Back in the light ages, before internet and with limited TV channels, I was an avid reader. In my diaries I wrote that I was reading Charles Bukowski, age 13. I also attribute my intense fear of heroin to reading Christiane F. at a similar age (which I read in a day!). The book was for adults – so I pestered my mum to buy it. It did the job of putting me off hard drugs. Both were translations to Portuguese, as I wasn’t fluent in English until I lived in the Uk for some years. Anyway, I don’t read as many books anymore – just too many news articles, but I do still read occasionally, because there’s nothing like a good book. * means I read it before.
2026
Jane Eyre – Charlotte Bronte – Movie adaptation with Samantha Morton. How to read Jane Eyre with Benjamin McEvoy and The Real Love Story… with The Book Club
The Bell Jar – Sylvia Plath – always been a little scared to read it, but the time has come! This podcast: Sylvia Plath by The Book Club, gave me the impetus to read it, as it describes the book as being more cheerful than you’d think and beautifully written. I also found the audio book for free on YouTube, read by Maggie Gyllenhaal. There’s a movie with Billie Eilish as Sylvia Plath to be released. The Bell Jar movie – 1979. I thought the book was hard to put down, with plenty of very intense, rich, visual and imaginative metaphors. Anyone nostalgic for the 50s would do well to read this. An oppressive and confusing time for both men and women.
Food for free – Richard Mabey
The Master and Margarita – Mikhail Bulgakov (Michael Glenny translation) – Learned a lot from this guide on ‘How to read the Master and Margarita‘, which I found accidentally while looking for the movie and then became a regular listener!
Rebecca – Daphne du Maurier (The internal dialogue of an introverted young woman in the 1920s is fascinating. Learned a lot about Gothic literature while listening to ‘How to read Rebecca’ by Benjamin McEvoy)
Bons tempos: Yesteryear (Portuguese Edition) – Caro Claire Burke (was delighted to find a cheap, Portuguese edition in Kindle shop for £3.99! Page turner)
The Housemaid – Freida McFadden (not a literary triumph but a page turner, won’t be reading the sequels though)
Fundamentally – Mussaibah Younis (fiction, but based on the author’s working experiences, funny and very London)
Flesh – David Szalay (An immigrant man with an empty inner life, who achieves financial success through marriage)
How to build a girl – Caitlin Moran (very funny moments in this 90s nostalgia)
Us Three – Ruth Jones (One RJ novel is probably enough for me)
Midnight in Chernobyl – Adam Higginbotham (Chernobyl disaster in minute detail, still haven’t finished it)
Poor – Katriona O’Sullivan (must read for anyone wanting to understand poverty in the UK)
Train Dreams – Dennis Johnson (How different life was when trees were systematically being destroyed in Idaho in the early 20th century, beautifully written)
Wuthering Heights – Emile Bronte * (forgotten how cruel people are in this! Quite violent!)
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2025
Snow Crash – Neal Stephenson
A closed and common orbit (Wayfarers Book 2) – Becky Chambers
The Long Way To A Small, Angry Planet (Wayfarers Book 1) – Becky Chambers
The Rachel Incident – Caroline O’Donoghue
The Wall – John Lanchester
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2024
Olive Kitteridge – Elizabeth Strout
Fathers and Sons – Ivan Turgenev
The Three-Body Problem Trilogy: Remembrance of Earth’s Past – Cixin Liu
The Dispossessed – Ursula K. Le Guin (Study guide)
Sea of Rust – C. Robert Cargill
Mozart in the Jungle – Blair Tindall
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2023
Mozart in the Jungle – Blair Tindall
Demon Copperhead – Barbara Kingsolver
The Fall of the House of Usher – Edgar Allan Poe
Rememberings – Sinéad O’Connor
The Change – Kirsten Miller
Amsterdam – Ian McEwan
Great Expectations – Charles Dickens (free copy on Google books)
Barba ensopada de sangue – Daniel Galera
Anos de chumbo – Chico Buarque (this link only works for me)
You don’t know what war is – Yeva Skalietska
Spare – Prince Harry the Duke of Sussex
O Irmão Alemão – Chico Buarque (this link only works for me)
It ends with us – Colleen Hoover
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2022
Madame Bovary – Gustave Flaubert
Michel the Giant: An African in Greenland – Tété-Michel Kpomassie (got this after Listening to interview with him on Outlook)
Everything I know about love (after watching on BBC) – Dolly Alderton
My first years in London – L Golubov (proof reading)
Teenage years in Brazil 1984-1989 – L Golubov (proof reading)
Vidas Secas – Graciliano Ramos (this link only works for me)
Ghosts – Dolly Alderton
My Body – Emily Ratajkowski
Um Brasiliero em Berlin – João Ubaldo Ribeiro (this links only works for me)
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2021
The White Tiger – Aravind Adiga
Twas the night shift before Christmas – Adam Kay
A Caverna – Jose Saramango
Standard Deviation – Catherine Heiny
Molly’s Game – Molly Bloom
Memorias de um sargento de milicia – Manuel Antonio De Almeida (FREE!)
