Decades: Compiling the Ultimate Library with Douglas Skelton

For the first time in the Decades series I have a returning guest. Not someone who has already taken part in Decades but an author who has previously joined me as a guest to chat about books. Before this year I had not hosted any guests at Grab This Book for around three years. In the first four years of blogging I actually hosted many brilliant authors and ran some recurring features which have since been put out to pasture.

One of the features I ran was called Serial Heroes. I love an ongoing series with recurring characters and I invited authors to join me to chat about the ongoing series of books they enjoyed and looked forward to reading. That idea came from hearing today’s guest, Douglas Skelton, chatting to readers as part of the North Lanarkshire Libraries Encounters festival. Douglas told the audience that he had been a big fan of the Ed McBain 87th Precinct stories and my immediate reaction was: YES! I wanted to know which books were read by the authors I was reading. If you want some more fabulous book recommendations then pop “Serial Heroes” into the search box at the top, right of the page.

So I jumped the gun slightly when introducing Douglas Skelton. As a former journalist he will appreciate that I have checked these facts from two different sources:

Douglas Skelton has published twelve non fiction books and eight thrillers (many of which have received glowing reviews on this blog). He has been a bank clerk, tax officer, shelf stacker, meat porter, taxi driver (for two days), wine waiter (for two hours), reporter, investigator and editor.

You can find the Skelton book collection here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Douglas-Skelton/e/B001K7TR10?ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_1&qid=1620335880&sr=8-1

If you follow Douglas on Twitter @DouglasSkelton1 you will know he takes some wonderful photographs and some of his favourites are on sale through his online store here.

He is one quarter of the hilarious “Four Blokes in search of a Plot” and visitors to Bloody Scotland cannot fail to have been impressed the year Douglas played a key role in the Scotland vs England football match (he was the pre-match announcer). He also wrote the 2019 sold-out show You The Jury which wowed audiences at the festival when a criminal trial was recreated with audience members invited to become members of the jury to hear the case and decide if the accused was guilty or innocent of the charges.

As is ever the case with Decades I asked Douglas to select five books he wanted to add to my Ultimate Library. He could only select one book per decade and he must make his selections from five consecutive decades.

I hand you now to Douglas Skelton…

DECADES

I have a problem whenever I try to pick favourite books because as soon as I decide on one title, I think of a few more. I once vowed to be more decisive but then I changed my mind.

Anyway, here goes:

The Big Sleep – Raymond Chandler (1939)

I am a fan of US detective fiction and thrillers and, as you will see, I have been hugely influenced by both them and their movie counterparts. As anyone who has read the Dominic Queste books knows! I could have selected any one of Raymond Chandler’s Philip Marlowe books but went with this rich, complex tale of family deception and murder, told with his customary wit and style, not to mention some plot confusion. Who did kill the chauffeur? Who cares? This is literature masquerading as pulp – or maybe even the other way round – and I love it.

Shane, Jack Schaefer (1946)

This selection will come as no surprise as I constantly name it as one of my favourites. Again, incredibly influential to my work, particularly Davie McCall. It’s a western and the story has become timeless, I can think of at least three movies that rip it off. First published in instalments in 1946 then in expanded book form in 1949, Jack Schaefer’s reluctant gunslinger resonated with me when I read it for the first time as a teenager and has stayed with me ever since.

The Temple of Gold, William Goldman (1957)

I stumbled upon this book as a teenager in a batch given to me by my gran, who we called Nana. I knew the author, William Goldman, from his screenwork, particularly Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (when pressed, that’s my favourite movie. Then, as with books, I think of a dozen more). This was his first novel, a funny, moving rite of passage story which I have read and reread many times – and actually have two copies. One is the original which was in no great state to begin with but is extremely fragile thanks to the many re-reads. The other is a much late reprint.

Fuzz, Ed McBain (1968)

If memory serves, this acted as my introduction to the work of Ed McBain, although I read it in the 70s after seeing the movie version with Burt Reynolds. It spawned in me a deep affection for the 87^th Precinct novels which remains to this day, even though McBain (or Evan Hunter, or Richard Marston or any of the other names he used – his real name was Salvatore Lombino) has left us. I still pick one up at random and have a read whenever the mood takes me.

Marathon Man, William Goldman (1974)

William Goldman again. He was, for me, the master of the reversal. Just when you think the story or a character is one thing, he suddenly twists it and you realise it’s something else entirely. He pulls a few such tricks in the book, most of which could not be replicated in the celebrated movie, although the celebrated – notorious – dentistry scene remains intact. Apart from that, this is a fine paranoid thriller that benefits greatly from Goldman’s use of humour as well as his ability to wrong-foot us! I wish I could write like that. Altogether now – is it safe?

I will add these classics to the Library. My deepest thanks to Douglas for his continued support and for choosing such great books.

You can see all the books which have been added to the Decades Library here: https://grabthisbook.net/?p=5113

DECADES WILL RETURN

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May 2

The Family Tree – Steph Mullin and Nicole Mabry

The DNA results are back. And there’s a serial killer in her family tree…

Liz Catalano is shocked when an ancestry kit reveals she’s adopted. But she could never have imagined connecting with her unknown family would plunge her into an FBI investigation of a notorious serial killer…

The Tri-State Killer has been abducting pairs of women for forty years, leaving no clues behind – only bodies.

Can Liz figure out who the killer in her new family is? And can she save his newest victims before it’s too late?

I received a review copy of the book from the publisher through Netgalley.

Last year I read a book which had DNA testing as a central theme. A few months later I had been recounting the plot to my wife and we had a conversation about the increase of DNA testing and how the process was now accessible to so many people these days. Many commercial operations have the ability let people know more about their roots than has ever been possible in the past. This can lead to unexpected discoveries, people have been learning the people they believed to be their parents or their siblings are actually an adoptive family and not their natural birth family.

