Books/Authors

[Dylan]

Couple of people mentioned 'Le Carre' but always prefered Len Deighton myself. 'Funeral in Berlin' and 'The Ipcress File' recommendable if you like the cold war spy stories. Also liked the films. Love Michael Caine as Harry Palmer.

David Niven's 'The moon's a balloon' is an extremely entertaining autobiography. Clive James' 'Falling towards England' is brilliant.

Possibly my fave all time non-fiction works is a little known road book called 'Blue highways' by William 'least heat' Moon. The guy is half native American working as an English teacher in college.When he loses his job, he buys a pick up truck and sets off to discover the real America travelling along B roads (marked in blue on American maps) and avoiding the major cities. Wonderful.

How did I ever forget about Deighton! My step-dad read those and as such I did too. It kind of got me into the whole genre.

 

[monty]

I have a great love of Conan Doyle, Roddy Doyle and Nevile Shute. My favourite is Monseratt's 'The Cruel Sea' a great war time read. The biogs of Niven, Ustinov and Dickie Bird are all well worth a look

 

[caught]

'New York Trilogy' is weird but good. 'Leviathon' is much more readable

I prefer the NY trilogy myself. Interesting idea, existentialist novellas in the form of the crime genre. City of Glass is the best of the three.

 

[Dylan]

The Sharpe series by Bernard Cornwell. I am also aware the fact that Sean Bean starred in a TV version of these books. However that show may have been, don't let that discourage you from excellent historically based stories.