Recommendations for my DP

[artifarti]

I appear to have turned into my DP's personal librarian. Now, I do quite like this role but he's reading rather too fast now and I am starting to run out of inspiration at the moment!

He likes: Anything by Martin Amis (although apparently the recent ones have been a bit rubbish), Ian McEwan and JG Ballard.

Recently read and liked:

The Corrections and Strong Motion by Jonathan Franzen
The Road by Cormac McCarthy
The Promise of Happiness by Justin Cartwright
Fangland by John Marks

He likes things with a US feel and is also 'filmy', if that makes any sense.

I am thinking Carter Beats the Devil and John Irving might be good choices for him next. Anything else?

I haven't read Fangland but have read and really liked the others and am also Amis, McEwan and JG Ballard fan and agree Amis has not been on top form recently.

How about Will Self? Has he tried David Mitchell? All very good. How about Steve Tolz's A Fraction of the Whole? and Roberto Bolano's The Savage Detective? Diaz's The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao? Cormac McCarthy's No country for Old Men is very filmic - Coen brothers were pretyy much able to lift the screennplay from the novel....

Oooh, thanks vespucci9! That will keep me on Amazon for quite some time...

Is David Mitchell the Cloud Atlas one? Have to say I hated that but did like Black Swan Green.

that's right. Mitchell wrote Cloud Atlas and Black Swan Green and his other novels ghostwritten and number nine dream show his range. All quite different in style.

From your list of your DP's likes it seems he likes thought provoking, literary fiction with ideas and social context...and that's David Mitchell.

Another thought is Claire Messud's Emperor's Children - brilliant on post 911 NY. Or how about Margaret Atwood?

John Updike's Rabbit books are a must. They could have been written for him! Or Couples, by the same author

I too seem to be responsible for DHs reading schedule .

I would recommend Steve Toltz, A Fraction of the Whole.
Also, DH (has similar tastes) loved Engleby by Sebastian Faulks.

There is a shamefully neglected writer called Rupert Thomson. His books are very diverse, but he is a bit Ballardish in a way. Five Gates of Hell and Air and Water are both set in America, but I also recommend Dreams of Leaving and Death of a Muderer.

William Boyd - Any Human Heart is a mini masterpiece, A Good Man in Africa hilarious (they did made a terrible film of it).

Paul Torday Salmon Fishing in the Yemen

Phew, that ended up quite a long list!

His tastes are very similar to my DH's. DH also likes Saul Bellow, Philip Roth & Will Self. I would also suggest Elmore Leonard, Kazuo Ishiguro and Graham Swift.

Another DP with very similar tastes here. Mine also likes jonathan raban.

Thanks everyone.

It's interesting how other DHs/DPs have similar tastes. I have always said to DP that I think he likes quite masculine writers but he doesn't understand what I mean. I'm not sure I understand what I mean either but I just know when I read a book whether he will like it or not!

Has he read Shantaram?

How about Underworld by Don DeLillo? Personally I wasn't all that wild about it, but sounds like it's right up his street. Plus it's so long it will keep him busy while you think of some more .

And if he likes US stuff, how about Jay McInerney and Bret Easton Ellis? Maybe a bit 80s now, but still quite fun.

And back in British fiction, there's always David Lodge. Personally I bloody hate him and think he's a misogynist over-intellectualised pillock, but my husband loves him.

What about Wally Lamb? American, quite funny and a good story.