I had never considered the implications of this, however, through her work my wife had become aware of charities who provide support or counselling for people who find out accidentally that their families adopted them. It was literally the next day I began reading The Family Tree and met Liz Catalano – she and her cousin had completed an ancestry test only for Liz to discover she did not share any relatives in common with her cousin. Liz was understandably traumatized by this discovery and my conversations with my wife gave me deeper appreciation around how Liz’s world had been turned upside down.

Liz wants answers, she needs to understand where her roots lie and it puts a real strain upon the relationship she has with the people she believed to be her parents. This part of the story is beautifully represented by Steph Mullin and Nicole Mabry as the reader cannot help but feel empathy for the situation Liz finds herself experiencing and the horror and anguish of her parents who lost the ability to share this information with their daughter in the manner of their choosing. The fact they waited and never told Liz of her background is addressed and it’s easy to understand why families put off such a big conversation. Liz and her parents are a family and although Liz does understand this, there is a feeling of betrayal and curiosity of the unknown which will drive her actions through the story in The Family Tree.

Liz uploads her DNA to a national database in a bid to find more familial links and hoping to trace her natural parents. This act of sharing her DNA triggers a whole new problem for Liz. Her DNA is a close match for DNA which the police have been monitoring as it looks like Liz may be related to a killer – the notorious Tri-State Killer who has evaded authorities for over 20 years. The authorities will be knocking on Liz’s door, they want to know more about her but the information they need (Liz’s family history) is something she herself does not know.

The Tri-State Killer has been active for many years and is a notorious and dangerous predator. He abducts two women in one event every couple of years. The women remain missing for many months before, ulitmately, their bodies are discovered dumped and scrubbed clean.

I loved how the authors addressed the Tri-State Killer in the story. We take a jump back into the past to read about the first two women abducted, readers see how their killer managed to gain entrance to their apartment and how he was able to subdue them both. The story then returned to Liz and her endeavours to trace her family – it is progressing and she believes she may have found her grandparents. Then back to the Tri-State Killer and we pick up the narrative on what happens to the abducted girls after the killer has them at this mercy. But this time it isn’t the first two girls who were abducted but the third and fourth! A delightful twist which brought home the impact of the killer’s actions and a pattern which repeats through the book. Each time we return to the story of the killer it is viewed through the eyes of the women he has abducted, a different pair of women each time. The fifth and sixth women, then the seventh and eighth and so on. Each time we return to Liz and her discussions with the family she never knew only to return to two new abductees. We know their fate and we know more women will be abducted – it’s compelling and it’s grim but it makes for great reading.

I flew through The Family Tree in super quick time. The switching narrative between past and present made me want to keep reading. Liz may be related to a killer but she and the investigators cannot know who that killer may be. She continues to meet with members of her new family (despite warnings to be careful) and she puts herself at risk each time. But Liz wants to know the truth about her natural parents and she also wants to help identify a killer – but what if she destroys her new family in the process?

I never tire of finding wonderful gems like The Family Tree to read. I really enjoyed this one and it’s due for release in just a few weeks – highly recommend getting this ordered. It spins an emotive drama around a dark serial killer story and the writing just flows to keep those pages turning.

The Family Tree is published by Avon on 10 June 2021 and will be available in paperback, digital and audiobook format. You can order a copy here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B08R6QPT3F/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_bibl_vppi_i0

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April 30

Decades: Compilling the Ultimate Library with Imogen Church

The very best libraries are the ones which offer a broad selection of books to choose from. Since January I have been inviting guests to join me in a quest to determine which books should be added to the Ultimate Library. I started the Ultimate Library with no books so there was a clean slate (or empty shelves if you prefer) and I ask each guest to nominate the books they feel should be represented.

There are just two rules governing the selections each guest can make.

1- Choose Five Books
2 – You May Only Choose One Book Per Decade Over Five Consecutive Decades

In the past I have been made aware my two rules are “frustrating” and cause much gnashing of teeth. Imagine then, if you will, my delight at hearing my guest this week found making her selections “easy” and the experience to be fun!

If you visit the blog outwith my Decades posts then you will know I am a massive fan of audiobooks and enjoy nothing more than having someone read me a brilliant story. If you were to peruse my Audbile Library you would see one name repeated over and over: Imogen Church. If I am selecting my next listen and I see Imogen is the narrator (which happens often) then I am more likely to select that book over others.

I ask my guests to introduce themselves before they introduce their books so it is with great pleasure I hand you over to Imogen Church.

DECADES

Well, hello there! My name is Imogen Church and I’m an actor and writer. If you are a massive bookworm (like me) then you may know me as the narrator of roughly a gabillion audiobooks. Possibly you know my voice from audio dramas like Dr Who (for Big Finish), or as the voice of the Harry Potter Quiz on Alexa UK? Probably you don’t know me at all, which is fine too, we’re all busy and you must have better things to do with your time than knowing who I am.

Basically, I’m a storyteller. Sometimes I tell that story with my voice, sometimes with my body and sometimes by tippidy–tappedy-tap-tapping away on a computer screen and writing my brain out. Mostly, I get paid to talk to myself in a recording studio all day and, for a somewhat shy actor who is obsessed with books, that’s the greatest job in the world. I just can’t get enough of books; I read all day every day, in my head and out loud into a microphone. I also write. Most of my writing has been screenplays for films, particularly satirical horror comedy, but last year Audible commissioned me to write a novel for Audible Originals, to be narrated by moi. They asked me to write a crime novel, so obviously I wrote a satirical comedy crime caper set in an alternate world of steampunk and strippers, called Death and the Burlesque Maiden. I mean, obviously, I did that. The book was inspired by my experiences as a burlesque performer combining satirical poetry and striptease, and my experiences of life as an intersectional feminist. For those of you who have listened to Death and the Burlesque Maiden, I suspect the below literary selection may make some small sense of my writing style… the things that inspire me are comedy, social satire, black humour, the macabre, and explorations of what it is to be a woman. Also, being rude.

If you fancy finding out more about the weird world of Imogen, here are the links you need:

Instagram: @imogenchurchgobshite

Twitter: @ImogenChurch

Website: www.imogenchurch.com

And here (drumroll please) are my chosen books!

