Me, I read a lot for work - biographies and meta-histories for my podcast and for this Substack (and when researching my books). And I don’t read a lot of fiction. When I do, it’s often twentieth-century male crime mysteries (Graham Greene, Raymond Chandler). If ever I had to cite a guilty pleasure…
So when I need to get jolted from my dry, smart-cracks-n-tumblers-o-whisky rut, I tend to call on my literary agent and a few of my smart, informed friends - Benjamin Law,
, AC Grayling and more such big minds - to steer me to some fresh turf. Today, I’ve asked them to do it for all of you here.Shall we turn this into a bit of a thread and expand the reading list? Introduce yourself and share “a recent book you’re telling everyone about and why” in the comments.