The Reading List #40

This is by far one of my favourite reading lists, in that these books were all five star. Some I had been meaning to read for a long time before finally picking them up, and I’m so glad I finally read them. Others I had never heard of until picking them up and now can’t stop recommending them.


Dominion, C. J. Sansom


It is 1952, in a world where Britain surrendered to Hitler in 1940, and Churchill is leading an underground resistance movement. Full of spies and political drama, this was a real page-turner. The story was good, but what I loved the most was how utterly convincing the world created was. It felt like a very realistic scenario, and this was sustained throughout the novel. I’ve recommended this one to a lot of people.


The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, The Girl Who Played with Fire & The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest, Stieg Larsson


The plot begins in the first book, with Mikael Blomkvist researching the Vanger Corporation for an unsolved mystery. Lisbeth Salander is a hacker and a lone wolf, with whom he crosses paths… And that’s all I can say! This isn’t a genre I’d typically go for – there’s a fair amount of violence and a focus on coding and hacking. The intricate plot also pulls in journalism and corruption, and it’s a real page-turner. Blomkvist and Salander are also stunningly complex characters, who I enjoyed reading about.


The Da Vinci Code, Dan Brown


A Louvre curator has been brutally murdered, and his body is left surrounded by codes. Professor Robert Langdon and cryptologist Sophie Neveu work together through the riddles. I came to this one way after everyone else had read it, and enjoyed it a lot more than I expected to. There’s plenty of suspense, and the ‘history’ is plausible and well thought-out. There were some moments where I couldn’t help feeling they’d escaped or cracked a code a little too easily to be believable, but overall it was a good read.


The Storyteller, Jodi Picoult


Easily one of my favourite books in a long time. The story spans two generations – one part is a man and his family, who are living with secrets in the present day; the other part is a Holocaust tale. This was just breath-taking, with the lives of the characters intricately woven. The story of one woman’s journey as a girl in horrific circumstances, and how her gift for storytelling kept her going, was beautiful. Both the war story and the present day were written well, with great characters, and I definitely shed a few tears.



Which books have you read recently which you can’t stop reading?

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