Features
The Book Doctor: January 2010
Our literary clinic opens once more, as Betty Ann Bristow seeks advice from Dave Lovely, a bookseller at Waterstone’s Manchester Deansgate
The patient
Betty Ann Bristow is 24, works as an undergraduate programme administrator at Manchester University, and is studying for a research degree in philosophy. Her favourite authors are Terry Pratchett and Joanne Harris; apart from them, she often chooses her books on impulse. She likes books with a dark edge to them, something magical that doesn’t belong in the day-to-day world. She also likes to find humour and richly imagined description of sensory experience in what she reads. She was avidly enjoying Neil Gaiman’s Stardust, with its animated and eerie depiction of a world that is completely other, when I spoke to her for this piece.
The diagnosis
Betty, like many of us, has favourite authors, and will read everything they’ve written, but also feels that one ought to go outside of one’s comfort zones sometimes. I’m hoping that my choices, all by fairly prolific authors, will draw on some of the themes and qualities she already likes, perhaps lead her in some new directions, and, most of all, provide her with three new writers to devour completely!
The treatment
The Baron in the Trees
by Italo Calvino
Harbrace Paperbound Library
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A young, 18th-century Italian nobleman defies his parents by taking to the trees. From his arboreal perch he watches the comings and goings of peasantry and aristocracy alike, and despite his unusual station in life, manages to lead quite a full existence! Calvino’s depiction of the Italian countryside is entrancing – he sees, and describes, things that no other writer does. Betty enjoys reading books set in other countries and both that and the sheer fantasy of the story should exert their charm on her.
The Magic Toyshop
by Angela Carter
Virago Modern Classics
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Fifteen-year-old Melanie and her younger siblings are snatched away from their comfortable rural life and thrust into the strange, claustrophobic world of their cold-hearted uncle’s house in London, full of magic puppets and life-size mechanical toys. This intensely written, disturbing modern fairy tale is shot through with dark humour and sensual description, which should both appeal to Betty – it’s quite frightening, too, so I hope she’s ready for that!
Morgan’s Passing
by Anne Tyler
Vintage
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Morgan Gower seeks refuge from the humdrum realities of middle-aged life and the responsibilities brought by his brood of grown-up daughters in an ever-more bizarre and eccentric series of alternate personalities. Then he meets an attractive newlywed couple, and a passionate obsession begins... Anne Tyler is a fantastic writer with a big, rich back catalogue and a real favourite of mine; I’m hoping that
her gift for creating quirky but instantly believable characters and for showing how extraordinary ordinary life can be will prove as spellbinding to Betty as it has been to me.
Need book advice? For a chance to get the expert suggestions of a future issue’s Book Doctor, email the Book Doctor, and tell him as much about yourself and your tastes as you can. And if you have a book question you’d like answered by a bookseller at any time, day or night, get personal expert advice at Waterstones.com/justask
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