100 Novels Everyone Should Read
35 watchers
Jul 2019
3:29pm, 17 Jul 2019
28,574 posts
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LindsD
I'm sure I've said this before, but I  some of MA and HATE some others. In fact, I have said this before. London Fields is in my top ten books of all time, though, and I think I've read it at least four times.
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Jul 2019
3:37pm, 17 Jul 2019
14,970 posts
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Sharkie
Hmm Linds perhaps I ought to give London Fields another chance? I didn't care for it at all. I read it in hardback at the time - borrowed from my local library.... practically on the edge of the real London Fields, very near where I lived then. Perhaps I was just disappointed the book was far more west than east London!
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Jul 2019
3:38pm, 17 Jul 2019
28,578 posts
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LindsD
I've got a copy if you want to borrow it. I *might* even have more than one copy (oops).
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Jul 2019
3:39pm, 17 Jul 2019
14,972 posts
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Sharkie
Top ten books is a big claim!
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Jul 2019
3:41pm, 17 Jul 2019
101 posts
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Love Lettuce
LAUM sounds great Daz - will try to find a copy to take on holiday with me next week. I will also be taking Richard Askwith's Today We Die A Little (not on the list, but been looking forward to it for ages).
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Jul 2019
4:01pm, 17 Jul 2019
28,580 posts
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LindsD
I know, and I'm not sure, tbh, but I think it's that thing that stuff you did/read/saw/listened to whilst young burns more brightly in the memory. I think I first read it in my early 20s.
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Jul 2019
4:14pm, 17 Jul 2019
14,973 posts
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Sharkie
Yeah, totally agree. Books, films, music - everything. I really need to edit 'my' lists forty years on.... I've been claiming Tender is the Night is practically my favourite book EVER for far too long. Might not even make top 20 these days.
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Jul 2019
4:23pm, 17 Jul 2019
2,101 posts
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DazTheSlug
as an example of one of the (many) jaw-dropping things that go in in LAUM: chapter 51 contains a list of the aforementioned 179 mini-stories; each one is precis-ed down to a single sentence; they are a joy to read in themselves; I noticed that the font had changed to a non-proportional, and that each description was *exactly* 60 characters long, and that there were weird graphic "separators" breaking the list up into the first 60, 61-120 and 121-179; this meant that there were effectively three 60x60 squares of letters (alright the third one is one short, i.e. 60x59); I noticed that the last letter of the first sentence was the same as the second-to-last letter of the second sentence, and the same as the third-to-last letter of the third sentence... etc all the way down the first letter of the 60th sentence; this letter was "e" btw for the first set of 60 sentences; a similar pattern was repeated in the other two sets (using letters "g" and "o"); this is not referred to in the text, and I can't find any reference to it on t'internet (I found one guy's blog entry who had noticed it in one of the three sets); bear in mind that this is translated from French, so kudos is also due to the translator. |
Jul 2019
4:45pm, 17 Jul 2019
5,241 posts
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Northern Exile
LL - interested to hear your thoughts on "Today We Die a Little". Just finished it, will keep my opinons to myself until you've had chance to devour it 
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Jul 2019
5:13pm, 17 Jul 2019
10,781 posts
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Cerrertonia
Not sure who translated Life:a user's manual, but it was Scottish Poet Gilbert Adair who translated Perec's "A Void", which doesn't use the letter 'e' - either in the original French or in the English translation. Suspect his 1200 word palindrome hasn't been translated though...
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