Anyone Read Any Decent Books Lately?

Look, I won't tell you all again, a star shone over a stable in Malahow on April 19th 1957
magi.gif
 
And the Duchess of Westminster said :

Bloody typical Sheikh Mohammed has sent three spies on camels
 
The conservatism of the early Irish state was a dreadful mistake, but at least it was Ireland's mistake to make.
 
I finished Vodka a couple of days ago and was a little disappointed with it in the end; it started very well & was going great guns until the last fifth of the book I guess - it just went on for that little bit too long & he [Boris Starling] tried to create too many sub plots in the end that it could have done without, really.

I'm reading Retribution by Jilliane Hoffman at the moment & I think it's very good so far. It's a crime novel set in the USA, but one of the better ones, it also has quite a lot of 'legalese' in it as the main character is a State Prosecutor. What I have found quite irritating about it though is the occasional way that the author lapses into language that isn't quite correct - the use of "off of" is really quite annoying! The other little thing is the inclusion of one of my personal pet hates when it comes to cliches - "salt and pepper hair" - it is one of those phrases that I really despise!!! :angry: Having said that, I wouldn't like to put anyone off reading it as it is quite good if you can stand the odd Americanism & cliche!
 
Sorry - thought I'd drag this one up to the top again!!!

I'm nearing the end of Boudica - Dreaming The Eagle by Manda Scott at the moment (I like my historical novels!!) and it is very good - so much so that I have been trawling the length & breadth of Gib to try to get hold of the next one in the series, Boudica - Dreaming The Bull. I didn't succeed in getting hold of one so I have turned to good old Amazon again! Anyway, I would thoroughly recommend it, it is certainly one of the better books I have read lately (even if I can't remember what I read before this one :confused: :lol: ).
 
I'm probably a bit late but what does anyone else think of the Da Vinci Code? Started it last week whilst in Hospital for 2 nights having deeply impacted wisdom teeth removed...which was nice.
I'm due to finish tonight or tomorrow and I am enthralled.
 
We had a long thread on iy earlier, Mark. I'll try to summarise - a rattling good yarn. Shame that Dan Brown tried to say that it was all based on fact.

The Priory of Sion was registered in 1956 by a team of hoaxers and DB must have known this as it came to light after the publishing of Holy Blood, Holy Grail.

And for a serious author he fell down on research (or quite possibly didn't as he had a fictional point to make). An author who says that the Merovingians founded Paris and omits to mention that the popes once lived in Avignon is lacking in the ara of historical research.

Something that was picked up on the previous thread was his claim that the Church burned five million women as witches. I think that here to make his point is is ignoring the historical record. The latest figures for deaths during the European witch craze are somewhere from 30,000 to 50,000 victims. Not all were executed by the Church, not all were women, and not all were burned.

So, Dan, why couldn't you admit that it was a work of fiction based on fiction? Some of us would have enjoyed it even more.
 
Thanks Brian.

I guess his ploy worked as it must have sold a helluva lot of copies. I should finish tonight, so no spoilers please! ;)
 
The Thatcher Years.

Those were the days my friend.
I thought they would never end.

da da da di da di da da da da.
 
From the Book:

At Heathrow Airport departure lounge.

Young Lady Reporter asks,wher eare you going Prime Minister.

BANKOK replied Mrs Thatcher.

You might as well,retorted the young lady reporter.

You have banned everything else.
 
I was also a really precocious child, read every single book in my infants school including Wind in the Willows and several Roald Dahl books unaided at the age of 6. I read really fast, too (as I still do) but took everything in - nobody believed me but when quizzed I could repeat virtually the entire story! Always been a good speller, too, I've never needed to put much thought into it. When I studied French and German at school I was always really rubbish at the actual language, but I could always spell the words! Weird really.

I've read Nobody True by James Herbert (mentioned in the first post here) and it's excellent! Also anything by Harlan Coben or Greg Iles (especially Black Cross by the latter). I'm currently reading the book of D-Day To Berlin (the new BBC series) and it's really very interesting - I've read plenty of good books about D-Day but this one takes it further.

Also a good read (but totally mental) is Anthropology by Dan Rhodes. It's 101 short stories, each with 101 words. Sounds crazy, but although the stories are so very short, they're also at times really poignant or really funny, and I recommend it highly!
 
I agree with Brian - I liked The Da Vinci Code very much (so much so that I read it in about a day and a half) as a work of fiction. It was fairly disappointing to find after I'd read it that he had pretty much plagiarised Holy Blood, Holy Grail but it is stil a great story, nonetheless.

Martin - stick with Vodka, it is a good book even if it does go on a bit at the end.

