Books you're reading... and should read. | Page 8 | Vital Football

Books you're reading... and should read.

I haven't read any Le Carre. My dad hardly read at all and it took him a year to finish a novel. But he read all of Le Carre's.

If your Dad hardly read but read all of Le Carre he must have been a really smart man. Le Carre's books are not the easiest which is what I enjoy about them. I don't mean it's dense and challenging to the point of tedium, or in such a way that he can show off as a writer of great "literature". Le Carre writes for intelligent people, and expects his audience to think as he weaves these fascinating, intriguing plots. His world of spies are dirty, underhanded, where boredom is a facade to be carefully managed to keep spies doing what they do best. Le Carre's spies will not have gadgets, or jump in and out of bed with the sexiest women before karate kicking their nemesis off a sky-rise building. They will be the old man in the cafe chain smoking while reading the form guide in the paper, or the passenger on the bus, very, very much in the background. Because of this, his plots are everything, and my god what plots. Twists and turns come, and like his characters, you've been turned without even knowing it. Great reads, but as I said not the easiest. Once you've made the investment as a reader though, you are in, and in deep, just like the spies he writes about.

As far as recommendations go, I'd start with "The Spy Who Came in From the Cold" and if that works for you move on to "Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy". I think you can track down the old TV show on Youtube, or watch the Gary Oldman film from a few years ago which is also top notch.
 
I've just started Day of the Caesars, book 16 of Simon Scarrow's Eagles of the Empire series. I knew I'd read a few of them but didn't realise the number was fifteen!
 
I've just started Day of the Caesars, book 16 of Simon Scarrow's Eagles of the Empire series. I knew I'd read a few of them but didn't realise the number was fifteen!

By coincidence, I've just finished Tacitus' Agricola and am about to start his Annales. Two of the sources Mr Scarrow will undoubtedly used, along with others.
 
Just started Gills "1809 Thunder on Danube" Vol II." I thought I was only two thirds through the first volume to suddenly come across "Appendices" and "Footnotes"!

I just wish his maps were better to make it easier to follow the action.

Also onto Book 3 of Brandon Sanderson's Stormlight Archive series which is pretty good indeed.
 
Just about to start reading Led-Zeppelin-When Giants Walked The Earth, by Mick Wall. By way of an antidote, and a different type of culture, I shall also be dipping into Old English Towns by W Andrews and Elsie Lang, which includes a nice section on Lincoln.
 
I've just started Day of the Caesars, book 16 of Simon Scarrow's Eagles of the Empire series. I knew I'd read a few of them but didn't realise the number was fifteen!

If you like a Roman theme and detective fiction, I can recommend Stephen Saylor's "Gordianus the Finder" series set in late Republican Rome.

Rosemary's Sutcliff's 3 Roman novels set in Britain are good, too, the first being Eagle of the 9th. They were actually written as what today we would call YA fiction, but stand up well as an adult read.

Robert Graves's two Cluadius books - I, Claudius being the first - are a fantastic read.
 
If you like a Roman theme and detective fiction, I can recommend Stephen Saylor's "Gordianus the Finder" series set in late Republican Rome.

Rosemary's Sutcliff's 3 Roman novels set in Britain are good, too, the first being Eagle of the 9th. They were actually written as what today we would call YA fiction, but stand up well as an adult read.

Robert Graves's two Cluadius books - I, Claudius being the first - are a fantastic read.
Cheers, I'll have a look for those!
 
Anything by John Boyne who wrote ' the boy in the striped pyjamas '.
To be honest that is an excellent book but nowhere near his best.
'The hearts invisible furies' is probably the finest novel I have ever read.
It is hilarious in parts and desperate sad in others the writers brilliance is that he put you through all these different emotions whilst reading one book.
Also his novel 'the history of loneliness' a great read.
 
I'm currently reading "The Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Lindsey" by Kevin Leahy.

Before that I just finished book 10 (the final one) of the Chronicles of Thomas Covenant by Stephen Donaldson.
 
I'm currently reading "The Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Lindsey" by Kevin Leahy.

Before that I just finished book 10 (the final one) of the Chronicles of Thomas Covenant by Stephen Donaldson.

Good Lord, I read the Covenant books back in the 80s in 6th form. Only the first 3, though. I actually wrote a computer game based on them and - this is pre-internet, for our younger viewers - released it as shareware.
 
Good Lord, I read the Covenant books back in the 80s in 6th form. Only the first 3, though. I actually wrote a computer game based on them and - this is pre-internet, for our younger viewers - released it as shareware.
I read the first 6 about 20 years ago. My Mum had/has signed copies of them. Then read the last 4 in the last couple of years.