1920’s
Gentlemen Prefer Blondes by Anita Loos (published 1926)

Women have always been funny; with the crap our bodies put us through, we have to have a sense of humour. A century ago, one genius of a woman wrote a brilliantly acerbic, funny satire about the attention certain women get from men and what that means for those women and for all the women who are trying desperately to become those women. It is so funny, so biting, so sharp and witty. And she wrote it a century ago. One hundred years in the past. Yet it is still relevant… *Imogen sighs and stares off into the middle distance for a while*

1930’s
Cold Comfort Farm by Stella Gibbons (published 1932)

Did I mention that women are funny? It’s always my objective in life, to try and ‘do a Gibbons’ at any given point in time. In Death and the Burlesque Maiden I got the chance to ‘do a Gibbons’ by breaking the fourth wall and having the narrator talk directly to the reader, about the novel, mostly deriding the quality of the writing. I remember when I first read Cold Comfort Farm, the shocking oh-my-god-did-she-just-do-that joy I felt when Stella declared that she was going to help the literary critics out, by highlighting the sections she’d written rather well thank you very much, making it easier for them to pluck out and glorify her name. Throughout the novel there are moments when a particularly flowery and pretentious sentence is flagged by an asterisk or three: for our consideration. I mean… the genius! It made me die laughing and I wanted to write my own homage when I got the chance. Cold Comfort Farm is a warm and quirky pastoral parody, a silly, eccentric, heartfelt satirical joy and easily one of the greatest books I have ever read. Obviously, you can disagree with me, but I’m afraid you’d be wrong. You would be wrong.

1940’s
1984 by George Orwell (published 1949)

Orwell. Just… Orwell. I first read 1984 as a teenager and it blew the top right off my head. As I scooped my brains back inside my skull, I realised that the book had changed the shape of my brains, for life. Nowadays, any satirical dystopia has me drooling to consume it, all because of 1984. I think 1984 was the first novel to give shape to the feeling I had, that we are extremely lucky, to be alive at this point in history, in this place in history, in a world where we can access and read someone like Orwell, and the very keen feeling that I must never take that for granted. Orwell knew how small we all are, but also how important every small person can be and his writing is the most wonderful combination of misery and hope, humour and horror. Orwell. Just… Orwell.

1950’s
Wasp by Eric Frank Russell (published 1957)

I initially tracked down and read this book when I met my (now) husband and my (now) father–in–law told me it was his favourite book and he read it every single year.

Was I trying to impress him? Possibly!

Did it work? Certainly!

But did I also genuinely love the subversive, dystopian nature of it and the reminder that even the smallest individual matters? Absolutely!

Terry Pratchett chose Wasp as one of his favourite books of all time and said that he “can’t imagine a funnier terrorists’ handbook”. I rest my case.

1960’s
Catch 22 by Joseph Heller (published 1961)

If you don’t laugh, you’ll cry. Or kill yourself. This book makes you do the first two, but hopefully not the third. How else can you process the horrors of war, but to laugh through the pain? There are true horrors in Catch 22, true horrors and legitimately insane humour and those two are essential bedfellows.

Why?

Why does satire have such a hold on me? I think it’s all about power. Power, and impact for change. Satirising the terrifying, the inhumane, the oppressive, is a way to gain mastery over it. I love work that satirizes bigotry, predators, misogyny, Nazis… because mocking them gives me a feeling of power over them, that to laugh in the face of horrors, emboldens us. Also, satire is an entertaining inroad that makes for powerful impact. Humour softens an audience, it helps them relax and let down their barriers, the act of laughing releases endorphins that make us so much more susceptible… when an audience has let go of the stresses of real life, it enables the artist to get right in there, right under the ribs, right up in to the soft squishy heart of a person with ideas, ideas about cruelty and society and how to avoid moving backwards into persecution, racism, misogyny, fascism, all the things we really should be too grown up by now to be playing around with. I love art as entertainment, but I also want art to be something that helps us understand more about our lives, our world, our humanity.

I think this is why these are some of my favourite books of all time; stories that are beyond precious to me and have clubbed together to form part of who I am.

Which is why I love books.

My thanks to Imogen for her time and for these excellent additions to my Library

You can see all the books which have been added to the Library if you click this handy wee link: https://grabthisbook.net/?p=5113

DECADES WILL RETURN

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April 29

Prisoner – Ross Greenwood

A shocking thriller inspired by the true stories of a male prison officer in a women’s prison…

Prison Officer Jim Dalton works on the male side of HMP Peterborough. It’s a dangerous place, fuelled by testosterone-driven violence, but he has the prisoners’ respect. When Dalton is transferred to the female side of the prison, his next shift is so easy he can’t believe that the officers over there get paid the same wages. He sleeps well for the first time in years.

Billie hasn’t had it easy in life, and she has earned the nickname Damage because she has been known to cause some! Ending up in prison might have been inevitable, but Billie hasn’t given up on her dreams yet. If there’s a way to get out of prison faster, she’s going to find it.

When Dalton is assigned to the young offenders’ wing, dealing with female prisoners no longer seems so simple, and in Billie he fears he may have met his match. As Billie starts to turn the screw, Dalton faces losing everything…

My thanks to Rachel at Rachel’s Random Resources for the opportunity to join the blog tour.

HMP Peterborough is unusual in that it has a male wing and a female wing. Author Ross Greenwood has drawn on personal experiences when writing Prisoner – the story of Prison Officer Jim Dalton. Dalton is an experienced Officer who has worked the male side of the prison for a number of years. He works long, challenging shifts and takes all the overtime available as his family badly need the money.

At home Dalton’s personal life is a mess. His wife is struggling badly to cope with their two young children and the constant financial pressures are making things difficult. As Dalton is working as many hours as he can at the prison he is not able to give his wife the support she needs at home and this only serves to put further strain on their relationship.

