Recommended Reading for Father's Day
Posted by Emily Rowland in Recommended Reading
With Father's Day fast approaching (Sunday 20th, if you've forgotten…) my lovely colleagues and I thought we'd try to make your book-buying decision-making a little easier.
So I had a quick run round the office to see what he folks here at LBBG are likely to be giving to their Dads this year.
Heads were put together, coffee and cake was consumed and what came back to me was the following wide and varied selection of titles. There's truly something here for every Dad's taste…
(Click the book covers or titles below for more information from our main online catalogue.)
The Council of Dads by Bruce Fieler
Bruce Feiler, bestselling author and award-winning journalist, was diagnosed with cancer in 2008. On learning this, he decided to approach six friends who could each provide advice and support to his young twin daughters through their lives should he die.
This book is the inspiring story of what happened next. Mixing the highly personal diary of his treatment with the uplifting lessons of these men, Feiler's account is a touching, funny, and ultimately deeply moving tale of parenthood, loss, and love, and will be a blueprint for how others can take his experience and use it to deepen their own relationships with friends and family.
Open Secrets by Robert Winder
A chronicle of the exhilarating competition that was the 2009 Open, published to celebrate 150 years of the Open in 2010. Here Robert Winder traces the thrills and spills of a resonant sporting drama, listens to the players and administrators, and describes the many ways in which the Open truly is open: the world, to the elements, and to the never-ending outrages of fortune.
It's Not The Winning That Counts by Max Davidson
Chivalry is the soul of sport and, for life-long sports addict Max Davidson, there is no more moving spectacle than a sportsman who does not try to win at all costs, but enshrines the values of fair competition and embodies the old adage 'It's not the winning that counts, it's the taking part'.
At the heart of It's Not the Winning that Counts is that elusive combination of grace, modesty and good humour we call sportsmanship.
'A splendid narrative. Take along Max Davidson's charming book next time you go to a sporting event. I guarantee it will warm you on the wettest day and in the chilliest stadium' – Mail on Sunday
Slipless in Settle by Harry Pearson
Kiss goodbye to the lengthening-shadows-on-the-village-green cliché; in Slipless in Settle cricket is as brutal and hardcore a game as you can imagine. Initially introduced as a way to keep working men out of the pubs and out of trouble, cricket clubs in the North have gone on to produce some of the greatest players Britain has ever seen. Warm, affectionate and savagely funny, Harry Pearson explores the world of cricket in former pit villages and mill towns that look straight out of The League of Gentlemen – because they are where it was filmed…
The Bad Beekeepers Club by Bill Turnbull
Bill Turnbull is a BBC man twice over – once with Breakfast, which he presents for BBC One; and again as a founder member of the Bad Beekeepers' Club. This charming book chronicles Bill's beekeeping mishaps – and brief moments of beekeeping triumph – with the humour and Zen-like acceptance of a man who knows his enthusiasm will always outweigh his abilities.
'An entertaining beekeeping memoir' – The Times
I Am Ozzy by Ozzy Osbourne
'People ask me how come I'm still alive, and I don't know what to say. When I was growing up, if you'd have put me up against a wall with the other kids from my street and asked me which one of us was gonna make it to the age of 60, which one of us would end up with five kids and four grandkids and houses in Buckinghamshire and Beverly Hills, I wouldn't have put money on me, no f***ing way. But here I am: ready to tell my story, in my own words, for the first time.'
Frank, fearless, and very funny, I Am Ozzy is Ozzy Osbourne's bestselling autobiography, in which he comes clean: in all senses.
'Packed with outrageous, hilarious, disgusting and wholly improbable incidents' – The Guardian
Traitor by Duncan Falconer
Special forces operative John Stratton returns in a twisting and explosive thriller set on a North Sea oil rig and in the heart of Russia, far below ground.
An action-packed, high-octane thriller, Traitor is a page-turner packed with thrillingly authentic detail, gained from Falconer's many years as a top operative.
'Inevitably he'll be compared to McNab, but I'd say Falconer has the edge' – Mail on Sunday
Bleed for Me by Michael Robotham
Ray Hegarty, a highly respected former detective, lies dead in his daughter Sienna's bedroom. She is found covered in his blood. Everything points to her guilt, but psychologist Joe O'Loughlin isn't convinced.
Fourteen-year-old Sienna is Joe's daughter's best friend and he has watched her grow up and seen the troubled look in her eyes. Against the advice of the police, he launches his own investigation, embarking upon a hunt that will lead him to a predatory schoolteacher; a conspiracy of silence and a race hate trial that is captivating the nation.
With dark psychological twists and heart-stopping tension, Bleed For Me is a page-turner thriller and undoubtedly Robotham's best yet.
'A clever novel by a very talented storyteller' – Sunday Telegraph
The Executor by Jesse Kellerman
In a mysterious, darkened old house, philosophy graduate Joseph Geist starts a new career as a 'conversationalist'. He has been employed to spend a few hours a week making intelligent conversation with elderly Alma Spielmann after answering a bizarre advert in the newspaper.
But then Alma's nephew Eric appears on the scene. Eric is a handsome, manipulative drifter, and the apple of his aunt's eye; Joseph takes an instant dislike to him. However, he couldn't possibly predict what a devastating effect Eric and his aunt will have on the rest of his life…
A brilliant and utterly gripping thriller, The Executor is the long-awaited new masterpiece by the author of the Richard and Judy bestseller The Brutal Art which was shortlisted for The Galaxy British Book Awards 2009.
'A most accomplished novel by a writer of great imagination and skill' – Sunday Telegraph
Five Ways to Kill a Man by Alex Gray
An unpredictable killer is loose on the streets of Glasgow. Black hood pulled up, suddenly appearing out of the shadows, this dark figure is experimenting with murder, again and again. Beginning with brute force and relishing the power of snuffing out another human life, the murderer moves on to poison and drowning, greedy for new and better ways to kill.
