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Jul 13, 20231 min read
1078. Torrey Peters - Detransition Baby
Featured on Radio 4’s ‘A Good Read’, a novel about transsexuals in New York. There were points of interest but the subject didn’t really...
Dec 5, 20221 min read
1034. Harriet Tyce - Blood Orange
I have read this before, but have no memory of it, I think, except for a scene where the daughter is lost on Hampstead Heath. There is a...
Jan 9, 20221 min read
932. Martin Edwards - Mortmain Hall
Never heard of this guy, or read anything of his before. 1930’s upper class decadence and sexual depravity meets 1930’s intellectualised...
Sep 22, 20211 min read
897. Dolly Alderton - Ghosts
Borrowed from P, as between library books. Inherently far too girly for me, but full of sharply observed points. Ghosts means (news to...
Feb 4, 20211 min read
846. Susanna Moore - In The Cut
I have read this before, I think many years ago and it is very good. Full of quite graphic sex, but a lot better than Shades of Grey. The...
Nov 7, 20191 min read
727. Patti Davis - Bondage
The author is apparently the daughter of Ronald and Nancy Reagan. It is actually quite a good exploration of a fairly taboo sexual topic...
Jul 20, 20191 min read
697. Julian Barnes - Before She Met Me
Needed something easy to read after the rigours of 696 so plucked this off the bookshelf. It is pretty low grade really – a tiresome...
Jun 30, 20191 min read
693. Tessa Hadley - Late In The Day
I half enjoyed this, if that is possible. Paddy said it reminded her a bit of Iris Murdoch, although it was better written and without...
Apr 11, 20191 min read
675. Saskia Vogel - Permission
Heard the author on Radio 4. Slightly strange book about love, loss and sado-masochim as an outlet for this in modern California. Quite...
Mar 31, 20191 min read
672. Milan Kundera - The Unbearable Lightness Of Being
Haven’t read this for a long time but it is a brilliant book. About sex, love, metaphysics, and the Russian invasion of Czechoslovakia in...
Feb 9, 20191 min read
657. Imogen Hermes Gowar - The Mermaid And Mrs Hancock
A huge novel in the modish genre of bolting modern themes into a historic period; in this case late 18th century London. Mr Hancock is a...
Feb 7, 20191 min read
656. Ian Rankin - Strip Jack
An early (I think) Rebus novel, pre Siobhan Clarke and Cafferty. This is pretty good - about an up and coming (married) politician caught...
Sep 13, 20181 min read
622. Hubert Selby Jr - Last Exit To Brooklyn
Emergency purchase at WH Smiths in Gatwick, as kindle won’t accept my card for some reason. Wildly controversial at the time, now perhaps...
Jun 2, 20181 min read
594. Henry James - The Wings Of A Dove
Maybe optimistic to pick a difficult late James after enjoying 593, but you can see the logic I hope. And I read the Ambassadors...
Apr 6, 20171 min read
478. E.L. James - Fifty Shades Of Grey
Could be a parody of Pride and Prejudice, except I can’t think of 2 suitable nouns. Nonetheless, girl falls for incredibly rich and...
Mar 10, 20171 min read
473. Pauline Réage - The Story Of O
The best book of erotica I have ever read. Serious sado-machocism, although overwritten in rather florid prose at times. Surprisingly...
Oct 3, 20161 min read
435. John Braine - Room At The Top
A follow on from Lucky Jim. Interesting these post-war working class boys (if the authors really were) who are interested in different...
Sep 28, 20161 min read
433. Chad Kultgen - The Lie
Pretty good and totally different. Full of pretty lurid sex which however becomes just a motif. Quite like an 18th century novel about...
Jun 28, 20161 min read
415. Tim Lott - The Last Summer Of The Water Strider
A library book from P. Set in the 1970’s, a mildly bored and disaffected teenager is sent off to live with his hippy uncle on a houseboat...
Jun 15, 20161 min read
413. Sarah Hilary - Someone Else's Skin
Rather desperate and protracted (due to flight cancellation) airport reading on the way home. A thriller about inversion in a battered...