Although his job at the prison is challenging Dalton understands how the place works and knows how to treat prisoners and read the moods and tensions. But his familiarity with the role is about to change when a family member is sent to the prison and put under Dalton’s care. This is far from the ideal situation so Dalton is offered the opportunity to work on the young offenders wing on the female side of the prison. Now there are lots of new challenges to be faced and Dalton is going to find that the females may be more dangerous than the male prisoners.

Initially his new duties appear easy – a roar from him (a large angry man) was sufficient to quell a fight between two of the prisoners. But he soon learns that the girls under his care have lacked or feared father figures and while he may intimidate some of them, others will be drawn to him and want to earn his good favour.

As with any group there are dominent personalities and Dalton finds the most dominant to be Billie. She has had a challenging background but seems smart, sassy and full of confidence. Dalton is warned to be careful of getting too attached to Billie but these warnings may not be sufficient and any mistakes he makes could really create big problems, both inside the prison and outside.

I thoroughly enjoyed Prisoner and I put this entirely down to the detail brought by the author. It was clear Ross Greenwood had experienced working in a prison through the detail he brings to scenes and the situations he descibes. Interactions between the prisoners felt tense and edgy and as I reader I felt the wrong word at the wrong time by any of the characters could kick off a major incident. Dalton doesn’t come across as a saint and you can see mistakes he makes as they happen and long before he reaslises himself that he is creating a problem. This leaves you anticipating a crisis and you almost want to stop him and pull him back from digging a deeper hole for himself.

There is an excellent drama about Prisoner and reading about the various girls on the young offenders wing opens your eyes to a world many of us will not have known or want to experience first hand.

Not many books set in prisons so it was interesting to be reading something which felt new – I really enjoyed it.

Prisoner is published by Boldwood Books and is available in digital and audiobook format. You can order a copy here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B08R1FGTL1/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_bibl_vppi_i0

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April 28

Geiger – Gustaf Skördeman

The landline rings as Agneta is waving off her grandchildren. Just one word comes out of the receiver: ‘Geiger’.

For decades, Agneta has always known that this moment would come, but she is shaken. She knows what it means.

Retrieving her weapon from its hiding place, she attaches the silencer and creeps up behind her husband before pressing the barrel to his temple.

Then she squeezes the trigger and disappears – leaving behind her wallet and keys.

The extraordinary murder is not Sara Nowak’s case. But she was once close to those affected and, defying regulations, she joins the investigation. What Sara doesn’t know is that the mysterious codeword is just the first piece in the puzzle of an intricate and devastating plot fifty years in the making . . .

My thanks to Tracy Fenton of Compulsive Readers for the opportunity to join the Geiger Blog Tour and to the publishers for my review copy.

My introduction to Geiger was a powerful promotional tease. A woman waves goodbye to her visiting family, takes a phonecall on which a single word is spoken”Geiger”. She then retrives a hidden pistol and executes her husband. How could you not want to know what followed that?

When you pick up Geiger that tease happens right at the start of the book. The story opens with the end of a family holiday where the grandchildren had been staying with Grandma Agneta and Grandpa Stellan. The grandchildren’s parents have been on holiday but now return to see their parents and recover their children. A happy family gathering where Grandpa Stellan shows off his garden and all his plants and Grandma Agneta tries to keep a degree of calm amongst the brood of grandchildren before they are packed into cars and the holiday ends. As the families depart and goodbye’s are waved that phone call takes place. Grandma Agneta answers and shortly after she steps up behind Grandpa Stellan and shoots him in the back of the head.

Agneta goes on the run. Many years earlier she had a handler, a contact who ensured she had access to an untraceable car, money and another weapon. What prompted this shocking turn of events? The police will initially be stumped. Grandpa Stellan is famously known across Sweden as Uncle Stellan. He was one of Swedish televisions most beloved faces, for years he had been a reliable and safe pair of hands and everyone in Sweden knew and loved Stellan. His murder will cause shockwaves through the country. The disappearance of his wife, Agneta, is the most worrying element for the police – was she kidnapped, is she running for her life or has she been killed and her body hidden? It certainly does not occur to them that Agneta may have been responsible.

Sara Nowak is a Swedish police officer. She works to prevent prostitution, attacks on working women and to stop the men who are exploiting vulnerable women and working as their pimps. Sara struggles to supress her anger when she sees men abusing the women she is trying to protect. Men being arrested are fair game to a kick or a punch from Sara and it is causing problems with her colleague. Sara has just arrested a man for beating a prostitute when the call comes through about Uncle Stellan. As a child Sara had grown up with Stellan and Agneta and she had played with their daughters – Sara’s mother had been the cleaner for the family. Sara rushes to the crime scene intent on being part of the investigation.

From this point on Sara relentlessly pursues the truth behind the family she grew up with. She uncovers a hidden life for Uncle Stellan who appears to have been deeply sympathetic to the East German political approach and there are strong links to the Stasi. His political leanings are just the tip of the iceberg though and Sara will unearth more and more shocking information about the family she clearly did not know as well as she thought.

Dividing her time between official investigations into attacks on the working girls in Sweden and the digging she is doing into Stellan’s disappearance we see Sara stretched and worn down by events. She enlists help from journalists, other police and even the security services will try to tap her for information – Sara will need some quid-pro-quo on that front.

There’s a lot to take in with Geiger. It’s a police drama with a lot of espionage and terrorism elements in there too. I’d recommend this to anyone who enjoys a spy thriller, a police drama and everyone that likes a great story – be warned, however, there are some potentially upsetting elements too best described in a non-spoilery way as “exploitation”.

Well worth hunting this one down – powerful drama.

Geiger is published by Zaffre on 29 April 2021 and is available in Hardback, Digital and Audiobook format. You can order a copy here:

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April 23

Decades: Compiling the Ultimate Library with Tim Baker

At the end of 2018 I collated my favourite books of the year. This is something I do every year, but in 2018 I gave the post the imaginative title of “Top Ten Reads of 2018” so it would be easily identifiable. On that list was a terrific book called City Without Stars. This book remains one of the best books I have read since Grab This Book launched in 2014 – I was utterly swept away by it at the time. So before today’s guest can share his recommendations I will nip in early and urge you to seek out City Without Stars. Just click the name and you will spring to a vendor who will sort you out with a copy!

