kierenmccarthy.co.uk

I have a strange habit that appears when I am depressed because of the miserable weather (i.e. January in the UK) and when I am too busy with work.

I only ever notice that I am doing when either the weather improves or I suddenly find I have loads of spare time because I’m no longer working on whatever project I was working on. And that habit is: I buy loads of books.

I get really interesting and excited about new subjects and search out and buy the best book on it  that I can find in order to read it later. So imagine my surprise when last night I reached for the book by the side of the bed and hit a whole pile of them. In all seriousness, I hadn’t noticed them build up.

Anyway, here are the books I shall be working my way through this time:

• Dogs and Lampposts - Autobiog of ex-tabloid editor Richard Stott (halfway through, interesting but not a classic)
• Bleak House - Charles Dickens. The old classic. Link: It covers an excrutiatingly long court case, like the Sex.com battle
• Berlin - Anthony Beever. It’s still hasn’t been read. Too fat, probably.
• Bad Thoughts - Jamie Whyte. Book bought for me because of my constant rants about corrupt and phoney logic.
• Colossus - Paul Gannon. Computers, British secrets, WWII, who could resist?
• Arafat - Tony Walker/Andrew Gowers. Another one been waiting to be read.
• Tom Paine: A political life - John Keane. Part of a new series in my mind of banned books.
• The Housekeeper’s Diary - Wendy Berry. Book banned in the UK for covering the disintegration of Charles and Diana’s marriage.
• Spy Catcher - Peter Wright. Classic banned book in UK over MI5.
• Born to Steal - Gary Weiss. The mafia scams in Wall Street
• The Best Thing That Can Happen to a Croissant - Pablo Tusset. A recommendation.

And then I can start buying new ones…