something that reminded me that Irving is a bit of a gap in my reading.

Currently reading Capital by John Lanchester, which I only bought because it was a Kindle 20p offer a few weeks ago. Can't stand it. It's readable enough but the writing is irritatingly glib, characterised by too much superficial detail and absolutely no depth. It's like he's done an awful lot of research but has nothing to say, so the characters feel like cardboard cutouts, little more than an exhaustive enumeration of superficial traits. Don't care about any of them or what happens to them. My self-imposed rule requires me to finish it but unfortunately, I'm slightly less than halfway through and it's 600 pages long...

I shall treat myself to some PG Wodehouse next as an antidote.

[pcolbeck]

Sexually, I'm more of a Switzerland.

A selection of personal ads from the London Review of Books.  Absobloodylutely hilarious.  Quite superb.  We on this forum are but Northern Conference League amateurs, compared to this lot, when it comes to self-deprecating erudite smut.  Mods, can we have a lonely hearts board???

I used to subscribe to the London Review of Books. The personal adds were a particular treat, often causing laugh out loud moments.

[Eccentrica Gallumbits]

Cunt, by Inga Muscio. I read it on the bus.

[LindaG]

It's not as good (IMO) as A Prayer For Owen Meaney or A Widow For One Year. So you can read those next.

It's pretty good though. Just that I liked those others of his better.

I adored A Widow For One Year. Did you see the film with Kim Basinger? Best things she's ever done that I've seen.

I haven't read Owen Meanie though.

[pcolbeck]

Sexually, I'm more of a Switzerland.

A selection of personal ads from the London Review of Books.  Absobloodylutely hilarious.  Quite superb.  We on this forum are but Northern Conference League amateurs, compared to this lot, when it comes to self-deprecating erudite smut.  Mods, can we have a lonely hearts board???

I used to subscribe to the London Review of Books. The personal adds were a particular treat, often causing laugh out loud moments.

Just resubscribed. Cant remember why I let my subscription lapse now.

[Nuncio]

Funnily enough, I only recently put all three of those books on my Kindle wishlist. Can't remember what made me do it but it was something that reminded me that Irving is a bit of a gap in my reading.

Fill that gap with a Garp, or a Hotel New Hampshire, or an Owen Meany, but not with a Last Night in Twisted River. And I appear to be in a minority, but I wouldn't fill it with the Widow For One Year - it just didn't move me like the others.  He's a very good story-teller.

[RJ]

I seem to have accumulated a small stack of Jim Perrin's books next to my bed.  Currently really enjoying The Climbing Essays

[Greenbank]

Just finished Decline and Fall by Evelyn Waugh.

I think it made me snigger just once, I just didn't get into the humour at all.

[Mr Larrington]

The Drowning ~ Camilla Lackberg.  Almost every female character is heavily pregnant.

[citoyen]

Just finished Decline and Fall by Evelyn Waugh.

I think it made me snigger just once, I just didn't get into the humour at all.

I had a similar experience when I read the Sword of Honour trilogy, which my dad had told me was hilarious. Put me off reading any more Waugh for years...

Scoop is much, much funnier.

[Mr Larrington]

As is "The Loved One".

[clarion]

Waugh? Huh!
What is it good for?
Absolutely nothing!

[citoyen]

As is "The Loved One".

Oh yes, The Loved One is extremely funny.

I found both Decline & Fall and Vile Bodies amusing too, if rather dated. It helps if you like your humour blacker than treacle on a moonless night. A Handful Of Dust is also funny but incredibly bleak.

[Mr Larrington]

As is "The Loved One".

Oh yes, The Loved One is extremely funny..

My copy was borrowed from the skool library in 1980 and somehow never found its way back.  Perhaps I should return it (plus a few others I have lying around the place) when helping out at the Pocklington control on LEL 

[RJ]

Waugh? Huh!
What is it good for?
Absolutely nothing!

(Say it again ...)

 

(To the tumbrills with all those floppy-haired, cricket-sweatered Brideshead wannabes  )

[Bledlow]

Just about to start Crimea: the Last Crusade, by Orlando Figes. Well-reviewed, & the last of his books I read was excellent (A People's Tragedy: The Russian Revolution, 1891-1924), so I have high hopes.

[citoyen]

Narcopolis - Jeet Thayil. Loving it so far. "Trainspotting in India" seems about right. Hilarious.

[tiermat]

Narcopolis - Jeet Thayil. Loving it so far. "Trainspotting in India" seems about right. Hilarious.

I must have approached it the wrong way, then, I didn't get much out of it.  Maybe I should re-try with that mindset?

Over the last week or so I have tried to read a few books, among them:
Bloodline by James Rollins, a FEEBLE attempt at a Knights Templar story in the modern day.  It is obvious that the author has never left the US.  One of the funniest bits, to me, was he describes a person from the UK who was "raised in an aristocratic family, in Leeds".  You see lots and lots of them in Leeds, don't you?  Anyways I gave up on it as it's just too shite to continue with.
I read one Louise Penny book all the way through, then started on the second one and realised it was just the same story, moved around a bit!
Waging Heavy Peace by Neil Young.  Don't get me wrong, I like Neil Young's music, love his radio show, BUT he can't write to save his life.  This book feels like I am reading one of TLD's assignments.  The narrative goes all over the place, with no real explanation of why.  Another one assigned to the "Only read if you run out of everything else to read"
Don't Know Much About the Bible by Kenneth Davies.  One of a series of "Don't Know Much About" and very good, but one I want to return to later.  Good for debunking passages from the Bible (a favourite pastime of mine ) and for getting background and history of the book.

So the one I am sticking with, for the moment is "Safe Haven" by Nicholas Sparks.  A weepy story (yes, I can be an old softy when I want to be ) about a woman in an abusive relationship who runs away to a small town in the South of the US.

[LindaG]

Giovanni's Room by James Baldwin.

Anyone who has ever fallen in love knows what a ruinous experience it is. Throw shame, guilt and cowardice into the mix and set the whole thing in the sordid Paris milieu. Then watch the suffering unfold. This is a finely written, sensitive book that has the smell of truth in it. It's wonderful, and horrible.

A story of men in love.

[clarion]

A wonderful and poignant book about things falling apart.  I was annoyed when I first read it because the cliche of the 'tragic homosexual' was everywhere in the 80s.  But I cut him some slack because he was such a wonderful writer.

A couple of years later, I worked on a fantastic production of Blues For Mr Charlie at the Crucible in Sheffield, featuring, inter alia, Clarke Peters, Ray Shell, and (I think) Clive Rowe.  A very powerful and moving production with an amazing set design. 

I love Baldwin's combination of fiery radicalism, poetically descriptive yet economical prose, and the depth of feeling he conveys.  I like The Fire Next Time so much I found at one point I had three copies. 

[citoyen]

Narcopolis - Jeet Thayil. Loving it so far. "Trainspotting in India" seems about right. Hilarious.

I must have approached it the wrong way, then, I didn't get much out of it.  Maybe I should re-try with that mindset?

I started it on the train this morning and haven't got very far yet, so maybe I'm being too quick to decide. I suspect it's one of those books you have to be in the right mood for. And you probably need a high tolerance of books with no discernible story or point - it seems to be little more than a collection of scenes seen through an opium haze. I just like the writing - it's fresh and vibrant, and a joy to read after the glib smugness of Capital. And one scene made me laugh out loud (always good on a crowded commuter train) - where the narrator attends a talk given by an enfant terrible artist and then ends up taking him back to his regular opium den haunt. Not sure quite where it's all going though, or if it will prove to have enough substance to sustain it for a whole book, but at least it is reasonably short...