Book selections for previous months are archived here.
Here are the October recommendations from the Book Lover’s Club:
5 star books this month:
James Rebanks - English Pastoral
Pat Barker - Regeneration
Shelley Read - Go as a River
Peter Berry & Deb Bunt - Slow Puncture
Virginia Carter - Looking for Trouble (possibly 4 not 5 *?)
Daniel Finkelstein - Hitler, Stalin, Mum and Dad
Richard Shepherd - The Seven Ages of Death
Catriona O’Sullivan - Poor
Elizabeth Strout - The Burgess Boys
Andrew O’Hagan - Caledonian Road
Rose Tremain - Absolutely and Forever
Kate Atkinson - Human Croquet
Heather Morris - Sisters Under the Rising Sun
Books read on the subject of ‘awakenings’:
Kristin Hannah - The Great Alone
Anne Tyler - If Morning Ever Comes (definitely not her best!)
Tete-Michel Kpomassie - An African in Greenland
Matt Haig - Midnight Library (another ‘not recommended’ one)
Rose Tremain - Absolutely and Forever
Victoria Hislop - The Island
Here are the September recommendations from the Book Lover’s Club:
No Country for Love by Yaroslav Trifima
The Trial of Lila Dalton by L J Shepherd
A Nature Poem for Every Winter Evening by Jane McMorland Hunter
Wild by Kirsten Hannah
Weyward by Emilia Hart
On the Black Hill by Bruce Chatwin
The Silver Dark Sea by Susan Fletcher
In Search of the Blues by Marybeth Hamilton
The Success and failure of Picasso by John Berger
Go as a river by Shelley Read
Eddie Winston is looking for love by Marianne Cronin
The Wedding People by Alison Espach
A fortune teller told me by Tiziano Terzani
You are here by David Nichols
What you are looking for is in the library by Michiko Aoyama
Books that were enjoyed On the theme of “Health, Illness and fitness”:
Scurvy by Stephen Bourn
A Fortunate Woman by Polly Morland
The Herd by Emily Edwards
Wellness by Nathan Hill
The Comfort Book by Matt Haig
The man who mistook his wife for a hat by Oliver Sachs
An Unquiet Mind by Kay Redfield Jamison
Checking out by Nick Spalding
Here are the August recommendations from the Book Lover’s Club:
David Attenborough - Adventures of a Young Naturalist
Kristin Hannah - True Colours and Home Front (but definitely NOT Firefly Lane)
Heather Morris - Sisters under the Rising Sun
Bill Bryson - A Short History of Nearly Everything
Aravind Adiga - The White Tiger
Abraham Verghese - The Covenant of Water (almost 5 stars)
Rose Tremain - Absolutely and Forever
Alexander McCall Smith - Minor Adjustments Beauty Salon
Diane Chamberlain - Pretending to Dance
Douglas Stewart - Shuggie Bain
Hilary Boyd - Thursdays in the Park
Deborah Levy - The Man Who Saw Everything
Anita Brookner - Hotel du Lac
Sarah Winman - When God was a Rabbit (with some reservations)
Antal Szerb - The Pendragon Legend
Stacey Halls - The Familiars
Abi Dare - The Girl with the Louding Voice
Books that were enjoyed on the theme of ‘a capital city other than Paris’ were:
John Kampfner - In Search of Berlin
Maeve Binchy - London Transports
Samuel Selver - The Lonely Londoners
Teju Cole - Tremor (Lagos)
Amor Towles - A Gentleman in Moscow
Paul Lynch - Prophet Song (Dublin)
Tideline - Penny Hancock (London)
Here are the July recommendations from the Book Lover’s Club:
You are here by David Nicholls
Just ignore him by Alan Davies
We are not like them by Christine Pride and Jo Piazza
Solito by Javier Zamora
The Locked Room by Ellie Griffiths
Hitler, Stalin, Mum and Dad by Daniel Finkelstein
My Cousin Rachel by Daphne du Maurier
Wish you were here by Jodi Picoult
Diary of an Optimist by Mary Barnard
Here are the June recommendations from the Book Lover’s Club:
The Holiday by T M Logan
Clytemnestra by Constanza Casati
A Crack in the Wall by Claudia Pineiro
Reflections in a Golden Eye by Carson McCullers
Unruly by David Mitchell
Now We Are Sixty by Christopher Matthew
