Crosswords - Talking About What I Read in 2018

So, I managed to read 104 books in 2018. That wasn’t my plan at the beginning of the year I just found myself with time to read. Or I made time to read. You can choose. I basically made sure that when I was travelling anywhere, I had a book with me, which because I commute into work every day gives me a minimum of about two hours of reading each day. Most work lunchtimes I tried to find, at least half-an-hour to read. You’d be surprised how much you can read if you do that. Particularly if – like me – you’re stupid enough to deliberately pick a slightly longer route into work because it both allows you more time to read and pretty much guarantees you a seat all the way from Willesden Junction to Waterloo.

Any other reading time is a bonus.

How did I decide what to read? Well, some of it is a spur of the moment choice in a bookshop or library. Some of it comes from a list of 1000 Novels You Should Read that I took from the Guardian a few years ago that I have since expanded with lists from other sources. Then there are recommendations from friends and family. Finally, there are several podcasts which I’ve been listening to in 2018 that have provided recommendations.

They are – in order – Backlisted, History Hit and Robin Ince and Josie Long’s Book Shambles. Backlisted is a podcast that I can’t recommend enough to anyone who likes books. Almost every book they talk about sounds interesting and their peripheral recommendations – in the introduction for example – can also turn out to be rather marvellous, for example, Eve’s Hollywood by Eve Babitz (of which more later) came in that introduction rather than being a specific book they focused on in the episode. You should give it a listen. History Hit focuses – obviously – more on history, which is a subject I am interested in reading about. Book Shambles covers a broader range of both fiction and non-fiction. It also talks more about science, which is one of the big gaps in my reading topics.

I also deliberately tried to read more poetry this year, which I managed to do. These were chosen via Acton Library, who had a surprisingly extensive selection of poetry books. Through that I got introduced to Carol Ann Duffy properly, Wendy Cope, Simon Armitage and others. Backlisted got me to read ‘Autumn Journal’ by Louis MacNeice, which I think was the best thing I read all year from a poetry perspective, although Carol Ann Duffy’s ‘Rapture’ blew my mind on reading it. I binge read it and even now it pops up in my mind on occasions.

So, I’m going to list my Top Five reads. First non-fiction and then fiction.

Our Boys – The Story of a Paratrooper by Helen Parr

This is one of the most moving books of military history and sociology that I’ve ever read. It takes the story of Helen Parr’s Uncle Dave who died fighting in the Falklands War and using it as the seed to tell a much bigger story of the Parachute Regiment (and the men who joined it), the society they lived in and the impact the Regiment and War had on their families

Death in Ten Minutes by Dr Fern Riddell

The story of Kitty Marion, a Suffragette this book digs deeper than into one – admittedly interesting -life and talks about a campaign of violence that could only be described as terrorism that we have edited out of our collective memory. There’s so much to praise in this book, not least of which is the writing itself.

The Literary Churchill by Jonathan Rose

I have read a lot of books about Winston Churchill, but this is the first one which I think gets a real grip on Churchill’s personality. I found myself reading this and Rose’s research and the conclusions he draws from that feel right. If you want to understand why Churchill was the person, he was – warts and all – this is the book to read.

Operation Chaos: The Vietnam War Deserters Who Went to War With The CIA, The Brainwashers & Each Other by Matthew Sweet

I haven’t read a book by Matthew Sweet that isn’t damn good, but this is an astonishing read. The subtitle of the book pretty much outlines what this book is about. The story is too good and too weird not to be told and Matthew Sweet tells it wonderfully well. And you can see the seeds sown that helped create our weird conspiracy culture (and Donald Trump if you look hard enough

The Anna Karenina Fix: Life Lessons from Russian Literature by Viv Groskop

A late entry here as I read this in a binge read last week but it does a great job of making you want to read some of those big Russian novels that you've avoided because they seem both depressing and difficult. Groskop draws out key themes, contextualises their writing and helps with some of the things that makes these books seem so difficult to approach, especially the names. 

