Robin_Cambs

The classics I find will stand up to repeated readings. I've read Middlemarch twice, Jane Eyre at least three times, Wuthering Heights a few times, Pride and Prejudice twice. They're like favourite holiday spots I can go back to over and over. I'm also a huge - HUGE - fan of Iris Murdoch, and I'm currently on my second go-round of all her books. I've now re-read The Book and the Brotherhood, The Black Prince, and The Sacred and Profane Love Machine, and I'm halfway through An Accidental Man for the second time. I find now that I'm less absorbed in the plot (and all those disastrous love affairs) I can see more of the incredible philosophical thought behind the stories. And the writing itself is just so beautiful.

I had to force myself to stop doing this, because I would sometimes have five or more on the go at one time. I don't find it difficult, any more than keeping up with more than one TV series. I generally do have a couple of more 'dry' art history or scholarly books that I will dip into, but carry on reading novels at the same time to liven things up a bit! I'm currently ploughing through an enormous book on Dutch golden age art, but there's no way I can concentrate on that exclusively. Also it's too big to carry around with me...

I read about half of Paradise Lost when I was a teenager...I still plan on finishing it someday, but UNNNGGGHHH. I also read the first volume of The Gulag Archipelago, not realising there was more. I think read enough to get the point though.

Yes! It's good, but What A Carve-Up and The Rotters Club are his best, I think. He's great fun to read. Slightly surreal situations but believable characters.