Books that give you pleasure

12 Feb 2004

We've had music and films, but I don't remember books. Here's a few of my favourites:
Richard Flanagan "Gould's Book of Fish (A Novel in Twelve Fish)", but it has to be the hardcover version. Beautiful, and very creative.
David Foster "The Glade Within The Grove". Another Australian one. It's big and rambling, and fascinating from start to end. Foster is fond of playing games with the medium, and does it brilliantly in this one. The first time I read it I was very disappointed - the book ended just as the story was about to get REALLY interesting. Then I started thinking. How did I know it was going to get interesting? Because I already knew what was going to happen. Because he'd snuck in the entire story without me noticing.
Jim Dodge "Fup". It isn't just because I love ducks. This is a very short book, but it has more depth and emotion than just about anything else I've read. And it has the best opening line ever.
Umberto Eco "Foucault's Pendulum". But we've dealt with this one already. I'm still not sure what happens.
Primo Levi "The Wrench". He was a survivor of Auschwitz, and his books dealing with that are enough to make me ashamed of being human. This one is different - a celebration of Man the Maker.

12 Feb 2004

Well, sorry to bring it down a level or two, but my fave book I've read recently is Tony Hawks' "Round Ireland with a Fridge".
He goes round Ireland. With a fridge.
:!:

12 Feb 2004

You didn't mention SHEEP!!!
Fiction:
John O'Farrell - 'The best a man can get' - it made me laugh out loud on numerous times.
Patrick Suskind - Perfume - the best modern exponent of the written word even if he is French. The language just holds the mind and flows like a river in surge.
Webster - The Duchess of Malfi - in the grandest Jacobean tradition ALL the cast end up dead on the stage at the very end. Intrigue and adultery galore.
Non-fiction and addendums tomorrow. Electric blanket overheating!!

12 Feb 2004

I'm with you davidd03, excellent!
My other favorite is a bit of a girlie cliche perhaps, but I make no appologies for it: Gone with the Wind, Margaret Mitchell's only book of course.
Rachel

12 Feb 2004

Books eh ?
Robert Nye's 1980 retelling of the Faust legend, in which a 16th Century German scholar sells his soul to the Devil in return for knowledge, wisdom and the pleasures of the flesh.
Anything and, indeed, everything by Jeff Noon - cyberpunk for those that hate things cyber, hippy for those fixed in the digital age and usage of language to make even the most devout wordsmith hum with happiness. Vurt, Nymphomation and the recent Cobralingus (remixing and digital filtering of the written word, no less) are all great starting points.
I was a robot, Wolfgang Flurs story of the history of his time with Kraftwerk from their garage band days to their reshaping of electronics in music.
I'm going through an odd phase in the written word at the moment, as you can tell !
Carpathian

13 Feb 2004

Damn it, Jags beat me to it with "Perfume"! A fantastic book. In no particular order, some other faves:
PGWodehouse - "Piccadilly Jim"
Flann O'Bryan - "The Third Policeman"
Evelyn Waugh - "Decline and Fall"
Kazuo Ishiguro - "An Artist of the Floating World"
Willans & Searle - "Down with Skool" - the gratest boke ever, as any fule kno

13 Feb 2004

No, no-oh God no!
I've been dreading someone opening this thread. I'll be here for ever-and changing my mind every day! I'm sitting here surrounded by books, wondering what the hell I ever did to them that they've enslaved me for life! But, I can't resist, so here are a couple that 'leap off the shelves at me'. I'm looking at them as I type and they all have special meaning for me. Most are from childhood: they enthralled me.
'Lorna Doone'-R.D. Blackmore-can almost quote it word for word, read it 30 times,have made pilgramages to Doone Valley, thrown things at the screen during the pathetic TV adaptions; I have a problem with this book.
'The Worm Forgives the Plough'-John Stewart Collis
'Cold Mountain'-Charles Fraser-terrified to see film in case it isn't a patch on the book
'Birdsong'-Sebastian Foulkes
'Kidnapped'-RL Stevenson
'Austerlitz' and 'Rings of Saturn'-WG Sebald
'The Alchemist'-Paulo Coelho
'Jock of the Bushveld'-Phillida Brooke Simons -small country boy, reading by the river Tern-cemented my love of books for ever.
'The Name of the Rose-Umbert Eco
Everything by Primo Levi
All the Sherlock Holmes stories
'Great Expectations' -Dickens
'Barchester' Trilogy-Trollope
'Masquerade'-Kit williams -anyone remember this? Chap buried a Golden Hare and put all the clues in this beautiful book. Spent two years of my life chasing this blasted hare.
'of Mice and Men'-Steinbeck
'Shropshire Lad'-Houseman
'The Remorseful Day-Colin Dexter-I read all the Morse novels, so, naff as they are,this one is special as it was the last...
'last of the Cooper
'Catcher in the Rye'-sallinger
'all the Pretty Horses'-Cormac McCarthy
'White Fang'-Jack London'Under the Greenwood Tree'-Thomas Hardy
'Cold comfort Farm'-Stella Gibbons
..plus Beau Geste, Biggles, Moonfleet, Ivanhoe, The Card, True History of the Kelly Gang, enough..enough...I'll think on it and pull out my favourites.
'I'm just going outside: I could be some time'. rolleyes

