Showing 1-16 of 26 Results.
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David Mitchell writes - Measured, solid, real, honed, slow-burning, infused with a spiritual intelligence, lingering, imperishable.
David Mitchell - 11/03/2011 |
Perfect dystopia; an eye-opening read.
Lauren Kate - 15/06/2012 |
This was one of the first novels where I remember being genuinely aware of the brilliance of the writing as I was reading it – there are sentences and paragraphs that still take my breath away now, despite the number of times I’ve read it. It’s a long, slow, relentless novel – a beautifully drawn mystery woven through a painfully moving story of class, classics and what it means to belong, carried along by a group of the most unforgettable characters you’ll ever come across.
Will Hill - 15/03/2012 |
Barbara Pym; Alexander McCall Smith Barbara Pym has been described as the Jane Austen of our times, and I would concur with this view. She created a whole world of people living rather mousy lives, illuminated with poignant detail. She is extremely funny in an understated way.
Alexander McCall Smith - 28/07/2011 |
EMILY BRONTË: Wrote my favourite female character – Cathy in Wuthering Heights - and is also responsible for the first ghost scene I ever read. There was no sleeping for almost a week when Cathy tapped on Heathcliff’s window in the middle of the night and it’s a scene I return to again and again to experience the joy of taut prose and terror.
Sara Sheridan - 19/06/2012 |
Even though he didn't actually write it himself, the voice and vernacular are all Keith. Particularly fascinating when describing London after the war.
Dylan Jones - 24/07/2012 |
Even if it wasn't so topical, I would have picked a Smiley novel. I love the understated style and beautiful story-telling. And I love spies.
Lindsey Davis - 20/03/2012 |
The story of Mary Lennox, the unloved, unloveable orphan warmed to life along with her secret garden, gave me one of my first female heroes. They should try moving her from the kiss-of-death Children’s Classics shelf, let her slug it out with the newcomers and see what happens.
Moira Young - 09/08/2012 |
Hunter S. Thompson; Ralph Steadman This is pure adrenaline- (and other substances) fuelled literary chaos – the pinnacle of Thompson’s gonzo style that he developed as a journalist for Rolling Stone. It’s theoretically an account of he and his lawyer attending a motorcycle race in Las Vegas, but in reality it’s nothing less than an anarchic, mind-bending peek inside the carnage that Thompson caused wherever he went, full of bad people and worse drugs, hallucinations and violence and destruction, described in some of the most distinctive prose ever committed to a page by a true literary genius. Completely indispensable.
Will Hill - 15/03/2012 |
This is the Dickens I return to more than any other. Pip’s journey to maturity – the misunderstandings, betrayals, misplaced pride, friendships, heartbreaks and hubris – always makes my heart ache with fellow feeling.
Moira Young - 09/08/2012 |
James Joyce; Hans Walter Gabler MOLLY BLOOM: Joyce’s creation from Ulysses, Molly Bloom is quite simply the most sensuous woman in literature. Married to Leopold Bloom, she starts an affair with Hugh ‘Blazes’ Boylan. Molly’s bawdy stream of consciousness opens the book though I find myself going back to read just that passage again and again. Joyce allegedly based Molly’s character on his wife Nora Barnacle, which I find particularly fascinating (was he Leopold or Hugh, I wonder?)
Sara Sheridan - 19/06/2012 |
Muriel Spark; Candia McWilliam Muriel Spark’s character, Jean Brodie, is a teacher in nineteen-thirties Edinburgh. She is one of the great characters of Scottish literature.
Alexander McCall Smith - 28/07/2011 |
Elizabeth Taylor; Paul Bailey Still much underrated: would she be better known if she didn't have somebody else's name?
Julian Barnes - 21/03/2012 |
Dylan dips in and out of his own life as though he is calling up clips on Youtube and then writing the back story for them almost as an afterthought. Magnificent. Why can't we have one every Christmas?
Dylan Jones - 24/07/2012 |
Of all the works inspired by Heart of Darkness, this one offers the most absorbing and astonishing chronicle of “the horror” of Congo after Conrad, under the grotesque dictatorship of Mobutu Sese Seko.
Maya Jasanoff - 29/05/2012 |