Listed below are my favourite books and why they are good enough to be on the list.
Kim by Rudyard Kipling
This is a classic and for me is one of the few books I can read and re-read as it has so much wonderful detail. The author was a journalist and grew up in India. His understanding of the live on the streets and how the elements of spying were developed are at the heart of a story about a monk and his search for enlightenment.
My Family and Other Animals by Gerald Durrell
This book was issued to me as a school text book for a week by mistake. Luckily for me I had read it and it changed my life. It led me to the very early David Attenborough books on his collecting journeys. But Gerald Durrell's life on Corfu, now as a TV series, does not touch the essence of his life that shines through this book. And how a young person, views the antics of his old brother, his sister and his mother. A great read and a lot of humour.
The Colour Purple by Alice Walker
This harsh book, is stunningly written. And before the #BlackLivesMatter this is so much more than a book about black poverty. If you want to understand the poverty of the last century and while not a slave story might as well be in some aspects. The strong female characters are highlighted and gives a straight, no holds barred story line. At the end, you feel you have achieved something by sticking with the book to the end and that you have learned so much about the world and probably about yourself as it makes you evaluate your views along the way.
She by H. Rider Haggard
She was written in 1886 by this prolific Victorian author. There are today collections of his 59 works on Amazon. In many ways he was the Victorian equivalent of Clive Cussler. His books came out as short paperback editions, cheap for their day and easy to carry on the new railway network. It has been criticised by later generations of being imperialistic. But at the time it was written, the countries of what has become the Commonwealth were new and exciting places. With strange customs and foods and people wanted to know more about these strange places in an era before television and radio.
A Vision of Eden published by Kew Gardens
and the newer Marianne North the Kew Collection published by Royal Botanic Garden Kew
These works describe the life of a Victorian women, once her father's carer who left the UK to travel the world painting stunning landscapes and covering details of flowers not then seen in the UK. And she had the foresight and money to create the very stunning Marianne North Gallery in the gardens at Kew. She arranged all the pictures and dictated how they would go up, frame to frame with no gaps. For those who have seen the stunning gallery and her paintings know what a treasure this is. Some of the viewpoints have now been lost due to development while others still remain. Her work is alive with colour. Much in the same way that Kipling and Rider Haggard used words to paint, she used a brush. A stunning legacy in an age where women did not travel alone, she did. An inspiration to women of any age.
A Book of Middle Eastern Food by Claudia Roden
This book had a profound effect on my cooking and eating habits. In 1977, I was living in the middle of the Sahara and having travelled a lot in Europe and to Tunisia, different foods were not a problem. But how to I cook them as another issue. How do I make foods nutritious when there is very little fresh veg around in the heat of the Sahara in summer. I needed answers and sent forth back to Heffers in Cambridge for some cookery books which would prove to be an inspiration even today. This book not only talks about the foods, they associated stories of ingredients, family lives and recipes make this a great cookery book. And for those with tastes closer to home try her Spain one published in 2011 another excellent read and great for cooking too. When faced with butchers, with the head of what was for sale on the pavement outside. My Sahara world was far from the supermarkets of today.
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