2006 Reading List
03 Jan 07 @ 10:36 AM
category » books
I've read quite a mixture of fiction and non-fiction this year. I'm finding that my trend is slowly edging towards more non-fiction than not but I have to say I've just finished two novels which might count amongst my favourite of the last decade: The Shadow of the Wind, and Any Human Heart. Oh, and some trash too!
The Lost Horizon - James Hilton
A Devil's Chaplain - Richard Dawkins
The Age of Wire and String - Ben Marcus
Search - John Battelle
What is Life - Erwin Schrodinger
The Devil's Cub - Georgette Heyer
Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
Moneyball - Michael Lewis
Tabloid Love - Bridget Harrison
Letters to a young Contrarian - Christopher Hitchens
Winkler - Giles Coren
The Rescue Artist - Edward Dolnick
The Proposal - Owen Slot
The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Luis Razan
They Fuck You Up - Oliver James
Who's Who in Hell - Robert Chalmers
Any Human Heart - William Boyd
Salt - Mark Kurlansky
1
The real Sex in the City
09 Jun 06 @ 08:04 PM
category » books
Bridget Harrison, ertswhile Brit reporter and Dating Columnist for the NYPost, friend, and sister of Smooth Harry, has just published her first book, Tabloid Love. The New York launch party was covered by Gawker, but sadly I was on a plane to France at the time and missed the shenanigans. The London launch party, shared with Giles Coren for his book Winkler (gotta love this man (a) for suggesting that there should be a "fat tax", to huge outcry in the UK and (b) for winning the Bad Sex Writing Award and creating a meme for the phrase "like Zorro"), was highly amusing. At one point I was chatting with a young journalist there about not recognising people you (supposedly) know. Any tale of mine paled by comparison to his, though, with his admission that at a party a week previously he'd been talking to a woman for about twenty minutes before she said to him, "You don't remember me, do you?". At which point, that dreadful thought goes through a man's mind, apparently, that perhaps he'd slept with her but didn't remember. Oh yes, oh yes, but much worse in this case - she was the girl he had lost his virginity to ten years previously! Ouch.
But I digress. B's book...I couldn't put it down, and read it in one long night. It's not laugh-out-loud funny, but oh so poignant and true a tale of love and betrayal in the big city. I cringed, I groaned, I recognised not only all the places and people, but the oh so bloody accurate account of the notoriously fickle and dreadful NY dating scene.
Candace Bushnell's cover quote was spot on: "A real-life Bridget Jones's Diary meets Sex and the City."
You go, B! I'm waiting to hear that the movie rights have been snapped up. I'm thinking Kate Winslet or Keira Knightley for the Bridget role.
Watching the English
30 Sep 05 @ 06:45 PM
category » books | culture | language
Kate Fox is a social anthropologist who has studied the behaviour of people at the racetrack, in the pub and at football matches. In her new book, Watching the English, she goes further and deeper into all the social interactions of the English and tries to identify how and why we do things differently from other nations engaging in the same activity.
She's smart and writes well - and, joyfully, wittily too. That's one of the key characteristics she claims for the English: the famous English sense of humour. In no particular order, but all connected, the following are the mainstays of the English character in her view: social dis-ease (awkwardness), humour, moderation and fair play. These underlying themes, she claims, directly result in such idiosyncrasies as our seeming willingness to queue in an orderly fashion (even in pubs, oh yes), and to rarely complain; our reticence to talk about what we do, and seeming diffidence towards strangers; the violence displayed when the English break out of their privacy/awkward zone (football hooliganism and the like) and the fact that we say "sorry" when others bump into us. All this, and much, oh much more. The book starts with the author sitting in a cafe in Paddington station, nervously having a drink early in the morning, to fortify herself for the job in hand. She's a hands on researcher, and has to engage in a spot of queue jumping, to record people's reactions. It's priceless.
