Welcome

This site is an ongoing labour of love to list all the books, other than reference or instructional books, I have personally owned and read or which are on my TBR list, whether I have purchased them myself or been given them as presents. I have also included some of my insights or recollections, as a header on the Literary Worlds & Series pages, about the books, authors, or maybe about events that occurred at the time I bought or read the books and which influenced my decision to buy them. The books are grouped, and split in the menu bar, by both Literary Worlds & Series and the author, so books can appear under both headings depending on whether the book is a stand-alone novel or part of a series. Both categories are arranged alphabetically with the books being listed in the chronological order in which I bought or aquired them.

The listings include a photo of the cover, a brief synopsis of the story, though not necessarily what was on the original book cover, the book format, the date purchased, the retail price (rather than the purchase price), the number of pages in the book and the year I read it.

My interest in reading and my love of books was kindled over my formative years by several different sources. 

• The first influence was my parents, who purchased a full set of Encyclopedia Britannica, back in the late 60s, along with a very thick Oxford English dictionary and a collection of hardback Classical novels such as Black Beauty, Treasure Island, Alice in Wonderland, Grimm Fairy Tales, and about half a dozen more. These were for me, my two brothers, and my sister to use and read both for pleasure and education. In those days there were no home computers, mobile phones or internet, so if you wanted to know something on any particular topic you had to look it up in the encyclopedia or use the dictionary if you came across a word that you did not know the meaning of. I particularly remember reading six of the classic books during the summer of 1972 while I was recuperating at home after having contracted meningococcal meningitis in early April and having spent three weeks in hospital recovering from it.

• The second influence was a UK children's television program called 'Jackanory', which in the late 1960s and early 1970s was transmitted every weekday evening on BBC 1, around 4:30 pm and lasted for about fifteen minutes. It featured a different actor or TV celebrity every week, who would sit in a comfortable armchair and read a children's novel, in much the same manner as Audiobooks today, occasionally there would also be drawings from the scenes being described shown on the screen.

• The final influence was the two English teachers I had when I attended secondary school, these being Mrs Casey and Mr Beesley. The first two years of secondary school Mrs Casey was my English teacher, and most weeks she would set aside about thirty minutes during one of her lessons just to sit and read to the class. Most of the books she read to us were either Adventure or Fantasy-based, but except for one, I do not recall what the titles were. The one book I do recall was called "The Moon of Gomrath'' which is the second book in the Tales of Alderley series by Alan Garner. The setting for the books is Alderley Edge, which is a place that was about fifteen miles from where I lived at the time. The combination of the stories location and the subject matter, ghosts, witches, goblins etc; fired my imagination and caused me to join the local library so that I could read the first book in the series "The Weirdstone of Brisingamen'', once I had read this I immediately booked out and re-read "The Moon of Gomrath". My other English teacher, Mr Beesley, taught me for the final three years of secondary school. He also used to set aside time to read to the class, however, rather than read a full book he would read interesting snippets and then assign the class some lesson based on this snippet. The instance I remember clearly, and which led to me requesting my parents buy me the book to read, was when he read the opening few chapters from "Jaws" by Peter Benchley, finishing with the scene on the beach where the young police officer finds the girl's mutilated body.  The lesson assignment after this was to rewrite this scene or something similar in your own words. 

As I have just noted, "Jaws" was the first book I owned and read, which I received from my parents as a Christmas present in 1975, however, it was not until April 1977 that I started to purchase and read books on a regular basis. This was due to a new book shop opening in the town where I lived and me having some birthday money to spend. 

These first books were all novelisations of the TV show Doctor Who, which was something I was a big fan of, so it seemed a logical progression to read the novels of the shows I had so enjoyed watching.

Thus my lifelong passion for books and reading began. Primarily, my main interests are Science Fiction and Fantasy but I have also read Horror, Thriller & Suspense, Action & Adventure, Humour and several other genres.

Wherever I have been or go, if there is a book shop there, I am drawn to it and enjoy nothing more than the simple pleasure of just browsing the shelves to see what is there on the shelves.