You have to read Lavinia!! I just read it a few months ago after reading the Penelopiad (grabbed it because I wanted another ancient story told in the woman's perspective) and I absolutely loved it. I haven't read any other Ursula K. Le Guin for the same reason - I just haven't felt drawn to any of her other books - but Lavinia was written so beautifully and the story was constructed so so well. Highly recommend!
This is such a good list! I get what you mean that sometimes you just read books at the wrong time, or when you're too young. I studied in Spain as a teenager and when I had to read some Saramago for school I didn't like it, but I feel like he's an author I could enjoy now. I've been meaning to learn Portuguese so might try to learn the language and then practice through his books hahaha. I hope you enjoy all these authors when you get around to them! x
I think you'd highly enjoy 'Death at Intervals' (I think that's how it is translated in the UK) by Saramago. It explores the idea of a society where no one dies and its repercussions. I find it a super important read especially at a time in which people are obsessed with the idea of immortality and technology is advancing towards that. Xx
I second Death at Intervals (called Death with interruptions in the US), it's my favourite Saramago, so far. However, I haven't read Blindness, which I believe tends to be considered his best work, so it might be a good place to start as well.
So cool your father like Jose Saramago! I’m portuguese and I found his work fascinating, as I studied him in school multiple times. I didn’t read The Elephants Journey yet, but “Baltasar and Blimunda” and “Caim” are amazing books! Hope you like him!
The first Sarah Waters I read was Fingersmith and it was absolutely incredible! So brooding and atmospheric, it had me completely hooked! And so many twists and turns! It's one I always recommend at work, and to friends.
I adore Octavia E Butler! I wrote my Master's thesis on the first book in the Lilith's Brood series and I adored it! I also really want to read Le Guin!!
I've read Kindred and The Parable of The Sower by Octavia E Butler which are both very popular, but the book I enjoyed the most by her by a fair way was Seed To Harvest, a bind up of 4 books from her Patternist series. My edition is under 800 pages so not quite snappy for 4 books. Also Fingersmith is out of this world!!! One of those books where I feel jittery and excited when I think about it and how much I loved it
I love that you are wanting to read so many authors who were your father’s favorites. Kindred is amazing, you’ve reminded me I need to read more Butler. Also love Sarah Waters ... I’d start with Fingersmith🤓
José Saramago is one of my all time favourite authors. I love whatever he writes. The book you picked is one of the first books I read by him as well 😊
José Saramago is a must all over Latin America and of course, I feel the need to read him. The book that I hear people mention the most is Blindness so I think that’s where I want to start. Great video by the way!
I read How Late It Was, How Late by James Kelman at uni and it was one of my favourite books that was assigned over my entire four years - highly recommend. It's very stream of consciousness and it's written in a Glaswegian phonetic style and when it won the Man Booker in '94 the snooty English establishment threw an absolute shit-fit, so you know it's good :P
José Saramago is awesome. I’m portuguese and we have to read one of his book at hightschool. At first i didn’t like, i was 16 - not a good age for deep reading. But some years later i found one of his books a masterpiece and i learn to like his writting. 😀
My favourite book by José Saramago is The Year of the Death of Ricardo Reis! But I liked all the books that I've read by him so far. Death at Intervals is also a good place to start, just because it's one of his shortest books and that may be helpful in order to get familiar with his writing style. Your pronunciation of his name was spot on by the way! Many people on youtube understandably say it wrong.
Aha I remember getting told off when I said his name on TH-cam once because I didn't say 'hosay' and I was like HE'S PORTUGUESE. I guess cause he was one of my dad's favourites I always heard how to pronounce it plus I have a Portuguese friend with the same first name. I'm hearing a lot of praise for Death at Intervals, maybe I should start there instead ^_^
I really loved José Saramgo’s “Essay on blindness” and “The double”, which Denis Villneuve made an adaptation (“Enemy”) starring Jake Gyllenhaal. I both enhoyed the book and the film, oddly enough...
José Saramago is amazing! I am portuguese and think he is one of the best portuguese author! My favourite is Blindness and I recommend it so hard... I'm sure you'll love it :) Continue with the amazing videos :)
I’ve read a couple of Saramago’s books. My favourite is probably Death at Intervals. Blindess is also amazing and its movie adaptation is worth checking out too.
Saramago is sooo good. I'd recommend starting with Blindness (I think that's the title in English?), because the pacing on The Elephant's Journey is a lot slower.
Love your videos! I always come out with great recommendations ❤ I don't know if you're very interested in Latin American literature but I read The House of Spirits by Isabel Allende at school and it's been one of my favorite books ever since. Melina Marchetta's books are also incredible.
"Death with Interruptions" is one that I highly recommend from José Saramago, read it years ago and stuck with me until today. Read "The Dispossed" and "The left hand of darkness" by U.K Le Guin, they are also fantastic. If you are on the vain of some more sci-fi, I would also recommend "Flowers for Algernon" and "Random acts of senseless violence" ;).
