Top Ten Favorite Books Taking Place in London

So this week, The Broke and the Bookish are focusing on settings. Top Ten Favorite Books from one setting. I chose London as my setting because I love London and I enjoy reading books taking place in this wonderful city. Especially because it seems to inspire some great writers too. This city seems to have a life of it’s own so that books taking place here, are always special because the city seems to be a character all on it’s own. So here’s a list of books taking place in London – do you know any other books taking place in London, I should read?

1. China Miéville: Un Lun Dun. So London is not just London, no, beneath London there’s another city where all the lost and broken things of London end up. UnLondon is very different from London and much more dangerous but it’s still a wonderful place to visit – or, it is when you just have to read about it!
2. Neil Gaiman: Neverwhere. So as in the previous book, in this book too there’s two Londons. A London Above and a London Below. Gaiman explains a lot of London place names in this one – and this is probably my favorite book on this list. Followed closely by the next two … and the first one … (My review)
3. Félix J. Palma: The Map of Time. This book features not only one London, but two. Victorian London as well as a future version of London, devastated by war. Or so it seems. The novel also features some of the main persons from London’s history – like H.G. Wells and Jack the Ripper. (My review)
4. Dan Simmons: Drood. Dan Simmons shows us through the London of Dickens and Wilkie Collins, both the posh and poor parts of Victorian London. It’s a wonderful book and again, the book would never have worked in any other city. (My review)
5. Marie Phillips: Gods Behaving Badly. So where have the Greek gods gone in the 21st century? Well, London of course! Artemis, Apollo, Aphrodite and more all live in Northern London, trying to combine being a god with normal life.
6. Peter Ackroyd: London The Biography. No one seems to understand the power of London better than Peter Ackroyd – or the city’s ability to be it’s own character. He has written an entire book with the city as it’s main character – a biography of a city. I haven’t read all of it yet but what I have read, is extremely impressive.
7. J.M. Barrie: Peter Pan. Yes, I know. Peter Pan doesn’t take place in London but for once on this list, London is not important because of all it’s wonders, but as a representative of the stiff society one wishes to escape from.
8. Michael Bond: The Paddington series. Well, Paddington wouldn’t be Paddington if he hadn’t been named after Paddington station. I guess for many tourists, Paddington station is more important because of it’s significance in this wonderful series than because of it’s connection to the rest of the London Underground. And yes, I have been and seen the statue…
9. Arthur Conan Doyle: Sherlock Holmes. Everyone knows that Sherlock Holmes resides at 221B Baker Street. Although he also ventures out of London to solve crimes, he does pop around London quite a bit – and Sherlock wouldn’t be Sherlock without London.
10. Charles Dickens. I haven’t picked any particular book by Dickens because, really, isn’t London a part of almost all of them? When I think of Dickens, one of the main thing that pops into my head is Victorian London – which he knew thoroughly. So of course, Dickens had to be on this list.

There are of course lots of other books featuring London – like Gail Carriger’s The Parasol Protectorate series, Harry Potter and Hilary Mantel’s Thomas Cromwell series to name but a few – but I’ve tried to choose the ones where the city is more than just a background for the story and instead takes an explicit part in the book. I think London is an important player in all of these books. And of course, now I want to go back …

Related posts:

• Top Ten Books Who Deserve More Recognition
• Top Ten Books I Read Before I Was a Blogger
• Top Ten Books I HAD To Buy … But Which Are Still Sitting On My Shelf Unread
• Top Ten Books at the Top of my Spring 2013 TBR list!
• Top Ten Series I’d Like To Start But Haven’t Yet

October and November – ‘Monthly’ Wrap Up

Yes, I admit to beeing behind on my wrap up posts – and just about everything else blog related. I blame work mostly – and that pretty much suck since I don’t get paid to work and because of that, I would really much prefer just reading and blogging. But it’s necessary to work and so we must try to find work as best we can. But lame excuses aside, I’ve been reading tough and long books these months so I haven’t read all that many books. The best thing, though, is that I finished Clarissa (and the crowd goes wild…) and I also read and loved Les Misérables. So two huuuuuge novels finished and although I’ve cheated and read Clarissa all year long, it only really counts in the month, it’s finished. I’m not sure I can complete argue for why that is but that’s one of the rules of (my) reading.

Anyway, this of course means that I’m hugely behind.

See, already 2 books behind on October 1st. But it should get much, much worse.

In one short month, I went from being two books behind to being 5 books behind. I mostly blame Les Misérables for that. It took me a month to read – but it was worth it. However, it did seriously mess up my goal of reading 52 books this year. And then I began reading The Kindly Ones in November too and well, any chance of reaching 52 was just gone.

1. Samuel Richardson: Clarissa. Clarissa, Clarissa, Clarissa. So many months spend reading about this young woman who flees an arranged marriage and ends up in the hands of a womanizer. It could have been so good but it wasn’t. 3 stars.
2. Jean M. Auel: The Land of Painted Caves. A dreadful end to a series that started out so so good. In this one, we follow Ayla’s training to become a Zelandonia but also relationship issues with Jondalar. After reading the last three books in this series, I have to say that Auel should have quit while she was ahead. 2 stars.
3. Victor Hugo: Les Misérables. This is an amazing book, well worth it’s status as a Classic. Jean Valjean as a character is so real and so flawed that you forget he is just a character. His relationship with Colette is one that all fathers will recognize, I think. Add to that Hugo’s fantastic grasp of language, which enables him to write beautiful about the sewers of Paris, and you can easily see why this book is so good. 5 stars.
4. Neil Gaiman: Neverwhere. From beginning to end, I loved this book! Richard Mayhew’s adventures in London Below are just so much fun. Gaiman’s grasp of language is amazing and I love how well he uses London as a setting and plays with well known place names. 4 stars.

