Writer's Reading | Luca Veste

I have a confession to make. The pictures you’re seeing attached to this piece are staged. Well, not staged, more managed. You see, over the last few years I’ve been a bit disorganised with my books. I’ve been buying so many, that to actually place them in size order, alphabetically, has been something I’ve avoided doing until I had to take these pictures. So, lest the world see my untidy bookshelves, with hardbacks placed precariously atop smaller paperbacks, like a ridiculously bizarre game of Jenga, I began the job of arranging my books into some kind of order.

It took me 4 hours.

Now, this wasn’t just because I have a lot of books. More because once I started going through them all, I began discovering ones buried which I haven’t looked at for a while. Like, NIGHT SHIFT by Stephen King. This was the book I read and re-read over and over when I was a teenager. Apart from THE STAND, it was the only Stephen King book I owned, really the only books I owned not written by Enid Blyton. I alternated between the two of them, reading each in turn. Now, I own almost everything Stephen King has written and haven’t read NIGHT SHIFT in a long time. So, half an hour was spent reading my favourite story from the collection (Quitters Inc.) before moving on.

Stephen King has been a mainstay in my reading since I was a teenager. Before that, as a kid I was usually found reading Enid Blyton, Famous Five, Secret Seven and the lesser talked about Mallory Towers series mostly. Either them or the Redwall series by Brian Jacques, a guy from Liverpool who grew up around the docks and went on to sell millions. A true inspiration, a huge part of my childhood, I was very sad when he died earlier this year.

A lot of people usually say their taste is eclectic. I suppose at first glance my bookshelves would attest to this description. However, I don’t really think it is. Sure, there’s horror mixed with crime, a bit of mystery and some thrillers, but really, the lines are so blurred with modern genres, you can pretty much just categorise everything as fiction at this point. Take my current favourite author Steve Mosby. On the surface they are pretty much standard crime/thrillers. Once you start reading though, you instantly recognise other genres within the story. There’s horror in THE 50/50 KILLER, mystery in STILL BLEEDING, sci-fi in THE CUTTING CREW. His latest book, and possibly best of the whole bunch, BLACK FLOWERS, combines a bit of everything to create a beautifully terrifying novel.

Since I’ve started my blog, reviewing all kinds of wonderfully different books, I’ve read more than usual. I was always a heavy reader though, going through 1 or 2 books a week. Now, with a kindle app nicely installed on my laptop as well, I’m reading almost 4 a week (although this has slowed in the past couple of weeks, since I started writing myself). Which means I sleep even less than usual and my wife rolls her eyes every time I come back from picking up milk and bread, armed with another couple of purchases from the local bookshop. I mainly read when I smoke, outside of the house for five to ten minutes every hour or so. Although if it’s a good book, I know instantly because I run out of cigs a lot quicker!

The best thing about writing about books, is finding new authors. One of the best I’ve read recently, hell in the last few years at least, was THE OFFICE OF LOST & FOUND by Vincent Holland-Keen. Possibly not something I would of come across if I wasn’t writing about books, it’s a fantastically crafted novel. I described it in my review as “gloriously confusing”. I’ve never been so happy to read something that has left me so happy to not have a clue what is really going on for 95% of the book before the end pulls all the strands together so well. I can’t wait to read more from this writer.

Back to the bookshelves, you’ll notice a lot of Harlan Coben, some Linwood Barclay and Gregg Hurwitz. These satisfy the craving I have for well written thriller/mysteries, which more often than not, have a nice twist at the end. Easy to read and very entertaining. Dennis Lehane is another I love to read.

There’s also a distinctly British feel to the books I’ve been reading recently though. Simon Kernick, Mark Billingham, Paul Johnston and John Connolly (OK best specify British AND Irish, I guess otherwise we’ll get letters) will always have a home on my shelves. Perhaps a lesser known author until recently for the crime/thriller genre whom I’ve read for a long time now is Neil White. Excellent writer and good guy (I may seem slightly biased in this case as I admin his fan page on Facebook!) his writing is getting better with every book and I don’t think it’ll be long before he finds himself alongside the more well known writers in his genre.

I’d like to mention one writer in particular though. Sean Cregan (the pseudonym of John Rickards) has authored two full length novels now, with one, THE RAZOR GATE, deserving the praise it has garnered in the past few months. A truly outstanding story, John is a fantastic writer, who really should be on more peoples shelves.

My TBR pile is quite small now, compared to what it was a few months back. This is due to the fact that I tend to buy more on the kindle these days. I’ve discovered some great writers by doing this. Nick Quantrill released his first book this year and he’s definitely one to watch. An excellent first novel (and he writes fantastic short-stoires as well), he writes about Hull so well, it almost makes you want to visit. Almost. Allan Guthrie is another I hadn’t read before and after reading TWO-WAY SPLIT I was a little annoyed with myself that I hadn’t read any of his before. And just so this whole post isn’t one big sausage fest, I’ll give mention to Julie Morrigan, whose debut novel CONVICTIONS was very, very good!

Well, that’ll do I think. I’ve gone on for a long time. I’ve mentioned a lot of writers I guess. But that’s where these books come from. Some guy or gal, who one day sat down and unleashed their imagination onto a blank piece of paper, or to be more ‘with it’ a blank screen. They provide hours of entertainment for less than the price of 20 cigs. And for that, I thank them.

Luca Veste

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