As the serial killer comes closer to Lorimer himself and his own family, can the DCI unmask the volatile murderer before the next victim is found too close to home?
So gripping and surprising that it will keep you on the edge of your seat from the very first page, Five Ways to Kill a Man is compulsive page-turner featuring the most dynamic Scottish detective since Rebus.
'This is a golden age for Scottish crime writing and Gray more than holds her own against the likes of Rankin and McDermid' – Daily Express
Blonde Bombshell by Tom Holt
The year is 2017. Lucy Pavlov is the CEO of PavSoft Industries, home of a revolutionary operating system that every computer in the world runs on. Her personal wealth is immeasurable, her intelligence is unfathomable, and she's been voted 'Most Beautiful Woman' for three years running. To put it simply – she has it all.
One thing, however, is not quite right in Lucy's life. She doesn't realize it yet, but she is in fact a bomb.
And not just any old bomb. Lucy is a very big and very smart bomb, and her mission is to blow up the planet known as Earth.
'Uniquely twisted … cracking gags' – The Guardian
Feed by Mira Grant
The year was 2014. We had cured cancer. We had beaten the common cold. But in doing so we created something new, something terrible that no one could stop. The infection spread, virus blocks taking over bodies and minds with one, unstoppable command: FEED.
Now, twenty years after the Rising, bloggers Georgia and Shaun Mason are on the trail of the biggest story of their lives – the dark conspiracy behind the infected. The truth will get out, even if it kills them.
'Gripping, thrilling and brutal' – Publishers Weekly
Adrenaline by Jeff Abbot
Sam Capra – brilliant CIA agent, loving husband, expectant father – loses everything that matters to him in a horrifying moment in London. An unknown enemy has set him up as a traitor, and Sam is thrown into a nightmare as his own kind turn against him and make him a man on the run.
Escaping from the CIA, Sam goes on a desperate hunt for the killer who stole his family, determined to save his kidnapped wife and child.
But the destruction of Sam's life was only step one in an extraordinary plot – and now Sam Capra must become a new kind of hero…
A scorching summer read, full of intrigue, danger and suspense, Adrenaline is the start of a thrilling new series.
'Jeff Abbott has been my favourite new thriller writer since Panic' – Joseph Finder
Robin Ince's Bad Book Club by Robin Ince
Robin Ince's Bad Book Club is a compilation and celebration of the world's worst, and inadvertently hilarious, books, all of which were purchased in second hand shops for less that three pounds or were donated by a fellow enthusiast. His treasure trove of underappreciated classics includes: vengeful beast horrors such as Crabs on the Rampage, (where Wales is the unlikely setting of a sociopathic crustacean invasion), romance sub-genres from the equine Diamond Stud to the gynaecological Sign of the Speculum, a hinterland of celebrity autobiography such as Syd Little's Little Goes a Long Way and his later volume Little By Little, and the now obsolete, but much sought after, The Secrets of Picking up Sexy Girls.
The Haunting of James Hastings by Christopher Ransom
James Hastings' wife Stacey is dead – killed in a horrific accident that leaves her husband shattered. Wracked with grief and guilt, James withdraws into his sprawling mansion, losing himself in liquor … and memories of Stacey.
Until the day two women enter his life. One is Annette, a gorgeous stranger with a dark past. The other is not a stranger, and her past is all too familiar.
First her voice echoes through the phone lines, and from behind the ballroom doors. Then her shoes reappear, streaked with mud and grime, as though unearthed from the grave. And soon Annette begins saying things only Stacey could know, enveloping James in a spiral of terror and violence that threatens to destroy his home, his sanity, and his soul. For death is only the beginning of his nightmare. And the haunting of James Hastings might just be the end of him.
Holy Warrior by Angus Donald
1190 AD: Richard the Lionheart has launched his epic crusade to seize Jerusalem from the cruel Saracens. Marching with the vast royal army is Britain's most famous, most feared, most ferocious warrior: the Outlaw of Nottingham, the Earl of Locksley – Robin Hood himself.
With his band of loyal men at his side, Robin cuts a bloody swathe on the brutal journey east. Daring and dangerous, he can outwit and outlast any foe – but the crimson battlefields of the Holy Land are the ultimate proving ground. And within Robin's camp lurks a traitor – a stealthy enemy determined to slay Christendom's greatest outlaw before the trumpets fade.
Blazingly paced and richly imagined, featuring a cast of unforgettable characters and packed with fast, furious action, Holy Warrior is adventure at its thrilling, white-knuckle best.
Danger UXB by James Owen
The narrative arc of Danger UXB follows the course of the bomb disposal's war, concentrating on its two periods of greatest threat and danger: the Blitz of 1940 and the deliberate attempt in 1943 by the Germans to kill BD officers with booby-trapped fuzes. Interwoven in the picture is the fates of four BD officers who were at the heart of some of its greatest triumphs and disasters: Stuart Archer; John Hudson; Robert Davies and the maverick, charismatic, The Earl of Suffolk – bomb disposal man extraordinaire who appears as himself in The English Patient and trains Kip the Sikh sapper.
Danger UXB reveals in full, for the first time, the desperate struggle to counter the UXB menace in a battle of wits that pitted German ingenuity against British resourcefulness. A compelling and exhilarating story of true heroism, it is peopled by remarkable men whose jobs required valour every single day. Filled with remarkable detail, astounding self- sacrifice and sheer courage in the most adverse of circumstances, this is a unique and enthralling story of an until now neglected chapter in the story of the Second World War.
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