The reason I mention City Without Stars is that my Decades guest this week is Tim Baker, author of the aforementioned book, and as Tim is going to be discussing books written by other people I wanted to make sure I got my cheerleading in first.

This isn’t Tim’s only book and I want to give a second cheer for Fever City which I have also reviewed and which I also thoroughly recommend. You can catch all of Tim’s books here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Tim-Baker/e/B018VPM0VM?ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_3&qid=1619117335&sr=8-3

If you are new to the Decades series I will recap why we are here.

I wanted to know which books would be added to the Ulitmate Library if you started with no books and built up a Library from scratch. How to choose which books should be included? I could not possibly undertake this task alone so I invite booklovers to nominate five books to be added to the Ultimate Library. To bring a degree of control to the process my guests must follow just two rules:

1 – Choose Any Five Books
2 – You May Only Choose One Book Per Decade From Any Five Consecutive Decades.

Now I turn you over to Tim Baker who will introduce his five selected titles and Tim has kindly provided the actual covers of the editions of the books he read.

DECADES

Born into a show business family in Sydney, Tim Baker travelled extensively around Australia and Europe before moving to Rome at the age of 23. He later lived in Madrid before settling in Paris, where he wrote about jazz and became a French citizen. He has published a collection of short stories, Out From the Past with William Collins and two novels, the JFK-themed neo-noir, Fever City and the epic crime novel, City Without Stars, both with Faber. He currently lives in the South of France with his wife, their son, and two rescue animals, a dog and a cat.

1930-1940

AS I LAY DYING, William Faulkner, 1930

“My mother is a fish.”

I discovered this novel in our municipal library in Campsie, western Sydney, when I was 15. Our family was on the ropes. One of my parents’ theatrical ventures was going south and we were about to lose our home. Not for the last time, I desperately needed the distraction and solace of a good book and picked up my first Faulkner. I read As I Lay Dying in one sitting. It changed my life.

1940-1950

THE SHELTERING SKY, Paul Bowles, 1949

“Reach out, pierce the fine fabric of the sheltering sky, take repose.”

Port and Kit Moresby are not your ordinary, well-to-do American expatriates, eschewing the Riviera for the unexplored, “more authentic” experience of North Africa. As his name suggests, Port is attracted to wilder shores, whether they be physical or emotional, and as the couple begins to push deeper into the desert, their voyage becomes a searing journey into the collective soul of a couple and the limits of shared love in the modern world. And then halfway through the novel, something tragic and extraordinary happens that takes your breath away, thrusting Kit into unimaginable territory. A devastating, unforgettable read.

1950-1960

DOCTOR ZHIVAGO, Boris Pasternak, 1958

“How wonderful to be alive, he thought, but why does it always hurt?”

What makes this novel so exceptional is the way it effortlessly inhabits two apparently contradictory worlds. One is a convincing and convulsive portrayal of a momentous moment in history – the turmoil, excitement and tragedy leading into and during the Russian Revolution, and the crushing despair that follows. The other is the poignant and intimate world of the two doomed lovers, Yuri and Lara, who must learn to live their brief, poetic moments together to the fullest, and to leave the rest to the meanderings of history and fate. The main themes of Zhivago, like all the other books in this selection, are our constant battle with despair and alienation, our sense of being both lonely and alone, and our desperate quest for the liberation of love.

1960-1970

WIDE SARGASSO SEA, Jean Rhys, 1966

“One day it all falls away and you are alone”

The creative audacity of Jean Rhys in taking Jean Eyre and turning it on its head with her creation of her protagonist, Antoinette Cosway/ Bertha Mason, is matched by her lush, insistent prose, haunted by the revenants of slavery, oppression, cruelty, injustice, magic and misogyny. The 1960s are often remembered for the bold flamboyance of its loud male authors – Mailer, Vidal, Vonnegut, Kesey et al – but this decade of post-colonial convulsion and women’s liberation found its most convincing voice in Rhys’ subversive masterpiece. A post-modernist classic that lingers like a guilty fever dream.

1970-1980

JR, William Gaddis, 1975

“—Money . . . ? in a voice that rustled.”

I can think of no other opening line that so brilliantly announces the theme of a book – in this case a blistering satire about America’s tortured self-enslavement to the almighty dollar. Long before The Bonfire of the Vanities, there was JR, the schoolboy/financial Wizard of Wall Street who can do no wrong so everyone else can do no right. Gaddis had been experimenting with writing plays in the three decades between his magnificent debut, The Recognitions and this, his second novel, and that work shines through in the book’s daring use of dialogue – multiple voices interposing different views, different lives, different lies – all cohering into a relentless but cohesive babble about bucks. Both horrifying and deeply funny, it remains the greatest fictional commentary on the insanity and insatiability of post-WWII capitalism.

My thanks to Tim. I think there can be little doubt there are some classics in the five which certainly should be included in every library.

If you want to see all the books which have been added to my Library so far then you can visit it here: https://grabthisbook.net/?p=5113

DECADES WILL RETURN

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April 16

Decades – Compiling the Ultimate Library with “Raven Crime Reads”

Another week and I bring word of a new booklover who is prepared to don the Hat of the Curator and help me select five books which are to be added to my Ulimate Library.

What is this Library? Back in January I had the thought – if I were to build a library from scratch, no books on any shelves, which books would I need to ensure were included? Clearly this was too much of a challenge to take on personally so I started inviting guests to join me and I asked each of them to select five books to include in the Library.

Two Rules:
1 – Select Five Books
2 – Guests can only pick one book per decade over five consecutive decades.

My guest today is Raven from Raven Crime Reads. Raven and I began blogging around the same time and I often find when I am honoured with a review quote inside a book that Raven is also quoted in that same book. We share a mutual appreciation of many authors. However, as her selections will reveal, Raven reads a much broader range than I and she has a fabulous eye for choosing a brilliant story. There are many bookbloggers sharing the booklove but Raven’s reviews are ones I will always make time to read – I am thrilled she agreed to join me for this challenge.

