Reading Globally: Pakistan

Then on Pakistan with The Reluctant Fundamentalist by Mohsin Hamid.

A young Pakistani man talks to an American stranger in Lahore, telling him about how he became disillisioned with the American way of life. It is a monologue, we never 'hear' the American's words. It is simple, but effective and the tension is built up to the brilliant ending.

A lot of the book was about American culture from the viewpoint of an outsider, but still some great detail about Pakistani culture, in particular the descriptions of food and nature. I was struck by how important food is, both in this book and in The Blood of Flowers, perhaps in the West, we take it too much for granted.

Reading Globally: Iran

Next on my travels was Iran in The Blood of Flowers by Anita Amirrezvani.

This book was a huge departure from my usual reading, not just because of the country (which I'd not been to before on my reading travels), but becuase it was set in the 16th century. I very rarely read anything that is set further back than the last century.

I really enjoyed this. The writing was very accessible, the main character had enough modern-day feist to make her interesting, but learning about the traditions of the era was fascinating. The descriptions of places, food and the rugs were brilliant.

Very frightening to think about how women were treated and how precarious their position in society was.

Reading Globally: Haiti

My first new country was Haiti in The Comedians by Graham Greene.

Quite a typical Graham Greene novel - exotic location, infidelity, religion and the absurdity of politics all there. The novel had a strange structure in that it you were told that one of the main characters was going to die at the start and the blurb on the back of my copy mentioned a letter from the doctor which is only received in the finally pages.

Set during the dictatorship of Papa Doc, the book gave an idea of some of the horrors of his reign but from a detached outsider's perspective. Nonetheless it was fascinating to read about the turbulent era in the country and despite the seriousness of the circumstances, there were some good bits of humour in the book too.

It has left me interested in reading more and I will try to get hold of a book from a native writer to see how this compares.

888 Challenge - Completed

1001 Books to Read Before You Die
1. Hideous Kinky - Esther Freud
2. Saturday - Ian McEwan
3. Choke - Chuck Palahunik
4. Drop City - T C Boyle
5. The Outsider - Albert Camus
6. The Third Man - Graham Greene
7. Light of Day - Graham Swift
8. The Secret History - Donna Tartt


Non-fiction
1. The Hypocrisy of Disco Clane Hayward (memoir about growing up in seventies communes
2. Pies and Prejudice Stuart Maconie (journey around the north of England)
3. The White Album Joan Didion (essays and articles)
4. The Film Club David Gilmour (film history mixed with father/son relationship)
5. Elephants on Acid Alex Boese (weird experiments)
6. Stuart a Life Backwards Alexander Masters (biography of a homeless man)
7 A Year of Magical Thinking - Joan Didion (memoir about grief)
8. My Life at Grey Gardens - Lois Wright (memoir)


Fiction authors that are new to me
1. The Russian Debutante's Handbook Gary Shteygart
2. The Best Thing that can happen to a Croissant Pablo Tusset
3. Post Office Charles Bukowski
4. She's Come Undone Wally Lamb
5. Flowers for Algernon - Daniel Keyes
6. Replay - Ken Grimwood
7. The End of Mr Y - Scarlett Thomas
8. Fup - Jim Dodge


Crime & Detectives
1. The Naming of the Dead Ian Rankin
2. The Big Blowdown George Pelecanos
3. Exit Music Ian Rankin
4. The Shape of Water - Andrea Camillieri
5. The Return of the Dancing Master - Henning Mankell
6. King Suckerman - George Pelecanos
7. The Sweet Forever - George Pelecanos
8. Shame the Devil - George Pelecanos



As seen on Screen (books with films or television series)
1. The Graduate - Charles Webb
2 Darkly Dreaming Dexter Jeff Lindsay
3. 84 Charing Cross Road - Helen Hanff
4 Dearly Devoted Dexter - Jeff Lindsay
5. Hallam Foe - Peter Jinks
6. Boy in the Striped Pyjamas - John Boyne
7. The Last King of Scotland - Giles Foden
8. Fight Club - Chuck Palahnuik