Personal Diary of Rachel Dupree by Ann Weisgarber
The Bee Sting by Paul Murray
Strange Sally Diamond by Lizzie Nugent
Silver Sparrow by Tayari Jones
Oh Sister by Jodie Chapman
T he Summer Job by Lizzie Dent
The Prophet Song by Paul Lynch
Solito by Javier Zamora
The Book of Lost Names by Kristin Harmel
A Year in Provence by Peter Mayle
The Bird Boy by Catherine Bruton
Our recommendations for the theme “True Crime”:
Forget you had a daughter by Sandra Gregory
Keane Reeves is not in love with you by Becky Holmes
In Plain Sight by Dan Davies
Shadow play by Joseph O’Conner
To hunt a killer by Julia McKay
Killing Thatcher by Rory Carroll
The Five by Hallie Rubenhold
True Crime Story by Joseph Knox
If you tell by Greg Olsen
Here are the May recommendations from the Book Lover’s Club:
The Summer Job - Lizzie Dent
Un Amor - Sara Messa
The wren, the wren - Ann Enright
Where the light gets in - Lucy Dillon
The Stone Circle - Ellie Griffiths
Only there, only now - Tom Newlands
The Husbands - Holly Gramazio
Old God’s Time - Sebastian Barry
The Life and Times of Thunderbolt Kids - Bill Bryson
The Tatooist of Auchwitz - Heather Morris
The Talented Mr Ripley - Patricia Highsmith
And away… - Bob Mortimer
Our recommendations for the theme “Trees, flowers Insects”:
The Buttercup Fields - Elizabeth Geoffrey
The Hidden Life of Trees - Peter Wohlleben
Flight Behaviour - Barbara Kingsolver
Wildwood a journey through trees - Roger Deakin
Clay - Melissa Harrison
Collins book of pests, diseases and disorders - Stefan Buczacki and Keith Harris
Garden of her heart - Zoe Richards
Birnam Wood - Eleanor Catton
Snowdrops - H D Miller
The Beekeeper of Aleppo - Christy Lefteri
Here are the January recommendations from the Book Lover’s Club:
Nadiya Hussein - Finding my Voice
Bernard J Farmer - Death of a Bookseller
Pamela Hutchinson - Red Shoes (BFI Film Classic)
Teju Cole - Tremor
Elizabeth Taylor - At Mrs Lippincote's
Alexander McCall Smith - The Cleverness of Ladies
John Boyne - The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas
Paul Theroux - The Great Railway Bazaar
Stacey Halls - Mrs England
Ronald Blythe - Akenfield
LJ Ross - Holy Island, Sycamore Gap (very timely), Heavenfield (DCI Ryan books 1-3)
Only Connect Quiz books 1 and 2 (in preparation for a possible future appearance!)
Jo Nesbo - The Son
Janice Hallett - The Mysterious Case of the Alperton Angels
Joanna Quinn - The Whalebone Theatre
Robert Harris - Act of Oblivion
John Boyne - Water
Jenny Graham - Coffee First, Then the World
Curtis Sittenfeld - The Tomorrow Box
Laura's top books to look out for in the next few months:
Nicola Gill - Swimming for Beginners (out now, and heavily discounted on Amazon)
Matt Coyne - Frank and Red (Feb 2024)
Lotte Jeffs - This Love (Feb 2024)
Ericka Waller - Goodbye Birdie Greenway (April 2024)
Books we read for this month's Scottish theme:
Sarah Gruen - At the Water's Edge (NOT recommended)
Colin MacIntyre and Ellen MacAskill - Hometown Tales: Highlands and Hebrides
Susan Fletcher - Witch Light (strongly recommended)
Joan Lingard - 'Maggie' books #1-4
Elspeth Barker - O Caledonia (also strongly recommended)
Len Pennie - Poyums
Tamsin Calidas - I Am An Island
The Trick is to Keep Breathing - Janice Galloway
Here are the December recommendations from the Book Lover’s Club:
The Ghost Fields by Ellie Griffiths
Amy and Isabelle by Elizabeth Strout
The Parsons Daughter by Catherine Cookson ( audio)
Nightingale Point by Lilian Goldie
Those Precious Days by Ann Patchett
The Children at the Gate by Lynne Reid Banks
Good pop, Bad pop by Jarvis Cocker
Home by John Mackay
O Caledonia by Elspeth Barker
The Bullet that missed by Richard Osman
Water by John Boyne
The Women who wouldn’t leave by Victoria Scott
We then had great fun with our genre topic of Desert Island Books!
