Best Books For A Great Read
Tom Walker, Publishing Director for The Folio Society, who, for over 70 years has been publishing illustrated editions of fiction and picture driven non-fiction books, has put together his top picks for reading – some top classic and modern fiction titles. While binge watching TV shows does help keep us entertained, it’s also good to finally say you’ll read “that” book when you have time. So turn off the TV now and again and settle in with a book.
The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
Being stuck at home and only allowed out to go to the shops seems a good time to read about feminism, and this is arguably the first feminist novel. Wildly surprising in its modern sensibility, Brontë rages against a society that held women shackled to men and the home.
The Little Prince
I can’t help thinking of how the Little prince would respond to our world right now. An enigmatic, compassionate but sad creature of the stars, I sometimes imagine the weight of his judgement on us all for the job we’re doing of keeping our little planet safe.
The World Turned Upside Down
The English Civil War of the 1640s shook the nation to its core, and in the process out scattered a legion of radical ideas and philosophies which have formed the national identity ever since. One wonders how our current upheaval will reshape us.
Dr Zhivago
What better time to re-engage with this great Russian epic? The recent translation by Boris Pasternak’s nephew returns the lyricism and colour to this beautiful novel of love, war and the Russian soul.
Moby-Dick
What an opportunity, if you never have, to read this bulking leviathan of a novel. From the first pages in Nantucket, where Ishmael befriends trusty Queequeg, Melville loops his crazed tale of ambition and revenge, culminating in scenes of terror on the high seas.
His Dark Materials
Pullman might be the purest storyteller of our times, and His Dark Materials is his masterpiece: a truly addictive adventure story which leads us into other worlds.
Handmaid’s Tale
Turning to Margaret Atwood in times of trouble is always a good decision. Prophetic or not she is wise and compassionate, and laces those qualities with a killer wit.
Maigret
If all else fails, pick up a Maigret. With plots as light as a feather and a stripped-down style, Simenon’s thrillers are beautifully evocative of the underground tensions of a mid-century Paris.
Persuasion
It’s always a good time to re-read Austen, to get lost in that luscious prose and arch wit. Persuasion is her last-completed, and perhaps her most mature novel, and a joy to revisit.
I am Legend
In the current circumstances this is not a book for the faint-hearted: Matheson’s vision of a post pandemic future doesn’t contain many people, and even fewer who are not zombie-vampires, but there is a glimmer of hope at its end…
Mirror & The Light
My eleventh choice is not yet available as a Folio Society edition, but I do hope that it will be one day. This is my current quarantine reading. A nine-hundred-page masterwork of astonishing delicacy and intelligence which draws one back through the eyes of Cromwell to a Tudor London infested with plague and political instability.
Audrey Patterson
Having started my career at My Weekly on Real Life stories, for the past 8 years I have been Beauty and Fashion Editor. I also write Travel and Homes features, plus the odd book review. We’re a flexible team! I also write features for Your Best Ever Christmas covering a variety of topics.
