Hello! Could people please recommend me some short books and places to get audiobooks?
I used to be the kind of person who could easily devour four books a week. For a few reasons, I no longer am that person. It’s partly health related- years of my brain being a bugger and the medication for it has messed me up cognitively. These days, as well as I am, I am usually a bit dulled and, “Eh?” I can be a wee bit foggy, my memory is arse and now find long pieces of text frustratingly difficult to read and concentrate on. The only books I can read are ones I have read many times before. I keep dragging Robert’s inpenetratable tomes into the bathroom in the hope that a particularly vicious bout of the runs will force me to sit down and read them. Alas, not only have my bowels failed me but my brain has, too.
Another reason is just cultural- Monsieur Internet has really spoiled me and I, like many people, am used to reading short texts rather than long ones. If I have time to kill I can just whip out my phone and read Cracked, or find out who That Fella Was In That Film. (It was Yer Man).
But it is from being bored. It is mental chewing gum. You don’t get lost in HTML the way you do a book. Long novels are very daunting to me but I’d like to start slowly with shorter ones.
Audiobooks are good, too, as is non-fiction. Interesting stuff like sociology and feminism and health and culture interest me a lot. I’ve recently downloaded one- it was my second favourite childhood book, “Which Witch?” by Iva Ibbotson, which, as I recall and found it very comforting to rehear, was read by Prunella Scales. I recommend it, it’s still a wonderfully warm, witty, clever and extremely English book.
Anyway, recommendations welcome! I like most things! Thank you!
i’ll have a ponder about suggestions but i know exactly what you mean, i used to go through tons of books (one year i did 18 on a 2 week holiday, even though i was with a friend and going out a lot) but now i can’t read like i used to. i initially blamed my pph degree because it was soooo reading-heavy that it made reading a bit like work, but i bounced out of that pretty easily. i just find it really hard to focus on them now – whether that be because of meds or technology (like you i’d read a mag on my phone or something) or whatever. but yeah, i hear you, it’s annoying isn’t it?
A couple of suggestions – in terms of short books, it may be worth looking into something called Quick Reads, which are adult books by well known, popular authors, that are short books – they generally advertise them at people who are trying to get into, or get back into, reading, and people who are very busy and might just want a short book that won’t take long etc. The libraries tend to have them in stock, or they are £1.99 to buy. Here is the website that says more about it http://www.quickreads.org.uk/
For audiobooks, lots of libraries now have ones you can download – they are usually valid for the same length of time that a normal book would be on loan for, and then they won’t play anymore after that. I know that my library has them, and I think its pretty common now, so might be worth a try.
xxx
Hi Ms. Molloy,
I’ve tried sending you a couple of e-mails about my first book that has just come out, I’m not sure if you’ve received. As you’ve specifically asked for book recommendations I thought I’d give it one last go. Instead of me going through a synopsis and my background here all over again, here is a link to the website for my novel Sisyphusa(https://sites.google.com/site/sisyphusa/) which should have all the info you need.
The book is now available on paperback from Amazon, Waterstones, WHSmiths and other major retailers around the world. I’d love it if you could take a quick look and please let me know if you’d like a free pdf version of the book to read or I could probably arrange for a paperback copy to be sent. I desperately want to get as many people as possible to read my book because I feel I have a lot to say about mental illness and about our society in general.
Thank you for your time,
Michael Richmond
P.S I hope the book wouldn’t be too long for you but I know exactly where you’re coming from- over the course of my illness I’ve swung from reading War and Peace to not even being able to pick up a book for months on end. It’s so frustrating but concentration is a fickle mistress.
Hi Seaneen,
you could try short stories for a start. Personally, I like Roald Dahl (Kiss Kiss), the Miss Marple and Hercule Poirot Stories, J.D. Salinger, Isaac Asimov, Philip K. Dick, Peter Hoeg (if he´s available in English)…
William Kotzwinkle novels are rather short and extremely hilarious, so they could be worth a try, too.
bye,
Arlene
Not exactly fiction but I have read and re-read Zen and the Art of Happiness by Chriss Prentiss and always enjoy it. Another quick read that is really good but is nonfiction is The Basketball Diaries by Jim Carroll. Happy reading!
Look on http://www.librivox.org they have all sorts of things out of copyright and they are free. I like to listen to Plato and Aristotle but you can find ‘newer’ thinks like Philip K Dick or Oscar Wilde.
I love audiobooks!
I just read and totally fell in love with Giovanni’s Room by James Baldwin. It’s about 150 pages I think and details a tragic, tender love affair between two men in Paris. Loved it.
Any of Flannery O’ Connors beautiful short stories. M.R James horror stories. Daphne Du Mauriers ‘The Birds and other stories’. Penguin are great for producing mini volumes of fab stories. The Great Loves series is fab:http://www.penguin.co.uk/static/cs/uk/0/pubsetpages/greatloves/index.html…Enjoy. Also trashy crime saved me when my attention span shipped out. x
Oh and Salinger, especially ‘A good day for Banana Fish’ x
^ I have this set and I love it, and I got it for £20 here http://www.amazon.co.uk/Penguin-Great-Loves-Magnetism-Gypsy/dp/B002FOGYO0/ref=sr_1_15?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1309610465&sr=1-15
The one I recommended is actually from there. Everything is around 100-200 pages long.
Fup by Jim Dodge is a nice little book. Very little, mind. Only 120 pages of big writing. Could probably read it in a couple of hours.
thats so weird- i was going to suggest exactly the same book! then scrolled down the comments and here it is already. read it (in german) recently. quite sad, a bit mad, quite wise. recommended it to a friend who was unhappy with their lot as ‘unsuccessful’ (their term) artist the other day too because before jim dodge published it he worked as a teacher/ woodcutter/ etc… so he as an example is also quite uplifting in the get over your struggling self kind of sense. quack*