My list so far..
Faust by Ivan Turgenev
Hamlet by Shakespeare
Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchells
All the Pretty Horses by Cormac McCarthy
The Unbearable Bassington by H. H. Munro
Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier
My list so far..
Faust by Ivan Turgenev
Hamlet by Shakespeare
Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchells
All the Pretty Horses by Cormac McCarthy
The Unbearable Bassington by H. H. Munro
Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier
The Prophecy by S J Parris. 7/10
The Pilgrim's Progress by John Bunyan. 6/10
The Suppliant Women by Aeschylus 7/10
The Persians by Aeschylus. 7/10
The Widows Secret by Brian Thompson. 7/10 (Book club choice)
Prometheus Bound. by Aeschylus
The Lost World. by Arthur Conan Doyle. 7/10
King John. By Shakespeare
The Voyage Out. By Virginia Woolf.
Posthomerica by Quintus of Smyrna. 7/10
Engleby. by Sebastian Faulks. 8/10
Penny Falls. By Mark Bastable. 8/10
Interesting and well written. A very unusual story of brotherly relationships and obligations. At his best when he makes us laugh
The Epic of Gilgamesh 7/10
The Sixth Science Fiction Megapack:
25 Classic and Modern Science Fiction Stories.
Arthur C. Clarke, Nancy Kress, George Zebrowski, Neal Asher, Pamela Sargent, Philip K. Dick, Mary A. Turzillo, C.M. Kornbluth, Samuel R. Delany
A couple of stories I'd read before, a couple of good ones and some that weren't up to much .6/10
Paths of Glory. By Jeffrey Archer.
The semi-fictional story of George Mallory, Mountaineer and Hero of the British Empire. It should've been really good, but it wasn't. I suspect a factual biography of this remarkable man would be more exciting and interesting. 6.5/10
The Mucker by Edgar Rice Burroughs,
Tales of derring a do, a hoodlum is reformed by the love of a good woman. 6/10
Elizabeth and her German Garden. by Elizabeth Von Arnim.
Wonderful, funny, semi autobiographical woman's journal. I have posted a review on the Book Review Thread. An unprecedented 9 out of 10.
Last edited by prendrelemick; 07-21-2013 at 05:02 PM.
ay up
The Prophecy by S J Parris. 7/10
The Pilgrim's Progress by John Bunyan. 6/10
The Suppliant Women by Aeschylus 7/10
The Persians by Aeschylus. 7/10
The Widows Secret by Brian Thompson. 7/10 (Book club choice)
Prometheus Bound. by Aeschylus
The Lost World. by Arthur Conan Doyle. 7/10
King John. By Shakespeare
The Voyage Out. By Virginia Woolf.
Posthomerica by Quintus of Smyrna. 7/10
Engleby. by Sebastian Faulks. 8/10
Penny Falls. By Mark Bastable. 8/10
Interesting and well written. A very unusual story of brotherly relationships and obligations. At his best when he makes us laugh
The Epic of Gilgamesh 7/10
The Sixth Science Fiction Megapack:
25 Classic and Modern Science Fiction Stories.
Arthur C. Clarke, Nancy Kress, George Zebrowski, Neal Asher, Pamela Sargent, Philip K. Dick, Mary A. Turzillo, C.M. Kornbluth, Samuel R. Delany
A couple of stories I'd read before, a couple of good ones and some that weren't up to much .6/10
Paths of Glory. By Jeffrey Archer.
The semi-fictional story of George Mallory, Mountaineer and Hero of the British Empire. It should've been really good, but it wasn't. I suspect a factual biography of this remarkable man would be more exciting and interesting. 6.5/10
The Mucker by Edgar Rice Burroughs,
Tales of derring a do, a hoodlum is reformed by the love of a good woman. 6/10
Elizabeth and her German Garden. by Elizabeth Von Arnim.
Wonderful, funny, semi autobiographical woman's journal. I have posted a review on the Book Review Thread. An unprecedented 9 out of 10.
