Book List - Part 3

Ah, the final part. I said 'top three' in my last post and, well, I lied. I implied that I had a 'top' of anything. Again, these are just ten of the books that stayed with me "for some reason" and some of them are for different reasons. So far, most of them have been fiction (and I suspect that will remain so) but I ought to explain this apparent bias.

Factual books I love, I do, but I view them as a means to an end - a way to acquire more knowledge or to think in a new way. As a consequence I am strictly utilitarian, mostly, when reading them. Some, like one in this installment, make me think so much in a new way that they stay with me. Most, I dip in and out of chasing references or sources. I am an historian and I read like that all the time. I said before that I do not prize a clever narrative over facts, and I don't, so 'great literature' to me can rarely be factual - mostly I chase information through labyrinthine corridors left by dry academics, and I like that. See a clever bit of prose and I get suspicious - what angle are they going for and why would they want me to focus on the prose rather than the facts?

However, I do respect the fact that some factual books are simply mind-blowing. Here I must plead the arrogance of youth and of my profession. I have worked so long and so hard to appear unfazed that I usually convince myself that mind-blowing information isn't. Now, I have already cited The Politics of Breastfeeding as one of my books and tonight I shall cite two more factual tomes that did blow my mind. But, hopefully, this explains why fiction has such a lasting hold on me.

Book List - Part 2

The click-bait continues! I was asked about ten books that stayed with me "for some reason" and I have only managed to talk about four of them. Because I often don't take the time to breathe (thank you, +Karen Schumacher, you are correct) I took a break and will likely take another yet. Still, I waffle enough and I still haven't done any original writing, so on with the list!

Book List - Part 1

This place has lain fallow for a long time. What with moving jobs and moving house and then settling into a brand new place and then attempting (and failing) nano last year, it's been hard for me to write anything of note and so I haven't been posting here. I don't know if I can make a change just yet (work, though lovely, is still very full at the moment) but someone did ask me what my top ten books were recently.

I know, it's a click-bait list article thing, and I can't really rank the books that I like easily. However, I think I can give you ten books that have stayed with me for "some reason" and briefly explain why. I can't promise any order to the list, any rhyme or reason to the inclusion of books or any great themes that I shall be exploring. Equally, there will be books that are missing simply by dint of me having read them too recently for them to have stayed with me yet, like How to be a Woman by Caitlin Moran and Kazuo Ishiguro's Remains of the Day, which are both brilliant books in their own rights and will no doubt make me think for a long while yet but, having only been read in the last few weeks, can't really qualify for the list.

Then there's the influential books that shaped who I am today: Bernard Cornwell's Sharpe series, Tom Clancy's books, Colin Dann's Animals of Farthing Wood series or pretty much anything by John Wyndham (his short story Consider Her Ways was very much part of making me who I am, as was The Trouble with Lichen and, of course, Chocky). Obviously not all of those can make a list of ten books that have stayed with me, so the list will be culled and will be pretty random. Without any further ado then, the list continues after the line break.