Prize Winners and Nominees
1. The Restraint of Beasts - Magnus Mills, McKitterick Prize & Booker Nominee
2. Last Orders - Graham Swift, Boooker Prize Winner
3. The Sea - John Banville, Booker Prize Winner 2005
4. The Gathering - Anne Enright, Booker Prize Winner
5. Boy A - Jonathan Trigell, John Llewellyn Rhys
6. Shipping News - Annie Proulx, Pulitzer
7. Whatever - Michel Houellbecq, Impac winner
8. The Accidental - Ali Smith, Whitbread Prize/Booker Nominee




Book Club reads
1. Uncommon Reader Alan Bennett
2. If Nobody Speaks of Remarkable Things - Jon McGregor
3. The Sea, The Sea - Iris Murdoch
4. City of God - E L Doctorow
5. Book of Things Lost - John Connolly
6. Norwegian Wood - Hanuki Murakami
7. Two Caravans - Marina Lewycka
8. Never Let Me Down - Kazuo Ishiguro



Books by authors whose other books I've enjoyed
1 Glyph Percival Everett
2. So Many Ways to Begin - Jon McGregor
3. A Spot of Bother - Mark Haddon
4. All Families of Psychotic - Douglas Coupland
5. The Third Brother - Nick McDonell
6. Three to See a King - Magnus Mills
7. The Body - Hanif Kureishi
8. Tortilla Curtain - T C Boyle

Book Award Challenge: Update November

1. Stuart: A Life Backwards by Alexander Master - Guardian First Book Award 2005
2. Last Orders by Graham Swift - Booker Prize 1996
3. The Sea by John Banville - Man Booker Prize 2005
4. The Gathering by Anne Enright - Man Booker Prize 2007
5. Boy A by Jonathan Trigell - John Llewellyn Rhys Prize 2004
6. Shipping News - Annie Proulx - Pulitzer Prize
7. Whatever - Michel Houellebecq - Impac Prize
8. The Accidental - Ali Smith - Whitbread Prize

Number of book: 8

Number of prizes: 6

Reading Globally

I realised that my reading tends to be set in the UK or the USA, and since I don't have the time nor the money to travel the world, I thought I'd expand my reading horizons.

So far as I can recall my reading travels in the past have taken me to these countries:
Africa
Uganda - Last King of Scotland by Giles Foden
Botswana - No 1 Ladies Detective Agency books by Alexander McCall Smith
Morocco - Hideous Kinky by Ester Freud

Asia
Tokyo - Norwegian Wood by Hanuki Murakami
Singapore - The Third Brother by Nick McDonell
Thailand - The Third Brother by Nick McDonell and The Beach by Alex Garland
India - The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri, Life of Pi by Yann Martel and God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy

Europe
Austria - The Third Man by Graham Greene
Germany - The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas by John Boyne
Norway - Naive Super by Erlend Loe
Sweden - Return of the Dancing Master by Henning Mankell
Prague - The Unbearable Lightness of Being and other books by Milan Kundera
Sicilly - The Shape of Water by Andrea Camilleri
France - The Outsider by Albert Camus and Whatever by Michel Houellebecq
Russia - Dynamo by Tariq Goddard, The Russian Debutante's Handbook
Ukraine - Death and the Pengiun & Penguin Lost by Andrey Kurkov and A Short History of Tractors in the Ukraine by Marina Lewycka
Spain - Homage to a Firing Squad by Tariq Goddard
Hungary - Under a Frog by Tibor Fischer
Poland - The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas by John Boyne
Ireland - The Gathering by Anne Enwright and The Sea by John Banville

South America
Cuba - Our Man in Havana by Graham Greene
Argentina, Peru, Chile, Venezuela, Ecuador, Colombia, Panama - all visited in The Motorcycle Diaries by Ernesto Che Guevara


visited 31 states (13.7%)
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