The John Carter of Mars series. by Edgar Rice Burroughs.
Think Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Lord of the Rings, James Bond and all that sort of stuff - only even more over the top. Excellent yarn for a twelve year old, I quite enjoyed it 7/10
Last edited by prendrelemick; 07-24-2013 at 11:30 AM.
ay up
The Prophecy by S J Parris. 7/10
The Pilgrim's Progress by John Bunyan. 6/10
The Suppliant Women by Aeschylus 7/10
The Persians by Aeschylus. 7/10
The Widows Secret by Brian Thompson. 7/10 (Book club choice)
Prometheus Bound. by Aeschylus
The Lost World. by Arthur Conan Doyle. 7/10
King John. By Shakespeare
The Voyage Out. By Virginia Woolf.
Posthomerica by Quintus of Smyrna. 7/10
Engleby. by Sebastian Faulks. 8/10
Penny Falls. By Mark Bastable. 8/10
Interesting and well written. A very unusual story of brotherly relationships and obligations. At his best when he makes us laugh
The Epic of Gilgamesh 7/10
The Sixth Science Fiction Megapack:
25 Classic and Modern Science Fiction Stories.
Arthur C. Clarke, Nancy Kress, George Zebrowski, Neal Asher, Pamela Sargent, Philip K. Dick, Mary A. Turzillo, C.M. Kornbluth, Samuel R. Delany
A couple of stories I'd read before, a couple of good ones and some that weren't up to much .6/10
Paths of Glory. By Jeffrey Archer.
The semi-fictional story of George Mallory, Mountaineer and Hero of the British Empire. It should've been really good, but it wasn't. I suspect a factual biography of this remarkable man would be more exciting and interesting. 6.5/10
The Mucker by Edgar Rice Burroughs,
Tales of derring a do, a hoodlum is reformed by the love of a good woman. 6/10
Elizabeth and her German Garden. by Elizabeth Von Arnim.
Wonderful, funny, semi autobiographical woman's journal. I have posted a review on the Book Review Thread. An unprecedented 9 out of 10.
The John Carter of Mars series. by Edgar Rice Burroughs.
Think Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Lord of the Rings, James Bond and all that sort of stuff - only even more over the top. Excellent yarn for a twelve year old, I quite enjoyed it 7/10
The Time Machine. by HG Wells . You know the plot . 7/10
The Enchanted April. by Elizabeth Von Arnim.
4 women heal themselves by taking a holiday in a wisteria clad castle in Italy. 7.5/10
Last edited by prendrelemick; 08-06-2013 at 02:08 PM.
ay up
You should try the Humphrey Cobb WWI Paths of Glory instead, although I bet the movie's better. "The paths of glory lead but to the grave."Originally Posted by prendrelemick
Last edited by JuniperWoolf; 07-24-2013 at 11:03 PM.
__________________
"Personal note: When I was a little kid my mother told me not to stare into the sun. So once when I was six, I did. At first the brightness was overwhelming, but I had seen that before. I kept looking, forcing myself not to blink, and then the brightness began to dissolve. My pupils shrunk to pinholes and everything came into focus and for a moment I understood. The doctors didn't know if my eyes would ever heal."
-Pi
The Damned United by David Peace - A football novel based upon real people and events in the football league in 1970s England written in a stream of consciousness style with intercut flashbacks.
Snuff Terry Pratchett - Commander Vimes brings Goblin equality to the country.
Pure - An engineer from Normandy is commissioned by a French Minister to dig out and remove the bones and bodies that have built up and begun affecting the air in the cemetery of Les Innocents in 18th century Paris. (The site of modern day Les Halles).
Life and Fate by Vassily Grossmann. Grossman's epic, banned after it was written, has been compared to Tolstoy's War and Peace. I would agree that the novel, which spans the months during and after the fight for Stalingrad in WW2, is a brilliant depiction the life of soldiers, commisars, civilians, old Bolsheviks, Nazi commanders, prisoners and scientists. It details the lives, loves, characters, thoughts, flaws and pressures of living under Stalin's regime.
