Joe's bookshelf 2009

[joe]

Books on my shelf waiting to be read

 

 

For Better, For Worse Carole Matthews

Birds without Wings Louis de Bernieres

Cloud Atlas David Mitchell

The Welsh Girl Peter Ho Davies

Loving Frank Nancy Horan

Going It Alone Claire Dowling

Red Riding Trilogy David Peace

Others James Herbert

Getting Rid of Matthew Jane Fallon

The Other Side of the Story Marian Keyes

Anybody Out There Marian Keyes

The Long Walk Slavamir Rawicz

Stardust Neil Gaiman

The Murder Book Jonathon Kellermen

Snobs Julian Fellows

Gridlock Ben Elton

A Place Called Here Ceceila Aherne

44 Scotland Street Alexander McCall smith

Melted Into Air Sandi Toksvig

I Heart New York Lindsey Keik

The Ex Boyfriends Handbook Matt Dunn

Betrayal Lindsey Harris

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society Mary Ann Shaffer and annie Barrow

Wives and Lovers Jane Elizabeth Varley

For Better For Worse Carole Mathews

White Teeth Zadie Smith

My Best Friends Girl Dorothy Koomson

The American Boy Andrew Taylor

The Empty Chair Jeffrey Deaver

The Stone Monkey Jeffrey Deaver

The Vanished Man Jeffrey Deaver

The Twelth Card Jeffrey Deaver

The Cold Moon Jeffrey Deaver

The Broken Window Jeffrey Deaver

The Stepford wives

The surgeon

The Yellow Lighted Bookshop - Lewis Buzzbee

Edited January 26, 2010 by joe
A new To Be Read Pile

[joe]

For One More Day Mitch Albom

 

 

Synopsis

'Every family is a ghost story ...' As a child, Charley Benetto was told by his father, 'You can be a mama's boy or a daddy's boy, but you can't be both.' So he chooses his father, only to see him disappear when Charley is on the verge of adolescence. Decades later, Charley is a broken man. His life has been destroyed by alcohol and regret. He loses his job. He leaves his family. He hits rock bottom after discovering he won't be invited to his only daughter's wedding. And he decides to take his own life. Charley makes a midnight ride to his small hometown: his final journey. But as he staggers into his old house, he makes an astonishing discovery. His mother - who died eight years earlier - is there, and welcomes Charley home as if nothing had ever happened. What follows is the one seemingly ordinary day so many of us yearn for: a chance to make good with a lost parent, to explain the family secrets and to seek forgiveness.

 

 

 

I truly loved this book and i think it is a modern classic, I have read his other book, The Five People You Will Meet in Heaven and I loved that too. Tis book I found to be very special as it focussed on a man who got the chance to spend one more day with his deceased mother. I found the book truly touching as i think most people would relish the oppurtunity to be able to spend time with a loved one and say things that they never got to say. I think that this is the special appeal about this book. It is a book that i will reread again and again. I found myself thinking about my father who died 10 years ago and i think that is why i found the book truly special as it brought home to me all the things that I never got to tell him

 

10/10

Edited May 4, 2009 by joe

[chesilbeach]

No Fond return of love Barbara Pym

 

Have you read any other Barbara Pym books? I read them all about 15 years ago, and then re-read Quartet in Autumn last year. I think she was a wonderful writer and very underrated, so I'll be interested to see what you think about this book.

[joe]

I have not read any of her books as yet. I will let you know what I think when i have read this one and will certainly be reading some of her other books too

Edited April 18, 2009 by joe

[joe]

I am halfway through No fond Return of Love and I am absolutely captivated by it. If i did not have to look after two small children all day i would have finished it by now. Anyway I am really enjoying this book. The characters of Dulcie and Viola are very interesting, they both have their own agendas in securing the love and affection of Alwyn Forbes but are using each other in order to do so and this I find very amusing. I just cannot wait to find out who gets their man although i have a feeling that it will end unhappily for both of them.

Edited April 21, 2009 by joe

[chesilbeach]

I'm so glad you're enjoying it. I would heartily recommend Quartet In Autumn by the same author, although it is slightly more melancholy and poignant in tone.

[bethany725]

The Pilots Wife Anita Shreeve

The Time Travellers Wife Audry Niffeneger

 

What'd you think of these two? I also read these recently.

I'm assuming from your signature quote that you liked TTTW

 

Also, what'd you think of Change of Heart? I think that's going to be my next Picoult read.

[joe]

I'm so glad you're enjoying it. I would heartily recommend Quartet In Autumn by the same author, although it is slightly more melancholy and poignant in tone.

 

I will give it a go as I am enjoying this book so much

[joe]

The Pilots Wife Anita Shreeve

The Time Travellers Wife Audry Niffeneger

 

What'd you think of these two? I also read these recently.

I'm assuming from your signature quote that you liked TTTW

 

Also, what'd you think of Change of Heart? I think that's going to be my next Picoult read.

 

I enjoyed the Pilots wife but i found the whole plot very predictable. I also did not enjoy it as much as bodysurfing which still remains one of my favourite reads recently.

 

The Time Travelers Wife I absolutely love, I have read it about ten times now.I just find that it's a beautiful love story told incredibly well. I cannot wait to see the film.

[Melisa]

I've also read those Mitch Albom's books and loved them!

 

I've got 'Tuesday's with Morrie' reseved at my local library so can't wait until that comes in..

 

My next read is going to be 'The Time Travellers Wife' - I got it a while ago but it's just been on my shelf of books to read for ages! It's just the case of something else to read, then something else, then something else....