It's a funny book which made me groan and giggle in recognition. It might not all be accurate, but it seemed mostly pretty spot on to me. Stereotypes of the English bound, and this book helps to explain why. I feel like giving it to any foreigner who is closely involved with me and saying "If you want to know how and why I behave in this way, read this book."
2005 Reading List
13 May 05 @ 07:37 PM
category » books
Kitchen Confidential ::: Anthony Bourdain
A Short History of Nearly Everything ::: Bill Bryson
Surely You're Joking Mr Feynman? ::: Richard Feynman
The Moral Animal ::: Richard Wright
Lonely Planet ::: Iran
Winners ::: Eric Martin
Sex and Sensibility ::: essays, edited by Genevieve Field
The Badass Girl's Guide to Poker ::: Toby Leah Bodan
On My Reading List
07 Feb 05 @ 07:46 PM
category » books
The Professor And The Madman ::: Simon Winchester
The War Against Cliche ::: Martin Amis
The Abolition Of Britain ::: Peter Hitchens
Killing Pablo ::: Mark Bowden
The Man Who Loved Only Numbers ::: Paul Hoffman
Prague ::: Arthur Phillips
A History Of Modern Iran ::: Ali Ansari
Blood And Oil: Inside The Shah's Iran
Moneyball ::: Michael Lewis
Grapes Of Wrath ::: John Steinbeck
Catcher In The Rye ::: J D Salinger
Catch 22 ::: Joseph Heller
The Master And Margarita ::: Bulgakov
Remembrance Of Things Past ::: Marcel Proust
War And Peace ::: Leo Tolstoy
Under Milk Wood ::: Dylan Thomas
Unbearable Lightness Of Being ::: Milan Kundera
Paradise Lost ::: John Milton
The Trial ::: Kafka
Dr Faustus ::: Phillip Marlowe
The Govt Inspector ::: Gogol
Leonardo's Mountains Of Clams, and
Dinosaur In A Haystack ::: Stephen J Gould
No Exit, Nausea, The Wall ::: Sartre
Steppenwolf, Siddartha ::: Herman Hesse
World History Of Art ::: Honour And Fleming
The Age Of Consent ::: George Monbiot
Antigone::: Sophocles
Middlemarch ::: Thomas Hardy
Mill On The Floss ::: George Eliot
Pendennis ::: W. Thackeray
Lot 49 ::: Thomas Pynchon
Into The Wild ::: John Krakauer
Manifesto For A New World Order ::: George Monbiot
Vanity Fair ::: Thackeray
2004 Reading List
02 Jan 05 @ 07:47 PM
category » books
In Patagonia ::: Bruce Chatwin
Bad Thoughts: A Guide to Clear Thinking ::: Jamie Whyte
Life of Pi ::: Yann Martel
Why is Sex Fun? ::: Jared Diamond
Yoga for those who can't be bothered to do it ::: Geoff Dwyer
Logic ::: Oxford VSI Series
What Should I Do with my Life ::: Po Bronson
The Surgeon of Crowthorne ::: Simon Winchester
Middlesex ::: Jeffrey Eugenides
Never threaten to eat your co-workers ::: Blog essays
Chapter and Verse ::: Don Bateman
Eats, Shoots and Leaves ::: Lynn Truss
Politics - VSI ::: Kenneth Minogue
The Island at the Center of the World ::: Russell Shorto
Democracy ::: Oxford VSI Series
The Wisdom of Crowds ::: James Surowiecki
Word Freak ::: Stephan Fatsis
Infidelity for First Time Fathers ::: Mark Barrowcliffe
Basket Case ::: Carl Hiaasen
The Star's Tennis Balls ::: Stephen Fry
Decline and Fall ::: Evelyn Waugh
Olivia Joules and the Overactive Imagination ::: Helen
Fielding
The Da Vinci Code ::: Dan Brown
The Curious Incident of the Dog in Nighttime ::: Mark Haddon
The Man in the High Castle ::: Philip K Dick
Hard News ::: Seth Mnookin
Angels and Demons ::: Dan Brown
Being a Man ::: Robert Twigger
The Amazing Adventures Of Kavalier And Clay ::: Michael Chabon
21 Oct 04 @ 05:54 PM
category » books
What a great, gripping, expansive piece of entertainment. I could
not put it down, and luckily I was lying on the beach in India so did not have to. Beautifully written, with powerful characterization and a
damn good storyline. A joy.
