April 2026

I was going to write about food security again, but the piece I ended up with was so depressing that it kept me awake at night worrying about the situation. I therefore decided to give the subject a rest for a bit and try something quite different. I have always been fond of books and reading; when I was a child they called me a bookworm. At the moment there seems to be a lot of interest in reading and books in the news, and I remembered a delightful book I discovered a few years ago: “Blurb Your Enthusiasm: an A-Z of Literary Persuasion" by Louise Wilder (2022). The author was a professional writer of copy for book jackets. She had to hook a potential reader's interest in 150 or so words, describing what the book was about without giving away the ending. She was clearly extremely good at it. I like very short pieces of prose, or indeed poetry like haiku, where the writer can say something important or beautiful in the fewest possible well-chosen words. At the time, I tried writing a few blurbs for some of my favourite books, just for fun (I'm not claiming my efforts were any good, mind you). I decided that books might be a more cheerful subject for the time being, so here they are: some of my favourite books. I do recommend them.

1. Pride and Prejudice – Jane Austin (1813) (Of course)

Five sisters, whose nearest male relative is a distant cousin, desperately try to find themselves husbands before their father dies and leaves them in poverty. Under 19^th century English law an entailed family estate could not be inherited by a daughter, and upper-class girls had very little chance of earning a respectable living. Elizabeth Bennet’s beautiful dark eyes and sparkling wit as she dances her way through her own and her sisters’ courtship mask this harsh reality.

2. Martial’s Epigrams (CE 86 – 103) translation James Michie, Penguin Classics

Very short poems by a right-wing Roman misogynist, ranging from the pastoral through the risqué to the absolutely obscene. You have to admit that they are clever, even while you cringe.

3. The Pride of Chanur – C.J.Cherryh

What is it doing?

How do you talk to a life form whose brain is wired up so differently that its behaviour is incomprehensible?

Is it a he or a she? Or both? Or something else?

This and other questions are explored in this description of half a dozen species trying to interact in intergalactic space when they all have different languages, different cultures and different agendas.  (And some of them have six parallel brains). With a neat illustration of sexism thrown in.

4. The Woman in White – Wilkie Collins (1859 – 60)

A young Victorian woman with money but no effective male protector is the victim of a particularly hideous form of identity theft.  Feel the fascination of the most delicious villain in literature as he winds her and her friends in his toils! Can the hero rescue her and foil the dastardly plot?

5. The Influential Mind – Tali Sharot (2017)

A manual by a well-qualified neuropsychologist on the unethical practice of using the latest scientific techniques to manipulate people. If you want to know why you are frittering your money away on things you don’t need, or voting for a government that is going to make your life hideous, this is the book for you.

6. The Kingis Quair (the King’s book) – James I of Scotland (15^th century)

It's springtime, and a captive Renaissance prince falls in love at first sight through the castle window. Patchy, but the good bits are well worth searching for. Oh, and you will have to look up some of the words, it’s written in Early Scots. But they are rather beautiful words and images.

7. Brave New World – Aldous Huxley (1932)

Do you want to see the world that modern politics is leading us to? Here it is. Children brainwashed into being compliant citizens as they sleep, recreational drugs to keep people docile provided by the state, humans beings bred in bottles to fill specific jobs – the perfect capitalist society.

8. Come, Tell me How You Live – Agatha Christie Mallowan (1946)

Gentle nostalgia – I just caught the very end of this era. British archaeology abroad seventy-nine years ago, when surveying was done with theodolites and photography meant spending hours in an improvised darkroom in an atmosphere of noxious chemicals. Archaeologists had to make the effort to learn the local languages because English had not yet spread worldwide, and it was accepted that you would spend at least a few days rushing between a stifling tent and a hole in the ground because of the local stomach bug. But the thrill of finding a small piece of brightly-coloured pottery at the bottom of a deep hole remains the same today.

(9) Dryden’s Translation of Virgil’s Aeneid  (1697)

Publius Vergilius Maro (70 BCE – 19 BCE), commonly known as Virgil, celebrates the destiny of Rome to rule the known world (and the divinity of the emperor Augustus) in this epic poem. A thrilling tale with plenty of battles, shipwrecks, gods and goddesses, and a trip to the Underworld, although the hero is rather nauseating. I suppose it shows me up as a total low-brow, but having been forced to read it in the original for a public exam, I would say that Dryden’s exquisite poetic style is much better than the original Latin.

(10) The Angry Chef – Anthony Warner (2017)

Or how not to be influenced by influencers, and it doesn’t just apply to trendy diets.  Anthony Warner, a biochemist turned chef, debunks many of the current wellness diets, providing a screamingly funny template for the influencers’ personal profiles. However, his message can apply to many other areas of pseudoscience as well. It does require the reading level of the average Guardian reader, especially the chapter on coconut oil and fatty acids (perhaps that’s just me) but it explains some useful scientific principles quite clearly. Anyone who did not get a biology A-level/Advanced Higher should get a copy at once.

I could suggest many more, but I think that's enough for now. Have fun!