Books you thought no one else has read

[tweetysylvester]

It's so fun to find rare books to read, or just look up or hear about less known books, so thought I'd start a thread about this. Nostalgic novels, YA books, current titles you discovered very randomly...

Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry

Great book!

Omg yes indeed. One of my “to be saved if the house is on fire” books. The whole series is excellent (but bloodier).

I was blown away - such a realistic depiction of the 'Wild West'. Quite gritty.

I hadn't been as mesmerised since reading Steinbeck many years ago.

She wrote 'Morning has broken' 🙂

Has anyone read 'Eagle in the Snow' by Wallace Bream?

Its set near the end of the roman empire and the main character is a general on Hadrians wall. It's very good.

Standard Deviation by Katherine Heiny. My mum lent me her copy, which she picked up for 50p on a used book stall. I’d never heard of the author but she said it was one of the funniest books she had ever read. It’s about a family dealing with an autistic son, and realising basically that everyone else in the family and almost everywhere else has varying levels of ASD. My sister is autistic, so it was close to home. I was laughing out loud before the end of the first page. Genuinely hilarious. Obviously it was easy for me and my mum to relate to, but I don’t think you need to have seen ASD at close quarters to find it funny. Can’t recommend it highly enough. I read it in less than a day.

The author has written quite a few books and I’ve since read several other of her books and they were equally good.

My other pick is Whatever Love Means by David Baddiel. He’s obviously very famous, but his writing is less so. Love all of his novels - in particular Time for Bed is very funny and The Secret Purposes is very beautiful- but WLM is a genuine edge-of-your-seat page turner (as well as very funny). His recent memoir, My Family, is also amazing- poignant and so, so, so, funny- but unlike his other books it’s been a massive best seller, so I don’t think it fits the brief of this thread.

I bloody loved Standard Deviation.

Standard Deviation is hilarious. Katherine Heiny has such a droll turn of phrase; when I first read it I felt there was something slightly English about her humour, then I discovered she’s married to a Brit. I loved her next novel, Early morning Riser, too - very different setting but just as funny.

ive found the one I bet absolutely no one else has read- and it’s such a funny clever book … How I ate my father by Ray Lewis.

If that is Evolution Man or How I Ate My Father by Roy Lewis then yes I have read it - so very funny!

If you liked it you will also like The Bear We Over the Mountain by william kotzwinkle which is also a very funny clever book.

Read it too - a very funny book.
I had to look it up as I know it just as 'The Evolution Man'

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A Book of Princesses - I think edited by Sally Patrick Johnson, its a collection of 12 or so fairy stories from around the world, all containing at least one princess. It had some great writers, Oscar Wilde, Walter de La Mere & I read it over and over. I was particularly fond of A Light Princess and The Long Nosed Princess.

I have still got my copy!

About 15 years ago my daughter was reading The Phantom Tollbooth at school and did a performance of it for school and parents. The school had Norton Juster come and speak afterwards. Kids weren't bothered but all of the adults who had read it as children were so excited. I have a photo of my dh with him.

Wow!

I’m excited vicariously! What a coup for your daughter’s school.

Judith Kerr signed my battered copy of When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit after giving a talk and a reading about twenty years ago. I hope I managed to convey to her how very much we loved Pink Rabbit, and The Tiger Who Came to Tea, and the Mog books but I fear I may have been too awed to be articulate. But she was so lovely.

In fairness the school is in Massachusetts where he lived. He was lovely though.

Trying to trace a series of book I read as a kid back in the 70s. It was based in Wigan and featured 4 children who solved mysteries. As far as I can remember,there were 3 girls, one of whom was called Becky and another called Camille (who was French), and Becky's brother. Any idea anyone?

Oh wow! I never knew that!!

@Grumpyoldpersonwithcats@Pallisersyes that’s the one!

Ok what about Victor Klemperer’s diaries?
absolutely mind blowing stuff

@insomniaclife aren’t they just. The many, many spiteful petty indignities and cruelties multiplying over time to make life as narrow and wretched as possible. And when he describes the horrors of the Dresden bombing and firestorm, which ended up probably saving his life by preventing him being deported to Auschwitz. As you say, mind-blowing.

@witheringrowan
I just finished Snowfall - thank you.