I always invite my guests to introduce themselves so I hand over to Raven (who seemingly has another name too) and ask her to introduce her books.

Decades

Hi, this is Jackie aka Raven Crime Reads , a blog that I started 8 years ago following a very inspiring conversation at a crime festival with two excellent crime writers, William Ryan and William Shaw- my favourite type of bills. I’m also known for my poor jokes. I am a judge for the annual Petrona Award for Scandinavian Crime Fiction with the wonderful Kat Hall (Mrs. Peabody Investigates ) and Karen Meek (Euro Crime) focusing on one of the most popular sub genres of crime, and something that sings to the depths of my dark soul. Crikey. And swiftly moving on, although my blog is centred on my love of crime fiction, I read widely from fiction to horror to science to nature to history to whatever…

I’m now based in the South West of England after living up and down the country, and have been a bookseller with Waterstones for almost twenty years, which runs alongside my role as a commercial expert and buyer for stores in my local region. I have a BA in English Literature and an MA in British and American Fiction, and like many other people my love of reading was fostered from an early age. With my particular background, and books having been a bit of a luxury, libraries were an absolute lifeline as a book obsessed little kid. The holy grail of my adult library card at the age of ten, and having a voracious reader for a mum all the way, held me in good stead for my very book-related journey through life.

For more of my bookish ramblings and other nonsense, you can find me on Twitter @ravencrime, and for far more sensible book stuff at GoodReads too.

And so to Gordon’s challenge, and what a challenge, to find five favourite reads in five consecutive decades. I think I severely under-estimated this difficulty of this, as many scribblings, post-its and Googled publication dates later, it has taken some time to get this final five nailed down. But here they are in all their glory, beginning in the 1970’s through to the 2010s…

1970-1979 Maj Sjöwall & Per Wahlöö – The Abominable Man (1971)

To be honest, I could have picked any one of the ten book series collectively titled The Story Of A Crime by the superb writing partnership of Maj Sjöwall & Per Wahlöö, but have always loved this one in particular for the amount of peril their chief protagonist, homicide detective Martin Beck finds himself in. Undoubtedly this series of books, aside from influencing generations of Scandinavian crime writers, kickstarted my passion for the genre. With its emphasis on the socio-political climate of the time, the relatively pared down writing style and the accomplished structuring of compelling police procedurals, this series stood above its time, and ignited the passion for Scandinavian crime that has remained with me ever since.

1980- 1989 Mark Timlin- A Good Year For The Roses (1988)

Strongly influenced by Ed McBain, Raymond Chandler and Ross MacDonald, Mark Timlin’s series featuring Nick Sharman, a former Met police officer turned private investigator in South London, was one I raced through in my late teens- A Good Year For The Roses is the first of the series. Having already read McBain’s 87th Precinct series (which also remains a favourite) I loved the grimy noir feeling of Timlin’s writing, and his maverick protagonist operating outside of the law, and still enjoy the ‘private investigation’ genre for the freedom it gives crime writers to place their characters in more physical and moral danger. Sharman was an exemplar of this, with his fair share of violent encounters , a cynical wit, and his somewhat fluid moral approach to the cases he undertakes. Timlin’s writing style made a big impression for me, and still influences the kind of noir detective/P.I. fiction that I tend to read- real punchy noir. There is also a strong influence of music in his books which has stayed with me, and has led to my love of writers like Doug Johnstone for example who punctuates his books with musical references.

1990- 1999 Tim O’Brien- The Things They Carried (1990)

My interest in the war genre really started growing up in the naval city of Portsmouth in the 1980’s, where the Falklands conflict was particularly resonant in our consciousness. On the back of this I started to develop an interest in the Vietnam War, as another singularly pointless war, and read books such as Dispatches by Michael Herr and A Rumor Of War by Philip Caputo, and then started looking for fiction, stumbling upon Tim O’Brien, whose books just blew me away, later forming the basis for my MA dissertation. O’Brien’s books based on his own tours in Vietnam, have a layer of sensitivity that underpin his always central theme of the human heart under stress. This book in particular, really emphasises the emotional lives of men in conflict, and the need to hold on to the human connection, be it with their fellow soldiers or those they left behind. He never shirks from the violence and pity of war, but digs down beneath the surface of these soldiers’ lives as they fight to survive, mixing brutal reality with a real sense of poignancy.

2000-2009 Don Winslow- The Power Of The Dog (2005)

You know that phrase about never meeting your heroes? Well try writing about them! I absolutely adore Don Winslow’s writing and will only add my still small voice to the overwhelming acclaim that this book has gathered from writers and readers alike. With six years research and being the first instalment of a sweeping trilogy (preceeding The Cartel and The Border) The Power Of The Dog is hands down one of, if not the best, thriller I have ever read. Spanning decades and continents, Winslow’s astute, visceral, authentic, multi-voiced and utterly compelling book focussing on the DEA’S war on drugs, is a masterclass in thriller writing, with no let up of this in the other two books in the trilogy. Rooted in the harsh reality of the international drug trade, with such close adherance to socio-economic and political fact, and peopled with a cast of characters that will anger, enthral or tap your empathy in equal measure, this is an absolute classic.

2010-2019 Antonin Varenne- Retribution Road (2014)

And the difficulty of this Decades challenge continues trying to pick a standout book from recent years, but this is it. To be quite honest, I could have picked any of Varenne’s books for this as Bed Of Nails, Loser’s Corner, or Equator (the follow up to Retribution Road) are superb too, but Retribution Road it is. A sprawling 700+ page novel structured in three parts, with a real feeling of a classic quest or odyssey, the book follows Arthur Bowman, a former soldier, an avenging angel and pioneer from conflict in Burma, to Victorian London and finally to the swathes of unconquered territory in America in the grip of the gold rush. A complex and challenging novel it encompasses themes of war, revenge, violence, human connection, religion, compassion and emotional strife, and supported with the beautifully naturalistic writing of landscape (another of my passions) throughout I was just entranced by this. Not an easy read but so, so worth it…

My deepest thanks to Raven for finding time to share her selections. Once again I do feel a degree of guilt over the angst I caused. But come back in a fortnight when my guest, who will take Decades into the month of May, told me she had found the challenge “EASY” and had no problems making her choices!

