Reading for pleasure

It has been a while since I have read for pleasure.  I normally have my head buried in chemistry books, for my degree.  I think the last book I read for pleasure was one of the fifty shades books.  That was certainly a pleasure.....

Since I have been in Florida, I have been reading what I want.  Here is a loose round up of the books I have read

South of Broad by Pat Conray

I was put on to this author by one of the mums from Oliver's baseball team.  He writes books that are set in South Carolina and the surrounding area.  I originally wanted 'Lords of Discipline', but my local library did not have it in. I took this and 'Prince of Tides'.  After reading the blurbs on the sleeves, I choose to bring this with me.  I thoroughly enjoyed this book, in fact, I think I finished it in 2 days.  From the description on Amazon...

'Leopold Bloom King has been raised in a family shattered—and shadowed—by tragedy. Lonely and adrift, he searches for something to sustain him and finds it among a tightly knit group of high school outsiders. Surviving marriages happy and troubled, unrequited loves and unspoken longings, hard-won successes and devastating breakdowns, as well as Charleston, South Carolina’s dark legacy of racism and class divisions, these friends will endure until a final test forces them to face something none of them are prepared for.'

I look forward to getting home to the other Pat Conray book I borrowed from the library and hope to read it before the mundane chemistry books set in

Link to Amazon

http://www.amazon.com/South-Broad-Novel-Pat-Conroy/dp/0385344074/ref=sr_1_6?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1373165482&sr

=1-6&keywords=pat+conroy

Half Blood blues by Esi Edgyan

A book I found in the house we are staying in.  This is not dissimilar in the previous book in that it jumps back and forward in time.  I choose this first as it is based in WWII history, and Louis Armstrong, is a fictional pretext is a character in the book.  From the blurb on Amazon

'Shortlisted for the Governor General’s Literary Award for Fiction

Berlin, 1939. The Hot Time Swingers, a popular jazz band, has been forbidden to play by the Nazis. Their young trumpet-player Hieronymus Falk, declared a musical genius by none other than Louis Armstrong, is arrested in a Paris café. He is never heard from again. He was twenty years old, a German citizen. And he was black.'

This book went out with a camp squib unfortunately.  The ending could have been so much better.

Link to Amazon. 

http://www.amazon.com/Half-Blood-Blues-Novel-Esi-Edugyan/dp/1250012708/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid

=1373165887&sr=1-1&keywords=half+blood+blues

The Last Gospel by David Gibbins

Another book I have found in the house we are staying in.  This is what I would class as a 'Dan Brown' style book, with the lead character being a marine archeologist.  It takes you from the Mediterranean, to Rome to London, to Jerusalem, then to Galilee.  This is my kind of book.

From the blurb on Amazon

'History is full of secrets. Secrets that have remained hidden for thousands of years. And we have no idea what many of them are. We know they're there, under the ground, at the bottom of the ocean, hidden away, just waiting for someone to unlock them. Enter Jack Howard, one of the greatest archaeologists of his day, a man who never stops believing, never gives up hope that out there might be the next big discovery. But when he and his best friend Costas are interrupted during a dive off the coast of Sicily that might possibly reveal the final journey of St. Paul, Jack has no idea what lies in store...Their journey takes them to one of the great lost libraries of antiquity, destroyed by the eruption of Pompeii, into the heart of ancient Rome and the holiest sites of Jerusalem. Their quest? So earthshattering that there are men who would kill anyone and anything in their path to conceal this secret...the secret of the origins of Christianity itself, and of THE LAST GOSPEL.'

I thoroughly enjoyed this read.  He has written more books in the Jack Howard character, and I would not mind reading another.  But I worry it would be too similar (just like the Dan Brown books......).  Might give another a go though, just to see.

Link to Amazon

http://www.amazon.com/Last-Gospel-David-Gibbins/dp/0755335155/ref=sr_1_11?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1373500521&sr

=1-11&keywords=david+gibbins

I am hard pressed to say which was my favorite, I think you can tell which was not!! I look forward to being able to read for pleasure again, hopefully not too far in the future....