Active discussions

Help protect children from gaming harms.

Take our survey

Please or to access all these features

Talk
What we're reading

Find your new favourite book or recommend one on our Book forum.

Original poster

Absolutely Unputdownable Books

259 replies

spacemonkey · 27/02/2004 18:54

Just interested to know what books mumsnetters found absolutely impossible to put down ...

Here are some of mine:

  • Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
  • anything by Jane Austen
  • Villette - Charlotte Bronte
  • Diary of a Nobody - George & Weedon Grossmith
  • If This Is A Man - Primo Levi
  • His Dark Materials Trilogy - Philip Pullman
  • The Wrong Boy - Willy Russell
  • Moab is my Washpot - Stephen Fry
  • Things Can Only Get Better - John O'Farrell
  • The Consolations of Philosophy - Alain de Botton

and (ahem) all the Harry Potters

What are yours?

OP posts:
Original poster
spacemonkey · 28/02/2004 12:54

The Man Who Mistook His Wife For A Hat by Oliver Sacks

OP posts:
Original poster
spacemonkey · 28/02/2004 12:35

I couldn't get through The Wasp Factory, I found it too disturbing

OP posts:
Original poster
spacemonkey · 28/02/2004 12:13

lilibet - no I've never seen him on stage, but I think he's a brilliant writer and I love books about acting. I've got his autobiography which is also good, if you haven't read it email me through contact another talker and i'll send it to you

PERFUME by Patrick Suskind shrub - BRILLIANT BOOK!

OP posts:
melsy · 28/02/2004 12:12

Janstar, will have to read that.

Good idea to print this page off.

manna · 28/02/2004 12:07

just add a new joanna harris - holy fools. Read it in a day!

Janstar · 28/02/2004 12:03

Melsy, I love Jeanette Winterson too - especially 'Sexing The Cherry'.

The Siege by Helen Dunmore
A Spell Of Winter and With Your Crooked Heart also Helen Dunmore.

Earthly Powers by Anthony Burgess
All Marge Piercy books
Gervase Phinn books about his days as a school inspector.
Jupiter's Travels By Ted Simon

shrub · 28/02/2004 11:47

the 'quincunx' eluded me, i started off really enjoying it then i got completely lost. 'follow your heart' - wonderful book, 'moab is my washpot' brilliant, 'the little friend' was such a disappointment after 'secret history'. my favourites:
'the alienist' caleb carr
'i know this much is true' wally lamb
'bad blood' lorna sage
'the magus' john fowles
'fingersmith' sarah waters
'the bronze horseman' paullina simmons
'les miserables' victor hugo
'the count of monte cristo' alexandre dumas
'the continuum concept' jean lleidoff
'after you'd gone' maggie o' farrell
'the power of one' bryce courtenay'
'the mind game' hector macdonald
'perfume' patrick suskind
can't remember anymore though i'm always looking for the next 'big' book thats going to keep me reading. shame you have to read so many rubbish ones to find the good ones - though i shall print this page for future 'amazon' purchases

monkeygirl · 28/02/2004 11:34

Just wanted to add my tuppence worth...
Quincunx is brilliant - maybe it should be considered for the 'reading group', might help solve some of its mysteries (she said trying not to give anything away).

I have also loved:

Prey - Michael Crichton (Was surprised at how much I enjoyed this).
A Prayer for Oweny Meany - John Irving (had me in tears)
Brideshead Revisted - Evelyn Waugh
Head-On - Julian Cope autobiography (brilliant and a fantastic nostalgia trip for an oldie like me)
Nicci French thrillers

So many more...but such a little brain for remembering...

cazzybabs · 28/02/2004 11:24

I agree about the the Quincunx - excellent and also War and Peace - it is fanastically well written. And Harry P and Lord of the Rings.

ks · 28/02/2004 11:18

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn

suzywong · 28/02/2004 10:04

Ah, so that's the way your mind works Zebra!
(Euurgh the baby with the steel helmet!!!!)

zebra · 28/02/2004 10:02

Oooh!! When I dared to venture into this thread again, realised I have read a lot of the books you all mention (actually, I rather didn't like a lot of them, but to each their own). I'm not as inadequate as I thought.
Anyway, my contribution: The Wasp Factory, Iain Banks.

melsy · 28/02/2004 09:19

Lilibet I can talk to you about Anita shreve , I love her books have them all, such mysterious places she conjours in the mind.

lilibet · 28/02/2004 09:04

Spacemonkey!!!!

Me too, and you are the only other person I have ever heard of who owns that book!!

Did you see it? Have you seen him since?

He really is wonderful. Can I just sneak in that mine is signed by the author and is some thing that I would rescue form a burning house (but thats another thread)

Others:-
Woman in White
Watership Down
Most things by Anita Shreve (I need to talk to someone who has read both The Last Time they Met and The Weight of Water without spoiling things for anyone who hasn't read both)
I like Robert Goddard
His Dark Materials
Lord of The Rings
Pride and Prejudice
Emma
Wives and Daughters

loads and loads more but cant think at this time in the morning!

suzywong · 27/02/2004 23:58

Soo
those two are my favourite gothic novels, the narrative structure of Dracula, the letters, is genius isn't it?

Fingersmith, by Sarah Waters is very like The Woman in White, but more Lesbian sex.

soothepoo · 27/02/2004 23:36

I skived a day off work to read The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins. Found Dracula spellbinding, particularly the first part of the book when Harker is in the castle. Am now inspired to start the Pullman trilogy.

carla · 27/02/2004 23:12

Follow Your Heart, by Susanna Tamaro. Borrow it from the library if you don't believe me. Even if you're not a mum, this one will keep you up all night.

Second on my list - oooooh what's that one - Jamaica Inn (I think, by Daphnie du Maurier) had me up all night too, but that was before childen!

Original poster
spacemonkey · 27/02/2004 23:06

have just ordered the quincunx and When We Were Orphans from amazon - I knew starting this thread would be fatal for my bank account

OP posts:
zebra · 27/02/2004 22:59

Couldn't read Sophie's Choice, not after seeing the movie, not after having my own children.
Maybe I'll make time to read some of these books by not dossing on MN all the time.

Beccarollover · 27/02/2004 22:57

DOH! I need to sleep

I meant Hannahs gift not Sophies choice

Sorry!

Beccarollover · 27/02/2004 22:56

I second Sophies Choice - I wrote to the author after I finished it, it had such an effect on me - she wrote back too

Original poster
spacemonkey · 27/02/2004 22:50

I keep remembering more ... Year of the King by Antony Sher

OP posts:
kiwisbird · 27/02/2004 22:26

Mmmm Coben is excellent, very goos sense of humour too

sammac · 27/02/2004 22:05

collision- hace you read Robert Crais? Methinks you would enjoy him too. Or Harlan Coben, same kind of thing as JP

kiwisbird · 27/02/2004 22:02

Vanity Fair
War and Peace
Anything by Mavis Cheek... She is brilliant!
But best of all is Anita Shreve ohhhhh love it love it love it....
Fortunes Rocks, Strange Fits of Passion... Eden Close...
And most poignant of all... Sophies Choice, I still weep...