Was very happy to see Ursula K le Guin on your list. She's one of my favourites! A Wizard of Earthsea is great but I always liked The Tombs of Atuan (the 2nd book) best. I hope you get on with it better this time around.☺️
This was great!😊 I have a similar list - there are so many authors I want to get to! Ursula K Le Guin is a good shout, I can imagine she’s a brilliant writer.
I've never managed to read Jane Austen and feel that I really need to dive in at some point. I started Pride and Prejudice a few years ago and didn't make it past the 50-100 page range but after dedicating more time to reading recently, I'm hoping to try again at some point!
I'd highly recommend Affinity and Fingersmith, they're my favourite Sarah Waters books. I find Tipping the Velvet so sad in places, that it's not ended up being my favourite!
Can I URGE you to read The Paying Guests by Sarah Waters, I’ve also read and loved Tipping the Velvet by her too, but The Paying Guests was just SO GOOD. So many authors I haven’t heard of and now want to try here Jean, THANK YOU! Xx
I've read 3 Jose Saramago books. 2 I really enjoyed (though "enjoyed" might be the wrong word for at least the first one), and the third one I read put me off reading him for a while, but I might try getting back into his books in the near future. In any case, I highly recommend Blindness and The Double.
Did Saramago write Blindness? As I feel that’s one I’ve always wanted to give a read. I’ve never heard of Kollontai. I shall have to look up more about her. I think you’d love Sarah Waters. I’ve read half of her books and am going to read The Paying Guests this bank holiday and Fingersmith at Christmas.
Yes, he did. That's one of the books that I've also been meaning to read. I've had a copy sitting on my shelves for a couple of years and it's just calling to me.
Saramago is one of my favorites, my favorite is the one about the convent, i don’t remember the name in english because i read it in Portuguese. The kindred was also a great experience
I highly recommend Anne McCaffrey, Robin McKinley and Ursula KLeGuin! If you find you don’t like Dragonflight as much as it’s hyped to be I recommend reading her Harper Hall trilogy, starting with Dragonsong. It’s more YA but it’s almost my favourite of her stuff.
I bought Blindness on a whim a few months ago, would like to get to that one. Judith Butler has some good points but yes, she is dense. I can't wait to read kindred with the Feminist Orchestra, it will be a great way to end the year! I read Tipping the Velvet by Sarah Waters first and I think it's a good one to start with, her writing is wonderful. I feel like I need to read Kate Atkinson, Helen Oyeyemi and Kazuo Ishiguro, I feel like I'm going to love them but haven't got to them yet.
Yes, Saramago!!! His books are very good! I recommend Death with Interruptions... it's about a city in which people, suddenly, don't die anymore. Even the ill, the old, everyone, because Death decides to take some time off. Soooooo good!
Blindness by Saramago is fantastic. If you get a chance, check out works by Heinrich Bill. I particularly liked The Clown and And Never Said a Word. Happy reading.....📚
Sarah Waters is amazing! My favourite is The Little Stranger, but I think either Fingersmith or Tipping the Velvet are the best ones to start with - I'd particularly recommend Fingersmith just because it's the one I prefer out of those two. :) I also desperately need to read some Ursula K Le Guin (you're not alone - I also need to give Earthsea a second chance after being unable to get into it the first time I tried) and Octavia Butler.
I feel hard core sold on Sarah Waters after filming this video and everyone leaving such positive comments about all of her books. I realised a friend passed on a copy of Fingersmith to me so I'll probably start there.
The only Sarah Waters book I've ever read was Tipping the Velvet, and it was very entertaining! I've heard great things about Fingersmith too though which is on my TBR 👍🏻
I love Sunshine by Robin McKinley. It's the best vampire novel out there.(and she is lovely, she replied to a tweet of mine once really sweetly :) Affinity is my favourite Waters novel, because it's the most melancholy & Gothic of her pastiches - a proper ghost story. I really like Blindness by Saramago, but my friend swears by The Gospel According to Jesus Christ as being one of her favourites of all time, so there's that.
I watched the movie adaption of The Tin Drum and that surely was an interesting experience... haven't read the book though so I can't really say anything about that but knowing the movie I can imagine it is a great book
Highly recommend Fingersmith, it's my favorite Sarah Waters, with Tipping the Velvet as a close second. I also really liked Kindred - I didn't expect to because I'm not super into time-travel stuff, but this was such a unique way of using that idea and a great perspective, coming from a Black woman. It's definitely hard to read at times because Butler does not shy away from the realities of slavery, but it's not gratuitous and it's really well-written.
If you want to read some Grass, start with "Cat and Mouse". It is much shorter and very similar in style to "The Tin Drum". So you can get a feeling for his style without to much of a commitment. As a German Studies major I read the original German edition: Please share how his very long run-on sentences got translated when you get around to him.
Ah it's really nice to hear from someone who has read The Elephant's Journey! I think I definitely need to go back and give the Earthsea books a second chance!
Left Hand of Darkness is definitely a book that leaves an impression. I still think about it years after reading it, but I didn't exactly ENJOY it while I was reading. I much prefer Ursula LeGuin's Wizard of Earthsea books. Anne McAffrey's books are really imaginative and fun to read, but there is some odd sexism in there that always gets on my nerves. Out of all the Pern books, I love the Harper's Hall trilogy the best! The Blue Sword is wonderful, amazing, fantastic, and a HUGE favorite of mine! You should definitely also read the second book in the duology, The Hero and the Crown. Both are so imaginative and full of deep meaning. Happy REading!