Purr - I was really into Roald Dahl too, I loved his books. I keep meaning to get my hands on Boy & Going Solo again as I remember they were very, very good. I loved Dirty Beasts and Revolting Rhymes, they used to have me in stitches.

I was also the same as a kid in that I would read a book very quickly & then be able to recite it virtually word for word afterwards - now, twenty years & quite a few bangs on the head later & I do struggle with my memory now which is very frustrating as it wasn't so long ago I had a photographic memory! :cry:

I like Harlen Coben a lot too - I love the Myron Bolitar books, Win is such a good character. An author who is very similar (in writing good, dark humour thrillers) is John Connolly - he has written Every Dead Thing, The Killing Kind, Dark Hollow, The White Road and more, they are very good.

Btw, having just re-read the thread, I can now remember the books I mentioned that I read at school - they were called Tim & Tobias I think & they were fantastic.
 
In the last couple of days I have finished Perfume by Patrick Suskind - I bought it on the recommendation of Bar The Bull. Cheers Bar - it was a very good book, if a little eccentric! I would certainly recommend it, and anyone who likes that would also like William Goldman's The Princess Bride, it strikes me as being written in a similar vein and is very good, far superior to the cult film that was made of it in the 80's.

I have also recommended Mark Billingham's books on here before, I am sure (they are very good) - I am on his mailing list & received a newsletter today. I thought it was pretty amusing & the beginning of it is here -


IT'S...
THE SIXTH...
MARK BILLINGHAM NEWSLETTER

http://www.markbillingham.com <http://www.markbillingham.com/>
 

May 2005.

It’s late, I know. Horribly late, and as someone who’s punctual to the point of obsession, this is extremely upsetting. What can I say? Things have been a bit hectic, I was laid up for a while with back problems and there wasn’t actually much news. If British rail can get away with “leaves on the line” or “the wrong kind of snow” and people still think there are WMD knocking around somewhere, I think I can get away with that…

Here in the UK of course we’re gripped by election fever, with no-one able to talk of anything else and the nation in a state of excitement unseen for many years. OK, so in reality we’re all a bit cheesed off by the whole thing, with those of us stupid enough to vote Cheshire Cat Blair in to begin with, now faced with a horrible dilemma. He of course has proved something of a let down (which is an understatement right up there with “that Jack the Ripper’s a bit of a naughty boy”)  but is there an alternative? Well yes, of course there is, but can one really put one’s X down for any other party without actually being physically sick and spoiling the ballot paper? Suddenly the Monster Raving Loony Party is looking damned attractive…

We DID have a Royal Wedding though. Hussah!! It wasn’t exactly free from problems, but the happy couple finally tied the knot. There was nearly another last minute hitch when the 24 hour postponement meant that Charles spent his stag night at the Pope’s funeral and the couple had to get married on the same day as the Grand National. This caused all sorts of problems as Camilla Parker-Bowles was supposed to be running.

Another year. Another invitation to the Royal Garden Party lost in the post…

So now the headlines…

· LIFELESS comes to life.
· More red-hot audio action.
· First TV script is written.
· Episode of well-known TV show ‘quite similar’ to SLEEPYHEAD.
· Tours to Australia and New Zealand confirmed.
· Billingham pops up in Windsor at crucial moment to shout “It should have been me. Get off her, Charles, you flappy-eared bastard!”

One of the above headlines may not be entirely true…
Click to expand...

If anyone is interested in reading the rest of it I can send it on, it's just a bit long to post on here & most of the rest of it is plugging his books anyway!
 
I'm reading Piers Morgan's book at the moment, which I must confess is far better than I thought it would be and all the gossip is proving rather addictive! :shy:
 
The recently republished biography of John Arlott - a bit pedestrian in style but very interesting.
 
I'm reading the new Wilbur Smith book "The Triumph Of The Sun". If any of you like his work, then you'll be very pleased to know that this is fully up to standard. In fact, I would go as far as to say that it's better than normal because he has avoided a trap that many established authors fall into of rewriting the same story, with the same characters, but with a slightly different location. Thoroughly recommended.
 
I'm just reading Mark Billingham's The Burning Girl at the moment and I'm hooked again - all of his books have been excellent thrillers!
 
Sorry to have missed the extended debate about The Da Vinci Code.

I'm not really bothered about how "historically accurate" it is, and I wouldn't deny that it is a bit of a page-turner. But, for crying out loud, it is written in such a twee, cliched and superficial style for the most part, and some of the characterisations are an abomination.

I can see why it has proved to be a big success.

****************************************

My favourite book of the last year or two was Joseph O'Connor's "Star of The Sea": a neo-Dickensian tale of murder and intrigue set against people fleeing Ireland during the famine. Very well written on the whole.
 
Back
Top