Need recs please - sorry!

[janeite]

What shall I look for in the library tomorrow please? I am currently reduced to re-reads of The Famous Five.

Another one i enjoyed was Company of Liars by Karen Maitland thats really good like Pillars it is set in Medieval England. one of my favs is The Tortilla Curtain by T C Boyle sad in parts but very well written

am having a bit of a roman phase myself...what about the robert harris novels charting roman life through the eyes of cicero (imperium then lustrum) or his pompeii novel....also have you read the falco series by lyndsey davies?

yours looks interesting takver!

Areyou still after recommendations ?

The best book I've read in a long time was moloka'i. About a girl who contracts leprosy and is taken to the Moloka'i colony

Not sure what to liken it to, it was just good !

Thanks for these. Have tried Lyndsey Davies before and really disliked it, I'm afraid - thought it was very clunkily written. Will look into the others.

Sorry - I am so awkward.

Do you ever read the Guardian Review on a Saturday? I find that it is a good way of finding books to look out for (there is a page of paperback reviews which is helpful as they are older books so more often in the library). I mainly read non-fiction (at least of newly published stuff) but they review a lot of fiction too.

Normally I hate 'survey' type articles, but they did a 'what do you recommend the new PM reads?' piece ( here ) which was IMO for once interesting - they had a good selection of people who gave a very varied list of books (even including Ben Jonson & a life of Shelley ). In the main they weren't new books, which of course helps if you are a library reader (as I am).

It is all online so no need to buy the paper

I hesitate to recommend because I know how opinionated you are about books. PI is Private Investigator.

Laura Wilson's novels are mostly historically set - The Lover, Stratton's War and An Empty Death are all set in WWII London.

pollywollydoodle im always going through a roman phase i love the era, i enjoyed Lindsay Davis but i finished with Saturnalia so have to get the other one, I enjoy Robert Harris too read Pompeii twice. There is a series called Emporer by Conn Iggulden and its got four books in it thats really good i enjoyed that. There is another series written by Steven Saylor with the main character a bit like Falco working as an informer/investigator but i only read the first book in the series not as enjoyable as the Falco ones,i kept comparing him to falco and he didnt have that special falco humour/sarcasm so i gave up do you have any recommendations?

thanks Kariba...i've only read a few of the lyndsey davies ones....i find them good beach reading....i can rec this i think it is part of a series but have only read this one

Go into the recommendations bit of your amazon account, then click all the HP and S King stuff where it says "do not use for recommendations".

Have you read the Vitner's luck and The Quincunx?

Both were recent favourites.

If Amazon doesn't work for recs, you could try Gnooks - you type in the name of a writer, & it shows other writers that people who read your original suggestion also like.
It works best with authors who are not too obscure but also not too popular, I find, but it is quite interesting. Mrs Gaskell, for example, gave me authors varying from Christopher Brookmyer to Louisa May Alcott (both of whom I also like . . .)

I failed horribly with The Quincunx.

Elkie - oh dear - opinionated sounds very bad! Sorry.

Read an Agatha Christie last night - it was dire.

Now Janeite - I always look up to you and your book choices but I must defend Aggie. I love Poirot. He's so ridiculous you can't help laughing.

This was a short story collection - the only good one in there was a Poirot one. I think I fancy him a bit actually...

Oh Janeite, I thought I was the only person in the world who thought the Quincunx was a waste of time!

Have you tried any Robertson Davies or Timothy Findlay? Or Elliot Perlman?

Jasper Fforde?

How are you on sci fi?

I've just read back on this thread and you're not into sci fi, but you do like fantasy.

I don't read that much fantasy but my bro and dh both do. They both recommend Glen Cook's Chronicles of the Black Company. Haven't read it myself yet though.

I've just finished Robert Graves' Antigua Penny Puce, which was hilarious, about warring bro and sis fighting over a very rare stamp in which neither really has any interest, other than to ensure the other doesn't get it.

I've also just finished No Present Like Time by Steph Swainson, which was quite good. It's the second in a series but I got it in a charity shop and haven't seen the first. I'd probably read the first if I came across it.

How do like real literature? I mean, Balzac for instance?

Oh and Margerite Yourcenar, Memoirs of Hadrian. Someone on here recommended this to me. It is delicious, like drinking cream. Packed full of facts but written so beautifully that they just slip down without you noticing. Half an hour disappeared in the bookshop while I was 'just seeing if I liked it'!

No, I think being opinionated about books is great, I'm sorry if that sounded insulting. I love reading critical reviews of books if they're done properly.

Real literature - yes, yes - am an English teacher!

Sci-fi - nope. Jasper Ffffffffforde irritates me - too clever for his own good and so self-satisfied about it all.

Fantasy - I only like The Lord Of the Rings, some Pratchet, Gaiman and King. I hate all that crappy modern fantasy involving women in cloaks and clunky description and places with silly names etc.

Hadrian one looks interesting. Prefer my history from the mediaeval period on generally.

Prolesworth - should I try again with The Quincunx. I was maybe biased by the fact that batty ex-colleague raved about it. She also liked A Quiet Belief In Angels though and I loathed that.

Phew - thanks Elkie!

picked up Recollections of a Racketeer yesterday at the library and have had some great laugh out loud moments. Am very much into non fiction ATM

Have you found anything worthwhile readng at the moment?

Do look at The Bookbag website - try reviews by Magda Healey, Louise Lawrie, Lesley Mason, Robert somebody, Jill Murphy (no she's not the author of kids' books though she does review mostly kids' and YA stuff, but she reads proper literary fiction too).

Thanks.

Things I have liked (or not) recently - erm -

I read (and didn't like) Chuck Palahnik (sp?)'s Invisible Monsters.

Ardrey whatshername's Her Fearful Symmetry - was okay but predictable and stupid ending and the more I analyse the more I criticise it - enjoyed it as a story though.

I liked the book that became Slumdog Millionaire - is called Question And Answer or something like that.

I read The Worst Journey In The World by Cherry Garrard about Scott's polar expedition (non-fiction) and thought it was brilliant.

Teenage fiction - The Knife Of Never Letting Go and the follow up - both excellent.

Re-read Dracula and Frankenstein. Read a book about Vlad the Impaler and liked it a lot. Oh and a novelised version of Scott and the Antarctic which was good.