Pack your books, we’re going on a trip!
So, you finally booked that trip you always wanted. Now, it’s time to pack. Clothes, cameras, girlfriend or boyfriend..but are you forgetting something? Your best friends are waiting just around the corner! I’m talking about THE BOOKS silly. Every book lover does a (not at all mini) tour in the local book store for new supplies. You think what should I get according to the occasion. Summer romantic novels, wintery spooky sceneries and wild landscapes, follow the Brontë sisters or do some biographical research? Well, it’s all up to you! What are your book cravings? Do you wanna sit in the sun and feel joy reading about a romantic love affair or do you wanna spend the cold night in the village trembling with fear and agony about what’s going to happen to that poor girl a crazy man is chasing in the detective story? Whatever you decide to choose, here I’m going to recommend you some of my all time favourite books.
1. DOUBLE NEGATIVE BY DAVID CARKEET.
Now, my edition is the greek one as you can see, translated by the greek writer Auguste Corteau. Double Negative is about the story of Jeremy Cook, the resident genius at the Wabash Institute, a southern Indiana linguistics think tank attached to a daycare center. He is very much interested in the linguistic development of toddlers (how they learn to talk). All good and geeky until a colleague of the department’s team is found dead in Cook’s office. When everything is a chaos and accusations such as ‘‘You did it..no YOU did it!’‘ fly in the air, a second body turns up and now our linguist has to use his magic linguistic wits to get out of the story and save himself and his reputation. Now this story is not absolutely a detective one. It has humor,it has suspense, and it has a bunch of linguists trying to escape this chaotic situation. The story could very much likely occur in a company of accountants where everyone is irrelevant to the case. At the end, everyone would try to solve it based on their skills!! It has humor, mystery, everything someone wants from a page turner. Loved it.
2. WINTER JOURNAL BY PAUL AUSTER.
Still a greek edition. Exactly one month before his sixty-fourth birthday, Paul Auster decided to write his autobiographical journey beginning from his childhood up to today. Examining his own life, Auster uses second person, as if he addresses himself as a stranger, in this memoir of bitterweet memories. I can think of hundreds of journals that could touch me deeply,yet Auster’s winter journal is something of a quite emotional chaos.By referring to chaos,I mean a real deep and human condition of a soul and not just a typical record.Some could claim that it is without order(chronological or logical) yet a life journal with its ups and downs and sometimes unexpected events can only rely on its unpredictability.
3. THE TURN OF THE SCREW BY HENRY JAMES.
A governess of two beautifully odd children, Miles and Flora, comes to encounter the evil spirits of a forlorn estate who come closer and closer and seek to corrupt the childrens’ bodies and possess their minds. As the story unfolds, she realizes terrified that the children are not afraid of the evil lurking in the dark but they are more than willing to follow it. A supernatural atmosphere, confusion over the behavior of the governess and the children and the final unsolved mystery: Who’s the victim and who’s the perpetrator? You’ll either love or hate this book!
4. 1984 BY GEORGE ORWELL.
A classic one. A very classic one. However, there are still many out there who haven’t read it. I advise you to go read it at once! The desire for an escape in this book shows the vanity of the world in which the character lives. Noone can escape, especially those who adopt “crazy” ideas like living in a world with freedom, what a man wishes for. Desperate and hopeless situations,very strong images of self-humiliation and a very big disappointment at the end,as everyone eventually must love the Big Brother,an inevitable feeling. It is a book far from its times, prophetic and great for those who like to ‘‘torment’‘ themselves with existential problems.
These are just some of the books you can get with you. In the infinite ocean of book choices, thank God there’s plenty of room to dive in!