The SMB Book thread

Making my way through the Christopher Brookmyre books I've somehow not read yet.

Just finished

A tale etched in blood and hard black pencil
and One fine day in the middle of the night.

Both incredibly enjoyable reads. Love his use of the written scottish slang, you weirdly find your inner monologue speaking in a thick Scottish accent.

Pandaemonium and Not the end of the world up next.

Also just finished American Dirt for my book club. Its an enjoyable character study of migrants getting to the US from Mexico and beyond. Horrendous things they have to go through. It wouldnt normally be my kinda thing but I did end up thinking it was a good read.
 


Feral by George Monbiot

Finally got round to reading this. Some very convincing arguments regarding rewilding, the flaws in current conservation programmes, particularly in the UK, and the economic value that's often to be found in giving over land to conservation rather than farming (in particular sheep farming). Monbiot takes some fairly dry subjects and makes them very readable. 9/10
 
buckowski said:
Yea a know what u mean, but I do think his writing is back to that level, for me it dropped off in his last few books.
Love the Savine character, daughter of Glokta, nailed on winner.
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Yeah, the writing is quality. I tried to read some other free fantasy off the kindle and its like it's written for kids in comparison
 
Monty Pigeon said:
This is a great companion to it:

www.backlisted.fm

105. W.G. Sebald - The Rings of Saturn — Backlisted

In this episode John and Andy are joined by Philip Hoare , a broadcaster, curator, filmmaker and writer whose books include biographies of Stephen Tennant and Noel Coward, the historical studies, Wilde’s Last Stand ; S pike Island: The Memory of a Military Hospital , and&am
www.backlisted.fm www.backlisted.fm

I love Sebald. Very difficult to single out any one book - they're all part of the greater whole.
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Backlisted is a great listen and has inspired a lot of my reading in the past year. John Mitchinson also follows Sunderland. There is an episode about Utz by Bruce Chatwin with Jonathan Wilson where they discuss their shared affliction and John M talks about his grandad in Sunderland.
 
Exapno Mapcase said:
Backlisted is a great listen and has inspired a lot of my reading in the past year. John Mitchinson also follows Sunderland. There is an episode about Utz by Bruce Chatwin with Jonathan Wilson where they discuss their shared affliction and John M talks about his grandad in Sunderland.
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Heard a couple but didn't know he was a MLF.
 
Arkle said:
Feral by George Monbiot

Finally got round to reading this. Some very convincing arguments regarding rewilding, the flaws in current conservation programmes, particularly in the UK, and the economic value that's often to be found in giving over land to conservation rather than farming (in particular sheep farming). Monbiot takes some fairly dry subjects and makes them very readable. 9/10
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Changed the way I look at the world. I'm going to Yellowstone sooner rather than later.

Lakes is just a wasteland to me now.
Barnacle Boy said:
Read Mark Lanegan's memoir the other week. Its brilliant, one of the best rock n roll biographies I've read
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Julian Cope and Luke Haines are the best two I've read.
 
cauldbairn said:
Heard a couple but didn't know he was a MLF.
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Think he is more of a distant follower than MLF. He always talks warmly of the whole north east but only in that episode does he reveal his colours. I started listening through a link from The Word podcast talking about Beatles books then saw they did Harpo Speaks! and Patrick Hamilton's Slaves of Solitude and I listen even if it is something I won't read.
 
Exapno Mapcase said:
Backlisted is a great listen and has inspired a lot of my reading in the past year. John Mitchinson also follows Sunderland. There is an episode about Utz by Bruce Chatwin with Jonathan Wilson where they discuss their shared affliction and John M talks about his grandad in Sunderland.
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This is a great read. I knew about John Mitchinson's Sunderland links, but I didn't realise that he was in the infamous Bullingdon Club photo with Boris Johnson.

bylinetimes.com

From Sunderland to the Bullingdon Club: Englishness Unravelled – Byline Times

Unsatisfied with George Orwell's description of patriotism, John Mitchinson digs deep into his own personal history to untangle the complex roots of his Englishness.
bylinetimes.com bylinetimes.com
Exapno Mapcase said:
Think he is more of a distant follower than MLF. He always talks warmly of the whole north east but only in that episode does he reveal his colours. I started listening through a link from The Word podcast talking about Beatles books then saw they did Harpo Speaks! and Patrick Hamilton's Slaves of Solitude and I listen even if it is something I won't read.
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He is a MLF. He gets to the odd away game.