Ah that's a shame, a few people have mentioned the outdated ideas in McAffrey's books so I'll go in prepared at least! I'm really excited for The Blue Sword now ^_^
Authors I need to read: Jane Austen and Charles Dickens. I don't read many novels. If you were to ask my my favorite I would say, "Don Quixote" and then I'd open my mouth and add, "Uuuuuuuhhhh...?" A bit of an exaggeration but it's a genre I want to read more of. Dickens' reputation for writing colorful, memorable and eccentric characters reminds me of Chaucer (who is one of my favorite writers). And I've just heard so much praise for Austen that I thought it was finally time. Also, I'm an American who has never read "Adventures of Huckleberry Finn." It's okay. You're free to judge me.
Xenu One of my long-term goals is to read all of Dickens' works. Ive only read two so far-A Christmas Carol and Tale of Two Cities-but I loved them both.
Good to know. :-) I was thinking of beginning with "Bleak House." What I've heard of it intrigues me most. George Orwell (my favorite essay writer, along with James Baldwin) also wrote a wonderful essay about Dickens that made me even more interested in finally taking the plunge.
Sarah Waters is a fantastic storyteller, she really is. Fingersmith is a great one to start on. They’re all very good to excellent whatever you choose, (I haven’t read The Night Watch). The Little Stranger film adaptation is out at the end of August! The Left Hand of Darkness has beautiful sentences, for me though, it’s better read as philosophy - character-wise it left me a half-starved. I going to start looking out for some Scottish writers. I never hear much about them, so I guess I need to read some of them!
I adore Robin Mckinley! BEAUTY was one of my favorite books growing up, and ROSE DAUGHTER, her other retelling of Beauty & the Beast is equally amazing. I'd also recommend reading DEERSKIN, and SUNSHINE.
ninsiana0 I don't think I've ever picked up a book of hers I didn't enjoy. I've got all the fairytale retellings, the hero and the crown books, and a bunch of the random stand alones. It's a rare author that goes from vampires, to retellings, to incredibly interesting original works.
Every time I watch your videos when you have this background I remind myself that I need to read some Noam Chomsky! Ahahha I also REALLY want to read Anne Bronte and Svetlana Alexievich.
Anne McCaffrey is my favorite author. I've read everything she ever wrote. You should definitely pick up dragon flight. The blue Sword is also one of my favorite books though.
I actually have a whole playlist of bookcase tours ^_^ th-cam.com/play/PL6PB4rVWktX-dq8alvif_9a16vVh-pn8k.html and this is the video looking at the bookcase behind me in this video: th-cam.com/video/O9rIkQ6TpGU/w-d-xo.html
I've read Jose Saramago's probably most famous work "Blindness" and if his other books are anything similar to it I will say the format in English is very difficult to follow. It was definitely worth trudging through the formatting to get the story but I hear his works are MUCH better in Spanish or Portuguese so I'll probably be trying him again in Spanish instead because English... yeah it was definitely a bit difficult
Kate Pfeil Well, I've read Blindness in Portuguese a few years ago and even though I'm a native speaker it was really hard to read too. I can't say I enjoyed the book, but I was a teenager then so maybe I would have a different opinion on it now.
Robin McKinley's books are great. I love her prose and how detailed it is as well as the worlds she creates, mostly in her books that are inspired by fairy tales. The Blue Sword was a good read and so too The Hero and the Crown, which has a dragon in it. I highly recommend her to you. I think you might like her work, especially the themes she touches on. I recently read Dragonflight and thought it was okay. There were some parts in it that annoyed me, mainly the male-female relationships, but the dragons were great.
I found Saramago's Blindness really immersive and because of that, very creepy. I'm reading The Night Watch right now, and I really like it so far (despite its WWII setting).
sarah Waters is incredible!! i’d recommend fingersmith if you like more exciting plot-driven works and the night watch if you like character-driven novels more :-)!!
The earthsea Cycle gets regular praise on r/fantasy. There was a time when i picked up between Herman Hesse and Günther Grass. Ended up with Hesse and loved his famous works but now that I hear Grass mentioned, it seems that i have forgotten him altogether. Can't seem to get into classics anymore because there is so much good fantasy being published these days.. But interesting names you mentioned.
Hi, I recently discovered your booktube and I love it! Your Penguin books collection are beautiful. Anyway, I wanted to ask since you love all Greek related lit, do you happen to like Roman and Egyptian as well? Thank you!
Thank you! Yes I've read tonnes of Roman literature as well, I studied the Romans and Greeks originally at uni but now focus on the Greeks. I haven't read much Egyptian stuff but I think the history is really interesting and would love to learn more ^_^
Thank you for replying. I really love all of your book collections, your channel are quite different from other booktubers that I have already seen. Hoping that your having a great day!