David - The Spy Who Came In From The Cold - John Le Carré
High Fidelity - Nick Hornby
Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
Luxury item - endless supply of coffee.
Linda - The Secret Life Of Bees- Sue Monk-Kidd
All The Light We Cannot See - Anthony Doerr
Olive Kitteridge - Elizabeth Strout
Luxury item - my own feather pillow.
Ginnie - The Kings and Queens of England - Ian Croft
The Collossal Book of Incredible Facts - compiled by Nigel Henbest
Lessons in Chemistry - Bonnie Garmus
Luxury item- an endless supply of matches
Wendy R - The Happy Prince - Oscar Wilde
Giraffes can’t dance - Giles Andreae
War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
Luxury item - Readers Digest Manual
Lin Winter- The Oxford Library of Words and Phrases ( 3 books)
Luxury Item- a supply of pens and paper
Laura P - To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
Fugitive Pieces - Ann Michaels
Daisy Jones and the six - Taylor Jenkins Reid
Luxury Item - supply of paper and pens
Emma A - Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
Book of Times Cryptic crosswords
Luxury Item - pens and paper
Wendy G - Full Catastrophe Living - Jon Kabat Zinn
The Lost Continent - Bill Bryson
200 Crochet stitches
Luxury Item - Crochet hook
Emma P - To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Ronald Dahl
Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe - Fannie Flagg
Luxury Item - a radio or source of music
Sue - To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
Flight Behaviour - Barbara Kingsolver
Hearts invisible furies - Johns Boyne
Luxury Item - Pillow
Catherine - The White Princess - Philippa Gregory
Pen Lettering - Ann Camp
The Prophet - Khalil Gibran
Luxury item - a calligraphy set
Andy - The Hobbit - J R R Tolkien
A Dance to the Music of time - Anthony Powell
Schindlers Ark - Thomas Keneally
Luxury item - The Little Drummer Girl…yes another book!…John Le Carre
Here are the November recommendations from the Book Lover’s Club:
George- A Magpie Memoir”- by Frieda Hughes
The Last of the Line - by John Mackay
Unnatural Causes - by Dr Richard Shephard
The Problem that has no name - by Betty Friedan
The Outcast Dead - by Ellie Griffiths
The bullet that missed - by Richard Osman
Beartown - by Frederick Backman
The Storm Sister - by Lucinda Riley
Still Life with Breadcrumbs - by Anna Quindlen
The Book of Beginnings - by Sally Page
The Last List of Mabel Beaumont -Audio - by Laura Pearson
Under Another Sky - by Charlotte Higgins
American Rust - by Philipp Meyer
A Hunger - by Ros Raisin
The Collected regrets of Clover- by Nikki Brammer
Act of Oblivion - by Robert Harris
The Pact - by Jodi Picoult
Our genre this month is “books written by authors famous for something else”:
Waging Heavy Peace (autobiography) - by Neil Young
The God desire - by David Baddiel
The Trial - by Rob Rinder
Bill Bailey’s Remarkable Guide to Happiness - by Bill Bailey
Spectacles - by Sue Perkins
Time out of mind - by Jane Lapotaire
Virtually Christmas-a children’s book - by David Baddiel
The Satsuma Complex - by Bob Mortimer
Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing - Matthew Perry autobiography (audio)
Home Stretch - by Graham Norton
Here are the October recommendations from the Book Lover’s Club:
Laura Pearson - The Lost List of Mabel Beaumont - (read and thoroughly enjoyed by several people)
Laura Pearson - Missing Pieces
Emily Edwards - The Herd
Henri Dunant - The Origin of the Red Cross
Roddy Doyle - Life Without Children
Shelley Read - God as a River
Amanda Prowse - How to Fall in Love Again
Julia Jarman - The Widows' Wine Club
Claire Keegan - So Late in the Day
Joanna Quinn - Whalebone Theatre
Richard Williams - Miles Davis
Rebecca Kuang - Yellowface
Anne Tyler - A Spool of Blue Thread
Satoshi Yagisawa - Days at the Morisaki Bookshop
Books we read on the theme of Numbers:
