1. Eric Ambler, The Night-Comers. (U.S. editions are sometimes titled State of Siege.) Think of Ambler as a precursor of Le Carré. I used to think he had one or two excellent works, now I am realizing his ouevre is much deeper than I had imagined. Just long enough at 158 pp., this novel uses
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1. Eric Ambler, The Night-Comers. (U.S. editions are sometimes titled State of Siege.) Think of Ambler as a precursor of Le Carré. I used to think he had one or two excellent works, now I am realizing his ouevre is much deeper than I had imagined. Just long enough at 158 pp., this novel uses the Sundanese setting very well. He was a favorite of Graham Greene’s, and I will read yet more by him.
2. Lydia Davis, Our Strangers, not on Amazon try these sources. Very very short fiction, sometimes as short as a single paragraph. With some periodic non-fiction (or is it?) thrown in. The best pieces are excellent, and many of the others are at least interesting. Here is my earlier CWT with Lydia Davis, I am a fan.
3. Alexandra Hudson, The Soul of Civility: Timeless Principles to Heal Society and Ourselves. Highly intelligent, and today much needed. Her opening sentence is: “Did you know there are at least four women named Judith who are internationally renowned experts on manners?” I would say that Alexandra is one of my “dark horse” picks to become a leading classical liberal influencer, except maybe she isn’t a dark horse any more.
4. Amitav Ghosh, Smoke and Ashes: Opium’s Hidden Histories. An extremely well-written, and also useful history of the opium trade, albeit with more than its fair share of left-wing jargon. And yes that is the novelist Ghosh. Due out in February.
The other books I’ve been reading I haven’t so much liked.
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