My Favourite Books of the Year - so far!

It’s July, so it’s time to pick out my top ten books of the first half of 2020. You would think there’d be more time to read during months of lock-down. In a way it’s what real readers dream of. And maybe there was indeed more time… but my thoughts were being dragged all over the place as I tried to concentrate. If reading is like soaring through the clouds… then lock down is like being shot at by all the errant thoughts that come swarming around you. They’re blasting your concentration to smithereens the whole time…

However… I’ve read a great many books and enjoyed almost all of them. Here’s my top ten…

Two non-fiction books – ‘The Life of Stuff’ by Susannah Walker (a daughter gets to learn about her mother’s life by excavating her clutter-filled house) and ‘Books for Living’ by Will Schwalbe (a very timely reminder of the importance of slowness and quality of attention and the vital importance of stockpiling books for later…)

Two historical novels – because in recent months I’ve realised how much I love this genre. I want fat books to fill up my days and convince me I’m in a different time to this. And to tell me surprising things about eras I only thought I knew. ‘Daughters of Rome’ by Kate Quinn (chronicling the year of the four Emperors – shockingly violent and vivid) and ‘The House at Riverton’ by Kate Morton (big house, servants, and long-held secrets. And something addictive and catnippy in the writing.)

A thriller! ‘The River at Night’ by Erica Ferencik (four middle aged ladies white water rafting in rural Maine… the Golden Girls meets Deliverance is only a *slight* exaggeration, but a great tagline.)

A ‘lost’ kids’ book – ‘Flavio and the Cats of Rome’ by Pamela Binns. I feel like I’ve rescued this slim, elegant, sparky animal book from a library sale circa 1977.

A fabulous anthology – Puffin’s ‘Favourite Treasury of Children’s Stories’ from 1997. A beautifully chosen and illustrated book – waiting ready on my shelf for a crucial moment in lockdown. I opened it just when I needed to be reminded of why I love disappearing into books. I had a dodgy day or two when I had a reading crisis… and a few days in the sunny garden with this helped a lot.

A vintage blockbuster! And I read a few – but this one by Iris Rainer Dart – ‘When I Fall in Love’, superceded more famous books by Jackie Collins and Judith Krantz. I absolutely love books about power-dressing women in showbusiness in LA and NYC in the last few decades of the last century. They exist now in a glamorous little bubble of iridescence. This one is about comedy writers and has a lovely, snarky couple of characters sharing the love story at the heart of the book.

A brilliant satirical novel – ‘Me, Cheeta’ by James Lever – which pipped another sarky Hollywood-based novel (‘Little Me’ by Patrick Dennis) to the post. This one is narrated spectacularly by Tarzan’s hairy pal, and it will break your heart.

And probably the best novel of the lot – and the one I was waiting to arrive (one of my very few book purchases during these odd months) was the new Anne Tyler, ‘Redhead by the Side of the Road.’ Succinct and full of empathy and understanding.

And that’s my ten!

I hope the next six months bring even more wonderful books – and better times for us all.