I've been listening to Backlisted almost since the beginning. At first I took the reading of the books as optional, but increasingly I just trusted their judgement and started reading all their forthcoming titles, whether they're my sort of thing or not. It's blown my reading horizons wide open. I haven't enjoyed everything, but I've discovered new favourite writers who I'd never ordinarily have gone near: Muriel Spark, Penelope Fitzgerald, Gordon Burn, Antony Powell....and many more.
 
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Monty Pigeon said:
This is a great read. I knew about John Mitchinson's Sunderland links, but I didn't realise that he was in the infamous Bullingdon Club photo with Boris Johnson.

bylinetimes.com

From Sunderland to the Bullingdon Club: Englishness Unravelled – Byline Times

Unsatisfied with George Orwell's description of patriotism, John Mitchinson digs deep into his own personal history to untangle the complex roots of his Englishness.
bylinetimes.com bylinetimes.com


He is a MLF. He gets to the odd away game.

I've been listening to Backlisted almost since the beginning. At first I took the reading of the books as optional, but increasingly I just trusted their judgement and started reading all their forthcoming titles, whether they're my sort of thing or not. It's blown my reading horizons wide open. I haven't enjoyed everything, but I've discovered new favourite writers who I'd never ordinarily have gone near: Muriel Spark, Penelope Fitzgerald, Gordon Burn, Antony Powell....and many more.
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I am not yet reading in anticipation but it has inspired me and widened my reading. It's not just the named book, it is the discussion of what else they are reading that just expands my horizons. My reading and depth of reading in the past 18 months has increased to how I always used to read, largely due to giving in properly to reading glasses but helped by Backlisted and a few other sources. A year or so ago the latest Jo Nesbo would have been read the week it was out in paperback, I got it in March but will read when the mood takes me rather than because I can't get going in anything else.

My reading this year so far is below and you will spot the Backlisted influence (not least Andy Miller's manifesto)
Jean Rhys - Good Morning, Midnight
Andrew Miller - Now We Shall Be Entirely Free
J L Carr - How Steeple Sinderby Wanderers Won the F.A. Cup
David Hepworth - A Fabulous Creation n.f.
Paula Fox - Desperate Characters
Elizabeth Taylor - In A Summer Season
Rebecca West - Return of the Soldier
Saul Bellow - Seize The Day
Eric Ambler - Uncommon Danger
Kate Atkinson - Big Sky
Stella Gibbons - Cold Comfort Farm
E.L. Doctorow - Ragtime
Darragh Martin - Future Popes of Ireland
Ivan Turgenev - Fathers and Sons
Anna Burns-Milkman
Winifred Watson - Miss Pettigrew Lives For A Day
W Somerset Maughan - Cakes and Ale
Barry Hines - A Kestrel For A Knave
Andrew Miller - A Year of Reading Dangerously n.f.
Kent Haruf - Plainsong
Iris Murdoch - A Severed Head
Evelyn Waugh - Men At Arms
Maugham (typo)
 
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Just finished "Use of Weapons" by Ian M Banks in my slow random wander round the culture series - I love his stuff dark and humorous but with flights of imagination beyond mere mortals like myself. Read Lanny by Max Porter before that - strange book started hating it but loved it by the end even though not all that much happened.
 
taipeisafc said:
Just finished "Use of Weapons" by Ian M Banks in my slow random wander round the culture series - I love his stuff dark and humorous but with flights of imagination beyond mere mortals like myself. Read Lanny by Max Porter before that - strange book started hating it but loved it by the end even though not all that much happened.
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Use of weapons is in my top three banks. Awesome
Just read battle mage by Peter flannery. It's free with prime on the kindle. The writing is pretty basic and the story pretty clichéd. However it tugged at my heart strings a few times and is an okay, free, easy fantasy read
 
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Rainmaker by John Grisham is a top read, got the hardback somewhere in the house but just got a 25 year anniversary copy. Read nearly all of it in a day (works slack), fab book, films not bad either 👍
 

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