Joseph Heller - Catch 22
Tom Friedman - 1000 Unforgettable Senior Moments
Rachel Ward - Numbers
David Mitchell - Unruly
P. Dedon - Maths and Mathematicians
Jeremy Standgroom - Einstein's Riddle
Sue Townsend - The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole Aged 13 3/4
April Pulley Sayre - One is a Snail, Ten is a Crab
Here are the September recommendations from the Book Lover’s Club:
The Last List of Mabel Beaumont by Laura Pearson
Kill Show by Daniel Sweren-Becker ( publication date 3/10/23)
The Woman on the Ledge by Ruth Mancini (publication date 4/1/24)
All the Broken Places by John Boyne
Light Perpetual by Francis Spufford
Tom Lake by Ann Patchett
Shrines of Gaiety by Kate Atkinson
The Millstone by Margaret Drabble
What July Knew by Emily Koch
Talking at Night by Claire Daverley
The Lick of Love by Julian Clary
Witness the Night by Kishwar Desai
Heartland by John Mackay
Mister Teacher by Jack Sheffield
Just Like You by Nick Hornby
Trespasses by Louise Kennedy
Our books on the topic of childhood:
O Brother by John Niven
We are completely beside ourselves by Karen Joy Fowler
The Madness by Fergal Keane
David Sedaris Diaries A visual Compendium by David Sedaris
1000 Roads Home by Carmel Harrington
Cloud Cuckoo Land by Anthony Doerr
Without Warning by Kit de Waal
Bookworm by Lucy Mangan
Oranges are not the only fruit by Jeanette Winterson
Shuggie Bain by Douglas Stuart
Hungry by Grace Dent
Hackney Child by Hope Daniels
Here are the August recommendations from the Book Lover’s Club:
Stewkey Blues Stories by D J Taylor
The Four Winds by Kristin Hannah
Yellowface by Rebecca F Kwang
Unnatural Causes by Richard Shepherd
The Photographer by E S Blake
Just Like You by Nick Hornby
The Marriage Portrait by Maggie O’Farrell
Eating People is Wrong by Malcolm Bradbury
Human Voices by Penelope Fitzgerald
The Heron’s Cry by Ann Cleeves
Lessons by Ian McEwan
(Sometimes a book appears in more than one of our recommendation lists where a club member has read it, based on recommendation, and then highly rated it)
Our recommendations on the theme of WATER are:
To the lighthouse by Virginia Woolf
The Seaside- England’s Love Affair by Madeleine Bunting
Desert Island Discs - reference by a variety of presenters
Frenchman’s Creek by Daphne du Maurier
The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway
Tideline by Penny Hancock
Offshore by Penelope Fitzgerald
Here are the July recommendations from the Book Lover’s Club:
Sow the Seed by Margaret Dickinson
The Franchise Affair by Josephine Tey
Landisfarne by Magnus Magnussen
About Love by Anton Checov
Did you hear mummy died? by Seamus O’Reilly
What just happened? by Marina Hyde
Bournville by Jonathon Coe
The Chosen by Chaim Potok
Notes on an execution by Dayna Kukafka
Stewkey Blues by D J Taylor
The Wrath to Come by Sarah Churchill
The Dictionary of Lost Words by Pip Williams
Yellowface by Rebecca F Kuang
Kala by Colin Walsh
Educated by Tara Westover
Our Classic recommendations are:
Little Dorris by Charles Dickens
O Pioneers by Willa Cather
This Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara
Hamlet by Maggie O’Farrell
Lady Audley’s Secret by Mary Elizabeth Bradden
The Daughter of Time by Josephine Tey
Cider with Rosie by Laurie Lee
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
Great Expectations by Charles Dickens
Here are the June recommendations from the Book Lover’s Club:
Act of Oblivion by Robert Harris
The Satsuma Complex by Bob Mortimer
The Nightingale by Kirsten Hannah
Violeta by Isabel Allende
Companion Piece by Ali Smith
No Life For a Lady by Hannah Dolby
The Romantic by William Boyd
Notes on an Execution by Dayna Kukafka
Old Filth by Jane Gardam
Our genre of the month “Seasons”:
On Sheep by Axel Lindon
The Autumn of the Patriarch by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Revolutionary Road by Richard Yeates
