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Original poster

I have run out of books - suggest some?

55 replies

CherryChoc · 11/01/2009 23:20

I always used to be reading, but I slowed down a lot since college and then I went off fiction about a year or 2 ago and have been reading nothing but parenting books since. However I recently read Two Caravans and enjoyed it, and have discovered I have a bit of time in the evenings to read while putting DS to bed, so I am looking for more books. Can anybody suggest anything?

It's probably easier to list what I don't like:
Depressing fashionable child abuse novels
Chick lit and/or anything utterly predictable
Fantasy
Horror/Thrillers etc
Crime
Romance (unless not utterly predictable and/or boring.)

I like things which are in the realms of believeable - ie set in the real world. Don't mind happy or sad, but I do like funny. Don't mind time period set, either.

Also - where do you start when choosing books to read, in a library or bookshop? Do you start with the bestsellers? Look for favourite authors? Pick a random shelf? I must have stopped reading when I had read all the books in the teenage section at the library and the adult section was full of boring books or trash.

OP posts:
bran · 14/01/2009 19:31

I recommend Crow Lake

If you like funny books Sparkle Hayter's are very funny, and clever, and not at all chick-lit as the cover suggests.

bran · 14/01/2009 19:29

ggirl that site is amazing. I love it. I think Amazon and the Book Depository are going to unexpectedly beat the downward economic trend. (I have a bit of a habit.)

chocolateshoes · 14/01/2009 19:19

Susan Hill - the various haunts of men
the Kite runner
Small Island - Andrea Levy
Good Women (short stories) - forgotten who by!
the memeory keeper's daughter - Kim Edwards
the lovely bones

Alibear1 · 14/01/2009 19:10

I'd also recommend Dorothy Dunnett - the Lymond Chronicles (Game of Kings etc) are better than the House of Niccolo IMO.

The Dream of Scipio, Ian Pears. Came out a few years ago and is a brilliant book.

Anything by Anthony Trollope - start with Barchester stories.

BoccaDellaVerita · 13/01/2009 21:18

If you liked Cloud Atlas, you may also like Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood. It covers similar themes and issues but is (in my view) more convincing and far better written.

rachels103 · 13/01/2009 20:41

The Book Thief
The Lovely Bones
Case Histories / One Good Turn

mosschops30 · 13/01/2009 20:32

My favourite two books of all time are:

This Book Will Save Your Life by A M Holmes
and
How to Talk to a Widower (cant remember author sorry)

madamekoto · 13/01/2009 20:29

Anything by Dorothy Dunnet, start with the game of kings.

janeite · 13/01/2009 18:56

"Notes From An Exhibition" = good.

bananapaddlepop · 13/01/2009 18:54

Oh good ChocolateDot at last someone on my wavelength...

Have you read Prayer for Owen Meany? Outstanding.
What about Cloud Atlas - I know it gets a regular slating on here but I thought it was fantastic. My next book is Cavalier and Klay...it's been on my shelf for eternity calling out to me.

SaltireOShanter · 13/01/2009 18:51

2 of the best books I read last year were
The Savage garden by mark Mills
and Notes from an Exhibition by patrick gale

janeite · 13/01/2009 18:46

Have you read "The Virgin Suicides"? I liked it much more than "Middlesex".

chocolatedot · 13/01/2009 14:31

Bananapaddlepop - they are my 2 favourite books of the past 10 years or so. Do you have any others you'd recommend as we're obviously on the same wavelength.

pollywobbledoodle · 13/01/2009 14:21

just read 13th tale by diane setterfield...really gripping tale about a woman called to do a biography of a writer whose past is a mystery

RedtartanLass · 13/01/2009 14:06

ggirl great website!

janeite · 12/01/2009 20:47

You could try some classics if you've not read them already:

If I could only choose five they would be:

  • Pride And Prejudice
  • Jane Eyre (but skip the boring first section! Janeite runs away before being flamed for this!)
  • Vanity Fair
  • Of Mice And Men (a different kind of classic)
  • 1984

Then I'd recommend:

The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood
The Kite Runner
Isabel Allnde's "Paula" for non-fiction
The Colour Purple - Alice Walker
A Town Called Alice - Neville Shute
"Brideshead Revisited"

Lots more but they are some of my favourites!

blackrock · 12/01/2009 17:17

I often listen to radio four...women's hour, the stories that are dramatised, the stories read aloud, also book club and other programmes. From the radio 4 website i get the book lists and choose a couple, then collect the aithor names. I find this opens my mind to new authors and fiction.

Tim Winton Cloudstreet

BoccaDellaVerita · 12/01/2009 17:09

Moon Tiger by Penelope Lively is another good 'un.

LadyMetroland · 12/01/2009 15:07

I'm currently reading The Road Home by Rose Tremain and I can't put it down. Would highly recommend it.

Recently read Consequences by Penelope Lively which I'd also recommend

ComeWhineWithMe · 12/01/2009 09:15

A thousand splendid suns.

The book thief.

brimfull · 12/01/2009 09:13

try this literature map
you type in a favourite author and loads come up ..the ones closest to the centre are most similar

bananapaddlepop · 12/01/2009 08:34

Try The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen. I loved this.

Or Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides

sleepycat · 11/01/2009 23:44

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Habbibu · 11/01/2009 23:36

Just finished and really enjoyed Life Mask by Emma Donoghue.

RedtartanLass · 11/01/2009 23:35

The Kite runner!

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