Unofficial Christ's Hospital Forum

I will start with just one author who I think is among the most brilliant of writers

Tobias Woolf

If you like childhood try "A Boy's Life"

If you like short stories try his collected short stories

I will post more wonderful books to read and hope you people will too

I am lucky enough to often photograph writers so I get an insider's reccomendation sometimes...

Wasn`t there another thread recently on current reading material??
Good idea to suggest a good read though! Plenty of books around and difficult to chose from!

What's yours?

Here are some highly rated books / authors

Peter Ackroyd - London (A Biography)
Blake (Perfect Biography of the artist no-one really understood - even perhaps himself - he wrote "Jerusalem")

Martin Amis - Experience (brilliant autobiography of his early life and of course full of anecdotes about Kingsley Amis, his father)

Nadeem Aslam - Very well respected author of 2 novels - not well known yet but will be. One is called "Maps for Lost Lovers"

I assume you have read Ian McEwan

If not Shame on you and go and get one now!

For the faint hearted try "Enduring Love"

Others try "The Cement Garden" or
"First Love Last Rites" or "Black Dogs"

Paul Auster is brilliant - read anything but I loved "Oracle Nights"

Pat Barker's "Regeneration" trilogy you should have read already

And that applies to Sebastian Faulks' "Birdsong" the famous account of the first world war

Older people who like a slower book should try Elizabeth Bowen who is really good - Irish troubles circa 1920 very romantic and suberbly written

Now I should tell you that my friend Richard told me about her and he has written some fabulous books with the best titles see below...







Ron Butlin "The Sound of my Voice"
ode to an alcoholic
Carson McCullers "The Heart is a Lonely Hunter"
a true classic which you should already know and love
Murakami "The Wind Up Bird Chronicle"
really weird Japanese novel where a small girl traps a man in a well
David Mitchell "Ghostwritten"
very strange interwoven group of stories, one taking over from the last
Patrick McGrath ANYTHING try "Asylum"
the true gothic writer of today - buy anything by him - he is a master
Flannery O'Connor - "Wise Blood" or anything else
you should know this writer well by now
William Gay - "The Long Home"
This writer is brilliant - I think there are only 2 books - highly recommended - very exciting reading
Kate Grenville - "Lillian's Story"
This is what some people would think is a women's book - I thought it was excellent
William Maxwell - "Time Will Darken It" and "They Came Like Swallows"
These are quite slow but like an Ingmar Bergman film, the time is well worth spent

I feel a reccomended film thread coming on!

Michael Ondaatje - "In The Skin of a Lion" and "Runnung in the Family"
This chap wrote "The English Patient, biut most agree with me about his best work

Denton Welch - "In Youth is Pleasure"
I can't remember this but do remember how good I thought it was - perhaps a bit romantic, perhaps a bit gay - I have a spare copy if someone wants it!

For lovers of short stories or for people who think they are not real try Somerset Maugham to get you into the idea then...

Raymond Carver
Andre Dubus (do read this writer)
William Faulkner (you should know and love this chap)
Richard Ford particularly Rock Springs

For factual books try
Tobias Woolf "In Pharoahs Army" Brilliant
Norman Lewis "Naples 1944" Brilliant

Richard Davenport Hines
"Sex Death and Punishment" mentions CH
"Gothic - 400 Years of Excess, Horror, Evil and Ruin."

There has been some correspodence in the Independent about how much people read.

I missed most of it but it appears that frequent readers read up to four books a year and even infrequent readers read at least one book a year.

So I checked with the library: so far this year I have had 44 items on loan. This includes books I have taken out if an offspring has forgotten a card, and I think 2 DVDs, but probably at least 35 books for me so far. However I am slipping because last year I took out 88 (but I wasn't working) and the year before 79, when I was working part time.

So what do you recommend as a brilliant book?

Very much a personal favourite:

The Cricket Match by Hugh de Selincourt

Paradise Motel - Eric McCormack

The bear went over the mountain - William Kotzwinkle

The Other Side - Alfred Kubin

The Wind Up Bird Chronicle - Haruki Murakami

All 19th century russian literature

Oh I quite forgot to mention Rupert Thomson, an old blue (Ba.B / Pe.B 1966-1974ish) who has written about 7 novels, the most easy to read one is the first, which is also the most autobiographical, called "`Dreams of Leaving".

But to my mind the best is called "The Insult" but if you want the latest one it's called "Divided Kingdom".

His new novel is coming out in the autumn and there is a film being made of his book "The Book of Revelation" right now.

I would have thought the Five Gates of Hell had a lot of autobiographical stuff in it - wouldn't you???????

Rory wrote:I would have thought the Five Gates of Hell had a lot of autobiographical stuff in it - wouldn't you???????

Well, it's a long time since I read it, Rory, though I do seem to recall there was a bunch of funeral directors who would arrange the death of clients to drum up more business and wasn't there a graveyard in the sea? And there was a sinister undertaker with black gloves, but I can't remember anything particularly autobiographical.

Maybe I should read it again.

Trouble is, I have, and always seem to have a big tower of unread books which I am very keen to read for the first time.

Interesting to hear you still have jazz records on vinyl - I have kept my records from the 1977 era too. Do you still have Tubeway Army? If not, I got a copy recently at a car boot sale on holiday in Dorset and I could send it to you if you'd like a trip down memory lane.

Nah - don't worry about the vinyl - still got loads.

As for the book - remember Parminters in South Street (second hand bookshop) and some interesting stuff about a funeral and some goings on in the orchard - although of course fiction takes over (there was no summerhouse)

have another read sometime.....

Who could forget Mr Parminter with his tortoiseshell glasses puffing and grunting as he shuffled badger like around the dusty shop. He got quite furious with me once for digging out an C18th leather bound treasure from the 1d box that had probably been there for years. It was worth a lot more but as it came out of the box he had to accept one penny. He looked like he was about to erupt!

I still have the book. Thomas Moore's Oriental Romance Lalla Rookh.

Anything by Louis de Bernieres, although his first three books: the South American trilogy are very surreal and really do need to be read in order, but I loved them. His latest, 'Birds Without Wings' is, in my opinion, his best, better even than 'Captain Corelli's Mandolin' and gives an excellent and compassionate insight into one of the 20th Century's least known but most tragic series of events. To my knowledge, his only other published book is 'Red Dog' which is a short but greatly enjoyable read though totally different from his other publications.

Jeanette Winterson is not to everybody's taste but I'd wholeheartedly recommend 'Sexing the Cherry', a strangely compelling mixture of the historical and the surreal.

Umberto Eco is another author I'd recommend although some of his books are pretty inaccessable. 'The Name of the Rose' and 'Bardolino' are fabulous; you probably need a degree in philosophy to get the most from 'Foucault's Pendulum' and I had to give up on 'The Island of the Day Before' at the first attempt of reading. Nonetheless, his novels generally repay a bit of perseverence and I'll have another go - sometime.

I really struggled with Focault's pendulum, but did finish it.

When I resd the De Vinci code it seemed to owe it's story line to that book. (But a much easier read).