• Book recommendations

Posted: **Sun Oct 21, 2018 8:29 pm**

Anyone got any book recommendations? normally read sci fi but open to anything apart from autobiographies.

Posted: **Sun Oct 21, 2018 8:36 pm**

Anything by Ken Follet.

Posted: **Sun Oct 21, 2018 8:44 pm**

Alistair Reynolds sci fi is good

Posted: **Sun Oct 21, 2018 8:45 pm**

Do you like the crime/thriller genre? Try Angela Marsons.

Posted: **Sun Oct 21, 2018 8:45 pm**

The kite runner and the other two books that the author wrote. Fantastic books which open your eyes to the middle east way of life but in a heart warming way

Posted: **Sun Oct 21, 2018 9:14 pm**

The Kite Runner - read the book, seen the film, seen it on stage, not particularly "heart warming", rather brutal and harrowing in my opinion. Worth a read however, amazing that the author's 1st book sold over 50 million copies.

Posted: **Sun Oct 21, 2018 10:01 pm**

Cleveleys_claret wrote:The kite runner and the other two books that the author wrote. Fantastic books which open your eyes to the middle east way of life but in a heart warming way

A Thousand Splendid Suns. Just astonishing. I don’t think I could read it again though.

Posted: **Sun Oct 21, 2018 10:49 pm**

Shore claret wrote:Anyone got any book recommendations? normally read sci fi but open to anything apart from autobiographies.

Just read Frederick Forsyths new one "The Fox" and thoroughly enjoyed it...

Posted: **Mon Oct 22, 2018 7:36 am**

How about a book by a local writer? In other words, ME

This one is inspired by and set in Ightenhill Park...

https://amzn.to/2CXq5eT" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Posted: **Mon Oct 22, 2018 8:09 am**

Anything by George Pelecanos, Denis Lehane or Don Winslow. A cut above your Pattersons, Grishams, or the run of the mill authors churning out 2 books per year to meet contract conditions.
Try A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole or Pulitzer prize winner Lonesome Dove by Larry Mcmurtry.
Really different books but just brilliant.

Posted: **Mon Oct 22, 2018 11:14 am**

On one of these posts a few years back, someone recommended Peter May the Black House trilogy. What a fantastic read. I highly recommend them

Posted: **Mon Oct 22, 2018 1:30 pm**

Shore claret wrote:Anyone got any book recommendations? normally read sci fi but open to anything apart from autobiographies.

Posted: **Mon Oct 22, 2018 2:03 pm**

The Day after Tomorrow by Allan Folsom. Fatherland by Robert Harris.

Posted: **Mon Oct 22, 2018 2:04 pm**

The Devils Guard by George R Elford.

Posted: **Mon Oct 22, 2018 6:18 pm**

Pies and prejudice by Stuart Marconi is light hearted and quite funny. Especially the audio book.

Currently reading (listening too) Jordan Petersons 12 rules for life. But its a bit heavy at times. Some of it is really good though.

Living with a Seal is in my library but net yet started it. But that one is meant to be excellent.

Posted: **Mon Oct 22, 2018 7:42 pm**

Get stuck into the Roy Grace series by Peter James. Crime drama based in Brighton, they're fantastic.

Posted: **Mon Oct 22, 2018 8:34 pm**

I'll second that, Fretters.

Posted: **Mon Oct 22, 2018 9:43 pm**

Fretters wrote:Get stuck into the Roy Grace series by Peter James. Crime drama based in Brighton, they're fantastic.

Read them all,just waiting for his latest to hit the Charity shops .

Also Graham Masterton detective books based in Cork are well worth a read.

Posted: **Mon Oct 22, 2018 9:45 pm**

The Three Body Problem by Liu Cixin

Outstanding Hard SciFi series. Mind blowing concepts & scale in the latter stages

Posted: **Mon Oct 22, 2018 10:22 pm**

The best books ever written are the Aubrey Maturin series...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aubrey%E2 ... rin_series" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Posted: **Mon Oct 22, 2018 10:40 pm**

I will second that TREX. Patrick O'Brian is the author start with Master and Commander and then work your way through. Similar to Hornblower but miles better.

Posted: **Mon Oct 22, 2018 10:43 pm**

ClaretLoup wrote:I will second that TREX. Patrick O'Brian is the author start with Master and Commander and then work your way through. Similar to Hornblower but miles better.

I'm just finishing "The Hundred Days" AGAIN!
I think this is the fourth or fifth time I've read the entire series.
The first time I read them I was dreaming in the language, I cannot begin to describe how immersive they are.
I've downloaded the Roy Grace books to read afterward, thanks for the rec.