I need to read books by David Foster Wallace, Kate Atkinson, Jim Butcher, Haruki Murakami, Margaret Atwood, Octavia E. Butler, Brandon Sanderson, Tahereh Mafi, Jay Kristoff, Alice Oseman and N. K. Jemisin :)
I picked up an Ursula K. LeGuin book not long after she passed away and was kind of underwhelmed by it. But it was literally just a random book from her back catalogue and not one of her well-known ones, so I'll give her another go at some point!
Hey, Jean :3 since I haven't read any of these books, I have a question which I feel like you can answer: can you read "Penelopiad" if you haven't read Homer? I just can't get into his work (mainly because of translation issues) and worry I won't appreciate Atwood's take on the story as well.
I read Affinity by Sarah waters for uni this year and I absolutely loved it, I definitely want to read more of her work now. Judith Butler is well know for being an incredibly interesting theorist who's writing is extremely difficult to read, I had one tutor say that he would give her the award for the worst writer ever😂 I found that researching the idea of gender performativity before reading Bodies that Matter really helped x
José Saramago is awesome. His style is gorgeous, the ideas are interesting and never what you'd expect. You should definitely read his books. He has written a book titled The Gospel According to Jesus Christ, which is an alternative, magical-realism style take on the story of Jesus. Saramago was an atheist, and so am I, and I still found it a really good story. Better than the original. (yes, I have read the entire Bible too) So I recommend that. But in more general, I think you should read the books your dad liked, and/or recommended to you first. I think that would be nice.
Also, for Robin McKinley try starting with The hero and the crown. I know the blue sword is technically 'first' but honestly it doesn't matter for those books.
I got by bachelor's degree in German, and I haven't read any Günther Grass. He's definitely on my list along with W. Somerset Maughm, Helen Oyeyemi, Jeanette Winterson, and John Wyndham.
Oh yeah absolutely, no stress! These are more authors I’ve been looking forward to starting for a while who have great reputations ☺️ I never stress about books I haven’t read aha.
Sarah Waters I hear recommended again and again. Fingersmith was in David Bowie’s top 100 of all time books list www.telegraph.co.uk/books/what-to-read/david-bowie-the-man-who-loved-books/
Ooh cool, I've checked and I have a copy of Fingersmith that a friend was getting rid of in Edinburgh so I'm definitely bringing it back to London with me.
![Authors I want to complete [CC]](/img/n.gif)
You have to read Lavinia!! I just read it a few months ago after reading the Penelopiad (grabbed it because I wanted another ancient story told in the woman's perspective) and I absolutely loved it. I haven't read any other Ursula K. Le Guin for the same reason - I just haven't felt drawn to any of her other books - but Lavinia was written so beautifully and the story was constructed so so well. Highly recommend!
This is one of the most interesting Booktube Videos I ever watched - Thank you for that! :) greetings from a philosopher student from Germany!
Aw thank you so much I’m so glad you enjoyed it!
I've never read any of Jose Saramago's books but will definitely be picking up The Elephant's Journey after this, it sounds so lovely!
This is such a good list!
I get what you mean that sometimes you just read books at the wrong time, or when you're too young. I studied in Spain as a teenager and when I had to read some Saramago for school I didn't like it, but I feel like he's an author I could enjoy now. I've been meaning to learn Portuguese so might try to learn the language and then practice through his books hahaha.
I hope you enjoy all these authors when you get around to them! x
I think you'd highly enjoy 'Death at Intervals' (I think that's how it is translated in the UK) by Saramago. It explores the idea of a society where no one dies and its repercussions. I find it a super important read especially at a time in which people are obsessed with the idea of immortality and technology is advancing towards that. Xx
Mariana A. In English the title is Death with Interruptions :)
I second Death at Intervals (called Death with interruptions in the US), it's my favourite Saramago, so far. However, I haven't read Blindness, which I believe tends to be considered his best work, so it might be a good place to start as well.
So cool your father like Jose Saramago! I’m portuguese and I found his work fascinating, as I studied him in school multiple times. I didn’t read The Elephants Journey yet, but “Baltasar and Blimunda” and “Caim” are amazing books! Hope you like him!
The first Sarah Waters I read was Fingersmith and it was absolutely incredible! So brooding and atmospheric, it had me completely hooked! And so many twists and turns! It's one I always recommend at work, and to friends.
I'm thinking Fingersmith might be my starting place after a few comments now. Thanks!
Fingersmith & Tipping the Velvet are my two Waters favourites. I highly recommend the audiobook for Tipping the Velvet; the narrator was amazing.
I've found a copy of Fingersmith and am definitely picking it up ASAP ^_^
Jean Bookishthoughts I hope you enjoy it as much as I did!
I adore Octavia E Butler! I wrote my Master's thesis on the first book in the Lilith's Brood series and I adored it! I also really want to read Le Guin!!
I've read Kindred and The Parable of The Sower by Octavia E Butler which are both very popular, but the book I enjoyed the most by her by a fair way was Seed To Harvest, a bind up of 4 books from her Patternist series. My edition is under 800 pages so not quite snappy for 4 books. Also Fingersmith is out of this world!!! One of those books where I feel jittery and excited when I think about it and how much I loved it
I love that you are wanting to read so many authors who were your father’s favorites. Kindred is amazing, you’ve reminded me I need to read more Butler. Also love Sarah Waters ... I’d start with Fingersmith🤓
I've never read the blue sword but i have re-read others by mckinley (beauty, spindle's end, rose daughter). i love her fairy tale retellings. 😊
This was a video idea I really enjoyed! There are so many authors now that I think about it that I really want to get to and read, or read more of!
