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Books for DS nearly 17

28 replies

Apileofballyhoo · 04/02/2025 19:25

DS wants to read more and spend less time on screens, so books are the obvious choice. We've had a bereavement this year and he's struggling a bit with concentrating so we are looking for books that are pretty easy to read but are still well written and quite literary. He found One Hundred Years of Solitude a slog but raced through Klara and the Sun. I'll read anything so I'm not much use to him, but I've suggested Life of Pi as I remember racing through that once I got past the first chapter. Also All the Pretty Horses, but he might struggle with the punctuation or lack of in McCarthy books. He doesn't feel up to reading anything particularly sad or bleak. All suggestions welcome!

OP posts:
Dappy777 · 05/02/2025 15:16

Oh god, steer him away from Cormac McCarthy if he's in need of cheering up. McCarthy is a superb stylist, but bleak beyond words. He makes Thomas Hardy and Philip Larkin seem like P. G. Wodehouse.

These are the books I would put into the hands of an intelligent 17-year-old:

Douglas Adams: A Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Tolkien: The Hobbit (if he likes it, he'll want to read Lord of the Rings)
Aldous Huxley: Chrome Yellow (the audiobook by Michael Maloney is excellent)
George Orwell: Down and Out in Paris and London
Robert Graves: Goodbye to all That
Bertrand Russell: The Problems of Philosophy (very short and written in crystal clear prose – might spark a lifelong interest in the subject)
Bill Bryson: A Short History of Nearly Everything (a superb general introduction to science, that, once again, might just light a flame)
Carl Sagan: Cosmos
Patrick Fermor: A Time of Gifts (made me want to read, learn languages, meet people and explore the world)
P. G. Wodehouse: Right Ho Jeeves (Wodehouse made me fall in love with language)
Evelyn Waugh: Decline and Fall (funniest book in English, especially the audiobook recording by Michael Maloney)
Oscar Wilde: Dorian Gray

JaninaDuszejko · 05/02/2025 15:41

Robert Graves: Goodbye to all That

Good shout, this is brilliant and feels so modern.

Testament of Youth is fabulous as well.

Pat888 · 10/02/2025 06:44

Robert Harris' An Officer and a Spy is such a good book based on fact - there's also a film but seemed a shame to cram hours of pageturning book into a couple of hours of film.

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