What are you reading at the moment

Ordered it from amazon for £1.98 and free delivery! Also getting another of his books, Notwithstanding: Stories from an English Village, which had good reviews. Have you read Red Dog?

I haven't mentioned it before, so I'm not the one you're looking for, ganja, but I did enjoy both books. I certainly learned a lot from Birds without Wings - couldn't put it down.

Hi ganja. I certainly loved Captain Corelli's Mandolin but I haven't read Birds Without Wings. It's now on my list to be read next if I can get hold of a copy.

I've just spent ages trying to find the Gransnetter who also loved Captain Corelli to ask her if she has also read Birds without Wings? It's not an easy read in any sense, but I thought it was marvellous. At least I now know what the Armenian Question, which crops up from time to time in the papers, was. Gave up on his South American trilogy, in spite of wonderful titles, The War of Don Emanuel's Nether Parts etc. Couldn't stomach comic writing about the horrors of life in a South American dictatorship.

Crimson - "A Thousand Acres" was my first Jane Smiley, and it's the best, I think. My friend in Minnesota gave it to me just after we'd visited someone on a farm in North Dakota. I was a third of the way through before the other connection kicked in! And me an English teacher. (I'm sure you've cracked it but am being circumspect just in case!)

Just started A Thousand Acres by Jane Smiley. I loved her book about American racing, Horse Heaven, but was disappointed to read that she hasn't treated her own ex racehorses well; however this book was going free at work so I bagged it. I do like her style of writing. Very much trying to get back into reading again. Having just finished The Lovely Bones I was very disappointed with the film.

I think the book sounds good Charlotta. I haven't read much by H G Wells. Only the History of Mr Polly tbh (which I love). Think I would like to read Kipps. Not too sure about science fiction.

Yes, I was jangly.

Just finished 'Snowdrops' - brilliant - so will have to get up the ladder to my book shelves and find something to take to bed..

Just re-read "The Women's Room"; so moving when I first read it and it still resonates with the lives of women back then. (Back then? Surely it was only yesterday?)

Yes jinglej the bok is about H.G Wells but he was such a complex character and it covers two world wars and he was the inventor of science fiction.
His books are now mostly out of print,
Excuse the question but aren't you jangley?

Anyone can write for adults but not everyone can write for children [imo]. Annoys me when people like Ginger Spice, Fergie or Madonna decide they will write a childrens book [because they have a child].

The best children's books can be read on more than one level. I hate it when they make a film of a classic (sometimes excellently done, but always thinner in texture) then bring out the "book of the film" which is no more than a sketchy resume of the plot, with illustrations of famous actors or gaudy cartoon characters.

Don't think of National Velvet as a childrens book; can be read on two levels. A lot of it is about what happens to ordinary people when they suddenly attain 'celebrity status' [as relevant today as it was then]. I think my love of horses racing stems from reading it as a child. 'Tiny men in silk were brave beyond bearing, and sat upon the horses like embryos with their knees in their mouths'. Like Anna Sewell she never wrote another popular book, although in Sewell's case it was because of ill health and an early death].

Have also reread "Black Beauty" which was exactly as I remembered it. Lots of impassioned pleas for better treatment (here of animals, not sweeps etc) but written much more simply and less likely to bore the pants put off a child.

Must look out for "National Velvet" and "Ballet Shoes"

Maybe that was what I originally read. I enjoyed it as a child - and I got all the messages about doing as you would be done by etc without the sledgehammer.

I read a shortened version years ago. Still got it. It was a series of classics that came out in hardback. All abridged, but a good way to get into them.

Charles Kingsley was a right old Christian Elegran! (not that there is anything wrong with that she adds hastily)

Now that I have discovered that Project Gutenburg have free Kindle-compatible books, I am rereading some old favourites. Currently reading "The Secret Garden" just finished "Kim" and have "The Jungle Book" downloaded ready. All these might possibly suit your grandson, JingleJ ? and free so having a look won't cost anything. found "The Water Babies" a lot longer and more sermonising than I remembered, maybe i read a shortened version last time (a long time ago)
They have a lot of PG Wodehouse, but the Jeeves and Wooster ones get a bit repetitive read one after the other. I preferred "Love among the Chickens" which is not J and W. but a nice gentle love story, with Wodehousian humour.

Well I don't just don't understand how some books (C in the R for eg.) get such a lot of press for so many years. It makes me feel inadequate when I haven't read them, and then when I do read them, I get cross about it!!

No. Its not in kindle. Loads of versions of study guides on it. People must still study it in exams.

I can remember Tommy Steele (years ago) raving about Catcher in the Rye. I ploughed on to the end, but didn't like it at all. Still got it somewhere. Might try again. Its probably free on Kindle now.

I want to find stories about boys of his age who get into scrapes (right up his street ). I gave him all the Just William stories on tape. He loves them!

yoga - he's 9.

I bought War Horse for him, but it is still in my "to read" pile!

chrissy, I couldn't get on with Catcher in the Rye either. It just didn't have any appeal for me. I'm struggling with The Secret Life of Bees at the moment. Not because it's badly written but because there is so much cruelty in it. I have to keep putting it down and having some recovery time.

jinglej - you don't say how old your DGS is, anything by Michael Morpurgo is really great for slightly older children. He's that man who wrote War Horse and so many other brilliant childrens' books. Adults can really enjoy them too