Lolita – Vladimir Nabokov
The Periodic Table – Primo Levi
Queenie – Candice Carty Williams
O Cortiço – Aluisio Azevedo * (AMAZING! and FREE)
I came here to take your job – Eva S.
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2020
I takes blood and guts – Skin
Lady Sings the Blues – Billie Holiday
Normal People – Sally Rooney
Catch-22 – Joseph Heller
The laughing baby – Caspar Addyman
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2019
You Then, Me Now – Nick Alexander
Twelve years a slave – Solomon Northup
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2018
Big Little Lies – Liane Moriarty
Capoeira reading list – I read a lot of books about Capoeira in 2015-2019
Nage – Fred Abreu (Rare and expensive!!!)
How to talk so little kids will listen – Joanna Faber & Julie King
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2017
Just Kids – Patti Smith
The Art of Taking Action: Lessons from Japanese Psychology – Gregg Krech
The Circle – Dave Eggers
Wild: A Journey from Lost to Found – Cheryl Strayed
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2015
Ham on Rye & Post Office * – Charles Bukowski
Capoeira: Roots of the Dance-Fight-Game – Nestor Capoeira
Help Yourself – Caspar Addyman
Found this old list
* read before
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Red Mars – Kim Stanley Robinson – February 2012
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The Shock Doctrine – Naomi Klein – Jan 2011
Booky Wook 2 – Russel Brand – Jan 2011
You are not a gadget – Jaron Lanier – Jan/Feb 2011
Teenagers! Rob Parsons – Feb 2011
Never Let Me Go, Ishiguro, Kazuo – Mar/Apr 2011
Life of Pi – Yann Martel – Apr 2011 (Book of the year!)
The Trigger Point Therapy Workbook: Your Self-Treatment for Pain Relief – Claire Davies – June 2011
Capoeira Conditioning: How to Build Strength, Agility, and Cardiovascular Fitness Using Capoeira Movements – Gerrard Taylor – June 2011
Diary of a Nobody – George Grossmith – June 2011
The Magical Maze: Seeing the World Through Mathematical Eyes – Ian Stuart – June 2011
One Day – David Nicholls – August 2011
The Book of Human Skin – Michelle Lovric – September 2011 – gave up halfway through
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A Hora Da Estrela by Clarice Lispector – Jan 2010
How to be Free by Tom Hodgkinson – Jan 2010
Nineteen Eighty-Four George Orwell – Feb 2010 *
One-Straw Revolution by Masanobu Fukuoka – March 2010
The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde – March 2010 *
An Unsocial Socialist by Bernard Shaw – March/April 2010
Crime and Punishment – Fyodor Dostoevsky April 2010
The Greatest Show on Earth – Richard Dawkins – May 2010
The Corporation by Joel Bakan – June 2010
Ana Karenina – Tolstoi Aug/Sep 2010
Why does E=mc2 – Brian Cox/Jeff Forshaw – Sep 2010
The Grand Design – Stephen Hawking, Leonard Mlodinow – Oct 2010
The girl who kicked horn’s nests – Aug/Sep/Oct 2010 – gave up, wasn’t really enjoying it.
The Shock Doctrine – Naomi Klein – Dec 2010