The SMB Book thread

The Rule of the Land : Walking Ireland's Border by Garrett Carr. As the title implies this is about walking the border between RoI and Northern Ireland. It's recent so, as well as mixing history with the travel side, it's also covers thoughts of what it might mean to the two countries post-Brexit. It has a nice laid-back style but perhaps lacks a spark to get you really involved. 7/10
 


SYB_DC said:
Reykjavik Nights (Arnaldur Indridason). Arnuldur writes crime fiction set in Iceland. This is crime fiction set in Iceland, and it stars his detective (Erlandur) as a young man. It's fine enough but Erlandur lacks the aged cynicism and bitterness that he has in the books featuring him as an older man, which takes away from the whole experience. The book provides a very insightful lookback to Iceland in the 1970s, long before Glitnir, Kaupthing, and Icesave became household names and is perhaps worth reading for that reason. Not his best. 6/10.
Click to expand...

Aye, the young Erlendur books don't quite work as yet but Oblivion is an improvement on Reykjavik Nights, largely because it focuses as heavily on Erlendur's mentor Marion Briem as it does on Erlendur.
 
The Bloody Chamber by Angela Carter 8/10

She tends to be styled now as one of the great feminist writers, but in fact she wasn't quite as rabid a feminist as many of her fans belief her to have been (that said, the book's title is as full-on feminist as you can get). This is a collection of reworked fairytales. I'm not a great fan of magic realism, which she employs here, but I do love great writing, and she was influenced by two of my favourite writers - Anthony Burgess and Vladimir Nabokov. The best of these stories are right up there with them.

Logon or register to see this image


The Winter Garden by Beryl Bainbridge 4/10

A massive disappointment. I travelled around the USSR in my teens, including the three places (Moscow, Leningrad and Tbilisi) featured here. But there's little sense of place, the characters seemed oddly detached from the places they're visiting and each other, and the central mystery is left unresolved. Compared to Angela Carter, the writing is nothing special.
I'm up for any recommendations of better Beryl Bainbridge books - I'm curious as to why she has such a towering reputation.

Logon or register to see this image
 
Arkle said:
Aye, the young Erlendur books don't quite work as yet but Oblivion is an improvement on Reykjavik Nights, largely because it focuses as heavily on Erlendur's mentor Marion Briem as it does on Erlendur.
Click to expand...

Cheers. I'm sure I'll get to it eventually. I do like the Erlendur series a lot generally.
 
Monty Pigeon said:
The Bloody Chamber by Angela Carter 8/10

She tends to be styled now as one of the great feminist writers, but in fact she wasn't quite as rabid a feminist as many of her fans belief her to have been (that said, the book's title is as full-on feminist as you can get). This is a collection of reworked fairytales. I'm not a great fan of magic realism, which she employs here, but I do love great writing, and she was influenced by two of my favourite writers - Anthony Burgess and Vladimir Nabokov. The best of these stories are right up there with them.

Logon or register to see this image


The Winter Garden by Beryl Bainbridge 4/10

A massive disappointment. I travelled around the USSR in my teens, including the three places (Moscow, Leningrad and Tbilisi) featured here. But there's little sense of place, the characters seemed oddly detached from the places they're visiting and each other, and the central mystery is left unresolved. Compared to Angela Carter, the writing is nothing special.
I'm up for any recommendations of better Beryl Bainbridge books - I'm curious as to why she has such a towering reputation.

Logon or register to see this image
Click to expand...
I really struggle with Angela Carter but my admiration for Burgess and Nabokov is very high. I sometimes find myself wondering if I am somehow wired not to appreciate female writers. I have been reading a book of short stories recently by Rosamunde Pilcher as a female friend said she was a brilliant short story writer. She writes beautifully but everyone of her stories so far evokes a world of upper middle class privilege and a love story that has a happy ending. Won't finish the book which is called Flowers in the Rain. 3/10
 
HerdnMulhall said:
I really struggle with Angela Carter but my admiration for Burgess and Nabokov is very high. I sometimes find myself wondering if I am somehow wired not to appreciate female writers. I have been reading a book of short stories recently by Rosamunde Pilcher as a female friend said she was a brilliant short story writer. She writes beautifully but everyone of her stories so far evokes a world of upper middle class privilege and a love story that has a happy ending. Won't finish the book which is called Flowers in the Rain. 3/10
Click to expand...

I'd also struggled with Angela Carter I recently read Edmund Gordon's excellent biography of her (9/10), and that totally changed my preconceptions of her and her work.

Logon or register to see this image


The Burgess connection was very strong - he was one of her favourite writers, and as she emerged in her own right, it was reciprocated. Like Burgess and Nabokov, words were at the forefront of her style. I still struggle with her arty-farty subject matter - fairytales, and circuses, and theatre - but the quality of writing is just wonderful.

I'm consciously broadening my reading horizons to include more female writers. Despite her position now as a feminist heroine, Angela Carter isn't really a 'female writer'. She's a great writer who happened to be female. (I'd put Doris Lessing in the same category.)
 
JonnotheMackem said:
An excellent, excellent book. Get on to Oryx and Crake if you haven't read it already. @Monty Pigeon how are you getting on with it?
Click to expand...

