Book recoomendations.
Top 5 books I would recommend.
1. The Road - Cormac McCarthy.
I actually got this from the library on audiobook, brilliantly read by Garrick Hagon. The novel is set in a post-apocalyptic America and follows a father and his son as they travel across a devastated, blackened landscape where snow fall is grey, and where nothing moves. They are heading for the coast, though they don't know if anything awaits them there, or what it might be. They are forced to carry their meager belongings in a shopping cart, scavenge for food, keep warm by fires, and avoid the maurauding, lawless thugs who would kill them without a second thought. The characterisation, like the landscape, is sparse, we don't know much about the characters' pasts, but that doesn't matter because for us, as for them, all that matters is the present, who they are now, and that they survive. Also, because they are the only characters in the book, and because their plight is so human and desperate, you can't help but identify with them and share their fear, anger and hope. Although this is in one way a book about two people trying to survive and maintain themselves morally and physically in a post-apocalypse world, it is also a book about family, about bonds, and about love. Father and son are 'each other's worlds entire' and both depend on each other for survival - the boy depends on his father for protection and food and love, but it's pretty obvious that the father would have given up on this quest long ago if not for his boy, and the boy is what sustains him, emotionally and morally. The boy is the reason the man is here and the reason he is fighting to survive. Boy and man are each other's sole beacon of hope and goodness in a world seemingly otherwise devoid of either.
This was one of the few books to really grab me emotionally, and to scare me. Those roving bands of lawless types are terrifying. Plus it was unputdownable. Not much 'happens', but a lot happens, if that makes sense. There's a constant tension throughout the book. Finally, although the book is nominally set in America, there's no sign of that. Nothing that defines the place as America. It could be anywhere, and that makes the story seem very real, and scary. Similarly, the man and boy are nameless, and could be anyone. Even though they are a 'man' and a 'boy', I think the reader, regardless of age, gender can very much 'feel' themselves into either character.
2. The Eye in the Door - Pat Barker.
Well, actually I'd recommend the whole Regeneration Trilogy (Regeneration, The Eye in the Door, The Ghost Road), and before you read The Eye in the Door, I would suggest you read Regeneration. The trilogy is set in the Great War, and covers a huge variety of themes - war, and what it does to the men who fight it, psychiatry, gender, sexual and class divides and issues, relationships between men and men, men and women, doctors and doctors, doctors and patients, the relationships and divides between class, gender, and sexual groups and different cultures (this last mostly in Ghost Road). Pat Barker includes several real life characters in her trilogy - the psychiatrist WHR Rivers, who treated many 'shellshock' patients during the Great War, Siegfried Sassoon, and Wilfrid Owen.
Billy Prior is the major character in The Eye in the Door, and Barker's own creation. He is a Lieutenant in the Army. From a working class, socialist background he joined up as an officer primarily to piss off his abusive, working class, socialist father and escape a life of depressive poverty and violence in working class Manchester. He also, I think, feels the need to prove himself, because he was a sickly child who suffered (and he still does) from asthma and was seen by his father, and himself, as a weakling. Prior is a deeply flawed man, and a deeply divided one. He first appeared in Regeneration, as a mute patient under Rivers' care at Craiglockhart War Hospital. His muteness was part response to the horrors he had experienced, and part working-class rebellion against the upper middle and upper classes he sees as represented by doctors like Rivers, and the people in government and the higher ranks of the military responsible for prolonging the war. In The Eye in the Door, Prior has been released from Craiglockhart and is awaiting his return to France. While 'Regeneration' focused mostly on Rivers and Sassoon, Prior is the focus in the Eye in the Door, and it is here we see what drives him, and what is coming awfully close to destroying him. Prior is deeply divided in terms of class and sexuality. In 'The Eye' he is torn between loyalty to his old, 'low friends' from working class Manchester who are heavily involved in the anti-war movement, and his duties as an intelligence officer at the Ministry of Munitions which is occupied and run by middle/upper class officer types. Prior is divided from his 'low' friends, however much he believes in their cause, by his positon as an officer in the military, and his position at the Ministry, and by his hatred of his working class father and resentment towards his downtrodden mother who always aspired for more than her working class husband could give her. Despite his attempts to help his working class friends in their cause, he is clearly divided from them despite his attempts to fit in, and one way Barker shows this is through language. Prior curses, and adopts a roughend version of his Northern accent to try to appear working class, but is divided from them still. This is shown through language in the scene where he meets with Mac, an old friend of his who is a leader in the anti-war movement. Mac is uncultured, and foul mouthed- he almost can't get a sentence out without using the word 'fuck', and this is what separates him from Prior, who uses the word frequently, but more with a purpose - when he's emotional, when referring to sex in a way that is to do with power and control, and when trying to appear working class - whereas Mac and his ilk use the word constantly, perhaps for the same reasons, but mostly because they really don't know any better.
Prior is just as divided from the officer class which his postions in the Army and at the Ministry make him a part, because of his oppositon to the war, his resentment towards the upper classes of which some members are responsible for prolonging the war, and by his working class background and rough Northern accent and language.
Ultimately, Prior belongs to no class group, and his real loyalties lie with the men he fought with, the men on the Front, and this further divides him from both class groups, but particularly from his anti-war, working class friends who he may support in some ways but whom he resents for not understanding and putting in peril, the men on the Front, just as much as the upper class government types he believes are responsible for the war.
Likewise, Prior belongs to no definite sexual group. Sex for him is mostly 'fucking', that is, it's about release, or about power and control. He uses it as a weapon - in the opening scenes of the novel, he fucks another offficer and enjoys the power it gives him over the other man. With his girlfriend, Sarah, however, sex is rare (she lives in northern England while Prior is in London for most of the novel) but is meaningful. He makes love with Sarah, and the sex is more about sustaining and comforting him emotionally and morally, Sarah is something Prior clings to in a world where he feels he doesn't belong, and where he struggles against his memories of the war and the deep divisions and conflicts within himself.
