Summer reads

[Shaggy]

Any suggestions?

[Jah Lush]

The Magus - John Fowles.

[Bleep]

Ah yes, quality book - although annoyingly I dropped my copy in a pile of poo last year.

I'm reading The Magic Mountain by Thomas Mann at the mo.

[Marmora Man]

I don't do summer reading - I just read.

Recent recommendations:

Life Class - Pat Barker (WWI and artists),

Restless - William Boyd (WWII - spies and families and lies),

Chesil Beach - Ian McEwan (all a bit premature),

Rogue Male - Geoffry Household (Assasination thriller first published 1940's I think),

Anything by Patrick O'Brian (Master & Commander series - great series of novels about early 19th naval life in Napoleonic wars),

Anything by Jane Austen - always worth returning to.

I may return to The Magus - last read as a student in the 70's, thanks for the reminder Jah.

[Ladygooner]

Shaggy - are you into chick lit? or more manly stuff?!

[Monkey]

Will read anything.

Thanks- will look up The Magus tomorrow. I read Restless recently. It was rather good.

[Shaggy]

Sorry - that post above was me. Monkey has been using my laptop..

[Peckhamgatecrasher]

Intrigued Bleep - I though reading on the loo was a fairly safe occupation - did you tear out pages as an emergency measure?

[Jessie]

Reading The Accidental by Ali Smith at the moment and actually think it's quite brilliant, and a good summer read if you prefer your books more literary (good for summer because set predominantly on a family's summer break in Norfolk)

[Ladygooner]

Can I suggest the following recent reads:

Arthur & George - Julian Barnes

This Book will save your life - A M Homes

Two Caravans - Marina Lewycka

Temptation - Douglas Kennedy

Vanishing Acot of Esme Lennox - Maggie O'Farrell

Order online at Waterstones - cheaper than buying at the store.

[SeanMacGabhann]

Haven't read the others LadyG but loved the Homes book

[jim_the_chin]

Bleep Wrote:

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> I'm reading The Magic Mountain by Thomas Mann at

> the mo.

God, i'm reading it too, or was until i gave up as most of it was going over my head - i think i got about 300 or so pages in. any clues as to what is going on (aside from the life-love-death thing) would be appreciated.

Recommended can't-put-downs:

Crime and Punishment - Dostoyevsky

The Secret Agent - Jospeh Conrad

Jekyll and Hyde - Stevenson

[Bleep]

Peckhamgatecrasher Wrote:

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> Intrigued Bleep - I though reading on the loo was

> a fairly safe occupation - did you tear out pages

> as an emergency measure?

I was reading it on a street at some point last year, and a ruffian barged into me, making me drop the book into an inconvenient large pile of dog poo.

[smith]

The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver - only a few chapters in, but unputdownable.

[catgirl]

I've read several wonderful books by her, Poisonwood Bible is one and also the Bean Tree and Pigs in Heaven.

Any Human Heart by William Boyd is a really great book and would be a fab holiday read. Have not met anyone yet who read it and has not raved about it!

[Michael Palaeologus]

"Summer Reads

Makes me feel fi-hine

blowing through the jasmine in my mi-hind .."

Sort of

My holiday reading includes:

A Florentine Death: Michelle Giuttari

Saturnalia: Lindsey Davis

In Xanadu, a Conquest: William Dalrymple

[dulwichmum]

I adored "Confessions of a chat room freak" by Mr Biffo. I love books that I can read in short bursts and get back into again quickly - I only get to read on the bus or in between outings with the children. This book had me laughing out loud on the bus (and I mean that seriously - I'm not choosing that phrase because it is trendy). I had people changing seats to get away from me because they clearly thought I was mentally ill!

That book is so very funny it should have a warning printed on the cover. It is the chat room dialogue of this guy who posed in as "Loopy Lisa 21" and was continuously being chatted up by men with one thing on their mind. On one occasion I almost inhaled my coffee in Starbucks it was so hysterically funny. I have bought two copies of it for friends in the last month.

[Jah Lush]

Top choice Catgirl. I read William Boyd's Any Human Heart a few years back and it is one of those unputdownable books that you don't want to end. Also if you want something that's fun and you can quickly wizz through a good one is William Sutcliffe's Are You Experienced.

[catgirl]

Mogadishu?

Have read 'are you experienced' a long while back but do remember it being a good, entertaining, quick read.

Other top reads from recent times (as in I've read them recently, not they've been written recently necessarily) are:

A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving

A History of Tracktors in Ukranian by Marina Lewycka (not read 2 caravans yet Ladygooner!)

The Kite Runner by Khaled Husseini

The Life of Pi by Yann Martel

Sophie's bakery for the broken hearted by Lolly Winston.

Have also read several Douglas Kennedy books and really enjoyed them (as per Ladygooner recommendation above)

All really well written, great characters but yet easy to read.

[Jah Lush]

Mogadishu???? Huh! The name's Lush...Jah Lush.

Also, I'd go for anything by Hanif Kureishi.

[Keef]

Just starting Merde Happens, the 3rd book of Stephen Clarke's trilogy about an Englishman in Paris (although in this one he goes to America with his French girlfriend). Nice easy reading, and funny if you like a dig at the French or Americans... All in good fun of course ;-)

[SimonM]

>>I may return to The Magus - last read as a student in the 70's, thanks for the reminder Jah.:D< But....I don't think time has been too kind to it myself.

[missd]

Recently read the following

Half of Yellow Sun - really very good -would highly recommend

A Thousand Splendid Suns - Khaled Hosseini- great book

Restless -William Boyd -first one of his I've read, and enjoyed it a lot

Douglas Kennedy -love all of his except the last one -The Woman in the Fifth -really good until the end -didnt much like it

[mockney piers]

Currently reading Francis Wheen's How Mumbo Jumbo Conquered the World and he seems to be neatly summarising most of the things that annoy me about the modern world.