Autumn Journal by Louis McNeice
The Summer Book by Tove Jansen
The Dry by Jane Harper
Driving Over Lemons by Chris Stewart
Three Ways to Capsize a Boat by Chris Stewart
Instructions for a Heatwave by Maggie O’Farrell
The Four Winds by Kirsten Hannah
Here are the May recommendations from the Book Lover’s Club:
Still me by JoJo Moyes
Lullaby by Leela Slimani
In Memoriam by Alice Winn
The Keeper of Stories by Sally Page
Station Eleven by Emily St John Mandel
This is Happiness by Niall Williams
French Braid by Anne Tyler
Scissors, paper, stone by Elizabeth Day
The Bookshop by Penelope Fitzgerald
The Fortune Man by Nadifa Mohamed
The Romantic by William Boyd
A Fortunate Woman by Polly Morland
No Life for a Lady by Hannah Dolby
Our genre of the month “Books about Books”:
The Lamplighters by Emma Stonex
How to read literature by Terry Eagleton
Death of a bookseller by Alice Slater
The Midnight Library by Matt Haig
The Reader on the 6.27 by Jean-Paul Didierlaurent
The Book Thief by Marcus Zusak
The Librarian by Salley Vickers
The Giver of Stars by JoJo Moyes
I don’t want to join a book club by Virginia Ironside
The Readers Room by Antoine Laurain
The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek by Kim Michele Richardson
Here are the April recommendations from the Book Lover’s Club:
The Lost Luggage Porter by Andrew Martin
The untold lives of the women killed by Jack the Ripper by Hallie Rubenhold
Sweet Sorrow by David Nichols (Audio on radio)
The Fortune Men by Nadifa Mohamed
I’m sorry you feel that way by Rebecca Wait
The Best Days of our lives by Lucy Diamond
Violeta by Isabel Allende
The Madness of Grief by Rev Richard Coles
Foster by Claire Keegan
The Memory Keeper of Kvyv by Erin Litteken
Tales from the dispensing bench by Lilian Middleton
And on the theme of “New Beginnings”:
The World my Wilderness by Rose Macaulay
Wayward by Emilia Hart
The Dutch House by Ann Patchett
An Experiment in Love by Hilary Mantel
The Great Passion by James Runcie
Britt Marie was here by Fredrik Backman
French Braid by Anne Tyler
The Things We do For Love by Kristin Hannah
Here are the March recommendations from the Book Lover’s Club:
The Switch by Beth O’Leary
Things I want my daughters to know by Elizabeth Noble
Foster by Claire Foster
The Keeper of Stories by Sally Page
Unquiet Women by Max Adam
The Mothers by Brit Bennett
The World’s Wife by Carol Ann Duffy
House Rules by Jodi Picoult
Books recommended from our own personal book shelves:
Whitstable Mum in Custard shortage- a collection of newspaper headlines
Silas Marner by George Eliot
The Loud Halo by Lilian Beckwith
Small Great Things by Jodi Picoult
The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk-Kidd
Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese
Scoop by Evelyn Waugh
Schindler’s Ark by Thomas Keneally
The Time Traveller’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
The Secret Island by Enid Blyton
Here are the February recommendations from the Book Lover’s Club:
The No Show by Beth O’Leary
Tall Bones by Anna Bailey
High Windows a poem by Phillip Larkin
Matthew Perry’s Autobiography
Apples Never Fall by Liane Moriarty
Beaumanor WW2 by Caroline Wessel
What Writers Read by Pandora Sykes
Escape to an Autumn Pavement by Andrew Salkey
Notes on an Execution by Dayna Kukafka
Tomorrow, tomorrow and tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin
A shilling for Candles by Josephine Tey
The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett
Agatha Christie by Lucy Worsley
Magpie by Elizabeth Day
Our genre of the month was “Passion”, here are the books we read:
The Practical Witches Love Spell Book by Cerridwen Greenleaf
All Passion Spent by Vita Sackville West
November 9 by Colleen Hoover
Playing under the Piano by Hugh Bonneville
Valentine by Carol Ann Duffy
The Architects Apprentice by Elif Shafak