In conclusion, The Eye in the Door is a fascinating and gripping and incredibly well-written exploration of what war does to men, of the conflicts, personal and general, of class and sexuality, and of the effects the war had on the men who fight it, and on people at home - most noticeably pacifists, homosexuals, and the doctors, like Rivers, who are responsible for treating the men who return from the Front. There are some interesting bits about Rivers in this novel too, and about the conflicts he himself faces, and his relationships with the men he treats, particularly Prior, but also his complex and ongoing relationship with Sassoon.
3. Bitter Sweets - Roopa Farooki.
Again, I actually borrowed this as an audiobook from the library. It follows the story of an Indian family, through a couple of generations. It begins in 1950s Bengal, when a wheeler-dealer, conman shopkeeper marries off his lazy, illiterate daughter, Henna Rub to wealthy, romantic Ricky Karim. Henna ensnares Ricky with a web of lies and deception, ultimately trapping both in a loveless marriage that is full of lies, secrets and deceptions that come to affect and threaten to destroy the lives of future generations of the family, most noticeably their daughter Shona, decades later in London. This description makes the novel sound a bit chick-lit-y, but it's far too dark for that, although the occasional humour and romance do add a lighter touch. The book deals with the devastating, poisoning effects of lies and secrets - 'bitter sweets' which force Shona to face difficult, hard truths about her family, and which threaten to destroy the bonds of that family. The book deals with the power of secrets and lies, the nature of family, and the fact that we often cannot know the people we love and that they, more than anyone else, are capable of hurting us. The characters are flawed and real, the plot has several twists, and it gives an interesting look into Indian and British culture. A very good, unputdownable read that's much more than the cover and synopsis may make it seem.
4 The Death and Life of Charlie St. Cloud - Ben Sherwood.
This book tells the story of Charlie St. Cloud, a sweet yet haunted and troubled man. Charlie works in a cemetry, where his younger brother Sam is buried. Charlie was the perfect, all American boy - worked hard at school, good at sports, loved his mum and Sam. But a terrible accident one day leaves Charlie responsible for Sam's death. Charlie dies himself briefly, but is brought back. Ever since, Charlie has blamed himself for Sam's death, and his guilt and fear of loss have kept him from meaningful romantic involvement. One day, the adult Charlie meets Tess at the cemetry. Tess is a young woman who loves sailing and is haunted by her own loss- the death of her father, whose guidance she desperately needs and misses. Charlie and Tess fall in love, which both find difficult to deal with in some ways. The book is about love, about family, about guilt and responsibility, and the characters, although flawed and haunted, likeable and real and undoubtedly human. It's a beautiful, sweet book, but far from soppy or saacharine, given the darker themes of death and guilt and responsibility it deals with.
5. Between Two Rivers - Nicholas Rinaldi.
I initially chose this book because it deals, at the end, with 9/11. But it's so much more than a 9/11 book that I would have enjoyed it just as much without the involvement of 9/11, which apparantly the author himself added at the end - he'd almost finished the book when it happened, but felt he had to add it. And 9/11 does have a rightful place in the novel, which follows the lives of a group of people living in an apartment block in Manhattan called Echo Terrace throughout the nineties and up to the events of 9/11. The plot follows the lives of the residents and staff as their lives collide in unexpected ways that become defining for all involved. There is Farro Fescu, the concierge, who knows every whim, custom, need and desire of his residents, and through whom many of their lives connect. There's Nora Abernooth, a widow, who lives with a meagerie of birds, monkeys and snakes for desperately needed company. There's Harry Falcon, a multimillionaire, now dying slowly of cancer. There's Dr Tattafruge, surgeon to the stars and specialist on sex change operations. There's Maggie Sowle who lives a quiet life sowing quilts that will hang in galleries worldwide. There's Abdul Said, a young Muslim man, who lives with his parents but dreams of a better life and the woman he loves. There's Karl Vogel, a former Luftwaffe pilot, and Luther Rumfarm who is making it big on the stock market and quietly buying up as many apartments as he can.
The story is character driven, with chapters acting as set piece glimpses into each character's life but with more and more connections and collisions between the characters' lives. As well as being influenced by each other, their lives are also affected by occurences in the ouside world, -the coming of the millenium, and both World Trade Centre attacks among others. The story also has a distinct New York feel, and the city is part of who the characters are. The diversity of the characters is particularly evocative of the city. The book is about the ways the lives of ordinary people collide, and the way ordinary lives can be extraordinary and complex and beautiful in their own ways. It's about friendship, and relationships, and families, and love and loss and pain and grief an hope, and city/New York life. If, like me, you love films like 'Crash' which deal with the way ordinary people's lives interwine significantly with strangers, you'll like this book. The characters despite their eccentricities and flaws, are human and likeable and interesting and their ordinary lives, with their extraordinary moments, are what makes the book so brilliant and so readable. The descrptions of 9/11, and the way it impacts the lives of each character, is both heartbreaking and hopeful. A wonderful book, and for me, right up there as one of the best New York books I've ever read. One of the best books I've ever read, actually.
Note: The books listed here are in no order in terms of preference, they're all brilliant. I read a lot, and most books I just enjoy. Very few books I find, the more I read, are memorable and really have an impact on me when I'm reading them and stick with me afterwards. There are several other books I would recommend, and many I would recommend simply as 'good reads' in terms of genre of unputdownable-ness, but it's these five, that when I think over all the books I've read, stand out most clearly in my mind, as ones that have hit my reading 'taste buds' on several levels or in several ways.