Question What are you reading?

[Massimo Giovanni]

The Forgotten Soldier by Guy Sajer.
A 16 year old drafted in German Army and 3 years fighting in Russia.
Harrowing read.

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

Just finished David Hepworth's Hope I get Old Before I Die: Why Rock Stars Never Die.A quirky read (as the title suggests).Exreemely well-written too.(Should add that I've seen most of the acts here play live-though by no means all!-not quite sure what that proves-if anything!).

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

Just funished Dianne Abbott's A Woman Like Me:This is a wonderful memoir & much better than her autobiography (wtitten a few years ago).

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

Just finished Roddy Doyle's The Woman behind the Door.Probably his best novel sine his first,The Commitments.RD has a great ear for dialogue.

 

[blues exile]

Decided to catch up on some famous novelists I somehow missed during my youth. Starting with Trollope's 'The Way We Live Now'. It's uncanny how similar Victorian England was to today's corruption and cronyism in high places.

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

Another vote for Marc Elliot's biography of Phil Ochs :Death of a Rebel.Excellent on the folk scene and US politics in the 60's & /70's.

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

Just finished Gabriel Gatehouse's The Coming Storm:A Journey into the Heart of the Conspiracy Machine.Well -written & researched (as you'd expect from a former Newsnight presenter) but a tad too much conspiracy theory for me.

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

finished Alan Johnson's short but excellent biography Harold Wilson.Always liked Wislon even after "the pound in your pocket" fiasco,

 

[blues exile]

finished Alan Johnson's short but excellent biography Harold Wilson.Always liked Wislon even after "the pound in your pocket" fiasco,

He must be turning in his grave at what has happened to his party.

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

Just finished Jonatan Raban's excellent Father & Son.Long been a fan of JR's (since Coasting days):Sadly this is his last book having died last yeay.Apparenly he had a stroke aged 69,which left him in a wheelchair for the last 12 years of his life:Who knew? (obviously I don't read the right papers. This memoir is jointly about his late father and histime in rehab.It's as good as anything he's written-which makes it very good indeed.

 

[Massimo Giovanni]

21 by respected historian James Holland
he spent much time interviewing rank and file military (not just British) about their experiences in WW2, most were just 21 at the time and many went from home/draft to war.
Very well written and thought provoking.

 

[rshepp]

Just finished Dan Jones. CRUSADERS.
Near 400 years of blood thirsty, cruel wars. Christians v non believers. 480 pages
Now have. PLANTAGENETS. The King's that made Britain. 1154 for over 300 years.
I go back a few months to when I put forward an idea of a library in the Shrimpers bar. 1 in 1 out.
No fee.

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

Just finished Anushka Asthana's timely Taken as Red:How Labour won Big and the Tories Crashed the Party . interesting read.As far as I'm aware this is the first book on Labour's big election win in July.

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[blues exile]

Asa Winstanley's 'Weaponising Anti-Semitism - How the Israeli lobby brought down Jeremy Corbyn'

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

I've just finished David Peace's excellent Munichs.Now I'm far from being a MU fan but this is a very moving book and as good (if not better than anything DP has done-and I'm a big fan)!

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

Not long finished Pedro Anmodovar's The Last Dream.Some of the short stories here are ver gay indeed -not supringly .But they're all very well-written.

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

Just finished The Curious Columns of Adrian Chiles.Easy reading for some perhaps but I'm quite a fan of his Grauniad stuff.

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

Just finished Jonathan Coe's The Proof of my Innocence.JC is pobably Engand's finest poltical satirist.Here he turns his hand to crime writing too.Deliciously ironic & serious at the same time.

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

Another vote for Asa Winstanley's Weaponising Anti-Semitism,which I've just finished.This is an important book,especially bearing in mind current events.

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

Just finished Alan Bennett's Killing Time.This is a vey amusing look at the effects of Covid on an old people's home.This is a subject which needs to be more widely discussed ,IMO.