Random Acts of Heroic Love by Danny Scheinmann
The Chosen by Chaim Potok
Broken Greek by Pete Perfides
Passion by Jude Morgan
The Pride and the Passion, a film from 1957 directed by Stanley Kramer
Here are the January recommendations from the Book Lover’s Club:
Traces by Patricia Wiltshire
The Whitsun Weddings by Phillip Larkin
Love Marriage by Monica Ali
This is not a pity memoir by Abi Morgan
Stoner by John Williams
Beaumanor war and peace by Caroline Wessel
Amazing Grace Evans by Fiona Littlewood ( published next week)
Lucy by the sea by Elizabeth Strout
Free by Lea Ypi
Elizabeth- an intimate portrait by Gyles Brandreth
Our selection of books on the theme “Back in Time”:
In the Reign of King John by Dan Jones
A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens
Remarkable Creatures by Tracy Chevalier
Tomorrow, tomorrow and tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin
A Terrible Kindness by Jo Browning Wroe
Sapiens- a brief history by Yuval Noah Harari
Letters of note compiled by Shaun Usher
The Inheritors by William Golding
If these stones could talk by Peter Stanford
Here are the December recommendations from the Book Lover’s Club:
The Colour Purple by Alice Walker
A Ladder to the Sky by John Boyne
Stoner by John Williams
The Angel of the North by Maureen Fry
Fierce Attachments by Vivian Gornick
Alexa what is there to know about love? By Brian Bilston
Fingersmith by Sarah Waters
The Paper Palace by Miranda Crowley-Heller
Station Eleven by Emily St John Mandel
On our theme of Food and Drink:
Whitstable Mum in Custard shortage- a collection of newspaper headlines
The Gift by Celia Ahern
Taste by Stanley Tucci
A Tudor Christmas by Alison Wier
Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant by Anne Tyler
My Tuscany by Lorenza de Medici
The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake by Aimee Bender
Happy Christmas by Delia Smith
A Half Baked Idea by Olivia Potts
Heartburn by Nora Ephron
Le Repertoire de la Cuisine by L Saulnier
Here are the November recommendations from the Book Lover’s Club:
Instructions for a Heatwave by Maggie O’Farrell
Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus ( again)
Enigma by Robert Harris
Alexa, what is there to know about love? By Brian Bilston
Keeping My Sisters Secrets by Beezy Marsh
Station Eleven by Emily St John Mandell
Fabric- The Hidden History of the Material World by Victoria Finlay
Should we stay or should we go? by Lionel Shriver (again)
Small things like these by Claire Keegan
Shrines of Gaiety by Kate Atkinson
Don’t mention the night by David Belbin
A Normal Family by Henry Normal
Small Pleasures by Claire Chambers ( again)
The Real Crown Jewels of England by Claire Aslet
100 years of Lennie and Margot by Marianne Cronin
On our genre of the month, “Kings and Queens”:
Innocent Traitor by Alison Wier
Far from Heaven by Mary Renault
The Persian Boy by Mary Renault
Untitled by Tina Brown
The Shadow of Queens by Alison Wier
George VI by Sarah Bradford
Young Bess by Margaret Irwin
The Last Tudor by Phillips Gregory
Here are the October recommendations from the Book Lover’s Club:
5* recommendations:
We All Want Impossible Things by Catherine Newman ( due out in hardback on 8/11/22)
Regrets of the Dying by Georgina Scule
Chouette by Claire Oshetsky
Mrs Hemingway by Naomi Wood
All My Mother’s Sectrets by Beezy Marsh
The Storied Life of A J Fikry by Gabrielle Zevin
Recommendations on the theme of “Refugees”:
Refugees - (a children's poetry book) by Brian Bilston
The Sleeping Beauties by Suzanne O’Sullivan
The Boy at the Back of the Class by Onjali Q. Rauf
The Girl Who Smiled Beads by Clemantine Wamariya
Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil by John Berendt
Welcome to Nowhere by Elizabeth Laird
Summer by Ali Smith
Songbirds by Christy Lefteri
In the Wars by Dr Waheed Arian
