I love to read, but I’m terrible when it comes to trying new authors. I read the books that I have over and over, apart from the ones that I look at and wonder why I still have them. The authors I have the most books by are:
Dick Francis
Terry Pratchett
Sue Grafton
Stephen King
Ellis Peters
I tend to cycle through these, with a sidestep to read Lord of the Rings every now and again, and maybe the Colin Dexter ones I have; until Morse’s pedantic ways annoy me, plus the Patricia Cornwell ones, until I find reading those in bed gives me unpleasant dreams! I have Thomas Harris ones, those are good. I have a few Dean Koontz still, but each time I read the remaining ones I tend to roll my eyes at them, lol. Got about 4 Iain Banks kicking around.
I suppose mystery/thrillers are more my thing than other genres, for non-fantasy stuff anyway (so glad the man in the secondhand bookstore here in town recommended Terry Pratchett to me all those years ago!) Can anyone recommend any authors that they think I might like?
Oh, I don’t have an e-reader, I’m a paper girl all the way
Hey Jelly, A dude I got into was Andrew Vachss. He’s a (retired?) Child abuse defendant, and his protagonist is Burke. Basically he goes kills the bad guy shagging the girl along the way, but I liked it for the different characters that develop into his family. Flood is the first in the long series. Incidentally, my late brother in law read them along with me, and loved them like me, but neither of us knew it at the time ! Or autobiographies. Black Elk. Leonard Peltier. Bury my heart at wounded knee… (dan brown I think) in the spirit of crazy horse, about two and a half inches think. Took a summer to read it with Train’s My Private Nation as the musical backdrop. Take care, Andy
Poll I looked at John Grisham ones when I was at work, but typically, never brought any home. I worked for a local charity that sold secondhand stuff, we were often stuck with way more books than we could display nicely, even selling them at 5 for £1. Because we’d get a load in at once when someone was clearing out their parent’s house or similar, always sad
But I’m such a dunce about trying new authors, that I’d talk myself out of it even if I could get the book for mere pennies! The only ones I was aware enough to nab was a Discworld book that I’d not read, and a lovely 1947 edition of Rebecca. By lovely I mean a properly faded and old book-smelling hardback. I love old books =3
You might like Station eleven by Emily St John Mandel not my usual type of thing but quite enjoyed it, I like Margaret Atwood,C J Sansom and have just finished 're reading almost all of Dickens all except Dombey and son,gave up with that-way too tedious. I did enjoy Stehen King’s 22.11.63. I also read(finally)most Arnold Bennett.
I read a lot. I’m like Poll these days, I only read e-books. Ever since I got a Kindle 3 years ago I’ve not read a paper book. They’re just too heavy.
And a good thing about e-books is discovering new authors, there’s a lot of unpublished / self published authors who are great. I get a daily e-mail from a site called ‘book bub’, it lists deals of the day, sometimes they’re cheap and sometimes free. Also, I have about 50 books listed on ‘price drop tracker’. It tracks what’s happening to the price of my selected books and when the price drops to my specified value, I get an email alert. It means I can pay as little as possible for the books I read. And it’s stunning how often the price of e-books changes. So for example, a john Grisham new book might be £7.99 in the shops, and £4.99 on Kindle. Then it’ll drop to 99p for 24 hours, I’ll get the email and can buy at the reduced rate. (This is an actual true example)
obviously there’s also a load of bad writing / dreadful editing / unlikely or unbelievable storylines out there. It’s a case of being a bit picky.
This month ive read Lisa Gardner, Harlen Coben, Andreas Eschbach, Emily St John Mandell, and a bunch of self published stuff that I got as part of Amazon Unlimited; the subscription library service for mostly self published writers. The only trouble with it is that I can’t always remember the names of writers!
Bit harsh. The Last Enemy by Richard Hillary. Autobiography. Dude got shot down ww2. Burnt up. Pt one about training, pt two about surgery. Bit with the kids gets me every time. Only book I’ve read more than once … Muppets Christmas Carol ?
I much prefer the feel and smell of an old book to an electronic device I loved going round secondhand bookshops haven’t read much lately due to sight but how about Kathy Reichs ( Bones TV series based on her books) Lindsey Davis ( detective stories set in ancient Rome ) Colin Dexter, apart from them I have reread the Narnia books and have managed to get hold of large print copy of Rumpole not something I would normally read but as I haven’t been able to read for 8 months I think it is good Happy reading Sue
I don’t think I’ll ever be able to part with the Narnia books. They’re a part of my childhood / adulthood / life. I’ve re-read them all several times and think I may be due for another re-read any day now!
Phil Rickman’s ‘Merrily Watkins’ novels are great. Really sharp writing and crackling dialogue a speciality and they are very funny as well as gripping. They are sort of crime (usually murder) novels, but Merrily isn’t a cop (although one of the other main characters is), she’s a priest - the Anglican Diocesan Exorcist, if you please - so there’s always a dark occult element in there - sometimes very dark but not explicitly gruesome, just intriguing. And the lightness of touch in the writing and good story-telling always stops it getting oppressive, so no nightmares involved. Highly recommended, and there are lots of them, so if you like the first one you try there is a lot of enjoyment ahead.
I really like the Earthsea quartet by Ursula Le Guin, and also Game of Thrones by George R. R. Martin. I got the whole set of these very cheap in The Works - worth looking there for books if you have one in your town. Both of these are fantasy and they are both brilliant.
Did you know that Felix Francis (son of Dick Francis) has written a few books? They’re along the same lines as his father - the ones I’ve read have been quite enjoyable.
A couple of others that I would recommend are:
‘White’ by Rosie Thomas - drama/adventure story set in the Himalayas. Danger, adventure, passion…
‘Peace Like a River’ by Leif Enger - oldest son arrested for manslaughter, resulting in an epic journey by the rest of the family when he breaks out of jail. Very gripping.
Hazel yes, I have one of the Francis collab books right now actually, my mum leant it, and another, to me. This is Silks, the other was Dead Heat. I see from Wikipedia that those were the 1st two. I’m relieved about that because Dead Heat annoyed me because of the clumsiness of the writing, and Silks does the same, I’ve yet to finish reading it because of this, but if they’re his first forays then he’ll improve as he goes along. I think I will finish Silks at some point, the story for Dead Heat was good, I just found the story-telling to be rather amateur. As you’re giving him a thumbs up I should give Silks another go, shouldn’t I, and try and set my prejudice aside!
I think my issue there is expecting too much because I love his dad’s books. If he’d published these solely under his own name, instead of using his dad’s name to sell them, I’d probably have been less judgmental I wonder if it was his decision, or the publishers, to give the impression that these books were mainly his dad still, because I don’t detect a single trace of Dick in the writing itself, so I guess Felix wrote a stories around already existing plots.
Ooooh, Jellysundae, a girlie with taste!!! Since you like Terry Pachett, try Terry Brooks, Shanara books, awesome he also does Children of Armaggedon, not as bad as ot sounds! I’ve read them & read them again, probably start em again now!! Tracey x
The Last Enemy by Richard Hillary. Autobiography. Dude got shot down ww2. Burnt up. Pt one about training, pt two about surgery. Bit with the kids gets me every time. Only book I’ve read more than once … Muppets Christmas Carol ?