The top ten classic spy novels

Rhodri Jeffreys-Jones is professor of American history emeritus and an honorary fellow in History at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland. He is an authority on American intelligence history, having written two American intelligence history surveys and studies of the CIA and FBI. He has also written books on women and American foreign policy, America and the Vietnam War, and American labor history.

For the Guardian, he named his top ten classic--"'classics' in being of some antiquity, and because, in addition to being of literary merit, they tell us something of their era"--spy novels, including:

Red Harvest by Dashiell Hammett (1929)

"We had another drink". One has escaped in a single bound the Wee Free manse that spawned John Buchan. One enters instead the amoral realm of a master of the short sentence not to mention short words like "moll". Hammett was the pioneer of the "hardboiled" detective novel. Earlier, until he left in disgust at their labour espionage work and became a communist, he worked for the Pinkerton detective agency. Red Harvest is a spy's repentance. Hammett's Continental Op (a thinly disguised Pinkerton operative) arrives in Personville, aka Poisonville, a town in the American West. Mining capitalist Elihu Wilsson owns it in every respect until his revolutionary workers go on strike. Wilsson introduces professional strikebreakers and one murder follows another, 20 of them committed by the Op himself.

Read about the other books on the list.

Red Harvest is one of 88 books that shaped America.

--Marshal Zeringue

Top 10 horror books

Michael Marshall Smith is a British novelist, screenwriter and short story writer who also writes as Michael Marshall. In 2003 he named his top ten horror books for the Guardian. One title on the list:

The Killer Inside Me by Jim Thompson

Another matter of definition, this one. Thompson's a crime writer, without doubt, and this story of a local sheriff out of control is certainly pitched nothing like horror. But as a glimpse into the mind of the dangerous, it's far more effective than an armful of typical serial killer-style horror novels. Noir.

Read about the other entries on the list.

The Killer Inside Me also appears among Charlie Higson's top ten horror books, Alex Barclay's top ten psychological thrillers, and Henry Sutton's top ten unreliable narrators.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five of the best stories about domestic servants

Julia Stuart's latest novel is The Pigeon Pie Mystery.

One of five of the best stories about domestic servants she tagged for the Wall Street Journal:

The White Tiger
by Aravind Adiga (2008)

The world suddenly seems terribly dull when you finish reading a masterpiece. Luckily, this Man Booker Prize-winner dazzles on each subsequence reading. It is sly and brutally funny, and the runaway pacing never trips. Narrator Balram Halwai, now a successful businessman, relates with glorious verve how his life as a driver (and reluctant foot massager) led him to murder. You can't help delighting in his impudent depiction of India as endlessly corrupt. "Vijay's family were pigherds, which meant they were the lowest of the low, yet he had made it up in life. Somehow he had befriended a politician. People said he had let the politician dip his beak in his backside." Balram's place in society is so skillfully rendered, you quite understand why he savagely kills the only employer who shows him a hint of humanity. You absolutely believe him when he says that he might do away with his own nephew next. And yet he takes the reader on such a thrilling, uproarious ride that you'd get into his car any day.

Read about the other entries on Stuart's list.

The Page 69 Test: Aravind Adiga's The White Tiger.

--Marshal Zeringue

Literature's ten most disturbing sociopaths

At LitReactor, Kimberly Turner named literature's ten most disturbing sociopaths, including:

Hannibal Lecter — Red Dragon and others by Thomas Harris

Skills: Licensed psychiatrist, extreme charmer, Epicurean, bibliophile, music lover, foodie—if you didn't know about the cannibalism and serial killing, you'd be tempted to invite him to your next dinner party. Just don't serve Chianti.

Dirty deeds: Yet ANOTHER orphan (note to writers: not all sociopaths need to be orphans), Lecter watched his sister get cannibalized when he was eight. Apparently that does bad things to a person's head. He kills every man who played a part in his sister's death—so far, it's a vigilante story not too far removed from The Crow or Batman—but he doesn't stop there. He goes on to become a prolific serial killer and blood-thirsty cannibal, later escaping from prison by cutting off a guard's face and using it as a mask. Presumably, that's easier and more subtle than stealing a guard's hat and keeping your head down.

Quote: "I collect church collapses, recreationally. Did you see the recent one in Sicily? Marvelous! The facade fell on sixty-five grandmothers at a special mass. Was that evil? If so, who did it? If he's up there, he just loves it, Officer Starling. Typhoid and swans - it all comes from the same place."

Read about the other entries on the list.