Here are the September recommendations from the Book Lover’s Club:
All my mothers by Joanna Glenn
Trees by Percival Everett
Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus
The Apple Never Falls by Leanne Moriarty
56 Days by Catherine Jane Howard
The Paperchase by Marcel Theroux
Prison Doctor by Dr Amanda Brown
And our “colour” themed books:
Amber Shadows by Lucy Ribchester
Red Dust Road by Jackie Kay
Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
A Spool of Blue Thread by Anne Tyler
The Little Red Chairs by Edna O’Brien
Black Water by Joyce Carol Oates
The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Gilman
The Woman Who Saved The Birds by Etta Lemon
The Colour Purple by Alice Walker
The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt
Here are the June recommendations from the Book Lover’s Club:
Medieval Bodies by Jack Hartnell
Queen of our times: The life of Elizabeth II by Robert Hardman
Desiree by Annemarie Selinko
Lessons in Chemistry (again) by Bonnie Garmus
The Dictionary of Lost Words by Pip Williams
Three Sisters by Heather Morris
And away… by Bob Mortimer
Should we stay or should we go by Lionel Shriver
Here are the May recommendations from the Book Lover’s Club:
Dear Grace by Claire Swatman
Tales of Muffled Oars by Magnus Mills
Gilka’s Journey by Heather Morris
Girl A by Abigail Dean
The Road Dance by John Mackay
Sweet Sorrow by David Nicholls
Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus
Let me tell you what I mean by Joan Didion
Should we stay or should we go by Lionel Shriver
Here are the April recommendations from the Book Lover’s Club:
The Spy Who Came in from the Cold by John Le Carre
Outbreak by Frank Gardiner
Reputation by Sarah Vaughan
The First Apostle by James Becker
Dry Hard by Nick Spalding
Olga by Bernard Schlink
Unsettled Ground by Claire Fuller
Mum and Dad by Joanna Trollope
The Four Winds by Kirsten Hannah
We also discussed a wide range of books with an “ ART” theme:
The Eclipse of Art by Julian Spalding
Stealing the Mona Lisa by Darian Leader
The Girl with the Pearl Earring by Tracy Chevalier
Vermeer and other Painters
Banksy by Will Ellsworth-Jones
The Story of Art by EHGombrich
Paintings by Paul McCartney
Audubon American Birds by Roger Tory Peterson
Open Water by Caleb Azumah Nelson
Portrait of an Artist a Young Man by James Joyce
Grayson Perry’s TV series
Here are the February recommendations from the Book Lover’s Club:
Love from Boy- Ronald Dahl’s letters to his mother - edited by Donald Sturrock
The Sight of You by Holly Miller
A Whole Life by Robert Seethaler
The New Mrs Clifton by Elizabeth Buchan
Big Sky by Kate Atkinson
Oh William by Elizabeth Strout
The Blush by Elizabeth Taylor
The Book of Two Ways by Jodi Picoult
The Man Who Didn’t Call by Rosie Walsh
East of the Sun, West of the Moon - Jackie Morris
Here are the January recommendations from the Book Lover’s Club:
Midnight Library by Matt Haig
The Twyford Code by Janice Hallett
The Man in the Queue by Josephine Tey
A Terrible Kindness by Jo Browning Wroe (not published until late Spring 2022)
Sorrow and Bliss by Meg Mason
The Shepherd’s Life by James Rebanks
Love after love by Ingrid Persaud
The Traitor King by Andrew Lownie
We Are Not Like Them by Christina Pride and Jo Piazza
We also had a number of recommendations in our “Music” related genre of the month:
Wham by Andrew Ridgley
John by Cynthia Lennon
A Dance to the Music of Time by Anthony Powell
Daisy Jones and the six by Taylor Jenkins Reid
Broken Greek by Pipa Fides
The Piano by Jane Campion
The Storyteller by Dave Groll
The Piano Shop on the Left Bank by
The Orchestra Saves the World by Alexander MacCall Smith
Prince by Moby Nazir
House of Music by Kadiatu Kanneh-Mason
Shout by Phillip Norman
Roadrunner by Joshua Clover
Autobiography of Chuck Berry
The Music Shop by Rachel Joyce
A Romance on Three Legs by Katie Hoffner
