Help me decide on a book to take on holiday next week

[RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie]

A real, live book - not Kindle. Has to be one I've not read before and has to be big. Ideally it will - be well written without being literary, have either a who-dunnit or historical or dystopian or apocalyptic element to it, or indeed all of those.

Things that would tick those boxes but that I've already read are:
Anything by Wilkie Collins
The Passage / The Twelve
CJ Sansom's Shardlake books
This Thing of Darkness

Don't fancy sci-fi at the moment and don't want anything in the best seller lists.

Thanks in advance.

How about the lighthouse by Alison Moore although it's not that long

The children's room by AS Byatt ticks 'thick' and 'historical'

www.theguardian.com/books/2009/may/09/as-byatt-childrens-book

Or shantaram? The only of your criteria it really fits is big, but it is different, and some parts very funny without being in the slightest bit fluffy. It all gets a bit dark.

Anna karenina?

Kate Mosse Labyrinth? It is next in my pile to read.
Oh, I think I might have one: Out
Deeply dusturbing book, it marked me, never read anything like it.

Have read most of Wilkie C's now. Not overfond of Marakami - have read Bird Chronicle; most of his too short too. Didn't like Eco but would fit length wise!

Why do I need to read The Luminaries? Deffo don't want to take it away with me, but happy to try it later.

PS - not sure if I dare admit it on here, but am finding that my patience with female writers is getting lower and lower. I want something manly, I think! :)

Hate Kate Mosse - dreadful writer imvho. Sorry - am being v awkward, as usual. :(

I never even finished foucault's pendulum but loved in the name of the rose.

Birdsong?

The Last Kabbalist of Lisbon by Richard Zimler.
When I Lived in Modern Times by Linda Grant

The Luminaries ticks a lot of your boxes - Big tome, historical (New Zealand during the gold rush of 1860s), very well-written, beautifully drawn characters. I was very impressed by it and couldn't believe that it was written by a 27-year-old.

I like Alison Moore, the lighthouse is quite a simple plot although very difficult to explain at the same time! Quite dark. Not sure if it's manly but it's definitely not womany either!

You know how I feel about woman writers. I was doubly impressed that its author is a woman.

I expect you've read it, but - Wild Swans?

Never read anything by Kate Mosse, so don't know :)
Awww, hope you find something. Enjoy your hols anyway :)

Dili - ignore me. Am a bloomin' fussy bugger.

Wild Swans - read it / didn't like it. Told you I was a fussy bugger!

The Lighthouse looks promising - not for this hol, but maybe one for later.

Hilary Mantel - Beyond Black, or Fludd, or Vacant Possession

Jane Harris - The Observations, or Gillespie & I

Marcel Theroux - Strange Bodies ( modern Frankenstein tale)

alas these are not very big, but you could take two.

Ooh Marcel T - I read one of his once and liked it. Brilliant.

Can't be doing with Hilary M though - hated Beyond Black & Fludd and just about coped with Wolf Hall.

Thank you. Sorry.

I'm reading Wolf Hall now and frankly regretting it.

How about Elizabeth Kostova's The Historian? Very chilling and gripping. Or Andrew Pyper's The Demonologist. Both a bit gothic, mystery, thriller-y. The Historian has it for size, though - kept me going for ages!

Just read and loved The Goldfinch - I would actually say that although Donna Tartt is 'literary' this is very page turning, but it seems a bit of a Marmite book as I know some people have found it not as gripping as I did. There is a very dreamy section in the middle - dreamy and disturbing and quite dystopian, actually, set in Las Vegas.

China Mieville does a lot of urban dystopia, and he is a man.

Read The Historian. Not going to bother with The Goldfinch as didn't think a great deal of her other two. Will google Andrew P, thanks.

Have you read Alias Grace? Big, historical (in that it's based on a true story), don't usually like Margaret Atwood but I love this one. Wonderful book.

And another writer who's thoroughly brilliant is Katherine Webb, and her latest, The Misbegotten, is fab - I'd describe her as a commercial author but her writing is as good as any 'literary' author. Her sense of place is amazing and she gives equal weight to plot and characters, which makes for a thoroughly satisfying read.

Oh, I've just remembered Carter beats the Devil by Glen David Gold. I loved it in the way that I loved Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell, The Crimson Petal and the White and Fingersmith. All very different books with fully created worlds/ societies.

Gothic any good? Melmoth the Wanderer is long (I haven't read it). The Monk and The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner are shorter but excellent.