Next up…Fiction

Eve’s Hollywood by Eve Babitz

I’m not sure if this is fiction in the purest sense because it is more of a memoir. I’ve put it here because whatever you want to call it I found it utterly captivating from start to finish. Clever, funny, witty and beautifully written this is a book that – and yes, I’m going to say it – if it was written by a man would be up there with ‘On the Road’ as a more than cult classic. I loved it. I’ll re-read it.

My Antonia by Willa Cather

I’d not come across anything by Willa Cather before this but there’s something rather beautiful about this story of a relationship that isn’t quite a romantic relationship. Cather’s writing is wonderful, especially her descriptions of land and landscapes but there’s a brilliant scene involving the arrival of a gaggle of children that is one of the best bits of writing I’ve seen anywhere.

Kokoro by Natsume Soseki

This is an early 20th-century Japanese novel about two men of two different generations becoming friends, although there will be much more to this in the end. It’s beautifully written and is moving in that understated way that one thinks of when talking about the ‘stiff upper lipped’ Englishness of the 19^th century. It’s a wonderful read.

Bid Me To Love by H.D.

This is probably the ‘artiest’ book on my list, but it is also a book that is about love, loss and the artistic flowering of an individual. It is – in a similar way to Eve’s Hollywood – a fictionalised version of a real life. It is unusual in being a feminine perspective on World War One and is worth reading as part of a double-bill with Richard Aldington’s ‘Death of a Hero’. Aldington is a character in H.D.’s novel and H.D. is a character in Aldington’s book. The two books give a fuller account of their relationship that just each individual text, but H.D.’s book also has the extra benefit of being about the realisation of a talent

A Man Called Ove

This is a book I came to on the recommendation of my brother, Karl. I saw the film first and then read the book. The film is great, but the book is magnificent. It’s blackly funny, moving and thoughtful. Read it and then think about how you’re living your life.

You’ll notice that there’s a lack of 2018 novels on that list. Mainly because I don’t think I read one. I’m usually a bit behind anyway and generally, I’m not keeping up with what’s being freshly published but I’m hoping that will change in 2019, although that might involve me trying to do some planning. So, don’t hold your breath.

I’ve missed out my Doctor Who reading. I very much enjoyed the New Doctor Who Target novelisations, but I was impressed with both Black Archives books I read, which are – for those uninitiated – in-depth guides to individual Doctor Who stories. I read Matthew Kilburn’s excellent book on ‘The Time Warrior’ and James Coorey Smith’s book on ‘The Massacre’. They’re both well-researched, well-written and do the thing that these books should do, which is re-watch the original stories they are discussing.

The full list of what I read is below. If you’ve got any questions then I’ll happily try to answer them. If you’ve got books you want to send me then feel free to get in touch.