The Music Played by Nathaniel Lande
Here are the Barrow upon Soar Book Lover’s club recommendations for December 2021. The author Laura Pearson is occasionally able to attend the group. She reads and reviews lots of books before publication. This time she had some 5 star recommendations for books which are not due out until March 22. There’s quite a strange mix of books this month which illustrates how different we all are in our choices:
The Pact by Sharon Bolton (on audio)
One Italian Summer by Rebecca Serle (out in March 22)
The Exhibitionist by Charlotte Mendelson (out March 22)
Impossible by Sarah Lotz (out March 22)
Welcome to Nowhere by Elizabeth Laird
Pompeii by Robert Harris
The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid
Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman
My Name is Lucy Barton by Elizabeth Strout
The Greatest Knight by Elizabeth Chadwick
Miss Bensons Beetle by Rachel Joyce
Lolly Willowes by Sylvia Townsend Warner
A Midwinter Break by Bernard MacLaverty
A Grimble at Christmas by Clement Freud
Christmas Chronicles by Nigel Slater
Small Pleasures by Clare Chambers
Driving Over Lemons by Chris Stewart
A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry
56 days by Catherine Ryan Howard
The Good Pilot Peter Woodhouse by Alexander McCall Smith
A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara
The Cost of Living by Deborah Levy
Burnt Shadows by Kamila Shamsie
Echoes by Danielle Steel
A Single Thread by Tracey Chevalier
The Skylarks War by Hilary McKay
Women of Steel by Michelle Rawlins
The Little Breton Bistro - Nina George
Magpie - Elizabeth Day
The Burning Girls - C J Tudor
The Wall Jumper - Peter Schneider
Without you there is no us - Suki Kim
Still I Rise poetry collection - Maya Angelou
The Fire of Joy collection of poems - Clive James
Small Pleasures - Claire Chambers
Travels on a donkey - R L Stevenson
Pompeii - Robert Harris
The First 80 years an alien - Lucy Sinclair (this book was written by a local lady, only available in the library)
Here are the Barrow upon Soar Book Lover’s club favourite “history” texts for September 2021:
“Etta Lemon” by Tessa Bose
“My Granddaughter Sends Her Regards and Apologises” by Frederick Backman
“The Reason I Jump” by Naoki Higashida
“Who they Was” by Gabriel Krauze
“The Shadow Queen” by Anne O’Brien
"Things I Don’t Want to Know" by Deborah Levy
"Night Bitch" by Rachel Yoder
"People of Abandoned Character" by Claire Whitfield
"The Appeal" by Janice Hallett
"56 Days" by Catherine Ryan Howard
"The Story of my Teeth" by Valeria Luiselli
We hope you enjoy exploring our selections and wish you happy reading.
Here are the Barrow upon Soar Book Lover’s club favourite “history” texts for May 2021:
“The Rose Code” by Kate Quinn
This book explores the roles played by women at Bletchley Park in the vital code breaking work in WW11. Based on real lives.
“Malibu Rising” by Taylor Jenkins-Reid
This is complete escapism into the glamorous star studded world of four siblings. Set in the 80’s
“Tombland” by C J Sansom
This is the 7th historical novel in the Shardlake series. A murder mystery set in 1549.
“The Dig” by John Preston
Set in 1939 in the context of the excavation of the Anglo Saxon ship at Sutton Hoo.
“On Wilder Seas” by Nikki Marmery
Set in 1579 this is about Maria, the only woman on the Golden Hind and is based on real life records.
For Mental Health Awareness Week we also chose some texts we would recommend related to mental health issues:
For adults:
“The Boy, the Mole and the Fox” by Charlie Mackesy
“The Miseducation of Evie Epworth” by Matson Taylor
“The Authenticity Project” by Clare Pooley
“The Road to Little Dribbling” by Bill Bryson
“This Book Will Save Your Life” by A M Homes
And for younger readers:
“Luna Rae is not alone”by Hayley Webster
“At Hawthorn Time” by Melissa Harrison