:roll:

13 Feb 2004

Hells Bells!!! mad

I was just about to go to bed when I spotted this thread. So instead I have just poured myself a pint of Gin and Tonic (I kid you not!!) and have settled down to try and pull out a few titles!! Boy, this is difficult. blink

Perhaps I will go for categories and pick my favourites from each (tonight at least)....
Favourite book of all time, Madame Bovaryby Gustave Flaubert. Beautifully crafted by a linguistic perfectionist who obssessively re-wrote everything countless times before he was satisfied. It took him 18 years to finish Bovary and he must have driven his publisher mad!
Homer's The Iliad - The original epic and sets the standard to judge the others by. Followed, of course, by The Odyssey.
Talking of epics, of course there is The Lord of the Rings, JRR Tolkien. I have been passionate about this since I was at school and long before the excellent films were thought of. The detail of the world that Tolkien creates is truly breathtaking (or am I the only saddo who has ever read all the Appendices? redface

).
As for modern novels, the incomparable Jags has already nabbed Suskind's Perfume, a truly stunning work, so I guess I will have to settle for Edward Rutherford's Sarum. It doesn't have the sumptuous language of Suskind, but (being a history nut) a novel that traces the development of a single place from the building of Stonehenge right the way through to modern Salisbury whilst charting the changing fortunes of rival families does it for me.
From my childhood I would choose Agatha Christie. I must have been a macabre little so-and-so. By the time I was 12 I had finished pretty much all the Poirot and Miss Marple novels.
Shakespeare, of course! The Sonnetsin particular. Of the plays, if I was forced to make a choice it would probably have to be King Lear, Hamlet, Richard III and "the Scottish play" and, for comic relief, Twelfth Night and As You Like It.
Jags ( worship

again) has already mentioned Webster - though my favourite of his has to be The White Devil.
I don't read many novels these days (though one gets a special mention at the end) so I must mention some non-fiction. There are several books entitled The Wars of the Roses, which is definitely 'my period'. My favourite of these is by Robin Neillands.
Favourite biography is probably Elizabeth Longford's Wellington.
Favourite autobiography would be Alec Guinness's Blessings in Disguiseand My Name Escapes Me.
For light relief and casual entertainment I would select any of the Cadfael Chronicles by Ellis Peters. Whodunnits in a medieval setting. Perfect!
For laughter, I can remember as a teenager roaring my head off to Tom Sharpe , particularly Porterhouse Blueand Vintage Stuff. Blissed (God bless him) has already mentioned PG Wodehouse but my favourite Wodehouse would have to be the Blandings novels.
Goodness knows how many I have missed. Graham Greene, Trollope, Dickens, not to mention Vanity Fair. Curse you DJohn!! evil

I have just seen the time!!
Oh my God!!! :shock: What on earth is poor Sappho going to do when she finds this? Now there is a lady who really knows her books. How will she cope? I had better get myself off to Shropshire with a cold compress to soothe her fevered brow.
Which brings me (at long last, you say) to the novel I said I would give a special mention to. The Moonstoneby Wilkie Collins - my current reading matter thanks to a very special recommendation.
Well, the outsize G&T is almost gone. Time to retire with The Moonstone with thoughts of books in general whizzing through my head.