Posted: **Mon Oct 22, 2018 11:04 pm**

I visited Corfu recently and was gobsmacked by the size and scale of the Venetian built fortifications there. So I borrowed a book from a mate about the history of the Venetian who at one stage dominated the East Mediterranean Sea for about 300 years. The book is perhaps the best written history book I have read & it's called Venice A New History and the author is Thomas Madden.

Posted: **Tue Oct 23, 2018 12:09 am**

I don't read much sci-fi but I do read fantasy. If it's something you think you could try. Read a David Gemmell book his first was called Legend and is iconic if you enjoy it there will be a new world open to you in his Drenai series and you won't need to ask for book recommendations for a while. Your welcome.

Posted: **Tue Oct 23, 2018 2:34 am**

conyoviejo wrote:Read them all,just waiting for his latest to hit the Charity shops .

Also Graham Masterton detective books based in Cork are well worth a read.

I'll add them to the list!

Posted: **Tue Oct 23, 2018 8:01 am**

Anything by Charles Dickens or Jane Austen

Posted: **Tue Oct 23, 2018 6:18 pm**

Siddo wrote:Anything by George Pelecanos, Denis Lehane or Don Winslow.

Second this, especially Pelecanos. I was so excited that his latest book (first for a few years) was out just before I went on holiday. Unfortunately I’d read it by day two!

Posted: **Tue Oct 23, 2018 6:26 pm**

Love the books from John Buchan, Greenmantle is a fantastic read

Posted: **Tue Oct 23, 2018 6:35 pm**

I enjoyed "Days without End", but it wouldn't be everybody's cup of tea. I thought "His Bloody Project" was absolutely excellent and a real left field concept.

Posted: **Tue Oct 23, 2018 7:30 pm**

Papillon.

Quite superb...

Posted: **Tue Oct 23, 2018 8:15 pm**

Animal Farm - it's about Tony Blair and Gordon Brown.

Posted: **Wed Oct 24, 2018 8:28 pm**

Cormac McCarthy border trilogy great American writer.

Posted: **Wed Oct 24, 2018 8:37 pm**

Can't go far wrong with Cormac McCarthy once you've attuned yourself to his writing style - which is easier if you're fortunate to have Bukowski and Kerouac to draw-on - No Country For Old Men is a personal favourite.

Matt Haig anyone? How To Stop Time might meet some people's definition of sci-fi. Honourable mention for The Dead Father's Club - setting a novel in Newark (Nottinghamshire, not New Jersey) is a brave call by any stretch

Posted: **Wed Oct 24, 2018 9:17 pm**

Siddo wrote:Anything by George Pelecanos, Denis Lehane or Don Winslow. A cut above your Pattersons, Grishams, or the run of the mill authors churning out 2 books per year to meet contract conditions.
Try A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole or Pulitzer prize winner Lonesome Dove by Larry Mcmurtry.
Really different books but just brilliant.

Good post ! Pelecanos is the Bruce Springsteen of crime literature, Winslow is the AC/DC. Actually when it comes to Winslow I prefer his slightly "quieter" stuff like The Winter of Frankie Machine or The Dawn Patrol to his recent stuff about the cartels which can be a bit TOO full on. Two fantastic writers. Pelecanos was one of the writers on The Wire for anyone whose watched that.
I'm currently on a run of reading predominantly espionage based novels. Le Carre is obviously the master but I recommend Charles Cumming and Mick Herron for anyone who likes this genre.

Posted: **Wed Oct 24, 2018 9:23 pm**

Stalingrad by Antony Beevor.

Fascinating and true, but reads like a horror novel.

Posted: **Wed Oct 24, 2018 10:25 pm**

The Mick Herron 'Jackson Lamb' series is very good. Recently read Spook Street which I'd recommend - a 21st century Le Carre rooted in 'Austerity Britain' he's certainly mined a rich seam of material there.

Posted: **Wed Oct 24, 2018 10:36 pm**

The new Viz profanasaurus is giving me a chuckle at the moment!

Posted: **Wed Oct 24, 2018 11:13 pm**

ClaretFelix wrote:The new Viz profanasaurus is giving me a chuckle at the moment!

Cant beat it.

Posted: **Wed Oct 24, 2018 11:15 pm**

Just downloaded count of monte cristo. Its only bloody 60 hours

War and peace is only 61...

