'I love book threads' wrote debut TLS commenter, childonfire on last week's blog. Comments like that, childonfire, are guaranteed to win you friends around here, expecially when you add your own recommendations:
The Emperor of All Maladies: for now, the definitive book on cancer, very well written, though perhaps not for those who are easily queasy.
Golden Boy: A biography of Kim Hughes (Australian cricket captain 1980s), probably not the thread to recommend this.
The Selfish Gene : 30th Anniversary edition: If you are going to read it, definitely try get this edition, a lot has happened in biology since this was originally published.
If you have come across Tips, links and suggestions for the first time, this blog is dedicated to discussing the books you are currently reading, swapping recommendations, and is your space to tell us what you'd like to see covered on the site. Here are some of the highlights from last week's thread:
I've been reading A Book of Silence by Sara Maitland and Rabbit, Run by John Updike... Whereas A Book of Silence is probably best read in small doses, as a soothing tonic at the end of the day, Rabbit, Run demands to be read frantically in one or two sittings. Having shamefully never read any Updike before, it seemed sensible to start at the beginning – and what a beginning.
I feel like such an oaf for not having already read this, but I'm reading The Woman In White by Wilkie Collins. I'm just over a third of the way through and the plot is unfolding teasingly.
I'm reading A Man of Parts by David Lodge and thoroughly enjoying it.
It's a fictionalised account of the life of HG Wells and it's made me want to read more about Wells - always a sign of successful fiction, I think. I had no idea Wells was so randy, though!
Currently reading The Dice Man and I can sense a pattern forming here...if I don't 'like' the main protagonist then I don't like the book. Now this doesn't mean I have to feel I want to pop out for a pint with them, I mean I loved American Psycho which this book reminds me of in a lot of ways but I wouldn't want Bateman to be a buddy! It's just that initial bond I guess, if it ain't there, I can't fake it. I find myself trawling through it thinking 'you're just a spolit brat with a pathetic mid-life crisis'...the humour is falling on deaf ears as well.
Well, I finally finished the first part of Don Quixote. It was definitely worth persevering with and came to a suitable conclusion raising some really good questions about realism and romanticism.
To the point where I was worried I may be guilty of some of the Don's traits and may become a knight-errant!
I'd also like to thank commenter and Flickr user katybird, for uploading to our What are you reading today? group the photo at the top of this blog. Here's what she says about it:
I found this photo in a second-hand copy of Frankenstein. There aren't any details on the back - no suggestion of who took it, where or when, no context for the slightly unsettling image. I like that I have a shared view, a window into the life of person unknown - might put a photo in all the books I donate from now on.
Here's a selection of some of the books and authors our writers will be reviewing over the next week, due to last minute changes, of course.
Non-fiction
• Ian Black on a selection of Libya books including Sandstrom by Lindsey Hilsum
• The New Few: Or a Very British Oligarchy by Ferdinand Mount
• Mary Quant: My Autobiography by Mary Quant
• Pakistan on the Brink: The Future of Pakistan, Afghanistan and the West by Ahmed Rashid
Fiction
• Dark Lies the Island by Kevin Barry
• Skios by Michael Frayn
• Scenes from Early Life by Philip Hensher
• Michel Faber on Karl Ove Knausgard
• Tropic of Cancer by Henry Miller
