Holiday reading

Back from a week’s holiday iin Sri Lanka – lovely, thanks – and ready to get back to work for the New Year, I thought I would share some of the holiday reading I enjoyed.

Most was of the crime/thriller sort – a great way to wind down:

• John Harvey (Good Bait)
• Michael Connelly (The Black Box)
• John Grisham (The Litigators)
• Ian Ranking (Standing in Another Man’s Grave) – always very good value
• Christopher Brookmyre (Jaggy Splinters – a selection of short stories, including the hilairious “Playground Football” – and When the Devil Drives)
• J K Rowling (A Casual Vacancy – better than I had expected)
• Terry Prathett (A Blink of the Sccreen – more short stories); I confess, I have never really enjoyed Pratchett’s books, though I realise they are hugely popular
• Ian M Banks (Consider Phlebas – about time I started the Culture novels, and I was not disappointed)
• Peter James (Not Dead Yet)
• Ian Sinclair (White Chappell, Scarlet Tracings)
• Jerome K Jerome (Three Men on the Bummell – I needed something for light relief)
• Dominion by C J Sansom

The most memorable book was non-fiction: Neil Postman’s “Amusing Ourselves To Death”, the main theme of which is that television inevitably trivialises public debate by treating it all as show business. Well worth a read, and readily available via the behemoth that is Amazon, in both paper and Kindle versions: http://amzn.to/TEeimk

In fact, I think I will Tweet quotes from it over the next couple of weeks