| Summer holiday book recommendations 13:58 - Jul 20 with 4753 views | traininvain |
Looking for some inspiration ahead of upcoming holidays and presumably others are in the same boat.
Don’t mind a bit of fiction or non fiction. Not so keen on business/life coaching type books.
Please share any ideas and apologies if there’s already a similar thread but couldn’t see anything. |  | | |  |
| Summer holiday book recommendations on 14:02 - Jul 20 with 3977 views | BrianMcCarthy |
Recommended this before, but happy to do so again.
'The Book Smugglers of Timbuktu' by Charlie English.
'An exemplary work of investigative journalism that is also a wonderfully colourful book of history and travel' Observer, Book of the Year 'A piece of postmodern historiography of quite extraordinary sophistication and ingenuity. [written with] exceptional delicacy and restraint' TLS The fabled city of Timbuktu has captured the Western imagination for centuries. The search for this 'African El Dorado' cost the lives of many explorers but Timbuktu is rich beyond its legends. Home to many thousands of ancient manuscripts on poetry, history, religion, law, pharmacology and astronomy, the city has been a centre of learning since medieval times. When jihadists invaded Mali in 2012 threatening destruction to Timbuktu's libraries, a remarkable thing happened. A team of librarians and archivists joined forces to spirit the precious manuscripts into hiding. Based on new research and first-hand reporting, Charlie English expertly tells this story set in one of the world's most fascinating places, and the myths from which it has become inseparable.'
https://www.easons.com/the-book-smugglers-of-timbuktu-charlie-english-9780008126
Loved it. So uplifting. |  |
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| Summer holiday book recommendations on 14:04 - Jul 20 with 3965 views | hubble |
How about David Mitchell's (not the comedian, the author) latest, Utopia Avenue? I thought it was absolutely superb. About a fictional band that forms in 1967 in Soho and interacts with all the famous names of the time. If you're into music (which I think you are) and great fiction, you'll love it. |  |
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| Summer holiday book recommendations on 14:17 - Jul 20 with 3916 views | Mick_S |
| Summer holiday book recommendations on 14:04 - Jul 20 by hubble |
How about David Mitchell's (not the comedian, the author) latest, Utopia Avenue? I thought it was absolutely superb. About a fictional band that forms in 1967 in Soho and interacts with all the famous names of the time. If you're into music (which I think you are) and great fiction, you'll love it. |
How the feck do I miss books like this at the airport? I’ll have a go on that one mate. |  |
| Did I ever mention that I was in Minder? |
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| Summer holiday book recommendations on 14:20 - Jul 20 with 3910 views | robith |
Read the Three Body Problem before the Netflix show comes out and inevitably ruins it |  | | |
| Summer holiday book recommendations on 14:33 - Jul 20 with 3871 views | ericgen34 |
I've recently finished Pierre Lemaitre's trilogy of the between war novels and haven't quite recovered yet about how fantastic they were. Each one better than the previous and can't recommend it highly enough. An English friend read the English translations and told me it was really well translated too
The books in order are:
The Great Swindle
All Human Wisdom
Mirror of our Sorrows [Post edited 20 Jul 2023 14:47]
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| Summer holiday book recommendations on 14:47 - Jul 20 with 3840 views | DaBurgh |
Just finished 'A man called Ove' think it's been around a few years. Can't recommend it highly e ough. Very good |  | | |
| Summer holiday book recommendations on 14:49 - Jul 20 with 3833 views | tonyQPR |
Lonely boy by Steve Jones is well worth a read. But you may already off done so judging by your avatar 👍 |  | | |
| Summer holiday book recommendations on 14:50 - Jul 20 with 3828 views | toboboly |
The Slow Horses (Slough House) series is excellent.
