The hiuse at riverton....this is a pile of crap isn't it...and are all richard and judy reads awful?

[zippitippitoes]

...bouhgt it in tesco as i wanted to read something and a few pages in it is not my kind of book at all, can't stand the faux way it is written and just seems a horrible big house illiterate cliche...does it get any better or should i just bin it?

and are all books with richard and judy recommends on rubbish?

So totally predictable but I read it all hoping for a surprise twist at the end. No such luck. Agree about lifted from Upstairs Downstairs and no mention of the suffragettes even though Hannah was a raging feminist.

Also hated it because it was described as "edwardian" when the main action took place during the war years.

She appears to also be influenced by the film 'Titanic'.

can't believe any writer would actually admit they were influenced by upstairs downstairs

or titanic

Testament of Gideon Mack was very good, despite R&J recommendation

perhaps a new label required saying that! to place anarchically over the R&J recommends one

yes one saying BUT DON"T LET THAT PUT YOU OFF

actually my reading tends to be unduly influenced by stickers saying 3 for 2 at Waterstone's

same here..though id did end up with the rubbish fifty is not a four letter word..but i did actually read it just that it was a load of puff but I expected that..sadly lacking in sex however which i had hoped might feature slightly more interestingly

Oh. I quite liked it

So did I,but I love Upstairs Downstairs!

have you read atonement you would love it and so much better written you won't look back surely

"Atonement" is the first McEwan I have literally fallen asleep reading. It was a better cure for insomnia than James "Instrument" Blunt. I found myself leafing through it, thinking, "I must be almost halfway, how much more of this is there to go?" and being thoroughly deflated that I was only 90 pages in or something.

To be fair, it picks up a bit at the halfway point and you suddenly realise what he has been trying to do, but Christ, he takes a long time getting there. I'm a big McEwan fan so I cut him a lot of slack.

It would have been more fun if structured with alternating early 30s/ wartime chapters, which I think is the approach taken by the film...?

Oh, I loved the first section og Atonement. The second (Dunkirk) bit was visceral, but a bit Boy's Own, I thought.

UD is a mind reader. I felt the same about 'Atonement'. Am a big McEwan fan as well.

but if you like riverton or whtever it's called then atonement is an easy read in the same kind of mould so although it isn't brilliant challenging it is entertaining and well written by comparison

""Atonement" is the first McEwan I have literally fallen asleep reading."

You mean you stayed awake through Amsterdam????

I gave up 2/3 of the way through Atonement, I found it a bit depressing and dreary.

I think there have been some decent R & J books :-Salmon Fishing in the Yemen, Restless, Savage Garden (except for the heaving bosom romance with beautiful Italian bit), and Half of a Yellow Sun.

mind you R & J are I think to blame for the number of Jodi Piccoult books re-issued

I'm reading Atonement at the minute, about 1/3rd of the way through and not really enjoying it. But have heard before that it improves in the second half so will perservere.

Never read a McEwan book before, anyone recommend any of his others?

I struggled through atonement, found the final section deathly dull and smug; first bit was ok but only ok. Star of the Sea was absolutely fantastic - again, I didn't think it would interest me at all but dh insisted I read it! The Island (Victoria Hislop) is also an R&J read iirc and I loved that too.

i always tend to think of the real mcewan being the short stories

but only because i was with him from the start as it were

Cement Garden is proper McEwan too. Know what you mean though. The stories are fab. Some of the later novels should have been stories.

"Cement Garden" and "Comfort of Strangers" had me utterly compelled in a nasty way, as did some of the early short stories. "The Child In Time" I remember enjoying, but thought (as with "Enduring Love") that it never really topped the gripping first chapter.

What's the short story with the boy who befriends the "large" lady and they go out for a sinister trip on the river together?... is that McEwan? It was dramatised with Annette Badland.

Yes that is McEwan, from one of his two early collections of stories.
Superb, isn't it?

I loved Atonement and I'm really looking forward to the film. I really like some Ian McEwan but then really felt like I was wading through treacle reading Saturday.

I've enjoyed a few Richard and Judy books; Arthur and George, The Girls, Time Travellers Wife. I thought The Island was dull.

I tend to buy 6 books at a time when on 3 for 2 and then work my way throught them. I'm currently reading The Last King of Scotland.