Young Lawrence: A Portrait of the Legend as a Young Man	Anthony Sattin
Is That The New Moon? A Stunning Anthology of Women Poets	Wendy Cope [Ed]
Casino Royale	Ian Fleming
The Mark of The Rani	Pip & Jane Baker
Hurricane: Victor of the Battle of Britain	Leo McKinstry
Churchill's First War: Young Winston And The Fight Against The Taliban	Con Coughln
The World's Wife	Carol Ann Duffy
Eve's Hollywood	Eve Babitz
Live & Let Die	Ian Fleming
Moonraker	Ian Fleming
Family Values	Wendy Cope
Hitler's Henchmen	Guido Knopp
High-Rise	J.G. Ballard
The West End Front: The War Time Secrets of London's Grand Hotels	Matthew Sweet
Theatre Writings	Kenneth Tynan
Shock & Awe: Glam Rock & It's Legacy	Simon Reynolds
Macbeth	William Shakespeare
The Sign of Four	Arthur Conan Doyle
The Crystal Bucket : TV Criticism from the Observer, 1976-79	Clive James
Diamonds Are Forever	Ian Fleming
The World's War: Forgotten Soldiers of Empire	David Olusoga
Their Darkest Hour: People Who Were Tested To The Extreme in WWII	Laurence Rees
Rose	Russell T Davies
Twice Upon A Time	Paul Cornell
You Lucky People: The Tommy Trinder Story	Patrick Newley
The Christmas Invasion	Jenny T Colgan
Selected Poems	Simon Armitage
Rapture	Carol Ann Duffy
The Day of the Doctor	Steven Moffat
Dam Busters: The True Story of the Legendary Raid on the Ruhr	James Holland
From Russia With Love	Ian Fleming
Last Hope Island	Lynne Olson
The Age of Shakespeare	Frank Kermode
Tolkien's Gown & Other Stories of Great Authors and Rare Books	Rick Gekoski
Dr No	Ian Fleming
The Last Stand	Mickey Spillane
Eleven Days in August: The Liberation of Paris in 1944	Matthew Cobb
The Vinyl Detective : Victory Disc	Andrew Cartmel
The Traitors: A Story of Blood, Betrayal and Deceit	Josh Ireland
Death in Ten Minutes	Fern Riddell
And Still I Rise	Maya Angelou
Collected Poems	Chinua Achebe
Operation Chaos: The Vietnam War Deserters Who Went To War With The CIA, The Brainwashers & Each Other	Matthew Sweet
Passschendaele: A New History	Nick Lloyd
Hundred Days: The Campaign That Ended World War One	Nick Lloyd
Goldfinger	Ian Fleming
For Your Eyes Only	Ian Fleming
A Man Called Ove	Frederik Backman
The Quiet American	Graham Greene
Kill All The Gentlemen: Class Struggle & Change in the English Countryside	Martin Empson
Thunderball	Ian Fleming
My Antonia	Willa Cather
The 007 Diaries: Filming Live & Let Die	Roger Moore
Darkness Falls From The Sky	Nigel Balchin
The Sound & The Fury	Faulkner
Human Chain	Seamus Heaney
Tropic of Ruislip	Leslie Thomas
The Third Man	Graham Greene
Strange Weather in Tokyo	Hiromi Kawakami
Ms Ice Sandwich	Hiromi Kawakami
The Image of Africa	Chinua Achebe
White Egrets	Derek Walcott
Arrow of God	Chinua Achebe
The Scarlett Pimpernel	Baroness Orczy
Look Stranger!	W.H. Auden
Epileptic	David B
Bid Me To Love	H.D.
The Riddle of the Sands	Erskine Childers
Ten Years in an Open Necked Shirt	John Cooper Clark
Tolkien & The Great War: The Threshold of Middle-Earth	John Garth
Towns of Two Halves	David Guest
About Time: The Unauthorised Guide To Doctor Who, Volume 7 (2007)	Tat Wood
The Age of Exodus	Gavin Scott
Ma'am Darling	Craig Brown
Our Boys: The Story of a Paratrooper	Helen Parr
The Time Warrior	Matthew Kilburn
Harold Pinter	Michael Billington
The Massacre	James Cooray Smith
Slow Days, Fast Company	Eve Babitz
Slouching Towards Bethlehem	Joan Didion
The Moon's A Balloon	David Niven
Sonnets	William Shakespeare
The Guest Cat	Takashi Hiraide
By Grand Central Station I Sat Down and Wept	Elizabeth Smart
The Vanquished: Why The First World War Failed To End, 1917-1923	Robert Gerwarth
The Heart of a Dog	Mikhail Bulgakov
Always Look On The Bright Side of Life	Eric Idle
A People's History of the German Revolution	William Pelz
The Dud Avocado	Elaine Dundu
Hear The Wind Sing	Haruki Murakami
Pinball, 1973	Haruki Murakami
Other Minds: The Octopus & The Evolution of Intelligent Life	Peter Godfrey-Smith
The Wild Sheep Hunt	Haruki Murakami
The Spy Who Loved Me	Ian Fleming
Kokoro	Natsume Soseki
Autumn Journal	Louis MacNeice
Prometheus Bound & Other Plays	Aeschylus
The Rivals of Sherlock Holmes	Hugh Greene [Ed]
Selected Poems	Pablo Neruda
The Literary Churchill	Jonathan Rose
Cockleshell Heroes	C.E. Lucas Phillips
Peacemakers - Six Months That Changed The World	Margaret MacMillan
The Existentialist Café - Freedom, Being & Apricot Cocktails	Sarah Bakewell
The Anna Karenina Fix: Life Lessons from Russian Literature	Viv Groskop