Red Dragon also appears John Mullan's lists of ten of the best dragons in literature and ten of the best tattoos in literature, and the (U.K.) Telegraph 110 best books; Andre Gross says "it should be taught as [a text] in Thriller 101."

--Marshal Zeringue

Five top literary adult mentors

Lauren Roedy Vaughn is an award-winning educator who has spent twenty years teaching English to high school students with language-based learning disabilities. Vaughn lives with her husband in Los Angeles, where she is an avid yogini and Big Lebowski nut.

Her debut novel is OCD, The Dude, and Me.

For Bookshelves of Doom, Vaughn named her five top literary adult mentors...and two characters who could use one.  One entry on the list:

There's a Boy in the Girls' Bathroom, by Louis Sachar

The opening of this touching story reads, “Bradley Chalkers sat at his desk in the back of the room—last seat, last row. No one sat at the desk next to him or at the one in front of him. He was an island.” As a special education teacher, I was hooked from the get go. I think I said aloud, “Oh, someone please help Bradley Chalkers!” Luckily, someone does. The newly hired and controversial school counselor, Carla Davis, connects with Bradley and teaches him that he is not the monster he thinks he is. Through the tears, I cheered a lot during this read.

Read about the other entries on the list at Bookshelves of Doom.

Visit Lauren Roedy Vaughn's website.

Writers Read: Lauren Roedy Vaughn.

The Page 69 Test: OCD, The Dude, and Me.

My Book, The Movie: OCD, the Dude, and Me.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five science fiction novels for people who hate SF

Damien Walter argues that science fiction's "denser stories can seem rebarbative to general readers," so he came up with five books that "tell immediately relevant, compelling tales," including:

Pattern Recognition by William Gibson is quickly becoming historical fiction. It so astutely pinpointed the emerging trends in technology in 2003 that a decade on from its publication it reads more like a documentary record than a work of SF. Cayce Pollard is a 30-something hipster immersed in the new media world of global corporate brands, who finds herself drawn in to a dangerous conspiracy as she tries to track down a mysterious set of video clips on the internet. Gibson's seventh novel pre-empted the YouTube revolution by mere months, and is still required reading for anyone trying to understand the fractured reality of our media-saturated world today.

Read about the other books that Walter tagged at the Guardian.

Pattern Recognition is one of David Ulin's five essential 9/11 books.

Learn about why Gibson decided to set Pattern Recognition in the present, unlike his previous novels.

--Marshal Zeringue

Seven of the best classic children's books

Philip Womack is the author of two critically acclaimed novels for children, The Other Book and The Liberators.

One of his favorite classic children's books, as told to the Telegraph:

My favourite children’s books are one by one making the journey to my adult shelves in London. The first to do so was TH White’s The Once and Future King. This humane, wise, witty, heartbreaking account of the Arthurian cycle was a constant companion of mine during the hot summer I was 12.

I loved it so much I would bring it to cricket matches and would snatch a page or two between overs.

Read about the other books Womack tagged.

The Once and Future King is one of Lev Grossman's five top fantasy books.

--Marshal Zeringue

Ten books about artist & architect Antoni Gaudí

Christian Science Monitor contributor Casey Lee came up with a list of ten top books on artist and architect Antoni Gaudí, including:

"Antoni Gaudí, 1852-1926: From Nature to Architecture," by Peter Gossel and Maria Antonietta Crippa

Part of a Taschen series on modern architecture, "Antoni Gaudí, 1852-1926: From Nature to Architecture" includes gorgeous photographs and text by Maria Antonietta Crippa, a tenured professor at the History of Architecture at the Polytechnic of Milan. In the text, Crippa considers the childhood, styling decisions, and ultimate goals of Gaudí.

Gaudí had a humble enough start to life as the son of a coppersmith. He decided that he was enamored with architecture at a young age and went to school in Barcelona. The city would become both his muse and his workplace, the site in which his most famous buildings would appear.

This book explores the way that the Industrial Revolution, the period Gaudí was raised in, served as a catalyst for his own works. Gaudí's goal was to both capture the history of and make a name for his home region of Catalonia. This focus on the past was particularly important to Gaudí. He strongly desired to capture the best parts of the past because Spain and the rest of Europe were modernizing. He saw his architecture as part of a fight between beauty and the drive toward efficiency.

The book's photographs clearly demonstrate the way that the textures, peculiar shapes, and designs of Gaudí's buildings make them a joy to view and impossible to forget.