In The Little World ::: John Richardson
07 Sep 04 @ 05:58 PM
category » books
An honest and insightful account of dwarfism and Richardson's
own changing perceptions as he becomes more involved with characters he first met
at the Annual Dwarf Convention whilst researching an article for Esquire. Surprisingly
gripping.
A World Lit Only By Fire ::: William Manchester
12 Aug 04 @ 05:59 PM
category » books
An enjoyable populist history of medieval Europe,
full of religious corruption, supersitition, anti-scholasticism and other
fascinating intrigues.
How To Be Alone ::: Jonathan Franzen
26 Jul 04 @ 05:57 PM
category » books
This is an varied and fascinating collection of essays, many
of which have appeared in the New Yorker and elsewhere over the past few years.
If you didn't catch them then, you'll relish this book. Worth a second read
regardless. Franzen's lucid and elegant prose, no-nonsense style, strength of
opinion and willingness to mock himself make for great reading. Entertaining,
illuminative and poignant, he covers topics ranging from his father's
affliction with Alzheimers, through the sex industry, the United States Postal Service
(gripping stuff, despite expectations), and maximum security prisons, to the
state of modern literature and the duties of a writer. He got a lot of stick
last year for his supposed snobbery in refusing the honour of having his book The Corrections blessed by Oprah's Book
Club. His account of the debacle is fascinating, and left me with enormous
sympathy for the man.
The CEO Of The Sofa ::: P.J. O'Rourke
04 May 04 @ 06:02 PM
category » books
O'Rourke's irreverence, wit and style are always a joy to
read. His excoriating summary of the history and antics of the United Nations
is an eye-opener, his treatment of political correctness in journalism is spot
on (my, I expect the authors hate him) and his argument that you can succeed in
any company by treating the executives as you would a child is hilarious. I
particularly like the presence of his wife - never named, but always there, in
the background, curbing his excesses. She sounds long-suffering. But I expect
never bored...
The Human Stain ::: Philip Roth
10 Mar 04 @ 05:53 PM
category » books
Another great big novel from Roth, a true master of language who
eloquently spins gripping tales of lies and deceit. I preferred this by far to American Pastoral, which I found repetitive in the last third. Another can't-put-downer.
2003 Reading List
03 Jan 04 @ 07:41 PM
category » books
Down And Out In Paris And London ::: George Orwell
I Don't Know How She Does It ::: Allison Pearson
Liar's Poker ::: Michael Lewis
Letters To A Young Poet ::: Rilke
Monkey Business::: John Rolfe
Bacchus And Me ::: Jay Mcinerney
Bombardiers ::: Po Bronson
Reporting Back ::: Lillian Ross
Love In A Cold Climate::: Nancy Mitford
Model Behaviour ::: Jay Mcinerney
The Predator's Ball::: Connie Bruck
Schott's Original Miscellany ::: Daniel Schott
All The Shah's Men::: Stephen Kinzer
How To Lose Friends And Alienate People ::: Toby Young
10 Sep 03 @ 06:01 PM
category » books
I'm reluctant to admit it, but this was an amusing, and
enjoyable read. Toby isn't ashamed of what he is, and it is clear he (now)
despises the very world he tried and failed to conquer, so there are few
wistful "if onlys" which would have made this, as a cliched hard luck
story, harder to stomach. Instead it is punchy, witty and sufficiently tongue
in cheek to be a good romp. For those not in the "glossy posse" world
of New York magazines already, it is an entertaining insight into the
narcissism of those who inhabit that world. For those within it I am sure this
is both a fascinating and horrifying read but they will happily write it off as
the rantings of a bitter and twisted failed Brit.
