1. Dissolution and Sovereign by C J Samson. These are crime novels set in the reign of Henry VIII. Boy do I like stuff about Henry VIII and not just his enormous codpeice as mentioned in a previous post (filed under 'Mannequin smut'). The protagonist in this series is a hunchback lawyer called Matthew Shardlake. These are great books - they're the full sensory experience - you can smell the 16th century poo as it floats down the Thames. I imagine there were lots of smells in Tudor Britain - there is one mention of people carrying posies of flowers to distract from their body odour. That's some seriously bad body odour or some seriously thoughtful people.
2. The World According to Garp by John Irving. I bought this while on my honeymoon (mark 2) from Gibraltar. It was a great find, up until then I'd had to buy books in non-English speaking countries and the selection was awful - very John Grisham-centric. Prior this this I'd never heard of John Irving, but now I'd read a few of his books. This is the best.
3. Lovesong by Alex Miller. On the one hand, I loved this. On the other, I thought it was a bit 'literature-y' for me. Mainly I loved it because I heard Alex Miller speak at the Melbourne Writers Festival and he was wonderful - he's this softly spoken, thinking man with these poignant and insightful stories. He told one story about how he met this guy ('X') and this guy (X) said something really profound and he (Alex) fell in love with the guy (X) (in a non-sexual way). It totally made me want to say something profound. Instead question time was taken up with people asking long winded questions about themselves (as is generally the case).
4. Shakespeare by Bill Bryson. This is part of a series by where prominent writers write about eminent dead people. As mentioned previously I heart Mr Bryson and this sort of historical genre he does extremely well - he writes of King James I:
James was not, by all accounts, the most visually appealing of fellows. He was graceless in motion, with a strange lurching gait, and had the disconcerting habit, indulged more or less constantly, of playing with his codpiece... His odd shape and distinctive waddle were exaggerated by his practice of wearing extravagantly padded jackets and pantaloons to protect himself from assassins' daggers. (p. 131)
5. Instance of the Fingerpost, Iain Pears. This is in for now, but I might bump it if I think of something else. Also set in the Reformation, it's written from the point of view of four different people, in a very clever and non-repetitive way.
But books are so 2010, this is what I really want:
Please.
Kitty
No comments:
Post a Comment