The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner – Alan Sillitoe

This book found me rather than it being the other way around. Captivated by its title, I picked it up in the public library in Imperia, the town on the Italian Riviera where my family has a tiny flat (so tiny it’s actually a small room – not even classifiable as a studio).

In spite of all its anger, the book made me happy. Because the main story is about waking up early to go for a run, about competing, about training even when it’s so cold you can’t feel your fingers and it’s so dark you can barely see the ground you are stomping on. All that, in my case, chasing the dream of one day finally breaking 17 minutes on a 5k in a small park in South East London...

But the book is more than just that. The other short stories in the collection also deserve their due credit as they are probably the most credible portraits of the life of the working class in the Midlands and Northern England after the end of the Second World War that I have ever read.

Il Cane di Terracotta – Andrea Camilleri

A book I first read as a teenager, before reading its English translation last year following the advice (and borrowing the copy) of my boss’s former boss. I was actually surprised by the quality of the English translation, able not to stifle the myriad of colours of the Sicilian dialect. Of all the Camilleri books this is probably my favourite because of Montalbano’s work of, essentially, historical research (although this novel sees in its early pages the death of Gegè, one of my favourite secondary characters).

Commissario Montalbano is half Maigret (his intuition) and half Carvalho (his love for food). In addition, he has a way with women that neither of the other two have. This novel in particular shows a more sentimental side to the man, as he works to unravel a mystery that, much like the murdered, has been buried for decades, fully aware that its resolution will only matter for a couple of elderly people.

Although, like my former boss’s boss remarked, it’s quite funny to see how the mobsters in Montalbano’s novels are always so charming and polite (I wouldn’t go as far as saying that they are men “of solid principles” although they definitely do have principles of some kind...).

Brave New World – Aldous Huxley

I reacted to this book like I reacted to 1984: I am glad I’ve read it, but that’s pretty much about it. Dystopia is probably just a bit too grim for me, in particular if you add ideas about noble savages etc. At the end of the day I probably just tend to believe that the human race isn’t going to end as badly as many writers have foreseen (at least, not in the relatively short run) and that life in the wilderness and far away from “civilization” isn’t that idyllic either. That said, I do have a very low opinion of mankind. And, much like for 1984, I’ve got nothing left to add...

Barney’s Version – Mordechai Richler

This book is the single greatest source of great North American Jewish anecdotes I’ve ever come across. While I liked Solomon Gursky Was Here better because of its epic family history, Barney’s Version is probably the better book.

Barney is, for want of a better word an incredibly charming son of a bitch, like probably the same Richler was. Readers (and women) are bound to love him and simultaneously wish they could head-butt him, mostly because you can’t let someone like Miriam (in particular if you picture her as Rosamund Pike, the best thing of the ok movie taken from the book) walk away.

We’ve all wanted to kill our best friends at some point in our lives (well, surely I have), but being accused of actually having done so and having to write some unreliable memoirs in order to clean one’s name is pretty heavy stuff...

The Thin Man – Dashiell Hammett

I started reading books by Hammett and by Raymond Chandler because their names were on Pulp Fiction’s poster and I thought it would have been really cool of me to read their works. This particular novel was one I stole from the bookshelf of a hotel in Salvador da Bahia – I was either going to do something innocuous like that or make a scene for the appalling service we received, I opted for the former.

All hard boiled novels are full of dry humour and witty one-liners and this one is no exception, but in The Thin Man Hammett adds the banter of a chirpy married couple. The novel actually reads like a perfect film script, and it’s no wonder that the movie taken from it was such a success. I’m sorry for Sam Spade, but in my opinion Nick Charles kicks his ass.

I wish I was sharp and interesting enough to hang out with Charles and Nora, but I really don’t think I could keep up with their drinking...