No Country For Old Men by Cormac Mcarthy. A bleak, violent but philosophical novel that challenges the effectiveness of the cowboy/ American icon of the self sufficient, capable and honourable man. The psychopath Chigurh survives the course of the novel with his bleak, nihilistic belief in predestination.
All The Pretty Horses by Cormac Mcarthy. Not as bleak as No Country, or Blood Meridian, but full of brilliant landscape evocations of Mexico with a ripping story. I've never ridden a horse, and I am unlikely to, (though you might be fooled into thinking I had with my bandy legs), but I enjoyed this almost mystical celebration of horses and their relation to people.
Eon by Greg Bear Interesting sci fi with good ideas and a story that keeps you engrossed to the end.
A Man Without Breath by Philip Kerr Bernie Gunther - ex Berlin detective co-opted as an investigator into an organisation of judges looking into war crimes - is called upon to uncover and present the mass grave at Katyn Woods near Smolensk as a Soviet Russian war crime in order to boost Nazi standing abroad. Great plot, instructive historical context and ripping thriller. I really enjoyed this one.
The Odin Mission by James Holland. Routine WW2 thriller, though I liked finding out details of the Norwegian campaign.
Solaris by Stanislaw Lem. Excellent sci fi exploring the unknowableness of an alien nature and its attempts to connect with scientists studying it on Solaris.
The Norman Conquest by Marc Morris. Morris claims in the blurb that everything you think you know about the Norman Conquest is wrong, and so it proves to be. Harold wasn't the rightful King - he was just in a powerful enough position to take the crown before losing it to William. An interesting and enlightening read about the Norman Conquest.
The Winter King by Thomas Penn. I decided to read this because I knew very little about Henry VII and so much more about Henry VIII. What a brilliant example of a king! Grasping, exploitative and paranoid. No wonder his son turned out as he did. This was another interesting volume, and definitely one to fuel latent republican tendencies.
The Penny Falls by Mark Bastable. This book, by our own poster Mark, is funny, packed with interesting observations and has a plot with more twists than that twisty thing Blackadder used to go on about. The narrative structure is complex and interesting, and the characters are vivid and well realised. If you've read any of Mark's comments and conversations on the forum, then you'll recognise his voice in here too - from his use of Amsterdam as a setting, (he's referred to living there on these boards), to the humour. "I'd rather nail my scrotum to a passing train" comes to mind. A very enjoyable read.
The Damned United by David Peace - A football novel based upon real people and events in the football league in 1970s England written in a stream of consciousness style with intercut flashbacks.
Snuff Terry Pratchett - Commander Vimes brings Goblin equality to the country.
Pure - An engineer from Normandy is commissioned by a French Minister to dig out and remove the bones and bodies that have built up and begun affecting the air in the cemetery of Les Innocents in 18th century Paris. (The site of modern day Les Halles).
Life and Fate by Vassily Grossmann. Grossman's epic, banned after it was written, has been compared to Tolstoy's War and Peace. I would agree that the novel, which spans the months during and after the fight for Stalingrad in WW2, is a brilliant depiction the life of soldiers, commisars, civilians, old Bolsheviks, Nazi commanders, prisoners and scientists. It details the lives, loves, characters, thoughts, flaws and pressures of living under Stalin's regime.
No Country For Old Men by Cormac Mcarthy. A bleak, violent but philosophical novel that challenges the effectiveness of the cowboy/ American icon of the self sufficient, capable and honourable man. The psychopath Chigurh survives the course of the novel with his bleak, nihilistic belief in predestination.
All The Pretty Horses by Cormac Mcarthy. Not as bleak as No Country, or Blood Meridian, but full of brilliant landscape evocations of Mexico with a ripping story. I've never ridden a horse, and I am unlikely to, (though you might be fooled into thinking I had with my bandy legs), but I enjoyed this almost mystical celebration of horses and their relation to people.
