The "I am currently reading" thread

[Bargepole23]

Nighthawking by Russ Thomas, police detective investigating a murder, set in modern day Sheffield. Not bad, not brilliant either.

 

Just starting The Emperor by Ryszard Kapuscinski, about the latter days and downfall of Haile Selassie.

[Rockers rule]

A captains duty. 2013.

Richard Phillips with Stephan Talty. 

 

Another charity shop 3 for a £.

Excellent true life account of the captain of a cargo ship hijacked by Somali Pirates.

Because it is joint written by the captain himself, the book captures his thoughts, feelings and the terror throughout.

There did seam to be a distinct line in the second part of the book where the detail of the events become a little blurred.

All in all a very good readable book on a well known story at the time.

Don't know what you'd do in such a situation? read the book, see what captain Philips did and learn what he thinks he would have done differently.

 

Of course once I'd read the book, I then had to watch the film 🙃.

 

So which is the better? the book or the film ?

Read my synopsis in 'Rate the last film you watched' 

[ukdobby]

Bob Mortimer,3/4 way through in a week,very easy read and such a nice guy.

[metalman]

Haven't got through very many in January, mainly because one was pretty long.

 

S. S. van Dine - The Benson murder case. Insufferable detective Philo Vance investigates the shooting of Alvin Benson in his armchair. Not bad, but it was quite easy to spot the real culprit.

Dell Shannon - Murder with love. In this 1972 outing, Lt. Luis Mendoza has an earthquake to contend with as well as several murders. Good as usual.

Tove Jansson - The exploits of Moominpappa. Another classic revisited.

Charlotte Armstrong - The protege. Elderly woman takes in young man who claims to have lived next door when he was a kid, but her granddaughter is suspicious. OK.

Various - 100 dastardly little detective stories. Large anthology of shortish crime stories, mostly of a good standard. Certainly kept me occupied for a couple of weeks.

Elly Griffiths - The postscript murders. Sequel to The Stranger Diaries. Asian cop Harbinder Kaur and a collection of amateur sleuths (including the obligatory pensioner) pool their resources to investigate the murder of an old woman and a writer. Excellent.

Gary Dexter - The Oxford despoiler. Entertaining Sherlock Holmes pastiche in which Victorian sexologist Henry St. Liver and his assistant Olive Salter investigate a variety of crimes, all of which have at their root some kind of bizarre sexual perversion. Very well done.

M. W. Craven - Dead ground. The latest Poe & Bradshaw case. A helicopter pilot, due to ferry politicians to an important summit, is battered to death in a pop-up brothel. Still top notch, though it perhaps veered too close to military thriller territory occasionally.

 

Now reading: 100 hair-raising little horror stories. Companion volume to the one above.

[JeffryBr]

Started to read Death on Nile

[Rockers rule]

see #3069.

 

Tom Kipper - the war years.

Tom Kippers - Schooldays.

Peter Sale.

 

Read these the wrong way around .

Researching Liverpool in the 40's through to the 70's I found 'Tom Kipper - the war years.

I was blown away with 'the war years & is still the best thing I've read this year ,

 

Found the 1st book in the series - 'Tom Kipper's Schooldays'.

'Schooldays' gives you the insight into Tom's earlier life and mischiefs prior to 'the war years',

But, yep there has to be a 'But'.

The writing and storylines while interesting, wander about from one subject to another without reason in places.

'The war years' is a lot tighter, story wise, and definitely the better of the two books. 

 

Secret agent 666.

Richard B Spence.

 

2nd time I've read this.

Was Aleister Crowley a British intelligent agent ?

 

For the conspiracist theory hunters this is the book for you  .

Lots of facts, could have's, was possible & might have done's throughout.

Makes for interesting reading though.

Well worth a read. 

 

While I was in't attic and while doing the conspiracy thing.

The Ship that never sank.

Robin Gardiner.

 

Read this a few times now.

Was it The Titanic that sank or it's Sister-ship the 'Olympic' ? 

Interesting theory and well written.

Why was the Titanic altered to resemble the Olympic?

Why was the Titanic on the summer route?

Why did so many boats in the area not come to her rescue?

 

Can be bought for as little as £4.53 on't ebay.

Well worth adding to your collection if you haven't read it already.

 

Keep safe, read well  .

  

 

 

[Rockers rule]

Spitfire women of world war 2.

Giles Whittell. 2008.

 

Love this type of thing.

Although not allowed to fly for the RAF (in combat),  women pilots were allowed to fly for the Air Transport Auxiliary.

No need to explain the 'male' dominated word of flying wasn't thought to be the type of place for women, especially in war time.

Thankfully these girls proved the establishment wrong.

Being restricted to ferrying Tiger moth training planes about did eventually lead to these women pilots transporting not only fighter planes, but even the mighty four engine'd Avro Lancaster's around the country (& ultimately jet powered aircraft).

The ATA attracted female pilots from America, Chile, Argentina, France & included those from background's raging from 'crop dusters' to Countess's.

Excellent read on both the infrastructure of the ATA and the larger than life personalities involved, including interviews from some of those still alive at the time of publishing.

 

Fully recommended.

From as little as £2.13 on't Ebay. 

Go on treat yourself  .

 

[metalman]

Might as well post February's reading because I'm not going to get through my current book for another few days yet.

 

Robert B. Parker - Trouble in Paradise. Police chief Jesse Stone tries to stop a gang of crooks raiding an exclusive island development. Up to his usual standard.

Tove Jansson - Comet in Moominland. Another childhood classic revisited.

Philip Macdonald - The Rynox mystery. The murder of the boss of the firm of Rynox has some important knock-on effects for the company in this relatively light-hearted story from 1930. One of the best of his I've read.

T. S. Eliot - Old Possum's book of practical cats. Half an hour or so of nostalgia.

Harry Kemelman - Friday the rabbi slept late. Rabbi David Small acts as amateur sleuth in the murder of a girl, despite being a suspect himself. Very good, and the first of a well thought of series written in the 1960s and 70s.

John Rhode - The telephone call. While Mr Ridgewell is lured out of the house by a bogus phone message, his wife is murdered. Rhode uses the famous Wallace case as the basis for this one; Supt. Waghorn comes up with the solution in his usual painstaking way (in reality, nobody did until long afterwards).

 

Now reading: Haruki Murakami - 1Q84 books 1 and 2. I'm nearly at the end of book 1, and it's a typical Murakami book really: everything starts off fairly normal and then dislocations of reality creep in gradually. Very good as usual, just a lot longer than usual.

[RJRB]

The Killing Hills  Chris Offutt

The first book I have read by this author ,but a good find.

Some similarity to a Jack Reacher character ,but much better written in my opinion and with some interesting characters from the hills of Kentucky.

 

[Rockers rule]

World book day.

I've enough my self, but seeing the Grandkids off to school dressed as characters from books and turning the day into an event to encourage an interest in books gets my vote.