I spend the last few days before a holiday choosing which books to take with me. The summer holiday in Europe is straightforward enough. Select as many as six books and just hope I haven’t read them all before we return home. This year’s jaunt to Canada is slightly more tricky because we will be with family and actually doing things, a rarity for me as I like doing no things on holiday. But this one is special and it’s about family. I’ll still need to read, though, given we have four flights of, in order, around 7.5 hours, 45 minutes, 4.5 hours and … gulp … anywhere between 8 and 9 hours. I’ve decided to take four books, but getting there has been really tough.
I’ve ruled out a variety of titles so far. Aberfan: government and disaster by Ian McLean and Martin Johnes, Hillsborough: the truth by Phil Scraton, Auschwitz, the Nazis and the final solution by Lawrence Rees and Somebody’s Husband, Somebody’s Son by Gordon Burn (this one’s about the Yorkshire Ripper) have returned to the shelves on the grounds that they didn’t really represent any kind of holiday mood. I’ll save them until we’re away somewhere sunny and hot in 2024.
I was all but banned by she who must be obeyed from taking a brand new book I’ve bought called Playing To Lose: how a Jehovah’s Witness became a Submissive BDSM Model by Ariel Anderssen because it was not really the sort of book you’d want to leave lying around when visiting family members. I put up a token fight but in my heart of hearts, I knew my partner was right. I’d keep Ariel’s book to read some sunny day.
My choice of holiday reading was not exactly popular with a former partner when we flew to Corfu back in 1988. Having just about conquered my irrational fear of flying, I decided Air Disasters by Stanley Stewart would be just the thing to see me through the three hour flight on Paramount Airways MD83 aircraft. I am not going to lie to you. It was a childish prank of mine which I thought would be very funny, especially for nervous flyers. And I made a point of displaying the book so that no one could miss it when passing by. Looking back it was just plain stupid, immature, disrespectful, unpleasant and obviously it still makes me smile.
No Air Disasters for 2023, though; at least I hope not in reality. Instead, I’ve finally chosen my four books (subject to late change).
Definites are:
- The Lost Album Of The Beatles – what if The Beatles hadn’t split up? by Daniel Rachel.
- Lost In Music – a pop odyssey by Giles Smith.
- Haywire – the very best of Craig Brown.
Probable is:
- Nice Jumper by Tom Cox, described on the cover as “does for golf what Fever Pitch did for football” but hopefully not quite as middle class and twee.
Tom Cox may yet fail to make the cut because Bill Bryson’s The Lost Continent is waving at me, as is Rory Stewart’s The Places In Between, Blue: a memoir – keeping the piece and falling to pieces by John Sutherland and Fall: the mysterious life and death of Robert Maxwell by John Preston.
After all that, my guess is I will be so busy I won’t read one book, in which case I’ll just keep quiet and delete this blog.
Does anyone else fret about this stuff, too?
POSTSCRIPT: Nice Jumper by Tom Cox has already been ousted by The Beatles Lyrics by Hunter Davies.