Eon by Greg Bear Interesting sci fi with good ideas and a story that keeps you engrossed to the end.
A Man Without Breath by Philip Kerr Bernie Gunther - ex Berlin detective co-opted as an investigator into an organisation of judges looking into war crimes - is called upon to uncover and present the mass grave at Katyn Woods near Smolensk as a Soviet Russian war crime in order to boost Nazi standing abroad. Great plot, instructive historical context and ripping thriller. I really enjoyed this one.
The Odin Mission by James Holland. Routine WW2 thriller, though I liked finding out details of the Norwegian campaign.
Solaris by Stanislaw Lem. Excellent sci fi exploring the unknowableness of an alien nature and its attempts to connect with scientists studying it on Solaris.
The Norman Conquest by Marc Morris. Morris claims in the blurb that everything you think you know about the Norman Conquest is wrong, and so it proves to be. Harold wasn't the rightful King - he was just in a powerful enough position to take the crown before losing it to William. An interesting and enlightening read about the Norman Conquest.
The Winter King by Thomas Penn. I decided to read this because I knew very little about Henry VII and so much more about Henry VIII. What a brilliant example of a king! Grasping, exploitative and paranoid. No wonder his son turned out as he did. This was another interesting volume, and definitely one to fuel latent republican tendencies.
The Penny Falls by Mark Bastable. This book, by our own poster Mark, is funny, packed with interesting observations and has a plot with more twists than that twisty thing Blackadder used to go on about. The narrative structure is complex and interesting, and the characters are vivid and well realised. If you've read any of Mark's comments and conversations on the forum, then you'll recognise his voice in here too - from his use of Amsterdam as a setting, (he's referred to living there on these boards), to the humour. "I'd rather nail my scrotum to a passing train" comes to mind. A very enjoyable read.
Rogue Moon by Algis Budrys. A fantastic premise - Alien artefact discovered on moon keeps killing those who try to explore it - turns out to be a disappointing novel full of psychobabble masquerading as a reflection on death. The exploration part - when it comes - is the weakest part of the book.
January
The Woman Who Died a Lot by Jasper Fforde 12/24/12 - 01/02/13 ***
The Silver Linings Playbook by Matthew Quick 1/02 - 1/03 *** ½
Beautiful Creatures by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl 1/03 - 1/07 *** ½
Beautiful Darkness by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl 1/07 - 1/10 ***
Beautiful Chaos by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl 1/10 - 1/13 *** ½
Beautiful Redemption by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl 1/13 - 1/14 ***
Warm Bodies by Isaac Marion 1/22 - 1/24 ****
Then We Came To The End by Joshua Ferris 1/24 - 1/27 ****
Room by Emma Donoghue 1/28 - 1/29 **
February
Lust for Life by Irving Stone 1/29 - 2/6 **
Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln by Doris Kearns Goodwin 2/6 - 2/22 ****
Touching the Surface by Kimberly Sabatini 2/23 - 2/26 ***
March
The Further Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Greg Matthews 2/26 - 3/2 ****
In Cold Blood by Truman Capote 3/2 - 3/6 ****
World's End by T.C. Boyle 3/6 - 3/12 ****
Summerland by Michael Chabon 3/12 - 3/15 ****
Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn 3/18 - 3/20 ****
John Adams by David McCullough 3/21 - 3/30 ****
April
Inherent Vice by Thomas Pynchon 4/3 - 4/9 ** 1/2
The Angel Experiment by James Patterson 4/9 - 4/12 ** 1/2
The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern 4/12 - 4/17 *****
A Spell for Chameleon by Piers Anthony 4/17 - 4/24 **
Son of Danse Macabre by Bryce Wilson 4/24 - 4/27 *****
Looking for Alaska by John Green 4/27 - 4/29 **
May
Duma Key by Stephen King 4/29 - 5/9 **
Inferno by Dan Brown 5/22 - 5/27 ***
The Necromancer by Jonathan L. Howard 5/27 - 5/30 ****
June
Black Swan Green by David Mitchell 5/30 - 6/5 ***
A Clash of Kings by George R.R. Martin 6/6 - 6/18 *****
The Detective by Jonathan L. Howard 6/18 - 6/22 *** 1/2
The Fear Institute by Jonathan L. Howard 6/23 - 6/28 ****
August
Shogun by James Clavell 6/28 - 8/5 **** 1/2
Hmmm. My question is - "What are you up to every other month that your reading rate goes down so much?"