Half way through The Black Dahlia by James Ellroy, it's part of a quadrilogy and has been good so far. |  |
| Sexy Asian dwarves wanted. |
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| Summer holiday book recommendations on 14:58 - Jul 20 with 3807 views | traininvain |
| Summer holiday book recommendations on 14:20 - Jul 20 by robith |
Read the Three Body Problem before the Netflix show comes out and inevitably ruins it |
Thanks, this looks up my street. Enjoyed Dark Matter and Recursion by Blake Crouch and recommend both. The former is being adapted for Apple TV. | | | |
| Summer holiday book recommendations on 15:17 - Jul 20 with 3762 views | robith |
| Summer holiday book recommendations on 14:58 - Jul 20 by traininvain |
Thanks, this looks up my street. Enjoyed Dark Matter and Recursion by Blake Crouch and recommend both. The former is being adapted for Apple TV. |
Recursion was great fun, felt a little like a TV treatment so will suit adaptation well I think
The clowns behind Game of Thrones are doing The Three Body Problem so I'm terrified of how they'll muck it up. There's a Chinese adpatation but apparently it's proper bananas | | | |
| Summer holiday book recommendations on 15:27 - Jul 20 with 3750 views | B_Wad |
Just got back from visiting Canada's maritime provinces and read the "Boys in the Boat". It's an account of a rowing team made up largely of working class boys from Seattle, Washington who were mentored by London born master craftsman and rowing icon George Yeoman Pocock that achieved an upset gold medal over Nazi Germany in the Berlin 1936 Olympics.
Daniel James Brown does a nice job of moving the account along while developing the setting of the Great Depression and the fascinating history, craftsmanship, athleticism and philosophy of rowing, along with the incredible personal challenges some individuals faced to get the opportunity to compete in the Olympics. |  | | |
| Summer holiday book recommendations on 16:10 - Jul 20 with 3679 views | MrSheen |
I hesitate to use the word "recommend", but I just finished a book called "Rampage" by James M Scott about the Battle of Manila in 1945. I'm a long-standing Japanophile but the description of their army's treatment of Filipino citizens really shocked me.
The Fall of Robespierre by Colin Jones is an extremely skilful description of his sudden downfall and to a degree the reversal of the revolution. It's something I've never understood and it does seem to have been a baffling and unexpected sequence of events for everyone involved. It's a great depiction of the fragility of political authority and how the unthinkable happens. Very complex events very well told and highly thought-provoking. |  | | |
| Summer holiday book recommendations on 19:52 - Jul 20 with 3548 views | PeterHucker |
| Summer holiday book recommendations on 14:04 - Jul 20 by hubble |
How about David Mitchell's (not the comedian, the author) latest, Utopia Avenue? I thought it was absolutely superb. About a fictional band that forms in 1967 in Soho and interacts with all the famous names of the time. If you're into music (which I think you are) and great fiction, you'll love it. |
I enjoyed his book Slade House. It’s a ghost story but not like any other I’ve read.
If you like fiction with a bit of creepiness try these.
The Supernatural Elements by Edgar Cantero
The Southern Book Club’s Guide to slaying vampires by Grady Hendrix
The Book Of Accidents by Chuck Wendig
Best non fiction book I’ve read recently is Over the Edge of the World: Magellan's Terrifying Circumnavigation of the Globe by Laurence Bergreen.
Such an incredible story, brilliantly told. |  | | |
| Summer holiday book recommendations on 20:14 - Jul 20 with 3501 views | stevec |
Anyone heard of Tilting at Windmills?
‘’Andy Miller is a sports atheist. The beautiful game, the roar of the crowd, winning, losing, taking part - these mean nothing to him. But at 30 he is worried. He thinks he's turning into a bit of a crank. So he decides that he must try to love sport - and just maybe it will love him back’’.
Enjoyable light hearted book about said fella, becoming a QPR supporter and the world of crazy golf (there is one, apparently). |  | | |
| Summer holiday book recommendations on 07:52 - Jul 21 with 3351 views | Monkey_Roots |
Papillon.
An amazing story of a very different time. |  | | |
| Summer holiday book recommendations on 08:14 - Jul 21 with 3323 views | distortR |
Recently read 'The Big Sky' by Guthrie, a story of the American western frontier in the 19th c. Struggled a bit at the start, but was then thoroughly immersed.
