Quick-I need a book!

[CurlewKate]

I've forgotten to buy a book for ds's stocking and it's a vital ingredient! He's 22, a bit of a hipster, likes modern literary fiction. Doesn't like Christmassy facty books. He likes Graham Green, Max Porter. If it could be a pretty book that would be lovely...

Has he read On the Road?

Oh pp great choice!!!!

Are you in a bookshop? Staff will be great at advising

The Hearts Invisible Furies by John Boyle, or Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro.

He probably has.

Stoner by John Williams, billed as the classic no-one has ever read. Good choice for a young man finding his way.
Beware of Pity by Stefan Zweig (it’s very much not modern but he’d be fine if he likes Graeme Green and SZ is an inspiration to such hipster royalty as Wes Anderson).
Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut.
Poor Things by Alasdair Gray (rather pretty and about to be a very cool film). Or Lanark, come to think of it, perhaps he’ll already have read that.
Chekhov’s Short Stories. Hipster-tastic. There are some pretty hardback Folio versions kicking about online.

Hangover Square by Patrick Hamilton

Thank you- he's read quite a few of these (I have trained him well!) Including Stonor, which he loved, and read because he found it in a charity shop and it's his best friend's name! Keep them coming- he has a birthday soon too!

John Marr - Passengers, etc

Theres several stand alone books but are also linked, written in the near future. One is about a world where cars are all automated etc. superb books.

Joseph Conrad, "Heart of Darkness".

Has he read the Megas by John Fowles?

The King Of Sunlight: How William Lever Cleaned Up The World Paperback – 28 Feb. 2011

by Adam Macqueen (Author)

A Very British Murder Paperback – 8 May 2014 -by Lucy Worsley

I love her books.

Cahokia Jazz by Francis Spufford. Murder mystery set in a 1920s American city, but in an alternate reality where the Aztecs partly rule things. Really interesting ideas and it’s new out so hopefully he won’t have read it!

Lost Horizon by James Hilton

Oh yes, I liked 'light perpetual' as well.

His non fiction is also great, loved Ice and the English Imagination

John Dos Passos, Manhattan Transfer
Thomas Pynchon, The Crying Of Lot 49
Don De Lillo, White Noise
William Faulkner, The Sound And The Fury

Ooh-I don't think he's read any Conrad. He's very "woke" so I'd love to hear what he thinks....🤣

I have bought Gringos by Charles Portis for a couple of people, both have later said they enjoyed it and so did I.

In Evil Hour, Garcia Marquez?

Giovanni’s Room by James Baldwin