Paul Whybrow
Full Member
I get a real thrill from recommending books, films and music albums to friends, and love it when they reciprocate. You can tell a lot about a person by their tastes in the arts—when we visit their homes, who can resist looking at the book shelves, CD collections and stacked DVDs?
A couple of years ago, one friend recommended Stoner by John Williams, which I loved. This novel has undergone a resurgence in popularity.
Funnily enough, in emails that crossed over, another friend told me she'd been enjoying reading Kent Haruf's novels, which I'd just suggested she read! If you think that you may have a problem with being too wordy in your own writing, I recommend reading Haruf, as his prose is lean yet full of meaning.
A friend lost his mother to an aggressive form of cancer, that came on suddenly. Several members of my family died of cancer, and I recalled a book that a library colleague suggested that I read, which I passed on to him. I Heard The Owl Call My Name, written by Margaret Craven, tackles the life, declining health and eventual death of a priest, sent to minister to a remote community of Native Americans.
I recommended Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy to a friend, and she loved them, and got extremely annoyed at the cleaned-up film adaptation of Northern Lights, titled The Golden Compass. This didn't stop her from recommending the trilogy to her friends, which shows the power of word of mouth advertising.
I've given copies of Annie Dillard's The Maytrees to several friends, as it's such a touching and unusual story about love and loyalty.
Another friend turned me onto the writings of Buddhist philosopher Pema Chödrön whose very book title Start Where You Are serves as great advice for a writer.
A public way of kindly introducing books to strangers, is the BookCrossing scheme, which involves setting a book free, leaving it unattended in a public place for an interested reader to pick up:
BookCrossing - Wikipedia
Has a friend introduced you to an author, who went on to become a favourite?
Which books do you suggest that your friends and family would enjoy reading?
Has anyone recommended a book that you didn't like?
Thankfully, that's only happened once with me, when someone who was more of an acquaintance, insisted that I read James Redfield's The Celestine Prophecy, literally pressing her copy on me as I left to catch a trans-Atlantic flight. Rather foolishly, I didn't take any other reading matter with me, and after wading through its poorly developed plot, pedestrian prose and hastily grabbed coincidences about spiritual beliefs, I felt like crawling out onto the wing to get away from it!
A couple of years ago, one friend recommended Stoner by John Williams, which I loved. This novel has undergone a resurgence in popularity.
Funnily enough, in emails that crossed over, another friend told me she'd been enjoying reading Kent Haruf's novels, which I'd just suggested she read! If you think that you may have a problem with being too wordy in your own writing, I recommend reading Haruf, as his prose is lean yet full of meaning.
A friend lost his mother to an aggressive form of cancer, that came on suddenly. Several members of my family died of cancer, and I recalled a book that a library colleague suggested that I read, which I passed on to him. I Heard The Owl Call My Name, written by Margaret Craven, tackles the life, declining health and eventual death of a priest, sent to minister to a remote community of Native Americans.
I recommended Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy to a friend, and she loved them, and got extremely annoyed at the cleaned-up film adaptation of Northern Lights, titled The Golden Compass. This didn't stop her from recommending the trilogy to her friends, which shows the power of word of mouth advertising.
I've given copies of Annie Dillard's The Maytrees to several friends, as it's such a touching and unusual story about love and loyalty.
Another friend turned me onto the writings of Buddhist philosopher Pema Chödrön whose very book title Start Where You Are serves as great advice for a writer.
A public way of kindly introducing books to strangers, is the BookCrossing scheme, which involves setting a book free, leaving it unattended in a public place for an interested reader to pick up:
BookCrossing - Wikipedia
Has a friend introduced you to an author, who went on to become a favourite?
Which books do you suggest that your friends and family would enjoy reading?
Has anyone recommended a book that you didn't like?
Thankfully, that's only happened once with me, when someone who was more of an acquaintance, insisted that I read James Redfield's The Celestine Prophecy, literally pressing her copy on me as I left to catch a trans-Atlantic flight. Rather foolishly, I didn't take any other reading matter with me, and after wading through its poorly developed plot, pedestrian prose and hastily grabbed coincidences about spiritual beliefs, I felt like crawling out onto the wing to get away from it!