As you may have noticed I like to gauge the depth of my reading knowledge by measuring how many of the selections I have previously read. Raven has left me red-faced this week as I have not read any of her choices but I have since sneakily added two of the five to my TBR.

If you want to visit the Library and see all the selections made to date then you need to click here: https://grabthisbook.net/?p=5113

DECADES WILL RETURN

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April 15

The Island – Ragnar Jónasson

Four friends visited the island. But only three returned . . .

Detective Inspector Hulda Hermannsdóttir is sent to the isolated island of Elliðaey to investigate a disappearance.

But she finds haunting similarities to an old case – the murder of a young woman ten years ago.

Has a patient killer struck again?

What secrets is the island hiding?

And what price will she pay for uncovering the truth?

I received a copy of The Island through Netgalley

One of the issues with juggling work, family and then reading and blogging is actually finding the time to do them all. The one which slipped most over the last 18 months was the blogging as the day job changed and took time away from blogging. The reading was able to continue (albeit at a slower pace) but writing up reviews of everything I read didn’t happen. So I am spending some time catching up on reviews I wanted to write but did not have the chance at the time.

One book I particularly enjoyed was the second in Ragnar Jónasson’s Hidden Iceland series: The Island. Normally I would be explaining how events pick up from the action in the first book (The Darkness) but that isn’t how this trilogy is working. The Hidden Iceland series is a trilogy which is being written in reverse so The Darkness and its unexpected finale happen after The Island which is the book that was written after The Darkness. Simple.

Knowing what the future brings for the investigating detective Hulda Hermansdottir makes her past behaviours seem more significant. In this outing she is called to investigate a death on a remote Icelandic island. Readers know that a group of schoolfriends had stayed at the island some years earlier and that during their stay tragedy struck. Now one of their number has proposed a reunion of the surviving friends. It is a strange suggestion as after the tragic events of their first visit the friends drifted apart and are no longer close.

The reader is treated to a creepy opening and the utter remoteness of the island does give the story a stillness and an intensity which almost makes you feel you should be treading carefully around Hulda’s investigations and the reunited friends (who seem to be struggling to keep each other company).

As we have come to expect from this author, the plotting is meticulous and the cast are used wonderfully to maximise the uncertainty for the reader. You are always guaranteed entertainment from Ragnar Jónasson and The Island did not disappoint.

The Island is published by Penguin and is available in paperback, digital and audiobook format. You can order a copy here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Island-Hidden-Iceland-Book-Two/dp/1405930829/ref=sr_1_16?dchild=1&qid=1618428925&refinements=p_27%3ARagnar+J%C3%B3nasson&s=books&sr=1-16&text=Ragnar+J%C3%B3nasson

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April 10

Decades: Compiling the Ultimate Library with Louise Fairbairn

Back in January I decided I wanted to build up a library of essential reads as chosen by booklovers. I started with empty shelves and I invite each of my guests to nomainate five books they feel should be added to my Ultimate Library. There are two rules:

1 – Choose ANY five books
2 – You can only choose one book per decade over five consecutive decades.

Today I am joined by Louise Fairbairn. Journalist, blogger and frequent chair and contributor to many book events. Recently Louise helped me prepare for my first appearance in an online event (which still remains secretly under wraps) and her wise council was very much appreciated as the butterflies were taking hold. I am frequently in awe of the diverse range of books she is able to discuss in depth and her assistance with my Decades project was always something I had hoped would happen.

I will hand over to Louise and invite her to introduce herself and her five selections.

DECADES

I’m a freelance production journalist and proofreader, and was the crime fiction reviewer for The Scotsman newspaper for several years. I chair the occasional event, am a Bloody Scotland Book Club panellist, and currently am a judge for New Zealand’s 2021 Ngaio Marsh Award for Best First Novel. I blog about crime fiction as The Girl With All The Crime Books (www.crimebookgirl.com / @crimebookgrrl), and ramble on about other stuff as @scarletrix on Twitter.

I could read before I started school (which didn’t impress the teachers) and since then it’s been a rare day I haven’t read a chapter of something at some point. We didn’t have a lot of books at home when I was young, but there were many well-used library tickets, book tokens often appeared for birthdays, and second-hand bookshops remain something that my family is incapable of walking past without entering, “just for a look”.

Picking just five books was HARD! My “Desert Island Books” are very different to this list, too (Neil Gaiman, Terry Pratchett, Peter O’Donnell, Val McDermid and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle). But I’ve chosen books I utterly love, and that I think demand to be read in one sitting while your cup of tea goes cold because you are so enthralled.

1940s

1946 Daphne du Maurier – The King’s General

I had a bit of a Daphne du Maurier binge a couple of years ago, and discovered this gem. She wrote a string of novels (most famously Rebecca) and heaps of short stories (including The Birds and Don’t Look Now), and led a rather peculiar life, if Margaret Forster’s biography is in any way accurate. All her novels are very different, all of them testament to an incredible imagination – and they’re often a bit *odd*. The King’s General is set around the time of the English Civil War, and is a romance with a bit of a mystery, but mostly is an incredible portrait of a woman’s life and the strength she finds when so much is ranged against her. I normally don’t much like historical fiction, and I’m definitely not a fan of romance, but this is just terrific – utterly gripping plot, a fascinating history lesson, and chock-full of emotional intrigues.