José Saramago is one of my all time favourite authors. I love whatever he writes. The book you picked is one of the first books I read by him as well 😊
Ah that's nice to hear that's where someone else started!
José Saramago is a must all over Latin America and of course, I feel the need to read him. The book that I hear people mention the most is Blindness so I think that’s where I want to start. Great video by the way!
I'm definitely going to prioritise reading him this year ^_^
I read How Late It Was, How Late by James Kelman at uni and it was one of my favourite books that was assigned over my entire four years - highly recommend. It's very stream of consciousness and it's written in a Glaswegian phonetic style and when it won the Man Booker in '94 the snooty English establishment threw an absolute shit-fit, so you know it's good :P
José Saramago is awesome. I’m portuguese and we have to read one of his book at hightschool. At first i didn’t like, i was 16 - not a good age for deep reading. But some years later i found one of his books a masterpiece and i learn to like his writting. 😀
My favourite book by José Saramago is The Year of the Death of Ricardo Reis! But I liked all the books that I've read by him so far. Death at Intervals is also a good place to start, just because it's one of his shortest books and that may be helpful in order to get familiar with his writing style.
Your pronunciation of his name was spot on by the way! Many people on youtube understandably say it wrong.
Susana_S_F I think her Scottish accent helps her a lot when pronouncing the R!
Aha I remember getting told off when I said his name on TH-cam once because I didn't say 'hosay' and I was like HE'S PORTUGUESE. I guess cause he was one of my dad's favourites I always heard how to pronounce it plus I have a Portuguese friend with the same first name. I'm hearing a lot of praise for Death at Intervals, maybe I should start there instead ^_^
Yessss I love Butler’s Kindred! I wrote a paper on in for uni about trauma and memory, it’s such a good book. I highly recommend it!
I'm so excited, I just hear amazing things about it!
I really loved José Saramgo’s “Essay on blindness” and “The double”, which Denis Villneuve made an adaptation (“Enemy”) starring Jake Gyllenhaal. I both enhoyed the book and the film, oddly enough...
A book following an elephants journey? Yes, I’m sold!
Right!? Perfect concept aha
José Saramago is amazing! I am portuguese and think he is one of the best portuguese author! My favourite is Blindness and I recommend it so hard... I'm sure you'll love it :)
Continue with the amazing videos :)
I’ve read a couple of Saramago’s books. My favourite is probably Death at Intervals. Blindess is also amazing and its movie adaptation is worth checking out too.
Saramago is sooo good. I'd recommend starting with Blindness (I think that's the title in English?), because the pacing on The Elephant's Journey is a lot slower.
Love your videos! I always come out with great recommendations ❤
I don't know if you're very interested in Latin American literature but I read The House of Spirits by Isabel Allende at school and it's been one of my favorite books ever since. Melina Marchetta's books are also incredible.
Thank you! I have actually read some Allende in the past and really enjoyed it ^_^ although I haven't gotten to The House of Spirits yet.
"Death with Interruptions" is one that I highly recommend from José Saramago, read it years ago and stuck with me until today. Read "The Dispossed" and "The left hand of darkness" by U.K Le Guin, they are also fantastic. If you are on the vain of some more sci-fi, I would also recommend "Flowers for Algernon" and "Random acts of senseless violence" ;).
Jose Saramago - Death with Interruptions. Its probably one of the most beautiful books that I have ever read!
Everyone seems to love that book, it has me really excited to experience it for myself ^_^
Was very happy to see Ursula K le Guin on your list. She's one of my favourites! A Wizard of Earthsea is great but I always liked The Tombs of Atuan (the 2nd book) best. I hope you get on with it better this time around.☺️
This was great!😊 I have a similar list - there are so many authors I want to get to! Ursula K Le Guin is a good shout, I can imagine she’s a brilliant writer.
I've never managed to read Jane Austen and feel that I really need to dive in at some point. I started Pride and Prejudice a few years ago and didn't make it past the 50-100 page range but after dedicating more time to reading recently, I'm hoping to try again at some point!
When it comes to Sarah Waters I started with ‘Tipping the Velvet’. My friend recommended it, I read and it made me want to read more of her works.
I'd highly recommend Affinity and Fingersmith, they're my favourite Sarah Waters books. I find Tipping the Velvet so sad in places, that it's not ended up being my favourite!
Love sarah waters! My fave is the paying guests, just love it
I'm finally reading one now, Fingersmith as I already had a copy, and really enjoying it ^_^
Can I URGE you to read The Paying Guests by Sarah Waters, I’ve also read and loved Tipping the Velvet by her too, but The Paying Guests was just SO GOOD. So many authors I haven’t heard of and now want to try here Jean, THANK YOU! Xx
I'm SO excited to start Waters after filming this video aha, think all the comments are the kick in the backside I needed. xxx
In the “western canon” by Harold Bloom he recommends “Baltasar and blimunda”, that said I haven’t read yet.
