Decades: Compiling the Ultimate Library with Sharon Bairden

Imagine you were tasked with the impossible responsibility of stocking a library from scratch but you were only allowed to include the very best books.  Where would you start? Could you do it?  Would you include that book everyone loves but you don’t understand why?

I wanted to know which books would be in the Ultimate Library so I decided to find out.  But I don’t get to choose – I want others to do the hard work for me. Readers, writers, bloggers, publishers – I am going to ask people to help me in my epic task but I am going to set my guests two rules:

Rule 1 – Nominate Five Books which should be included in my Ultimate Library

Rule 2 – You can only select one title per decade and the decades must be consecutive so we get a 50 year publication span

Easy!

To kick things off I asked my blogger pal, and debut author, Sharon Bairden to make the first five selections.  I hand over to Sharon to introduce herself and I asked her to include some self-promotion before she speaks about other people’s books.

Hi, my name is Sharon and I live just outside of Glasgow. By day I am a manager in a small independent advocacy service and by night I have a passion for all things crime! Some of you may know me as Chapterinmylife Book Blogger https://chapterinmylife.wordpress.com where I blog about the books that I love and book festivals and launches I attend.

I have also just stepped over to the other side and my debut novel, Sins of the Father was published by Red Dog Press on 27th November 2020. It is a dark psychological thriller/suspense set in Glasgow and it explores the impact of trauma through the eyes of Rebecca Findlay – a woman who has married her husband, not out of love, but to destroy him. Book two, another standalone psychological thriller, will be out later this year.

Gordon set me an almost impossible task! He has asked me to pick five of my favourite books and tasked me to choose one from each decade over five consecutive decades, from the 60s through to the noughties! So here goes!

 

DECADES

 

1960s – it has got to be Harper Lee’s To Kill A Mockingbird. Not only is this a damn good read, it has an important message and one that resonates with me deeply. Social justice and inequality are the themes that drive this book forward and outside of reading, upholding social justice, challenging inequality, discrimination and stigma are my passions.

 

1970s – Stephen King’s The Shining. Before I delved into crime, horror was my go to read and there was nothing better than curling up with a good Stephen King novel. The Shining is probably the only book and film which has terrified me throughout my life, the isolation, the addictions, the supernatural, God, it still sends shivers down my spine!

 

1980s William McIllvaney’s The Papers of Tony Veitch, what can I say, McIlvanney was, and in many respects, still is the icon of Scottish crime fiction. I’m currently rereading this series and realise that when I read it many years ago, I did not appreciate the beauty of his writing.

 

1990s – Martina Cole’s The Ladykiller, this ignited a love of crime, gritty gang life and saw me down at my library on an almost daily basis to get my fix. I’d fallen away from reading as much in my later teen years and Martina Cole set me back on track!

 

2000 – Lin Anderson’s Driftnet. Lin’s books cemented my love of Scottish crime fiction and it was my love of her writing which led me to start to go along to book events and festivals, which in turn brought me into contact with bloggers, writers and gave me the confidence to make the first steps in realising my dream to write my own book.

 

 

My thanks to Sharon for starting the curation process.  Decades will return and more books will be added to The Library.

Until then I’d recommend picking up Sharon’s book Sins of the Father.  Click through this link and grab a copy today: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Sharon-Bairden/e/B0899BQMJX?ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_1&qid=1611164121&sr=1-1