“READ more books” is likely to have been bumped up new year’s resolution lists since another national lockdown was announced on Monday.
As the country re-enters life indoors, some will reflect on the first lockdown last March, when reading committments may have fizzled out and bookshelves dominated the backdrops of Zoom calls.
But we urge you to reach for that bookshelf this time around, and here at DNG Media we’re always on the lookout for a good read. So to usher in a new year, and a new lockdown, we’re welcoming you to our very own book club, delving into each other’s reading lists and encouraging our readers to do the same.
Getting the literary ball rolling with some historical fiction is our editor Fiona Reid, who has chosen ‘Half of a Yellow Sun’ by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie as her first read of the year. It was the recipient of the 2007 Orange Prize for Fiction and Fiona has so far found the book “compelling”. She said: “It’s set during the Nigerian Civil War and some of the events of that time are truly shocking.”
Reporter Donald Turvill is kicking off his 2021 with George Orwell’s ‘Coming up For Air’. Having previously delved into the author’s better-known novels, Nineteen Eighty-Four and Animal Farm, he hopes the read will broaden his scope of the term ‘Orwellian’, which he said was “personified in 2020 by the likes of Donald Trump during the US election.”
Senior reporter Euan Maxwell currently has no book on the go, but is eagerly awaiting his partner to finish ‘Sh**ged. Married. Annoyed.’ by celebrity couple Chris and Rosie Ramsey, which he got her for Christmas.
As is the case for fellow senior reporter and bookworm Abbey Morton, who is yet to settle on her first read of the year. Having recently moved house, she’s thinking about getting stuck into Monty Don’s ‘Gardening World’ to seek inspiration for her new garden. Last but not least, our photographer Steve Matthew has recently finished reading ‘Tommy’s Honour: The Story of Old Tom Morris and Young Tom Morris, Golf’s Founding Father and Son’ by Kevin Cook.
He said: “It was a great read, full of Scottish history as well as an amazing father and son relationship between Old Tom Morris and his son Tommy, very tough times back then which they overcame to become champion golfers.”
*Get involved with the DNG Media Book Club – send your book suggestions and reviews to [email protected].