 

Looking forward to reading it though as everybody I've come across seems to love it!

 

[DanC_84]

I enjoyed the Pilots wife but i found the whole plot very predictable. I also did not enjoy it as much as bodysurfing which still remains one of my favourite reads recently.

 

The Time Travelers Wife I absolutely love, I have read it about ten times now.I just find that it's a beautiful love story told incredibly well. I cannot wait to see the film.

 

I agree, I loved this book! Whilst I am looking forward to seeing how they do the film I wasn't really that pleased to see Eric Bana chosen for the lead. Bana is not how I pictured Henry to be at all!

[joe]

Started to rread A Child's Game today by John Connor and I am thoroughly enjoying it.

 

Friday 31 December, 1999. In the early hours of the morning in a luxury central Leeds penthouse, intruders douse a terrified victim with petrol, set him alight and throw him burning from the ninth floor roof garden. DS Pete Bains is on night duty with CID when the call comes in. The body is quickly identified as Nicholas Hanley, a wealthy property developer, but Bains' attempts to pull together an enquiry stall when he cannot locate Hanley's lover, Anna Hart. Unknown to Bains, Hart and her daughter are less than five miles away, kidnapped at gunpoint and struggling to stay alive. Meanwhile, the security services are looking for DC Karen Sharpe. Eighteen months ago she walked out on Bains without a word of explanation. Now she has disappeared for real. What Sharpe has been doing not only connects her to Hanley's death, but has placed her at the disposal of men for whom human life means nothing. The danger is greater than anything she has faced before. If she cannot pull her shattered personality together, the last day of the millennium will be the last day of her life.

[rwemad]

The Time Travelers Wife I absolutely love, I have read it about ten times now.I just find that it's a beautiful love story told incredibly well. I cannot wait to see the film.

 

Oh my goodness. Ten times.

 

I have this book but I can't seem to get past the first few pages. I really struggle with it. I just can't understand myself as it seems to be well loved and recommended by all, I have yet to find anybody with a bad word to say about it. I'm worried about myself. I think I may be a bit weird.

 

Do you think it was hard to get into to start off with? Or did you love it from the first line?

 

I think it's the whole time travel bit... it is a fantasy isn't it? I always struggle with fantasy.

[lexiepiper]

The Time Travelers Wife I absolutely love, I have read it about ten times now.I just find that it's a beautiful love story told incredibly well. I cannot wait to see the film.

 

Glad to finally see someone who enjoys it as much as me, I've probably read about 10 times too, and it's my favourite book, I just love it

[DanC_84]

Oh my goodness. Ten times.

 

I have this book but I can't seem to get past the first few pages. I really struggle with it. I just can't understand myself as it seems to be well loved and recommended by all, I have yet to find anybody with a bad word to say about it. I'm worried about myself. I think I may be a bit weird.

 

Do you think it was hard to get into to start off with? Or did you love it from the first line?

 

I think it's the whole time travel bit... it is a fantasy isn't it? I always struggle with fantasy.

 

I loved it. Not immediately though, it did take me a little bit to get into the swing of it. But once I did there was no going back. Try to perservere with it, you will not regret it!

[joe]

Oh my goodness. Ten times.

 

I have this book but I can't seem to get past the first few pages. I really struggle with it. I just can't understand myself as it seems to be well loved and recommended by all, I have yet to find anybody with a bad word to say about it. I'm worried about myself. I think I may be a bit weird.

 

Do you think it was hard to get into to start off with? Or did you love it from the first line?

 

I think it's the whole time travel bit... it is a fantasy isn't it? I always struggle with fantasy.

 

I loved it from the very beginning but then maybe I am weird. Stick with it as I am sure that you will really begin to enjoy it.

[leah86]

I read Change of Heart by Jodi Picoult not too long ago. What did you think of this?

[joe]

I read Change of Heart by Jodi Picoult not too long ago. What did you think of this?

 

I really struggled with this book from the very beginning. I thought it was very obvious that the stepdad was abusing the daughter and that Shay, in trying to protect the little girl, accidentally killed them both. For this reason I could not enjoy the book fully as I found both the narrative and ending predictable. However having said that I found it very easy to read.

[joe]

No Fond Return of Love by Barbara Pym

 

 

Synopsis

 

Dulcie Mainwearing is always helping others, but never looks out for herself - especially in the realm of love. Her friend Viola is besotted by the alluring Dr Aylwin Forbes, so surely it isn't prying if Dulcie helps things along? Aylwin, however, is smitten by Dulcie's pretty young niece. And perhaps Dulcie herself, however ridiculous it may be, is falling, just a little, for Aylwin. Once life's little humiliations are played out, maybe love will be returned, and fondly, after all..

 

 

This is the first Barbara Pym book that I have read and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I did not want the book to end as I had got to know the charcters so well, i felt that I actually knew them. I am certainly going to read Quartet in Autumn.

 

 

10/10

[joe]

I have started to read Reading in Bed by Sue Gee. I am only thirty pages in but I am already hooked and just know that I am going to enjoy it.

[joe]

Going to start reading Emotional Geology today by Linda Gillard and I am very much looking forward to it

[Ceinwenn]

Enjoy it Joe! I know you will!!

[joe]

I hve read up to chapter three so far and I am hooked, I am finding it very hard to put down

[Chrissy]

I actually feel envious of you reading this for the first time!

 

I hope you enjoy it as much as I did - it is a captivating read.

[joe]

You know I am already half way through, would have finished it already had I not twp little ones to look after, and I am captivated. It is such a beautiful book. I really think that this book is going to be in my top ten favourite books.