I've read 3 Jose Saramago books. 2 I really enjoyed (though "enjoyed" might be the wrong word for at least the first one), and the third one I read put me off reading him for a while, but I might try getting back into his books in the near future. In any case, I highly recommend Blindness and The Double.
Did Saramago write Blindness? As I feel that’s one I’ve always wanted to give a read. I’ve never heard of Kollontai. I shall have to look up more about her. I think you’d love Sarah Waters. I’ve read half of her books and am going to read The Paying Guests this bank holiday and Fingersmith at Christmas.
SavidgeReads Yes, Saramago wrote Blindness and he is a great author. I love all of his books. Strongly suggest.
Yes, he did. That's one of the books that I've also been meaning to read. I've had a copy sitting on my shelves for a couple of years and it's just calling to me.
Saramago is one of my favorites, my favorite is the one about the convent, i don’t remember the name in english because i read it in Portuguese. The kindred was also a great experience
These books look so interesting to read!📖😍😍😍😍
Glad you think so ☺️
I highly recommend Anne McCaffrey, Robin McKinley and Ursula KLeGuin! If you find you don’t like Dragonflight as much as it’s hyped to be I recommend reading her Harper Hall trilogy, starting with Dragonsong. It’s more YA but it’s almost my favourite of her stuff.
Harper Hall is my favorite too!
I bought Blindness on a whim a few months ago, would like to get to that one. Judith Butler has some good points but yes, she is dense. I can't wait to read kindred with the Feminist Orchestra, it will be a great way to end the year! I read Tipping the Velvet by Sarah Waters first and I think it's a good one to start with, her writing is wonderful. I feel like I need to read Kate Atkinson, Helen Oyeyemi and Kazuo Ishiguro, I feel like I'm going to love them but haven't got to them yet.
Yes, Saramago!!! His books are very good! I recommend Death with Interruptions... it's about a city in which people, suddenly, don't die anymore. Even the ill, the old, everyone, because Death decides to take some time off. Soooooo good!
That seems to be a lot of people's favourite! Perhaps I should reconsider where I'm starting ^_^
Yeeees, and it's such a short book, it's a constant entry on those "Books you can read in a day" lists! Hope you enjoy it!
O, The Tin Drum! A lovely, quite whimsical sort of a novel . . .
I haven't read any Grass, but Tin Drum and this book I found at the used book store The Flounder sound really interesting.
Sarah Waters is def on my Author Tbr as well!
This year shall be our year!
Blindness by Saramago is fantastic. If you get a chance, check out works by Heinrich Bill. I particularly liked The Clown and And Never Said a Word. Happy reading.....📚
Sarah Waters is amazing! My favourite is The Little Stranger, but I think either Fingersmith or Tipping the Velvet are the best ones to start with - I'd particularly recommend Fingersmith just because it's the one I prefer out of those two. :) I also desperately need to read some Ursula K Le Guin (you're not alone - I also need to give Earthsea a second chance after being unable to get into it the first time I tried) and Octavia Butler.
I feel hard core sold on Sarah Waters after filming this video and everyone leaving such positive comments about all of her books. I realised a friend passed on a copy of Fingersmith to me so I'll probably start there.
Sarah Waters is all kinds of fabulous. Can't decide on my favourite. Either The Paying Guests, The Night Watch or Fingersmith.
Ok I'm definitely sold on reading some Waters ASAP.
The only Sarah Waters book I've ever read was Tipping the Velvet, and it was very entertaining! I've heard great things about Fingersmith too though which is on my TBR 👍🏻
Yeah everyone seems to be raving about Fingersmith aha! I definitely need to read her this year.
I love Sunshine by Robin McKinley. It's the best vampire novel out there.(and she is lovely, she replied to a tweet of mine once really sweetly :)
Affinity is my favourite Waters novel, because it's the most melancholy & Gothic of her pastiches - a proper ghost story.
I really like Blindness by Saramago, but my friend swears by The Gospel According to Jesus Christ as being one of her favourites of all time, so there's that.
I really think the Earthsea series is one to try again, it takes a while to get into but I adored it so much and it's not that long
I actually found a cheap copy recently so will definitely give it another chance.
I watched the movie adaption of The Tin Drum and that surely was an interesting experience... haven't read the book though so I can't really say anything about that but knowing the movie I can imagine it is a great book
Highly recommend Fingersmith, it's my favorite Sarah Waters, with Tipping the Velvet as a close second. I also really liked Kindred - I didn't expect to because I'm not super into time-travel stuff, but this was such a unique way of using that idea and a great perspective, coming from a Black woman. It's definitely hard to read at times because Butler does not shy away from the realities of slavery, but it's not gratuitous and it's really well-written.
If you want to read some Grass, start with "Cat and Mouse". It is much shorter and very similar in style to "The Tin Drum". So you can get a feeling for his style without to much of a commitment. As a German Studies major I read the original German edition: Please share how his very long run-on sentences got translated when you get around to him.
Thank you! That is really helpful.