2002 Reading List
01 Jan 03 @ 07:00 PM
category » books
A World Lit Only By Fire ::: William Manchester
In The Little World ::: John Richardson
The English ::: Jeremy Paxman
Short Stories ::: Edited By Nick Hornby
Mysteries Of Pittsburgh :::
Michael Chabon
The Universe In A Nutshell ::: Stephen Hawking
The Other People ::: Pat Barker
White Noise ::: Don De Lillo
The Ground Beneath Her Feet ::: Salman Rushdie
Bachelor Girl ::: Betsy Israel
Lives Of The Muses ::: Francine Prose
How To Be Alone ::: Jonathan Franzen
Atonement ::: Ian Mcewan
How To Lose Friends And Alienate People ::: Toby Young
The Day I Turned Uncool::: Dan Zevin
Reporting Back: Notes On Journalism ::: Lillian Ross
The Ceo Of The Sofa ::: P.J. O'rourke
The Day I Turned Uncool ::: Dan Zevin
The Human Stain ::: Philip Roth
If You Want To Write ::: Brenda Ueland
The Worldly Philosophers ::: Robert Heilbroner
The A.A. Of Kavalier And Clay ::: Michael Chabon
Tender Is The Night ::: F. Scott Fitzgerald
It pays to be bad...
06 Aug 02 @ 08:18 PM
category » books
Toby Young was apparently always a slimy little **** - he certainly was when I met him years ago - and over the years I've heard many tall tales of his various contretemps with Julie Burchill at the Modern Review and then of his shenanigans in New York whilst trying to ingratiate himself into the celeb and literary sets. So I can't say I am remotely surprised that he has lost friends and alienated people along the way. This is clearly his specialist expertise and, as shamelessly as only truly arrogant people can be, he has successfully parlayed his odiousness into a book contract. This, I admit, makes my bile rise a tiny bit. But of course I will read it...it's bound to be awful, largely untrue, but compelling and hopefully hilarious. And he will have a guaranteed audience of hundreds if not thousands - anyone that has ever come across him in his life will no doubt be curious to read it. I suppose you've got to give him credit for his cojones.
How to Lose Friends and Alienate People
2001 Reading List
04 Jan 02 @ 08:30 PM
category » books
Guns Germs and Steel ::: Jared Diamond
The Poisonwood Bible ::: Barbara Kingsolver
Touching the Void ::: Joe Simpson
Fall of the Phantom Lord
On Writing ::: Stephen King
The Fountainhead ::: Ayn Rand
About a Boy ::: Nick Hornby
Silk ::: Alexander
Dream Story ::: Albert Schnitzler
Enduring Love ::: Ian McEwan
No Logo ::: Naomi Klein
We Regret to Inform You ::: Philip Aaronevitch
Heartbreaking Work of S.G. ::: Dave Eggers
Song of Stone ::: Ian Banks
Kissing in Manhattan :::
How to be good ::: Nick Hornby
The Sun Also Rises ::: Ernest Hemingway
White Teeth ::: Zadie Smith
The Lexus and the Olive Tree ::: Thomas Friedman
2000 Reading List
17 Sep 01 @ 08:43 PM
category » books
The Tipping Point ::: Malcolm Gladwell
Nudist on the Late Shift ::: Po Bronson
Bring Home the Revolution ::: Jonathan Freedland
The Anatomist ::: Federico Andahazi
Into Thin Air ::: Jon Krakauer
Girls Guide to Hunting and Fishing
Colette ::: La Ble en Herbe
Marianne ::: George Sand
Archimedes' Revenge ::: Paul Hoffman
The New New Thing ::: Michael Lewis