11. Changing Places by David Lodge 4/10
12. Ann Veronica by H G Wells 5/10
13. The Cuckoo's Calling by Robert Galbraith (JK Rowling) 7/10 - A really good old fashioned murder mystery.
14. The Hobbit by JRR Tolkien 7/10 - Probably would have enjoyed it more when I was a lot younger, what with all the goblins and elves and dwarves and such, but on the whole I liked it.
Exit, pursued by a bear.
The Prophecy by S J Parris. 7/10
The Pilgrim's Progress by John Bunyan. 6/10
The Suppliant Women by Aeschylus 7/10
The Persians by Aeschylus. 7/10
The Widows Secret by Brian Thompson. 7/10 (Book club choice)
Prometheus Bound. by Aeschylus
The Lost World. by Arthur Conan Doyle. 7/10
King John. By Shakespeare
The Voyage Out. By Virginia Woolf.
Posthomerica by Quintus of Smyrna. 7/10
Engleby. by Sebastian Faulks. 8/10
Penny Falls. By Mark Bastable. 8/10
Interesting and well written. A very unusual story of brotherly relationships and obligations. At his best when he makes us laugh
The Epic of Gilgamesh 7/10
The Sixth Science Fiction Megapack:
25 Classic and Modern Science Fiction Stories.
Arthur C. Clarke, Nancy Kress, George Zebrowski, Neal Asher, Pamela Sargent, Philip K. Dick, Mary A. Turzillo, C.M. Kornbluth, Samuel R. Delany
A couple of stories I'd read before, a couple of good ones and some that weren't up to much .6/10
Paths of Glory. By Jeffrey Archer.
The semi-fictional story of George Mallory, Mountaineer and Hero of the British Empire. It should've been really good, but it wasn't. I suspect a factual biography of this remarkable man would be more exciting and interesting. 6.5/10
The Mucker by Edgar Rice Burroughs,
Tales of derring a do, a hoodlum is reformed by the love of a good woman. 6/10
Elizabeth and her German Garden. by Elizabeth Von Arnim.
Wonderful, funny, semi autobiographical woman's journal. I have posted a review on the Book Review Thread. An unprecedented 9 out of 10.
The John Carter of Mars series. by Edgar Rice Burroughs.
Think Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Lord of the Rings, James Bond and all that sort of stuff - only even more over the top. Excellent yarn for a twelve year old, I quite enjoyed it 7/10
The Time Machine. by HG Wells . You know the plot . 7/10
The Enchanted April. by Elizabeth Von Arnim.
4 women heal themselves by taking a holiday in a wisteria clad castle in Italy. 7.5/10
Lady Chatterley's Lover. by DH Lawrence.
Lady Chatterley rejects the intellectual and empty life with her crippled husband, to find true love through some down to earth shagging with Mellors the gamekeeper. 8/10
The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry. by Rachel Joyce
A man walks 600 miles on a whim/act of faith.
I really liked this one, uncluttered and moving . The author instictively knows what to include and what to leave out - A much underated skill. Her characters are believable, their thoughts and outlook are those of real people. So you care. 8.5/10 .