OMG, I absolutely love the elephant journey by Jose Saramago :)
Ah it's really nice to hear from someone who has read The Elephant's Journey! I think I definitely need to go back and give the Earthsea books a second chance!
Left Hand of Darkness is definitely a book that leaves an impression. I still think about it years after reading it, but I didn't exactly ENJOY it while I was reading. I much prefer Ursula LeGuin's Wizard of Earthsea books.
Anne McAffrey's books are really imaginative and fun to read, but there is some odd sexism in there that always gets on my nerves. Out of all the Pern books, I love the Harper's Hall trilogy the best!
The Blue Sword is wonderful, amazing, fantastic, and a HUGE favorite of mine! You should definitely also read the second book in the duology, The Hero and the Crown. Both are so imaginative and full of deep meaning.
Happy REading!
Ah that's a shame, a few people have mentioned the outdated ideas in McAffrey's books so I'll go in prepared at least! I'm really excited for The Blue Sword now ^_^
Authors I need to read: Jane Austen and Charles Dickens. I don't read many novels. If you were to ask my my favorite I would say, "Don Quixote" and then I'd open my mouth and add, "Uuuuuuuhhhh...?" A bit of an exaggeration but it's a genre I want to read more of. Dickens' reputation for writing colorful, memorable and eccentric characters reminds me of Chaucer (who is one of my favorite writers). And I've just heard so much praise for Austen that I thought it was finally time. Also, I'm an American who has never read "Adventures of Huckleberry Finn." It's okay. You're free to judge me.
Xenu One of my long-term goals is to read all of Dickens' works. Ive only read two so far-A Christmas Carol and Tale of Two Cities-but I loved them both.
Good to know. :-) I was thinking of beginning with "Bleak House." What I've heard of it intrigues me most. George Orwell (my favorite essay writer, along with James Baldwin) also wrote a wonderful essay about Dickens that made me even more interested in finally taking the plunge.
Anne McCaffrey was my very first favourite as a kid....ever. Good times!
Sarah Waters is a fantastic storyteller, she really is. Fingersmith is a great one to start on. They’re all very good to excellent whatever you choose, (I haven’t read The Night Watch). The Little Stranger film adaptation is out at the end of August! The Left Hand of Darkness has beautiful sentences, for me though, it’s better read as philosophy - character-wise it left me a half-starved. I going to start looking out for some Scottish writers. I never hear much about them, so I guess I need to read some of them!
I adore Robin Mckinley! BEAUTY was one of my favorite books growing up, and ROSE DAUGHTER, her other retelling of Beauty & the Beast is equally amazing. I'd also recommend reading DEERSKIN, and SUNSHINE.
ninsiana0 I don't think I've ever picked up a book of hers I didn't enjoy. I've got all the fairytale retellings, the hero and the crown books, and a bunch of the random stand alones. It's a rare author that goes from vampires, to retellings, to incredibly interesting original works.
Every time I watch your videos when you have this background I remind myself that I need to read some Noam Chomsky! Ahahha I also REALLY want to read Anne Bronte and Svetlana Alexievich.
Aha he's dense but really makes you think!
I love Robin McKinley! The Blue Sword and The Hero and the Crown are great. My favorite by her is Beauty.
I'm excited to finally experience her writing since she's so loved ^_^ and it's nice to know if I like her she has so many books.
Anne McCaffrey is my favorite author. I've read everything she ever wrote. You should definitely pick up dragon flight. The blue Sword is also one of my favorite books though.
Eeeh I'm so excited for McCaffrey. I loved discovering a new beloved fantasy author that has a huge back catalogue.
Would love to see a book shelf tour, or do you swap and sell a lot of books on after reading?
I actually have a whole playlist of bookcase tours ^_^ th-cam.com/play/PL6PB4rVWktX-dq8alvif_9a16vVh-pn8k.html and this is the video looking at the bookcase behind me in this video: th-cam.com/video/O9rIkQ6TpGU/w-d-xo.html
Jean Bookishthoughts brill thanks
I want to read all these now! How are you so good at convincing people to read books??
Ahaha I'm sorry/not sorry ;)
I've read Jose Saramago's probably most famous work "Blindness" and if his other books are anything similar to it I will say the format in English is very difficult to follow. It was definitely worth trudging through the formatting to get the story but I hear his works are MUCH better in Spanish or Portuguese so I'll probably be trying him again in Spanish instead because English... yeah it was definitely a bit difficult
Kate Pfeil Well, I've read Blindness in Portuguese a few years ago and even though I'm a native speaker it was really hard to read too. I can't say I enjoyed the book, but I was a teenager then so maybe I would have a different opinion on it now.
Robin McKinley's books are great. I love her prose and how detailed it is as well as the worlds she creates, mostly in her books that are inspired by fairy tales. The Blue Sword was a good read and so too The Hero and the Crown, which has a dragon in it. I highly recommend her to you. I think you might like her work, especially the themes she touches on. I recently read Dragonflight and thought it was okay. There were some parts in it that annoyed me, mainly the male-female relationships, but the dragons were great.
Yas to more dragons! That's a shame about Dragonflight but I'm excited for The Blue Sword all the more now.