I might become a mountain man, although historically I've not been great at getting beaver..... | | | |
| Summer holiday book recommendations on 10:02 - Jul 21 with 3241 views | MrSheen |
| Summer holiday book recommendations on 14:04 - Jul 20 by hubble |
How about David Mitchell's (not the comedian, the author) latest, Utopia Avenue? I thought it was absolutely superb. About a fictional band that forms in 1967 in Soho and interacts with all the famous names of the time. If you're into music (which I think you are) and great fiction, you'll love it. |
Mitchell is a magician, but "The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet" is exceptional. Our hero is a Dutch officer stranded on duty on Dejima Island, Japan's only contact with the outside world, at the beginning of the 19th Century. He's just great at depicting the difficult interaction of the lost world we are familiar with - Europeans in the service of Empire - and the one we know almost nothing of, Shogunate Japan. Completely brilliant. | | | |
| Summer holiday book recommendations on 10:22 - Jul 21 with 3215 views | DannyPaddox |
Just finished this this morning. Totally transfixed me. Travel writing through pre-history all the way back to when life was just single-cell groupies hanging around deep-sea hydrothermal vents. Brilliantly written, accessible, and often approaching poetry which helps if you don’t have a brain that usually takes in this sort of stuff. My immediate reaction to finishing the book is to start reading it again.
https://geographical.co.uk/book-reviews/review-otherlands-by-thomas-halliday |  | | |
| Summer holiday book recommendations on 10:35 - Jul 21 with 3203 views | E17hoop |
I've started loads this year but not finished them so working through these to get done:
Everyday Hate: How antisemitism is built into our world - and how you can change it
Dave Rich
Lots in this which extends the thinking and examples from Baddiel's book.
The Song of Significance
Seth Godin
Excellent marketing advice (as always)
Emotional Ignorance: Lost and found in the science of emotion
Dean Burnett
Science for people who don't understand it
How To Stand Up To Sexism: Words for when enough is enough
Toni Hargis
Great insight into how pervasive sexism is in our language, systems and culture.
Making Decisions
Ed Smith
Superb book on how to use data and qualitative information to make decisions |  |
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| Summer holiday book recommendations on 11:05 - Jul 21 with 3167 views | johann28 |
New Ones
Stuart Maconie - The Full English - follows JB's Priestley's 'English Journey' making observations. Liberal/left sympathies.
Timothy Garton Ash - Homelands, a Personal History of Europe - as it says, a personal take on Europe since 1945
Old Ones
Pete Brown - Man who Walks into a pub - hilarious travelog for real ale fans
Patrick Hamilton - Slaves of Solitude - great short novel set in Henley during the war from the author of 'Gaslight' and 'Hangover Square' |  | | |
| Summer holiday book recommendations on 13:35 - Jul 21 with 3089 views | Wilkinswatercarrier |
If you or anyone else on here is a history buff I'd recommend a book called The Anarchy by William Dalrymple.
A stunning history of the East India Company and its business in India. The money they stripped from the country is staggering, some unbelievable. Plus the government bailouts to keep it afloat.
And all done by a corporate company that rewarded shareholders whilst millions starved. Nothing really changes.
Very highly recommended. | | | |
| Summer holiday book recommendations on 10:31 - Jul 25 with 2879 views | ericgen34 |
| Summer holiday book recommendations on 14:04 - Jul 20 by hubble |
How about David Mitchell's (not the comedian, the author) latest, Utopia Avenue? I thought it was absolutely superb. About a fictional band that forms in 1967 in Soho and interacts with all the famous names of the time. If you're into music (which I think you are) and great fiction, you'll love it. |
Great recommendation! I started it at the weekend and can't put it down now. Thank you | | | |
| Summer holiday book recommendations on 10:51 - Jul 25 with 2820 views | Hoopstar |
Fellow history buff/nerd here.
Just finished "The Restless Republic: Britain without a Crown" by Anna Keay - all about the decade post the English Revolution under the Protectorate.
Really can't recommend it highly enough - one of the best history books I have read in years. |  | | |
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