Posted: **Thu Oct 25, 2018 7:10 am**

George Pelecanos has become my favourite crime writer, along with James Ellroy. A recent great Pelecanos read for me was one from the mid-2000s, set in D.C. in the springs of 1959 and 1968. The book, which came out after the Derek Strange novels, serves as a prequel to that trilogy. It is entitled 'Hard Revolution', and is set in the build-up to the D.C. riots. It's brilliant.

Posted: **Thu Oct 25, 2018 1:36 pm**

Just bought a copy of SHANKLY-My Story-The Autobiography. Pub. 2013.

Not started it yet any one read it if so what did you think?

Posted: **Thu Oct 25, 2018 5:40 pm**

I am also a huge fan of Cormack McCarthy. The border trilogy, no country for old men, the road and so on are magnificent.
James Ellroy was the best until Bloods a Rover. Which I just didn't seem to get. However his LA trilogy was brilliant, and American Tabloid and The Cold Six Thousand ( the first 2 of the trilogy that climaxed with Bloods a Rover) were two of the finest books to come out of American crime fiction.
As an aside, the black humour of the Dortmunder series by Donald E Westlake are classics.

Posted: **Thu Oct 25, 2018 5:45 pm**

spadesclaret wrote:Do you like the crime/thriller genre? Try Angela Marsons.

If you like Crime Thriller try Peter James' Roy Grace series.

Posted: **Thu Oct 25, 2018 5:49 pm**

Apologies, I'm not trying to take over the thread but if anyone is interested in the Vietnam war, particularly now Max Hastings book has been released, you have to read Kittyhawk by Robert Mason, We were Soldiers Once and Young, by Hal Young and General Galloway, which are factual accounts, and Matterhorn by Karl Marlantes, which is "faction".

God only knows what I would have done in some of the situations these soldiers found themselves in.

Posted: **Thu Oct 25, 2018 6:09 pm**

IBM and the Holocaust

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Ibm-Holocaust- ... +holocaust" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Makes you wonder.

Windmills

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Windmills-Moor ... s=windmill

Haven't you always been fascinated about how they work?

The Faber Book of Utopias

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Faber-Book-Uto ... of+utopias" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Well written summary of various ideas of Utopia.

The Worlds of Robert F Young

https://www.amazon.co.uk/WORLDS-ROBERT- ... rt+f+young" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

A series of charming off beat Sci-Fi stories.

Secret Knowledge

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Secret-Knowled ... id+hockney" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Hockney's interesting take on how science and the art of painting worked hand in hand to produce some stunning pictures.

Posted: **Thu Oct 25, 2018 6:20 pm**

Just bought a copy of SHANKLY-My Story-The Autobiography. Pub. 2013.

Not started it yet any one read it if so what did you think?

I have read it and enjoyed it,

However I prefer Red or Dead by David Peace (he of Damned United fame) it is written in an unusual style, which takes some getting used to, Best described (with my limited ability) as though Shankly is narrating it, so if you read it and you remember what Shankly's voice sounded like, you will get the rythym of the book. Hope that makes sense.

Posted: **Thu Oct 25, 2018 6:40 pm**

The Vorrh trilogy by Brian Catling.
Not Sci- fi but a dark fantasy which crosses over into surrealism, magic-realism, horror and steampunk.

I know you weren't after autobiographical books but these two are along those lines but different;

We had some laughs - Dan Waddell about his childhood and growing up with his Dad, Sid Waddell.

When Breath becomes air Paul Kalanthi - It is a memoir about his life and illness, battling stage IV metastatic lung cancer

Friday Night lights - H G Bissinger American (college) football, just a brutal account of a sport and the difference between winning and losing.

Night Games - Anna Krein Aussie Rules football, young men,sex, consent and power.

This is going to hurt - Adam Kay a secret diary of a junior doctor, sometimes funny, sometimes dark, but a powerful look at how hard it is to become a Doctor

Posted: **Thu Oct 25, 2018 6:51 pm**

MrTopTier wrote:I have read it and enjoyed it,

However I prefer Red or Dead by David Peace (he of Damned United fame) it is written in an unusual style, which takes some getting used to, Best described (with my limited ability) as though Shankly is narrating it, so if you read it and you remember what Shankly's voice sounded like, you will get the rythym of the book. Hope that makes sense.

Oh good that’s in keeping with some other reviews I’ve read.

That David Peace one looks good as well I will keep my eyes open for that one, I picked up the SHANKLY book from a charity shop for £1...bit pricey but thought I’d push the boat out for once

Posted: **Sat Oct 27, 2018 8:36 am**

All Sci-Fi by China Mieville

Pedido St Station being my personal favourite.

Posted: **Sat Dec 15, 2018 10:52 pm**

Bump. Any more proper sci-fi or fantasy recommendations?

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