The book I am currently reading
I’ve just finished Paris Lees’s coming-of-age memoir What It Feels Like for a Girl. It is so vivid, and the use of dialect so clever, that it feels as if you are living her life with her. Now I am on to Nadifa Mohamed’s The Fortune Men: the fictionalisation of real-life events, about a black man who was falsely accused of a murder in Wales in the 1950s and executed. I read every sentence in total awe.
The book that changed my life
Virginia Woolf’s Orlando. I saw Sally Potter’s magnificent film first then had to read the novel. I think of it as a children’s book for grownups: a fantasy about a poet who lives for centuries and changes sex. It made me realise that, for a writer, the only parameter of fiction is your own imagination.
The book I wish I’d written
Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone by JK Rowling. It is rare that an author can create such a complete world. I always think the Harry Potter universe has at least a hundred great ideas in it, if not more.
The book that had the greatest influence on my writing
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl. It was the first book I read on my own as a child and is arguably the greatest children’s book of all time.
The book I think is most underrated
John Wyndham’s work is very underrated. I devoured his science fiction stories as a child, especially The Day of the Triffids, Chocky, The Midwich Cuckoos and The Chrysalids. His books might not be read as much by young people nowadays, but he was a visionary who influenced Cloud Atlas author David Mitchell as well as the legendary Margaret Atwood.
The book that changed my mind
George Orwell’s work had a big influence on me politically. Of course, I read Animal Farm as a child, and Nineteen Eighty-Four as a teenager, but I loved his nonfiction too. Orwell may have gone to Eton, but he chose to write about the horror of 1930s working-class life in The Road to Wigan Pier. The book is still a powerful punch of a read. I credit Orwell with waking me up from my privileged middle-class childhood and making me become a socialist.
The last book that made me cry
I found Kazuo Ishiguro’s The Unconsoled incredibly moving. I read it when it came out 25 years ago and again recently. It is a dream narrative about a concert pianist named Ryder trying to travel to his own concert. There is a thread about Ryder desperately trying to please his parents, which resonates with me strongly.
The last book that made me laugh
Sue Townsend’s Adrian Mole series is laugh-out-loud funny, as is Douglas Adams’s The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, which has a sparkling new edition with illustrations by the genius Chris Riddell. I have just bought it for my nephews in the hope that they will become fans too.
The book I couldn’t finish
The Bible. I bought one with the intention of finally reading it cover to cover. While I was reading Genesis I found myself flicking all the way to Revelation to see if there was a happy ending. Sadly there isn’t.
The book I’m ashamed not to have read
I haven’t read any of my own books, but I do hope to one day. I hear they are wonderful. I also haven’t read Ulysses by James Joyce (who I am often compared to). I know it is a work of genius, but it looks very long.
The book I give as a gift
There are hundreds of editions of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll as illustrators are forever drawn to it. It is a book to treasure.
My earliest reading memory
Lying on my father’s hairy chest as he read Dr Seuss’s Green Eggs and Ham to me. Dr Seuss’s books are the perfect bedtime read as they are like dreams, and sometimes nightmares.
My comfort read
Philip Larkin’s collections of verse might not seem like comfort reading, but he gives me comfort in the same way the songs of the Smiths or Nick Cave give me comfort. His poems make you feel like you are not alone.