The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood 10/10
A good time to read this - there are undoubted parallels with what's happening in America right now. The intricate structure and beautiful writing put it well above the usual dystopian fare. It's one of those books that stays with you after you've turned the final page.

Logon or register to see this image


Soon to be a major US TV series, due to air in April. Well worth reading before then - no matter how good it is, the TV series can't possibly match the richness of the book.

 
Monty Pigeon said:
The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood 10/10
A good time to read this - there are undoubted parallels with what's happening in America right now. The intricate structure and beautiful writing put it well above the usual dystopian fare. It's one of those books that stays with you after you've turned the final page.

Logon or register to see this image


Soon to be a major US TV series, due to air in April. Well worth reading before then - no matter how good it is, the TV series can't possibly match the richness of the book.

Click to expand...

The film was decent too. Not as good as the book, obviously. Did you paper-book it or audio-book it? I imagine a well done audiobook would be brilliant.

To you as well, if you haven't already, get on to Oryx and Crake/Year of the Flood/Maddaddam.
 
JonnotheMackem said:
The film was decent too. Not as good as the book, obviously. Did you paper-book it or audio-book it? I imagine a well done audiobook would be brilliant.

To you as well, if you haven't already, get on to Oryx and Crake/Year of the Flood/Maddaddam.
Click to expand...

Audiobook with Claire Danes narrating. Faultless.

I'll definitely read/listen to more Margaret Atwood this year
 
Logon or register to see this image


Chavs - The Demonization of the Working Class by Owen Jones.

An interesting and engaging book with a couple of flaws. First - the assumption that chav=working class and mockery or attack on one is an attack on the other. Second - devolves into almost mindless bile at times, especially on Thatcher and the 80s. Third - uses pejoratives and the same kind of snobbery the book is supposed to attack in places which weakens the book overall.
 
The Testament of Mary by Colm Toibin 8/10

Listened to this with Meryl Streep narrating. The story of Jesus told by his mum. Brilliantly written, though perhaps too short - 89 pages, three hours on audiobook - to be regarded as a novel rather than novella.

Logon or register to see this image
 
Kubicki said:
Not a rating but can anyone recommend some books about time travel?
Click to expand...
The Time Machine - HG Wells
The Time Travelers Wife - Audrey Nffenegger
The End of Eternity - Asimov
11/22/63 - Stephen King
The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August - Claire North

A couple I haven't read yet but must get around to are Hyperion by Dan Simmons, and Replay by Ken Grimwood.

Another that could loosely fit on the list is Stephen Kings novella, The Langoliers.

And finally, whilst the premise of the series is based on time travel but doesn't go into much scientific detail, Julian May's The Saga of The Exiles is a cracking series.
 
All the Pretty Horses by Cormac McCarthy 10/10

I've been meaning to tackle McCarthy's Border Trilogy for ages. Just knocked off the first volume. What a great book. So many incredible sequences. The scene in which John Grady breaks a group of horses, and the aftermath, is just breathtaking: The wild and frantic band of mustangs that had circled the potrero that morning like marbles swirled in a jar could hardly be said to exist and the animals whinnied to one another in the dark and answered back as if some one among their number were missing, or some thing.

Logon or register to see this image

 
Wizards Sleeve said:
The Time Machine - HG Wells
The Time Travelers Wife - Audrey Nffenegger
The End of Eternity - Asimov
11/22/63 - Stephen King
The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August - Claire North

A couple I haven't read yet but must get around to are Hyperion by Dan Simmons, and Replay by Ken Grimwood.

Another that could loosely fit on the list is Stephen Kings novella, The Langoliers.

And finally, whilst the premise of the series is based on time travel but doesn't go into much scientific detail, Julian May's The Saga of The Exiles is a cracking series.
Click to expand...
Cheers fella i will give then a look at
 
SYB_DC said:
I got it for my mother in law (NO!) for Christmas. Yep, is indeed up my alley.
Click to expand...

Finally picked it up last night after spending weeks picking my way through SPQR by Mary Beard (a great housebrick of a history book which, to be fair, is aimed at a more general audience).

As a thought on SPQR for those considering reading it - I found the early parts where Rome's early history was discussed, then through the period of the Republic, quite dry. A lot of thought on Rome's early history is, necessarily, speculation and my interest really isn't in the lives of rich, aristocratic senators. Tellingly, I flew through the last few chapters on how the lives of the rich and the poor differed, how ordinary (that is to say on or below the poverty line) Romans passed their time and on how people lived in the provinces. Could have done with more discussion on Julius Caesar's power grab and Octavian's consolidation of it, but I suppose she was trying to give a snapshot of all the important bits, then an interested reader can delve deeper.
 
JonnotheMackem said:
Logon or register to see this image


Chavs - The Demonization of the Working Class by Owen Jones.

An interesting and engaging book with a couple of flaws. First - the assumption that chav=working class and mockery or attack on one is an attack on the other. Second - devolves into almost mindless bile at times, especially on Thatcher and the 80s. Third - uses pejoratives and the same kind of snobbery the book is supposed to attack in places which weakens the book overall.
Click to expand...
You've talked me out of getting this like. :lol:
 

Back
Top