What have you read and enjoyed?

If you like historical fiction, any of the following are mind-blowingly good:

- The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet, David Mitchell
- This Thing Of Darkness, Harry Thompson
- Wolf Hall/Bring Up The Bodies, Hilary Mantel
- The General In His Labyrinth, Gabriel Garcia Marquez

or even

- The Book Thief, Markus Zusak

Everyone's heard of Mantel but the first two are simply stunning. Historical fiction isn't really a genre I enjoy but I couldn't put either down. If you've not read the Zusak then you really should.

If you like atmospheric evocations of recent America:

- The Last Pilot, by Benjamin Johncock - brilliantly written debut from a local author which deserves to win every prize going. It's like Hemingway meets Raymond Carver meets Tom Wolfe.
- Homicide by David Simon - if you like the Wire (which he also wrote) this is a Must Read
- The Corner by David Simon (ditto)

If you like ghost stories/paranormal:

- Slade House by David Mitchell
- Let the Right One In by John Ajvide Lindqvist

If you like thrillers, try

- The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo (et seq), Stieg Larsson
- Child 44, Tom Rob Smith

If you like fantasy:

- the Song of Ice and Fire series by GRR Martin is unputdownable - again fantasy isn't really a genre I like much but the writing is so good that it just keeps you going. Also very good for the kindle platform as the books are hefty and when you're into it you'll want to use the kindle's ability to read or re-read bits out of sequence (it interweaves the stories from several main protagonists' point of view and it's good to be able e.g. just to read Arya's story from beginning to the end thus far, etc)
- The Bone Clocks by David Mitchell
- His Dark Materials trilogy by Philip Pullman (an awful man but a brilliant writer)

If you like Spy books then

- A Perfect Spy by John le Carr? - forget the spies who caught a chill, this is a perfect novel and one of the great books of last century. It's about spies but much more about life and it's simply brilliant - the best from a brilliant author.
- Enigma by Robert Harris - he's never written better

If you like the Modern English Novel then try anything by Ian McEwan, Arthur and George by Julian Barnes, or White Teeth by Zadie Smith (her second is the famous one but I think the first is better), or maybe Life of Pi by Yann Martel or White Tiger by Aravind Adiga. Or maybe A Week in September by Sebastian Faulks.

If you're into epics, the classic One Hundred Years Of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez is peerless, though you might think about some of Ken Follett's work.

And if you've never read Khaled Hosseini get on The Kite Runner and

Finally, Any Human Heart by William Boyd is one of those books everyone should read.

Oh God. I've left so many brilliant books out...

Posted By: Old Man on December 8th 2015 at 15:54:10

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