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.

[RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie]

Charlie - yes I knew you meant Jasper Fffffffffffffffffff and not the racy series! I don't like Jasper Fffffffffff and haven't read the racy ones. One paragraph as a taster was at least 6 lines too many.

Have read Ken Follet's ones. Not v well written but okay to lose self in a doorstop for a while.

I don't mind YA and actually read it often, but they are just not long enough for what I want now.

I can't read Cloud Atlas. Have tried, several times, but it bores me to tears and makes me want to poke myself with a pointed stick just to cheer myself up a bit.

Hated, 'Gone with the Wind'. I actually didn't finish it - made it about three quarters of the way through, hating every minute of it, and then realised that I didn't actually have to finish the damn thing.

Read Line of Beauty and Midnight's Children but neither are really my sort of thing. Only read because desperate.

I still haven't got anything - think I will have to buy something at the airport, in which case it'll probably end up being a history book.

[DuchessofMalfi]

Final suggestion - something by Sharon Penman? Detailed, historical, and very long eg The Sunne in Splendour, or Lionheart? I have both of these lined up to read - getting more interested in historical novels.

[MadamBatShit]

Don DeLillo. Definitely man. Big one is Underworld.

Have you read Unfinite Jest? David Foster Wallace. Very big one.

A naked singularity, Sergio de la Pava, very trendy, and big.

Neal Stephenson.

Paul Preston's the Spanish Holocaust. Not exactly ight holiday reading, very big.

You've read the Worst Journey in the World?

I must admit not to have read these but they are from my 'to read' pile.

[RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie]

Read and love, 'The Worst Journey in the World' - one of my favourite books ever.

[MadamBatShit]

Do you like mountain climbing books? I may have asked this before (not here though) and I cannot remember..
Into the Silence by Wade Davis.

About Malory, war and the mountain.
Fear of hights, that's me, but reading about these expeditions... ah, the stuff of madness!
Herzog's book about Annapurna is fab too, but probably not long enough. Also not very accurate but the story is good anyway.
Jon Krakauer and Joe Simpson do good books on this as well, but also too short probably.

[RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie]

Read it - absolutely loved it.
Read Joe S' ones too.
Think I might have read Herzog too: having a memory fail.

I love mountain ones but only really the historical ones, rather than contemporary. I'm fine finding non-fiction generally, but am really struggling with novels.

[MadamBatShit]

Yep me too, the old stories are more interesting than the modern ones about sponsors and high tech mojo. Though Simpson and Krakauer do it well.

Hm, novels are tricky, lots of them are rather boring.
Strange bodies by Marcel Theroux?

[RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie]

Ooh yes - that does look good. :)

[CheckpointCharlie]

remus I think I have a Touching the Void from a couple of years ago when I was a book giver (am this year too, and last year!) I can stick it in the post if you fancy it?

[Hiphopopotamus]

Games of Throne? Cracking book - and if you like it, will get you into a whole book ( and TV) series.

[Hiphopopotamus]

Obviously that should be 'Thrones'

[RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie]

Charlie - that's kind, thank you - have read it though.

Game of Thrones - have read two & given up as the writing is so bad.

John Connolly - didn't like The Book of Lost Things much, so have never tried any of his others. Are they v different?

Love the Holmes stories but have read them all many times. Don't like Middlemarch.

[wizzler]

We have similar taste.. I loved the Shardlake books and Wilkie Collins.
My other favourites are

Paulina Simons, the Bronze Horseman
Precious Bane by Mary Webb
Red Leaves by Paulina Simons ( actually... anything by Paulina Simons)
The Serailler novels by Susan Hill ( possibly not spelt like that!)

[RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie]

Just looked at the Charlie Parker books. Sounds eerily reminiscent of King.

[CheckpointCharlie]

No probs! I can send it to anyone actually, if anyone fancies it.

[CheckpointCharlie]

Not very related to the other kinds of books you like but have you read A Million Little Pieces by James Frey? Its one of my all time faves.

And I have just read two non-fiction books that were brilliant, El Narco by Ioan Grillo and The Gift of Fear by Gavin De Becker.

[Burmahere]

Have you read The Snow Leopard by Peter Matthiesson? Gorgeous wonderful story set in the Himalayas.

I'm also looking for big fat books to take away with me.

Had the Quincunx all ready to recommend but see already dealt with !

Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet? David Mitchell but quite different from Cloud Atlas.

Neil Gaiman American Gods

Have got Jonathan Strange & Dr Norrell recommended on here and in my bag ready to read .

[heymammy]

The Count of Monte Cristo? Great book but I have to say I'd second the Shogun recommendation...it's a damn fine book!

[RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie]

I failed with Jonathon Strange - it just wasn't engaging me and I gave up on it. Maybe should try again, as it is certainly big!

Read and really enjoyed, 'American Gods.'

Read, 'A Million Little Pieces.'

'The Snow Leopard' sounds v good, but really wanting fiction.

Can't cope with Mitchell now! I will deffo give Shogun a try at some point.

[SerenaJoy]

This is from my 'to read' pile but what about The Earthsea Quartet by Ursula Le Guin? I don't know if it will fit your 'manly' criteria but it does look good.

I've been wanting to read it for ages but can't stay awake long enough to read at the mo due to pesky non-sleeping babies and toddlers.

[applies matchsticks to eyelids]

[LeBearPolar]

DH is reading The Three Musketeers. Manly and historical! And it has a picture of the musketeers on the front. Sometimes I just gaze at it

[blueeyedpea]

have you tried John Irving? I enjoyed A Prayer for Owen Meany, but it might be a bit love/hate