Last edited by prendrelemick; 08-18-2013 at 09:37 AM.
ay up
The Prophecy by S J Parris. 7/10
The Pilgrim's Progress by John Bunyan. 6/10
The Suppliant Women by Aeschylus 7/10
The Persians by Aeschylus. 7/10
The Widows Secret by Brian Thompson. 7/10 (Book club choice)
Prometheus Bound. by Aeschylus
The Lost World. by Arthur Conan Doyle. 7/10
King John. By Shakespeare
The Voyage Out. By Virginia Woolf.
Posthomerica by Quintus of Smyrna. 7/10
Engleby. by Sebastian Faulks. 8/10
Penny Falls. By Mark Bastable. 8/10
Interesting and well written. A very unusual story of brotherly relationships and obligations. At his best when he makes us laugh
The Epic of Gilgamesh 7/10
The Sixth Science Fiction Megapack:
25 Classic and Modern Science Fiction Stories.
Arthur C. Clarke, Nancy Kress, George Zebrowski, Neal Asher, Pamela Sargent, Philip K. Dick, Mary A. Turzillo, C.M. Kornbluth, Samuel R. Delany
A couple of stories I'd read before, a couple of good ones and some that weren't up to much .6/10
Paths of Glory. By Jeffrey Archer.
The semi-fictional story of George Mallory, Mountaineer and Hero of the British Empire. It should've been really good, but it wasn't. I suspect a factual biography of this remarkable man would be more exciting and interesting. 6.5/10
The Mucker by Edgar Rice Burroughs,
Tales of derring a do, a hoodlum is reformed by the love of a good woman. 6/10
Elizabeth and her German Garden. by Elizabeth Von Arnim.
Wonderful, funny, semi autobiographical woman's journal. I have posted a review on the Book Review Thread. An unprecedented 9 out of 10.
The John Carter of Mars series. by Edgar Rice Burroughs.
Think Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Lord of the Rings, James Bond and all that sort of stuff - only even more over the top. Excellent yarn for a twelve year old, I quite enjoyed it 7/10
The Time Machine. by HG Wells . You know the plot . 7/10
The Enchanted April. by Elizabeth Von Arnim.
4 women heal themselves by taking a holiday in a wisteria clad castle in Italy. 7.5/10
Lady Chatterley's Lover. by DH Lawrence.
Lady Chatterley rejects the intellectual and empty life with her crippled husband, to find true love through some down to earth shagging with Mellors the gamekeeper. 8/10
The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry. by Rachel Joyce
A man walks 600 miles on a whim/act of faith.
I really liked this one, uncluttered and moving . The author instictively knows what to include and what to leave out - A much underated skill. Her characters are believable, their thoughts and outlook are those of real people. So you care. 8.5/10 .
Slaughter House Five. by kurt Vonnegut.
A strange tale of time travel, alien abduction and the Dresden bombing. I haven't read anything else of his, but thought it was written in a -look how clever I am and never mind the story, style. I enjoyed it all the same. 7.5/10
Last edited by prendrelemick; 09-11-2013 at 01:18 PM.
ay up
15. The Wings of the Dove by Henry James - 6.5/10
Not up to James's usual standard, I thought. His style is really difficult, something I never realized when reading Portrait of a Lady and The Bostonians because in those novels his convoluted sentences seem intricate and beautiful while here they are just tedious and annoying and the beauty is rather thin on the ground. It has a sort of conventional Faustian pact plot where the principal characters sacrifice their moral integrity for the sake of material gains and we predict correctly that it is not going to end well, but I feel James was not able to carry off the necessary moral ambiguity in any interesting way, nor did he bring out for us sufficiently the tragedy of the ultimate smash up, something he's usually so good at.
Exit, pursued by a bear.
Something Fresh/New by PG Wodehouse.
One has to laugh before being happy, because otherwise one risks to die before having laughed.
"Je crains [...] que l'âme ne se vide à ces passe-temps vains, et que le fin du fin ne soit la fin des fins." (Edmond Rostand, Cyrano de Bergerac, Acte III, Scène VII)
The Damned United by David Peace - A football novel based upon real people and events in the football league in 1970s England written in a stream of consciousness style with intercut flashbacks.