As you can see, I’m also so behind on writing reviews. I promise I will try to get them written before the new year.

I have finished almost all my challenges this year. Reading Neil Gaiman’s Neverwhere finished my second to last challenge. However, I have to realize that I will not finish my own reading list and challenge for this year. I still need to read 12 books, I need to read Neil Gaiman American Gods, Don DeLillo Underworld, the first volume of Coppleston’s history of philosophy as well as a non-fiction book about collecting and then finish reading Sherlock Holmes…  I’m not going to make it. So I will focus on reading as many books as possible because there are so many books I desperately want to read – and then set some new goals for 2013.

Related posts:

• September 2012 – Monthly Wrap Up
• August 2012 – Monthly Wrap Up
• July 2012 – Monthly Wrap Up
• June 2012 – Monthly Wrap Up Post
• May 2012 – Monthly Wrap Up
• April 2012 – Monthly Wrap Up
• March 2012 – Monthly Wrap Up
• February 2012 – Monthly Wrap Up
• January 2012 – Monthly Wrap Up

Neil Gaiman: Neverwhere (review)

What would you do if you came walking down a street and saw a young woman lying hurt on the sidewalk? Would you stop to help her and carry her to your home if she asked you not to call an ambulance? If you said yes to this question, I’m sorry to say that your answer is wrong! Really really wrong! At least if you have a life and maybe a family you care about.

Because that is exactly what Richard Mayhew does. He finds a hurt woman, he takes her to his home to help her – and because of this random act of kindness, he’s thrown into a life and an existence he had no idea existed even though it was right beneath his feet.

The girl he helped, was Door. Door comes from the London Below and if you associate too much with people and places from London Below, your existence in London Above disappears. People stop seeing you, you loose your job and your apartment – you’re simply forgotten. And that’s what happens to Richard. He helps Door escape from the very nasty Mr Croup and Mr Vandemar and he takes a message from her to the Marquis de Carabas – and that’s it. Suddenly, he’s shunned in London Above and he has no choice but to go to London Below – like all the other things and people who have fallen through the cracks.

Once Richard is below, he’s dragged into Door’s life. And she does not lead a peaceful one. Instead she’s on the run from the people who slaughtered her entire family and trying to figure out why they did so. Various characters help and hinder this quest and it’s all good fun and gives the reader a lovely, entertaining time. And the rats, of course. And pigeons.

Besides a fascinating story that I really enjoyed, what I loved most about Neverwhere was the way, Gaiman uses London. Place names of various parts of London suddenly get a new – and often sinister – meaning when you know London Below. Names and phrases like Mind the Gap, Shepherd’s Bush and Knightsbridge are some of the things that get the Gaiman treatment. And of course the floating markets – people from London Below just meet up in places and have their markets and then pack it all down again and move on to a new location. One such location is Harrod’s and the description of this is just marvelous. London Above – and Below – will never be the same. It all reminds me of an Escher painting.

And I just love Gaiman’s writing. Here are a couple of quotes to showcase it: ‘To say that Richard was not very good at heights would be accurate, but would fail to give the whole picture. It would be like describing the planet Jupiter as bigger than a duck. True, as far as it went; but it could go further.’ (p. 43) and ‘He never had believed in angels. He was damned if he was going to start now. Still, it is much easier not to believe in something when it is not actually looking directly at you, and saying your name.’ (p. 154).

One of my favorite authors is Terry Pratchett. And another author who is rather new to me and who I’m really starting to like, is China Miéville. This book by Neil Gaiman reminds me of both these authors. There’s a lot of similarities between Neverwhere and Miéville’s UnLunDun and The City & The City. Both Neverwhere and UnLunDun takes place in London but in a different London than we know. And just as people don’t see the people from London Below in Neverwhere, people don’t see the other city and it’s inhabitants in The City & The City. There’s something so interesting to me about these co-existing cities and how they exemplify how we live our lives, not seeing what we’re not supposed to see and if you see something that other’s don’t, you’re automatically labelled insane. It could be really interesting to read all these three novels together to really compare them and dig into their themes and similarities – and their unique aspects as well.

The similarities with Terry Pratchett is clearly seen in the humor. There are sentences here where it could almost have been Pratchett writing. No wonder that Pratchett and Gaiman wrote a book together – but big wonder that I didn’t particularly like it … I think I need to reread Good Omens at one point.

One other thing that fascinates me about this book is, that it originally was a tv series and then Gaiman adapted it into a novel. Right now, so many books are made into movies – Cloud Atlas, Life of Pi, Les Misérables, The Hobbit, Midnight’s Children – but it’s rarely the other way around, I think. I really want to watch this series (and all those movies…!). But I wonder – I prefer reading the book before the movie … but if the book is based on the tv series, should you read the book first or watch the series???

Anyway, I digress. What I really wanted to say with this review is, that Neil Gaiman is living up to my expectations and that he has taken a big step closer to be added to my small list of favorite authors and that I loved reading this book.

• Title: Neverwhere
• Author: Neil Gaiman
• Publisher: BBC Books
• Year: 1996
• Pages: 287 pages
• Source: Own Collection
• Stars: 4 stars out of 5

If you liked this novel, you might also like Gods Behaving Badly by Marie Phillips, anything by Terry Pratchett or The City & The City and Un Lun Dun by China Miéville.