Gaudí doesn’t use the typical outlines for his buildings, and shuns the dull colors that had been used before. His buildings make a statement. Although influenced by neo-gothic design, this style ultimately became a stepping stones to the more fanciful designs of Gaudí. Gaudí is also famously known for using bold colors and unusual bits of material in his work.

Although unusual, Gaudí's buildings were well received by the general public. They also helped to put Barcelona into the limelight. Gaudí’s works of art gave a name and unique identity to the city that he loved.

Gaudí's works became an inspiration to many, largely because his style of architecture was so unique.

This book covers the best known buildings created by Gaudí, particularly Barcelona's unfinished Sagrada Família cathedral.

Read about the other books on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five top books about the struggle for Afghanistan

William Dalrymple's books include several works of history and travel, including City of Djinns, which won the Young British Writer of the Year Prize and the Thomas Cook Travel Book Award; the best-selling From the Holy Mountain; White Mughals, which won Britain’s most prestigious history prize, the Wolfson; and The Last Mughal, which won the Duff Cooper Prize for History and Biography. His new book is Return of a King: The Battle for Afghanistan, 1839-42.

One of Dalrymple's five favorite books on the struggle for Afghanistan, as told to the Telegraph:

The Looming Tower (2006) by Lawrence Wright is still the best of the many books on 9/11 and the rise of al Qaeda. A meticulously researched and beautifully written account of how the Great Game finally came home to roost.

Read about the other books Dalrymple tagged.

Also see: Top ten books on Afghanistan; Five top books on foreigners in Afghanistan; Five books on Afghanistan; and Five best books about Afghanistan.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five top books on uprisings in pursuit of freedom

One title on the Barnes & Noble Review's list of books on uprisings in pursuit of freedom around the world:

V for Vendetta
by Alan Moore

In a devastated London in the wake of a nuclear holocaust, a draconian government assumes control and attempts to squelch any whisper of dissent. Yet a mysterious, highly educated insurgent wearing a Guy Fawkes mask starts committing singular acts of terrorism, setting off bombs in the Houses of Parliament and hijacking radio and TV outlets, slowly convincing a subdued, paranoid citizenry to rise up and start ruling themselves. Released during the height of the Cold War in the 1980s, this visceral comic book classic redefined industry concepts of superheroes and vigilante justice and established Moore as a master of the genre.

Read about the other entries on the list.

V for Vendetta is among Lauren Davis's ten most depressing futuristic retirement scenarios in science fiction and Malorie Blackman's top 10 graphic novels for teenagers.

--Marshal Zeringue

The ten best fictional royal babies

Viv Groskop is a writer, broadcaster and stand-up comedian.

With the latest spawn of the British royals lurking just over the horizon, she came up with the ten best fictional royal babies for the Guardian, including:

Le Petit Prince
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

First published in 1943, the weedy prince with a shock of golden hair is the most famous work of the French aristocrat and aviator Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. The most read and most translated book in the French language, The Little Prince sells more than 1m copies a year and is one of the best-selling books of all time. Le Petit Prince is the best kind of royal, an extra-terrestrial: he has fallen to Earth from an asteroid. Most of all, though, he’s a bit of a philosopher: “But eyes are blind. You have to look with the heart.”

Learn about the other entries on the list.

The Little Prince is among Christopher Clark's five top books on unusual journeys, the best literary quotes ever tattooed, Simon Callow's six best books, Sita Brahmachari's top 10 books that take you travelling, Maria Popova's seven essential books on optimism, and Dalia Sofer's most important books.

--Marshal Zeringue

Jonathan Alter's six favorite books

Jonathan Alter is an award-winning author, reporter, columnist and television analyst. He spent 28 years at Newsweek, where he was a longtime senior editor and columnist and wrote more than 50 cover stories. He has also written for the New York Times, The Washington Post, The Washington Monthly, The Atlantic, Vanity Fair, The New Republic and other publications. Since 1996, Alter has been an analyst and contributing correspondent for NBC News and MSNBC. His 2010 book, The Promise: President Obama, Year One, went to #4 on the New York Times Nonfiction Bestseller List and was one of the Times' "Notable Books" of the year. The Defining Moment: FDR's Hundred Days and the Triumph of Hope, published in 2006, was also a bestseller.

One of his six favorite books, as told to The Week magazine:

The Best and the Brightest by David Halberstam

I read this book in high school; its depiction of how brilliant, well-intentioned policymakers got us into the Vietnam War taught me that journalism and history can be fused in a big book that stands the test of time.

Read about the other books on Alter's list.

The Best and the Brightest is one of the Barnes & Noble Review's five top books on U.S. generals in an era of change.

--Marshal Zeringue