Snuff Terry Pratchett - Commander Vimes brings Goblin equality to the country.
Pure - An engineer from Normandy is commissioned by a French Minister to dig out and remove the bones and bodies that have built up and begun affecting the air in the cemetery of Les Innocents in 18th century Paris. (The site of modern day Les Halles).
Life and Fate by Vassily Grossmann. Grossman's epic, banned after it was written, has been compared to Tolstoy's War and Peace. I would agree that the novel, which spans the months during and after the fight for Stalingrad in WW2, is a brilliant depiction the life of soldiers, commisars, civilians, old Bolsheviks, Nazi commanders, prisoners and scientists. It details the lives, loves, characters, thoughts, flaws and pressures of living under Stalin's regime.
No Country For Old Men by Cormac Mcarthy. A bleak, violent but philosophical novel that challenges the effectiveness of the cowboy/ American icon of the self sufficient, capable and honourable man. The psychopath Chigurh survives the course of the novel with his bleak, nihilistic belief in predestination.
All The Pretty Horses by Cormac Mcarthy. Not as bleak as No Country, or Blood Meridian, but full of brilliant landscape evocations of Mexico with a ripping story. I've never ridden a horse, and I am unlikely to, (though you might be fooled into thinking I had with my bandy legs), but I enjoyed this almost mystical celebration of horses and their relation to people.
Eon by Greg Bear Interesting sci fi with good ideas and a story that keeps you engrossed to the end.
A Man Without Breath by Philip Kerr Bernie Gunther - ex Berlin detective co-opted as an investigator into an organisation of judges looking into war crimes - is called upon to uncover and present the mass grave at Katyn Woods near Smolensk as a Soviet Russian war crime in order to boost Nazi standing abroad. Great plot, instructive historical context and ripping thriller. I really enjoyed this one.
The Odin Mission by James Holland. Routine WW2 thriller, though I liked finding out details of the Norwegian campaign.
Solaris by Stanislaw Lem. Excellent sci fi exploring the unknowableness of an alien nature and its attempts to connect with scientists studying it on Solaris.
The Norman Conquest by Marc Morris. Morris claims in the blurb that everything you think you know about the Norman Conquest is wrong, and so it proves to be. Harold wasn't the rightful King - he was just in a powerful enough position to take the crown before losing it to William. An interesting and enlightening read about the Norman Conquest.
The Winter King by Thomas Penn. I decided to read this because I knew very little about Henry VII and so much more about Henry VIII. What a brilliant example of a king! Grasping, exploitative and paranoid. No wonder his son turned out as he did. This was another interesting volume, and definitely one to fuel latent republican tendencies.
The Penny Falls by Mark Bastable. This book, by our own poster Mark, is funny, packed with interesting observations and has a plot with more twists than that twisty thing Blackadder used to go on about. The narrative structure is complex and interesting, and the characters are vivid and well realised. If you've read any of Mark's comments and conversations on the forum, then you'll recognise his voice in here too - from his use of Amsterdam as a setting, (he's referred to living there on these boards), to the humour. "I'd rather nail my scrotum to a passing train" comes to mind. A very enjoyable read.
Rogue Moon by Algis Budrys. A fantastic premise - Alien artefact discovered on moon keeps killing those who try to explore it - turns out to be a disappointing novel full of psychobabble masquerading as a reflection on death. The exploration part - when it comes - is the weakest part of the book.
Sun Diver by David Brin A hard science sci fi with an intergalactic civilisations, ETs, spaceflight, missions into the sun to meet new ETs, murder, sabotage and tech. An enjoyable sci fi with twists.
The Space Merchants by Pohl and Kornbluth A top advertising exec experiences life as a consumer and revolutionary in this grungy dystopian vision of corporate power. It's vision is relevant and very interesting given it was written in 1952.
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