best book you've read

[Beowulf]

One of the most magical sights in the area :

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burgh_Castle_Roman_Site

Robert,

Didn't get a chance to see this. I did look up Burgh Castle on Google maps, and 'wandered about a bit' on googles map view.

Of course being from the other side of the pond...and a bit inland (Arizona) I have been totally unaware of Norolk. The Bure, Yare and Waveny. I'm always looking at the map in the book. Suddenly sizing myself waaaay down and I'm there, looking for the old castle, the ghosts and the rivers.

I would love to know if anyone has had any ghost experiences, the author lists dates as important to the reoccurrence of the past in ghostly form.

I've wondered if on those days there are flocks of people at Burgh Castle or Breydon Water or other places.

It's fun to dream and a book can do a lot for ones imagination

[Cogidubnus]

Noviomagus

Hi Robert

Surprising resemblance there to Chichester City walls which albeit somewhat medievally rebuilt, largely survive...long live cogi (or togi) dubnus!

All the best

Dave

[Limehouse]

If had to pick just one book?

To Kill A Mockingbird.

[Steve S]

I always imagined Lovecraft's stuff set in Cornwall.
The Atlantic coastline seem's to conjure the sense of cosmic power at work beyond the mundane provincial world.

I can see that......East Anglia just seems to have that air of decay and the history of the Witch Trials.........

[Scorpio]

I always imagined Lovecraft's stuff set in Cornwall.
The Atlantic coastline seem's to conjure the sense of cosmic power at work beyond the mundane provincial world.

[Steve S]

Lol. Webbed fingers? Really?

How wonderful to have been there too! That book is a definite lure to the region. Wish I could see it.

Btw, Ever have any 'experiences'?

btw, I'm having a great deal of difficulty accessing this site, Internet Explorer keeps shutting me out of it, says there is something wrong with it. Don't know if I will get to write this anywhere else...it took me about 7 attempts to get here!

Not in that area..........If Lovecraft had written in the UK, He'd have set them in Norfolk...........

[Robert]

One of the most magical sights in the area :

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burgh_Castle_Roman_Site

[The Good Michael]

Sorry, but you're all obviously wrong. The correct answer is clearly 'Moby Dick'.

"All visible objects, man, are but as pasteboard masks ..."

I'll say this about that: I read Moby Dick at about age 10. Nothing scared me in any work of fiction more than the narrator seeing and describing Queequeg for the first time when the headhunting harpooner came into the room as he was lying in bed. I was also terrified when the whale attacked the ship. I've read tons of horror since then and love it all, but those early memories of Moby Dick are still haunting.

Mike

[Beowulf]

I have a copy....and I've been there!....Alright once you get used to the locals' webbed fingers........

Lol. Webbed fingers? Really?

How wonderful to have been there too! That book is a definite lure to the region. Wish I could see it.

Btw, Ever have any 'experiences'?

btw, I'm having a great deal of difficulty accessing this site, Internet Explorer keeps shutting me out of it, says there is something wrong with it. Don't know if I will get to write this anywhere else...it took me about 7 attempts to get here!

[Robert]

When you're reading a book at school, you know you're enjoying it when you carry on reading it in your lunch hour. That happened for me with Animal Farm and White Fang.

We started doing Wuthering Heights. I'd already read it at home. Unfortunately the other lads (all boys school) got fed up with it so the teacher put us on another book instead.

[Magpie]

Wasn't Day of the Triffids a B-Movie? No idea it was a book.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

The B movie is only very loosely based on the book.

There have been several excellent television adaptions in the UK that have followed the book quite closely.

Day of the Triffids remains one of the best post-apocalyptic novels ever written.

[Steve S]

I have a copy....and I've been there!....Alright once you get used to the locals' webbed fingers........

[Beowulf]

I'm reading a book right now titled Ghosts of the Broads, by Charles Sampson.

This book is about ghost stories, presented as old old stories from this region collected and written down, supposedly true but at the very least historical. They are the sort that recall medieval castles in the area of what is called the broads, pirate ships, long ago battles and it is extremely well written.

Really fascinating stuff. Makes me want to take a plane and run over there. Great read.

[I'veBeenToMitreSquare]

Barnaby Rudge is my favourite book, for what it's worth.

[Wickerman]

The Alienist was like 15 years ago. You haven't read a fiction book sense? In any event, I was wondering why more non-fiction books aren't being listed since the title of the thread doesn't specify genre or type.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

Yes Tom, it might be about that long ago. I know I was working at Westinghouse in the Engineering Dept. until 2000 and I read it before then.

I have bookcases loaded with books, much to my wife's dismay (no room for her ornaments), but 90% of them are history/archaeology and concern Egypt, Israel & the Late Bronze Age/Iron Age in the Eastern Mediterranean. Nothing of which could be of interest in this thread.
The rest are Ripper related works and contemporary works on the state of society in the Victorian period.

The last book I bought was, London Labour and the London Poor, Mayhew, a condensed version of all four volumes.
To me, reading about real people and true events is far more engaging than a novel - but thats just me