To think so many books these days are fairly crap and unoriginal

[goddessoftheharvest]

I'm going away for the weekend, so I decided to get some new books for my kindle.

There's thousands of books in the Kindle store, it shouldn't be so hard to locate something decent!

They all seem to be trashy crime (there's a time and a place for a good crime thriller, but really)

Or else they have awful twee names, along the lines of "The Cotton Candy Teashop For Hopeless Cat Ladies In Badly Patterned Retro Swing Dresses"

Or they look ok, then you read the description and it's one of those plots where Mandy finds a letter in her granny's shoe, and for some reason this means that every other chapter flashes back to Cynthia in 1914, who has a dark secret that is actually bloody underwhelming, once you are 554 pages in.

Then there's the ones where the author can write well, but they try to be a bit too highbrow, and they churn out some huge fucking tome which tarts itself out as "a moving depiction of the disintegration of a marriage",when really it's about Barbara finding out that Cyril has been shagging round with the lady in the chemist.

I love books, and I'm not even that picky. I don't think it has to make big statements about love, or war. I'm not adverse to trash, especially when it's fairly well written, you can tell the author has just had a good time writing it, tongue firmly lodged in cheek

Everyone seems to feel their book has to be deep, to say something really original and meaningful and subversive. Either that or it's a story about Mary Sue opening a fucking organic cupcake shop

AIBU? Suggestions welcome, by the way. So far I've only downloaded a book about Nepalese cookery,which is lovely but not exactly what I'm looking for

A Change in Altitude - Anita Shreve and The Post Birthday World - Lionel Shriver were both books I didn't think I'd enjoy but both have really stayed with me.

The Book of Memory - Petina Gappah is also really good. I just reviewed a copy for Mumsnet. That's a really good way to discover new authors/genres if you sign up on the book giveaway pages. I don't work for Mumsnet btw

What drives me mad is the new spate of kindle books titled 'Book Title: A Psychological Thriller' or, worse, 'Book Title: The Highly Rated Thriller'. If you have to tell me that, I'm just not interested.
I definitely think the quality of literature has gone downhill. While I loved Wolf Hall I sometimes fancy something a bit lighter, but everything is so bloody samey. If the pathetic, completely lacking in gumption heroine was banned there would be few books published these days.

Agree.

Following recommendations I recently bought-

Girl on the train. Mediocre. Certainly not s gripping read.

The bone clocks. Shelved it halfway through. Nothing had happened yet.

Kite runner. Loved it. Beautifully written, so sad when I had no more to read.

About to start A man called Ove.

Heard Man called Ove is great from my dad; he's not that much of a praiser of book.

Girl on a Train would have been an OK book if we hadn't have been informed of how extraordinary it was. It really is middle of the road; kind of book you might read when you don't feel like making much effort concentrating on the narrative - would suit filling a long boring train journey (bah ha ha)

I was feeling the same as you OP. All these book covers kept popping up of some busty bird in jodhpurs and a crop a la jilly Cooper or pictures of cakes or a sad looking child or some form of transport and a worried looking redhead.

I saw 10 authors you should read on an amazon thing and picked Anne Cleeves Shetland as a starter. Fucking brilliant. I devoured the Shetland series and then Vera. Just started on George and his Mrs and haven't read as much or enjoyed reading as much for a long time.

I don't mind chic lit and trash but I want well written and something that makes me want to carry on. Anne Cleeves does a good old fashioned murder mystery with real people as characters and sets a beautiful backdrop too. It's not gory or chilling or gruesome just compelling.

I like historical novels. My favourites are Guernica by Dave Boling, A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini and I like Victoria Hislop. I also enjoyed The Seamstress. I can't remember who wrote it, it was about a seamstress who became a spy during the Spanish civil war.

The blind assassin by Margaret Attwood, beautiful but sad.
Juliet, naked- Nick Hornby, lighthearted holiday read.

The Kite Runner was very good I agree spoonful and I was underwhelmed by Girl on a Train too. I was gripped by Never Look Away by Linwood Barclay took me by complete surprise. Not my usual choice but couldn't put it down, lots of twists and turns. Highly recommend it.

just buy everything Kate Atkinson has ever written - trust me - no cats, tea shops or vintage frocks

Maybe you should write one OP? You have a good turn of phrase

I've just read All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doer. Highly recommend.

Doesn't the title annoy you, fruit? Light is invisible- we can't see any of it.

ghosty I am 200 pages into Life After Life - it is great. So much better than the premise suggests.

I like I am Pilgrim too. Also the The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry - very moving. Stranger Child, The Girl with all the gifts and Coffin Road - Peter May has such a lovely way with words.

Another vote for A Little Life by Hanya Yanigahara - mindblowingly heartbreaking and wonderfully written.

The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt is another doorstop tome I could (and probably will) re-read forever.

I have just finished the Eleanor Ferrante novels and they were incredible. The level of detail she goes into makes it feel so real that I am devastated I've finished them!

I love that book EssentialHummus

just abandon the idea of reading any new fiction and download a stack of Daphne du Maurier and Susan Hill :)

I can't remember who suggested this series initially, but I enjoyed the Loki series as well, though I haven't finished it yet

just buy everything Kate Atkinson has ever written - trust me - no cats, tea shops or vintage frocks

YES! 'Behind the Scenes' at the museum is one of the best books I've ever read. Currently reading 'A God in Ruins'.

I saw her at a lit festival around the time of 'When will there be Good News?' and she was fabulous. I'm a total fangirl.

Just don't read really recent stuff. If things which were on the Booker shortlist 5 or 10 years ago are still being read and enjoyed, they're probably pretty good, whereas the reviews of this year's hot titles have no perspective.
Or choose a genre you don't know much about, like sci fi or thriller or whatever, and ask the aficionados what they rate.
Life is too short to read things just because they're flavour of the month.

Someone mentioned Dave Eggars. His book Zeitoun is remarkable. A true story, set after the New Orleans flood, beautifully written. Another biography well worth reading - Unbroken - the story of an Olympic runner who became a PoW. I'm usually a fiction person but found these unputdownable.

I'm going to have to hide this thread before I bankrupt myself!

Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell. Original, clever, compelling. Best book I've read in years, by far.

Also We are all Completely Beside Ourselves by Karen Joy Fowler was a refreshing change.

Quite enjoyed Elizabeth is Missing (can't remember the author) and The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini.

The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry kept me amused too. Apologies if these are all hopelessly out of date and you've already read them all!

space mitzy the particular sadness of lemon cake is due to the protagonist's ability to feel others' emotions through taste. It is an interesting premise but ruined by the fact that her family also have "talents", her brother's is transmogrification.
SPOILER he turns into a chair. Yep, a fecking chair.

I was gutted because I loved her first book on a maths teacher with OCD an invisible sign of my own it was lovely
Her short story collection was not great. Very magical realism/poetic almost but A Chair. He. Turned. Into. A Chair.
MN bookclub were apoplectic.

mitzy (you, again!) YOU CAN SAMPLE BRIAN BLESSED'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY ON KINDLE YES BY MY BEARD IT IS THIS SHOUTY!!!!