4 3 2 1 by Paul Auster

Reservoir 13 by Jon McGregor

History of Wolves by Emily Fridlund

Solar Bones by Mike McCormack

Elmet by Fiona Mozley

The Ministry of Utmost Happiness by Arundhati Roy

A Passage to India by E.M. Forster

My Man Jeeves (Jeeves & Wooster Series Book 1 by P. G. Wodehouse

The January Man: A Year of Walking Britain by Christopher Somerville

When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi

 
At the age of thirty-six, on the verge of completing a decade’s worth of training as a neurosurgeon, Paul Kalanithi was diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer. One day he was a doctor making a living treating the dying, and the next he was a patient struggling to live.

I loved the overall message of the book - make life as meaningful as you can in the time you have.

At times the book felt quite clinical, although the part written by his wife post his death was written from the heart! 

It never felt a self-pitying but is beautifully written and insightful. 

A Horse Walks into a Bar by David Grossman, Jessica Cohen

Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë

 

This story wasn't how I imagined it. It is a dark novel, about the cycle of violence and aggression: Heathcliff eventually becomes like the man he hates, by being brought up with beatings and anger he in turn unleashes it on everyone else.

It tells of how love can become a catalyst for hatred.

So many of the characters are utterly unlikable! Cathy is selfish and foolish and obstinate; Heathcliff is brutal and vengeful and psychotic; Hindley is spiteful and venomous and a drunkard.  

 

Amongst Women by John McGahern

The Bell by Iris Murdoch

The Last September by Elizabeth Bowen

Learning to Dance by Michael Mayne

Howards End by E. M. Forster

Family And Friends by Anita Brookner

The Man in the Brown Suit by Agatha Christie

The Book of Barely Imagined Beings: A 21st-century Bestiary by Caspar Henderson

Our Mutual Friend by Charles Dickens

The Mayor of Casterbridge by Thomas Hardy

A Time to Keep Silence by Patrick Leigh Fermor

The Rector's Daughter by F.M. Mayo

Galahad at Blandings by P.G. Wodehouse

Clayhanger by Arnold Bennett

On The Black Hill by Bruce Chatwin

To The Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf

  

This was not an easy read but wow what a beautiful one!
It is complicated by an interweaving of narrative and personal reflection and as a result it is difficult to discern who is thinking what and which thoughts are the result of whom.

The Heart Of The Matter by Graham Greene

    

I really enjoyed this novel. It is a powerful, thought provoking and deeply profound novel about love and catholic guilt set amongst British colonial settlers in West Africa during the Second World War.
It is a tragedy where Major Scobie, a 50-year-old Deputy Commissioner, is
passed over for promotion and so becomes forced to borrow money to send his despairing wife away. In her absence he falls in love with Helen, a young widow, and his life is transformed by the experience.However, it does not have a happy ending.

The Pursuit of Love by Nancy Mitford

Washington Square by Henry James

The Way We Live Now by Anthony Trollope

Anthony Trollope wrote this satirical novel as a reaction to the financial scandals of the 1870s in Great Britain.  It is an archetypical Victorian novel, featuring the two big Victorian obsessions - class and women.
It took me a long time to read - it is Trollope's longest novel, but it was enjoyable!
I loved all the disreputable characters. I took an instant dislike to Felix - who basically spends everyone's else money and is a cad! One of my favorites is the seductive Winifred Hurtle, who, they say -- and I love this detail! -- shot a man in Oregon!

The Big Sleep (Philip Marlowe Series Book 1) by Raymond Chandler

Set in 1930s Los Angeles, then a sleepy town controlled by the mob as much as the police, The Big Sleep is a non stop action thriller. Chandler’s first book is a classic and would help redefine and reinvent the mystery genre.
Chandler wrote this back in 1939 and it reads like an American classic detective novel should! The dialogues are just perfect!
 

The Ballad of the Sad Café: Wunderkind; The Jockey; Madame Zilensky and the Ki by Carson McCullers

This is a strange collection of 7 short, in some cases, almost minimalistic tales.I enjoyed them, especially the first one!
They are linked by isolation and the loneliness juxtaposed to selfless love in implausible triangular relationships. 
I love the way Carson McCullers paints a specific scenery in one's imagination while flawlessly dropping the characters there.

Middlemarch by George Eliot

 

I loved the descriptions of the depth and breath of society. 
It is full of insights into society, human nature, what to do in life when one can't quite make one's dreams come true, and how to make a marriage work. 
I love the large cast of townsfolk that round out the novel create an amazing mix of gossip and family histories.
I love the Elliot's idea in making her characters subjugated by the forces of society; they eventually have to conform to the role society has laid out for them. 
Elliot provides a great deal of historical context.
This is not an easy read but a very enjoyable one!  

Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert

 
Having read Flaubert's parrot I supposed to ought to read the novel that inspired it.
The book is about Mme. Bovary's thoughts of "If only X would happen, THEN I could be truly happy" and finding out that is simply not the case! I think I need to learn from her mistakes! 
In spite of the sadness of the book, I loved the descriptions of the Normandy countryside which are very vivid! 

Flaubert's Parrot by Julian Barnes

This is the second time I have read this strange book! It is very gimmickacy - the  non-traditional biography of Gustave Flaubert, as researched by a
fictitious biographer’s, interluded with concern for, and reflections on, his wife dying of an illness.
It is unlike books I read before but I loved it for that reason!

Sad Cypress by Agatha Christie

 

I thought Agatha Christie had been clever with this story as the mystery that begins with court proceedings, as the accused suspect is being tried for the murder of an innocent, lovely girl!