I found Saramago's Blindness really immersive and because of that, very creepy.
I'm reading The Night Watch right now, and I really like it so far (despite its WWII setting).
Speaking of Scottish writers, I’m currently reading Irvine Welsh’s Trainspotting.
sarah Waters is incredible!! i’d recommend fingersmith if you like more exciting plot-driven works and the night watch if you like character-driven novels more :-)!!
Ok I really think I need to pick up Fingersmith in the next couple of months!
The earthsea Cycle gets regular praise on r/fantasy. There was a time when i picked up between Herman Hesse and Günther Grass. Ended up with Hesse and loved his famous works but now that I hear Grass mentioned, it seems that i have forgotten him altogether. Can't seem to get into classics anymore because there is so much good fantasy being published these days.. But interesting names you mentioned.
Ray Bradbury and H.P Lovecraft are the only two authors whose books I've been wanting to read.
Hi, I recently discovered your booktube and I love it! Your Penguin books collection are beautiful.
Anyway, I wanted to ask since you love all Greek related lit, do you happen to like Roman and Egyptian as well? Thank you!
Thank you! Yes I've read tonnes of Roman literature as well, I studied the Romans and Greeks originally at uni but now focus on the Greeks. I haven't read much Egyptian stuff but I think the history is really interesting and would love to learn more ^_^
Thank you for replying. I really love all of your book collections, your channel are quite different from other booktubers that I have already seen. Hoping that your having a great day!
I need to read books by David Foster Wallace, Kate Atkinson, Jim Butcher, Haruki Murakami, Margaret Atwood, Octavia E. Butler, Brandon Sanderson, Tahereh Mafi, Jay Kristoff, Alice Oseman and N. K. Jemisin :)
I've only read Atwood of that list but she has written some of my favorite books. I would also like to check out N. K. Jemisin in the near future!
I picked up an Ursula K. LeGuin book not long after she passed away and was kind of underwhelmed by it. But it was literally just a random book from her back catalogue and not one of her well-known ones, so I'll give her another go at some point!
Yeah sometimes it's all about finding the right book, right? Aha. Like there are some Atwoods I really don't like but some I love.
Yeah, I hear you! I've only read The Handmaid's Tale by Atwood and it's my book of the year so far and so she has a lot to live up to!
Hey, Jean :3 since I haven't read any of these books, I have a question which I feel like you can answer: can you read "Penelopiad" if you haven't read Homer? I just can't get into his work (mainly because of translation issues) and worry I won't appreciate Atwood's take on the story as well.
Yes! I did ^_^ I read and adored the Penelopiad when I was a teenager and didn't read the Odyssey for a few years after.
Jean Bookishthoughts thank you! I'll get on it then 😊
Enjoy!
Please start Saramago with Baltasar & Blimunda. I think you will love Blimunda.
My favourite Le Guin is The Lathe of Heaven
I hadn't even heard of that one, thanks for the recommendation!
I read Affinity by Sarah waters for uni this year and I absolutely loved it, I definitely want to read more of her work now. Judith Butler is well know for being an incredibly interesting theorist who's writing is extremely difficult to read, I had one tutor say that he would give her the award for the worst writer ever😂 I found that researching the idea of gender performativity before reading Bodies that Matter really helped x
José Saramago is awesome. His style is gorgeous, the ideas are interesting and never what you'd expect. You should definitely read his books.
He has written a book titled The Gospel According to Jesus Christ, which is an alternative, magical-realism style take on the story of Jesus. Saramago was an atheist, and so am I, and I still found it a really good story. Better than the original. (yes, I have read the entire Bible too) So I recommend that.
But in more general, I think you should read the books your dad liked, and/or recommended to you first. I think that would be nice.
If you want a taste of let guin try changing planes. Such a good book, all short stories.
Also, for Robin McKinley try starting with The hero and the crown. I know the blue sword is technically 'first' but honestly it doesn't matter for those books.
I got by bachelor's degree in German, and I haven't read any Günther Grass. He's definitely on my list along with W. Somerset Maughm, Helen Oyeyemi, Jeanette Winterson, and John Wyndham.
Woohoo for once I’ve actually read all of those authors and they’re amazing, I’m sure you’ll love them!
I've heard nothing but good things!
i have loads of authors i need to read but i try not stress abt them bcs the list constantly grows
Oh yeah absolutely, no stress! These are more authors I’ve been looking forward to starting for a while who have great reputations ☺️ I never stress about books I haven’t read aha.
Sarah Waters I hear recommended again and again. Fingersmith was in David Bowie’s top 100 of all time books list
www.telegraph.co.uk/books/what-to-read/david-bowie-the-man-who-loved-books/
Ooh cool, I've checked and I have a copy of Fingersmith that a friend was getting rid of in Edinburgh so I'm definitely bringing it back to London with me.
Tipping the Velvet! Although fingersmith has a better film adaption.....
Eeh I've got so much to look forward to with all her books and film/tv adaptations aha.
I also couldn't get into The Wizard of Earthsea
Such a shame as so many people love it!
i loved tipping the velvet when i read it!! would def recommend it is so tender at parts and so gay & hot and also there's socialism!!!! :)