MY SIX BEST BOOKS

CJ TUDOR

THE SHINING

Stephen King

Hodder, £9.99

The Shining is a classic and a great lesson in the slow burn. Little happens in the first third but it’s imbued with creeping dread, while the isolated Overlook Hotel is the most compelling character of all.

SPARES

Michael Marshall Smith

HarperCollins, £9.99

Spares is even better than his first book Only Forward. It’s original, sad, darkly funny and a more interesting take on cloning than Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro, which was shortlisted for the Booker Prize.

WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT KEVIN

Lionel Shriver

Serpent’s Tail, £8.99

A book that just builds and builds the tension and asks whether some women are meant to be mothers, and if monsters are created or born.

ALTERED CARBON

Richard Morgan (Gollancz, £8.99)

Part sci-fi, part noir, this blew me away. In the 23rd century, human minds can be downloaded into new bodies called “sleeves”. However, only those who are very wealthy can continually acquire new ones and live forever.

THE BEACH

Alex Garland

(Penguin, £8.99)

Lord Of The Flies for the backpacking generation. It’s very much of its early 90s time, it captures the backpacking obsession to find one perfect spot no one else has heard about.

TRAINSPOTTING

Irvine Welsh

(Vintage, £8.99)

A revelation! Non-linear, told from different perspectives and in a Scottish dialect, the story of Renton, Sick Boy, Begbie, Spud and Tommy was like nothing I’d read before. It’s still a stand-out.