13 Feb 2004

Grief - here I am bleary eyed absorbing all the great books of the western world - I need to add some to my truncated list but it will be later.
All I can say is 'WOW'...
x x xx

13 Feb 2004

All I read are study books at the moment but I'm off to buy a copy of Patrick Suskind - Perfume this morning.
I feel like I've miss out on something blink

Dawn :silly:

13 Feb 2004

Quote by Dawn
I'm off to buy a copy of Patrick Suskind - Perfume this morning.
I feel like I've miss out on something

Oh you have Dawn. Believe me you have!
By the way, before anyone else points it out. Yes, I know the Blandings novels of P G Wodehouseandthe Cadfael Chronicles are both set in Shropshire; and no, that didn't have anything to do with their selection, honest. Well, it didn't!
From PGW :
"Now, how about a quick drink? I know a little bar round the corner." said Will who, wherever he was, always knew a little bar round the corner.

13 Feb 2004

:shock: Oh no! A book thread! Is there a plot to subvert me from doing any work today? It's going to take me all day to compile my list - and then I'll forget something and have to come back and my post will end up with hundreds of edits -and it'll end up looking like a bloody bibliography! rolleyes

Oh, DJohn - what have you done?
Sappho xxx

13 Feb 2004

Quote by Sappho
:shock: Oh no! A book thread! Is there a plot to subvert me from doing any work today? It's going to take me all day to compile my list - and then I'll forget something and have to come back and my post will end up with hundreds of edits -and it'll end up looking like a bloody bibliography!
Oh, DJohn - what have you done?
Sappho xxx

I told you!! Didn't I tell you? :roll:
Coming, darling! The poor love is going to be in a dither all day now. You certainly have a lot to answer for DJohn - but thanks for all the fun it has given us too.
Now then Sappho 8) , you just lie back and let me bathe your temples in cologne and ease the tension out of your shoulders. We'll give it an hour or so and then I will open the Rawson's Retreat. I know it is a little early but it is Friday and you are in a heightened state of agitation.
Now then, how about asparagus and mushrooms for lunch followed by some poached salmon and, of course, raspberries to finish (:twisted smile

.
:love:

13 Feb 2004

I think my tastes may be considered a bit odd, but in late victorian times, these were what everyone wanted to read. I still do, but I'm not quite that long in the tooth to remember that far back!
My fav author at the moment is Silas Hocking . I've just finished reading The Lost Lode.
I can recommend all his books, but you will need a hanky (to weep into).

13 Feb 2004

Quote by willxx69
(or am I the only saddo who has ever read all the Appendices? )

Reading the appendices isn't sad. Sad is eagerly awaiting the next volume of The History Of Middle-Earth every year for however long it was. I was heavily into the languages for a while. But I'm better now.
"If you don't think that The Lord of the Rings is the best book that there
ever was when you're 13, there's something wrong with you. If you still
think that when you're 43, there's really something wrong with you."
--Terry Pratchett (who is NOT on my list)

15 Feb 2004

Anything by Guy Bellamy but in particular The Nudists very funny but also moving with a bit of sex thrown in as well

16 Feb 2004

Top favourite books, in no particular order.
Felidae - Akif Pirincci, a murder mystery set in the cat world.
Great Apes - Will Self, they say that every one has at least one book in them. After reading Great Apes I came to the opinion that I don't, the man is simply a genius.
The Wimbledon Poisoner - Nigel Williams, a very funny book about a man trying to murder his wife. Not a premise that lends itself to humour but Williams does it.
Vintage Stuff - Tom Sharpe, every character was a perfect. Provided a definition of a climbing crampon that I have never forgotten.
The Hunchback of Notre-Dame - Victor Hugo - No justification necessary.
The Phantom of the Opera - Gaston Leroux. Skip the musical and films, just read the book, as is usually the case the book is far better.
The Yes Minister Diaries - Jonathan Lynn and Antony Jay, a must for anyone interested in British politics.

