Reading is on the rise ... but where do you start?
People have “rediscovered the pleasure of reading” in lockdown, publisher Bloomsbury has said, after reporting its best half-year profits since 2008.
The firm, best known for publishing the Harry Potter books, said profits jumped 60 per cent to £4 million from February to August.
There are few greater pleasures to building a book collection, writes Sue Wilkinson. There is snobbery surrounding what constitutes a “good read” but my philosophy is, if you enjoy it, that’s all that matters.
Here are my recommendations for building a home library, starting with 1001 Books to Read Before You Die, a great guide to books from the beginning of storytelling to the present day.
Classics
Anything by Charles Dickens – but especially Oliver Twist and A Tale of Two Cities. Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, Wilkie Collins’ Woman in White and Thomas Hardy’s Tess of the d’Urbervilles would also be there.
Prize winners and nominees
I set myself the task a few years ago of reading all the Booker winners and shortlisters from 1969 ... not one after the other, though!
Some are a challenge, the 1,000-page stream of consciousness of Lucy Ellmann’s Ducks, Newburyport – shortlisted for the Booker last year – not least of them. There are delights including Hilary Mantel’s Wolf Hall and Bring Up the Bodies, The Sea, The Sea by Iris Murdoch and Troubles by JG Farrell, whose Singapore Grip was serialised for TV earlier this year. Schindler’s Ark is a tough book – and reads more like a factual biography than a novel – as is Marlon James’ A Brief History of Seven Killings, set round the attempted murder in Jamaica of reggae star Bob Marley.
Right now I am reading the 2018 winner Milkman by Anna Burns. This is a surreal, 350-page, stream-of-consciousness, furious, witty, coming-of-age tale about a teenage girl in 1970s Belfast.
Comedy
Step forward PG Wodehouse! I came to his country house parties only this year – the TV adaptation of Jeeves and Wooster starring Hugh Laurie and Stephen Fry put me right off.
The novels and short stories are a delightful escape from the dark days of lockdown. His Blanding series is also sublime.
The Reggie Perrin and Henry Pratt series by David Nobbs are also must-haves.
Historical crime One of my favourite genres – but for introduction to this rich vein then CJ Sansom’s series featuring the Tudor lawyer Shardlake is fabulous. Also, look up Abir Mukherjee whose setting is India after World War One.
Modern crime
Lee Child, James Paterson, CJ Tudor, Val McDermid, John Grisham and Don Winslow should be on your shelves.
Spy thrillers
John Le Carre’s Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy is the quintessential spooks’ story. Alongside this should sit Mick Herron’s Slow Horses – the first Jackson Lamb.
Factual
There is a wealth of wellwritten books out there. On my shelf of late is A Cheesemonger’s History of The British Isles by Ned Palmer and Coastlines by Patrick Barkham.
Children
These are not just for children. Katherine Rundell, Lucy Strange and Abi Elphinstone are top of my list.
Romance
Tough one this, because it is one genre I really don’t like. Except, that is, anything by Daphne Du Maurier – who doesn’t really count as a writer of romance – but I have all her books and started with Frenchman’s Creek, which remains my favourite.