1950s

1955 Alistair MacLean – HMS Ulysses

I wanted to drop in an Alistair MacLean because they’re great action thrillers that sold ridiculous amounts of millions of copies in his lifetime, yet he’s all but forgotten these days and I think he shouldn’t be. But just to be awkward, I’m recommending his debut, HMS Ulysses because it’s not like all the others. As with several of his later novels, it draws on his experiences during the Second World War, but while it’s fiction, it has no need to exaggerate for effect because the experience of the Arctic convoys was so extreme. The thriller plot holds the attention fine, but what sticks in the mind is the battle against the elements as much as the enemy, and the way he evokes the deep-seated fear of the men who went through hell every time they left port. It’s a book that tears at you, but you cannot put it down. Unlike several other titles of his, it made such an emotional impact I’m not in a rush to re-read it, but it’s astonishingly powerful.

1960s

1961 Muriel Spark – The Prime Of Miss Jean Brodie

I almost went with The Girls Of Slender Means, which I adore, but there’s a reason The Prime Of Miss Jean Brodie is so well known and so enduring and it’s not just Maggie Smith’s amazing portrayal in the 1969 film. The novel is only 128 pages long, but it’s absolutely rammed full of plot, character work, evocation of place and some of the sharpest, wittiest, most poignant foreshadowing you’ll ever see in fiction. I studied it at university, and it was among the few books that I enjoyed rather than endured, then have re-read it several times since as it’s just so entertaining and rewarding. Spark was a poet, so stuffing lots of ideas and sensations into a tiny number of sentences was in her nature, but it’s still a masterclass in how much richness you can offer in so few words.

1970s

Ted Lewis – Get Carter (aka Jack’s Return Home)

I’ve been banging on about Ted Lewis for a few years, and it’s entirely Nick Triplow’s fault – I picked up his biogrphy of Lewis when it came out, then saw him do a Q&A at a screening of Get Carter, after which we had a pint and a chat. Thanks to him I’ve been hooked by Get Carter, the novel. It’s interesting to compare it with the film – the setting is different, being moved form Humberside to Newcastle, but to me the main change is that Michael Caine makes Jack more human than he is in the book. In Lewis’s novel he’s uncompromising, unwavering and often brutal; in teh film there’s a glimmer of something else behind the cold gaze – in part because of Caine’s film CV rather than anything he does overtly. Lewis specialised in unlikeable protagonists and grimy, unsettling true noir plots, and while he’s an uneven writer, his best are gripping reads. Get Carter is perhaps the most accessible; I’d recommend both book and film for any library. Watch/read with a pint in a thin glass to hand.

1980s

1984 William Gibson – Neuromancer

I spent a lot of my teens and 20s reading sci-fi and fantasy, and comics, and still dip into that world now and then (comics is a medium, not a genre, people!), so Neuromancer in part stands for all that. It’s also just a little slice of genius. As with SF authors since forever ago, William Gibson gives us a brave new world extrapolated from and built on the one we live in – plus here he gives us the terms “cyberspace” and “the matrix”, and is credited with creating the archetypal “cyberpunk” novel. Information is thrown at you with no explanation, just go with it and you’ll find it’s a great ride – and something of a crime novel too, if you care to look at it from a certain angle. It’s perhaps dated now, but try and read it in the spirit of 1984 (I first read it circa 1989, hat tip to my pal Neal for pressing it into my hand) and feel its freshness, and the wonder and glee of that first audience. Gibson’s whole oeuvre is worth exploring, he’s a very thoughtful writer who sees the world from interesting angles.

Some big, big titles in this selection. My thanks to Louise for taking on my Decades challenge – I know she spent quite a lot of time deliberating over her final selection as I got frequent updates which suggested I had caused some frustration!

You can see all the books which have been added to my Ultimate Library here: https://grabthisbook.net/?p=5113

DECADES WILL RETURN

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April 10

Last Prophecy of Rome – Iain King

NEW YORK: A delivery van hurtling through Wall Street blows up, showering the sky with a chilling message: America is about to be brought down like the Roman Empire. And there’s only one man who can stop it.

ROME: Maverick military historian Myles Munro is on holiday with girlfriend and journalist Helen Bridle. He’s convinced a bomb is about to be detonated at the American Embassy.

When a US Senator is taken hostage, Myles is caught in a race against time to stop a terrorist from destroying America in the same way ancient Rome was thousands of years ago.

As Myles hurtles from New York to Iraq, Istanbul and Rome, he’s desperate to save the world’s superpower. But can he stop a terrifying threat from becoming reality before it’s too late?

I received a review copy from Bookouture through Netgalley

Last Prophecy of Rome is an action adventure which takes lead character, Myles Munro, across the globe. It’s a grand scale story and sees Munro thrust into the heart of another adventure but it’s not a situation he wants to be in.

America is under threat. A terrorist called Juma plans to bring America to its knees and see it crumble to dust in the way the mighty Roman empire once fell. Munro is an historian and can see parallels between past events and the current threat which America faces. The action commences with an explosion – a delivery van in Wall Street (the heart of New York’s financial might) blows up and causes instant chaos and fear.

Myles Munro is introduced and the quirky protagonist from Secrets of the Last Nazi is soon in the thick of the action once again. In a pacy action thriller it is difficult to review without straying too far into Spoiler Territory. What I can share is that Munro is on top form and that is entirely down to the detailed and informed research Iain King brings to the party. The whole backstory has the feel of “this could happen” the assertions of the terrorists are based upon past events. There are real incidents driving their actions and there are people who have put their faith in a rebalancing of the natural order who want to see America diminished. Munro knows these historical events and he patiently explains to the authorities why they are being targeted. It brings authenticity and tension to the unfolding action.

From high drama “Hollywood Blockbuster” set piece dramas to moments of contemplative reflection and consideration, Iain King keeps Munro front and centre throughout the story. If you enjoy action packed page turners with the endangered but bulletproof hero then this is the book you should be seeking out.

Last Prophecy of Rome is published by Bookouture and is available in digital, audio and paperback format. You can order a copy here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Last-Prophecy-Rome-action-packed-conspiracy-ebook/dp/B018UWX8V2/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1534001439&sr=8-1&keywords=last+prophecy+of+Rome

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