16 Feb 2004

Thank you

to everyone for the recommendation of Patrick Susskind's Perfume - I'm really enjoying it. As soon as I bought it I went for a hot chocolate in my favourite coffee shop - and was nearly late for the school run.
There are some books that I have to religiously reread at least once a year.
Jane Austen's works, Pride and Prejudice being my ultimate favourite;
Charlotte Bronte, Jane Eyre
Anne Bronte, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
William Morris, News from Nowhere
Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol - every Christmas without fail!
Favourite author? Far too difficult, but Wilkie Collins must be at the top of the pile - The Woman in White, The Moonstone, Armadale...
Other favourite authors I can read again and again are Mrs Gaskell, Caroline Graham, David Eddings and - I have a very catholic taste!
Biography - Antonia Fraser's Cromwell, Our Chief of Men and Vincent Cronin's Louis XIV.
Poetry - Lord Rochester, Robert Herrick, Alexander Pope, Shakespeare's Sonnets, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, John Donne...
The books I cannot live without in everyday life? The Chambers Dictionary, Chambers Biographical and Fowler's English Usage - the tools of my trade! Is this a good time to mention I have over 32 dictionaries? Um, perhaps not.
This list isn't exhaustive by any means but it has meant I'm revisiting my collection in search of forgotten gems!
Sappho xxx

16 Feb 2004

I have to say that your post was a lot shorter than I think we all envisaged - a round of applause for the soul searching you have obviously had to go through to step a foot in the camps of both brevity and completeness.
Out of interest, how many would you have chosen, given a choice ?
Oh, and yes, I realise that sentence of mine was awful.
Carpathian, obviously not leaving a literary work to be remembered by judging by his English....
P.S. The Jane Austen book "Persuasion" just won the mock Booker prize for 1818 on BBC4

17 Feb 2004

about time someone threw in The Idiot by a little known Russian author - Dostoyevsky

17 Feb 2004

Quote by jfelidae
Provided a definition of a climbing crampon that I have never forgotten.

:rotflmao: :rotflmao: :rotflmao:
How right you are!! That's twice on this thread I have laughed at the thought of that quote! Once when I included Vintage Stuff among my favourite books and again now that you have reminded me of it. Absolute classic!! lol

17 Feb 2004

I can't remember who said this - the film Cold Mountain is not as good as the book (I never think films are!) but it's still worth seeing!
Round Ireland with a Fridge sounds like something I would love to read. I'm going to buy it tomorrow!
I read so many different types of books that it's too hard to pick favourites.
It's much easier to say which books I don't like - which are mostly autobiographies of people who are only 23!!!
I was given the Idlers Book of Crap Towns recently. I wasn't very impressed but it's actually hilarious!!! lol

18 Feb 2004

If you are going to read 'Round Ireland with a Fridge', I would recomend you also read, 'Playing the Moldovians at Tennis', also by Tony Hawks and equally good.

18 Feb 2004

Quote by Dawn_Mids
I'm off to buy a copy of Patrick Suskind - Perfume this morning.

Now if only I can find the time to get past page 8
Dawn :silly:

20 Feb 2004

Oh gawd ... just found this thread. (Must be calm, must NOT spend rest of day adding title after title .....)
LOTR, obviously - "One Book To Rule Them All ....."
Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas, by Hunter S Thompson
Towards the End of the Morning, by Michael Frayne
Trainspotting, by Irvine Welsh
Crime and Punishment, by Dostoyevsky
The Queen's Gambit, by Walter Tevis
The Player of Games, by Iain T. Banks
Mission, by Patrick Tilley
Pop. 1280, or anything else by Jim Thompson.
As for non-fiction ..... Jesus, what have you people DONE to me??? I'm off to work (sobbing piteously).

20 Feb 2004

Yup... Perfume is definitely worth a read.
Other books I like are: Captain Corelli's Mandolin - Louis de Berniere (anyone wanna correct me on spelling? Just try it!!)
Trainspotting - Irvine Welsh .... read back when I was a teen, still a fave now though
Cat's Eye - Margaret Atwood
Hamlet - William Shakespeare (for the sake of Willxx69)
Falling Leaves - Adeline Yeh Mah.... a well written biography, made me laugh and cry real tears rolleyes

Beloved - Toni Morrison... weep time again!
but the weepiest of all touching books was The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold. Read it, read it, read it!!!!

27 Feb 2004

Does no-one like Harry Crews?His "childhood,autobiography of a place" is fantastic.I,m surprised bukowski is'nt on here either.

27 Feb 2004

I just started reading Bukowski (Tales of Ordinary Madness) yesterday. It's very different from the books I usually read, but I like it.

27 Feb 2004

I'm glad this thread has been resurected.
Wot no Joseph Heller - Catch-22 - Yosarian lives !
Jan Martell - Life of Pi
I see Catcher in the Rye and some Homer - good 2 see !
Good to see Iain M Banks
Any Pratchett
Yosarian