Thick books to (finally!) read on your holidays
I don't know about you, but I am counting down the days until I have a lovely two weeks off! And one thing I'm most excited for is getting some reading done. If you're a one book kinda person but still want to get a lot of reading done, or if you've been waiting to dive into something thick until you had the holidays in front of you, then these chunky books are the way to go!
If that's not your vibe, we have a great collection of novellas here that are also great reads, but can be smashed out in one cosy afternoon ...
Juice by Tim Winton
Do I really need to sell you on the latest Tim Winton? It's Tim Winton! And with 528 pages, you'll be spending some good, quality time with him.
Two fugitives, a man and a child, drive all night across a stony desert. As dawn breaks, they roll into an abandoned mine site. From the vehicle they survey a forsaken place – middens of twisted iron, rusty wire, piles of sun-baked trash. They’re exhausted, traumatised, desperate now. But as a refuge, this is the most promising place they’ve seen. The child peers at the field of desolation. The man thinks to himself, this could work.
Problem is, they’re not alone.
So begins a searing, propulsive journey through a life whose central challenge is not simply a matter of survival, but of how to maintain human decency as everyone around you falls ever further into barbarism.
Praiseworthy by Alexis Wright
Winner of the 2024 Voss Literary Prize, the 2024 Miles Franklin Literary Award, the 2024 Stella Prize and the 2024 ALS Gold Medal, it's clear this book is pretty good! And with a whopping 736 pages, Praiseworthy will definitely keep you occupied these holidays!
Praiseworthy is an epic set in the north of Australia, told with the richness of language and scale of imagery for which Alexis Wright has become renowned.
In a small town dominated by a haze cloud, which heralds both an ecological catastrophe and a gathering of the ancestors, a crazed visionary seeks out donkeys as the solution to the global climate crisis and the economic dependency of the Aboriginal people. His wife seeks solace from his madness in following the dance of butterflies and scouring the internet to find out how she can seek repatriation for her Aboriginal/Chinese family to China. One of their sons, called Aboriginal Sovereignty, is determined to commit suicide. The other, Tommyhawk, wishes his brother dead so that he can pursue his dream of becoming white and powerful. This is a novel which pushes allegory and language to its limits, a cry of outrage against oppression and disadvantage, and a fable for the end of days.
Caledonian Road by Andrew O'Hagan
Our reviewer said 'This novel is why we read: to examine how we live, and why. It asks us to be better, and yet also shows us that intention is not enough.' We think that's a pretty compelling case to pick this book up, ASAP. And with an easy 656 pages, you'll fly through it! Read the full review here.
May 2021. London.
Campbell Flynn – art historian and celebrity intellectual – is entering the empire of middle age. Fuelled by an appetite for admiration and the finer things, controversy and novelty, he doesn't take people half as seriously as they take themselves. Which will prove the first of his huge mistakes. The second? Milo Manghasa, his beguiling and provocative student. Milo inhabits a more precarious world, has experiences and ideas which excite his teacher. He also has a plan.
Over the course of an incendiary year, a web of crimes, secrets and scandals will be revealed, and Campbell Flynn may not be able to protect himself from the shattering exposure of all his privilege really involves. But then, he always knew: when his life came tumbling down, it would occur in public
The Poppy War Collector’s Edition by R.F. Kuang
Want to read a bestselling fantasy, in style? This special edition of The Poppy War, one of Time Magazine's top 100 best fantasy books of all time, is the way to go. It's a stunning hardcover with sprayed edges and gorgeous illustrations, and just a casual 576 pages.
A brilliantly imaginative epic fantasy debut, inspired by the bloody history of China’s twentieth century and filled with treachery and magic.
When Rin aced the Keju – the test to find the most talented students in the Empire – it was a shock to everyone: to the test officials, who couldn’t believe a war orphan from Rooster Province could pass without cheating; to Rin’s guardians, who had hoped to get rich by marrying her off; and to Rin herself, who realized she was finally free from a life of servitude. That she got into Sinegard, the most elite military school in Nikan, was even more surprising ...
A Suitable Boy by Vikram Seth
Looking for the chunkiest of chunky books? Then this is the most suitable! Coming in at a massive 1504 pages, look no further. And you know when Netflix makes an adaptation, the book must have made a splash.
Vikram Seth’s novel is at its core a love story, the tale of Lata – and her mother’s attempts to find her a suitable husband, through love or through exacting maternal appraisal.
Set in post-Independence India and involving the lives of four large families and those who orbit them, it is also a vast panoramic exploration of a whole continent at a crucial hour – as a sixth of the world’s population faces its first great General Election and the chance to map its own destiny.
The Will of the Many (Hierarchy, Book 1) by James Islington
This hefty book was the winner of the 2023 Aurealis Award for Best Fantasy Novel. It may be 640 pages, but you will fly through it and be begging for book number 2 immediately!
The Catenan Republic – the Hierarchy – may rule the world now, but they do not know everything.
I tell them my name is Vis Telimus. I tell them I was orphaned after a tragic accident three years ago, and that good fortune alone has led to my acceptance into their most prestigious school. I tell them that once I graduate, I will gladly join the rest of civilised society in allowing my strength, my drive and my focus – what they call Will – to be leeched away and added to the power of those above me, as millions already do. As all must eventually do.
I tell them that I belong, and they believe me. But the truth is that I have been sent to the Academy to find answers. To solve a murder. To search for an ancient weapon. To uncover secrets that may tear the Republic apart. And that I will never, ever cede my Will to the empire that executed my family. If the Hierarchy finds out who I truly am, they will kill me ...
A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara
Shortlisted for the 2015 Booker Prize, shortlisted for the 2016 Baileys Prize for Women’s Fiction, winner of 2016 Fiction of the Year at the British Book Awards & finalist for the 2015 National Book Awards ... need I say more? Well, I will say it's 752 pages too!
When four graduates from a small Massachusetts college move to New York to make their way, they’re broke, adrift, and buoyed only by their friendship and ambition. There is kind, handsome Willem, an aspiring actor; JB, a quick-witted, sometimes cruel Brooklyn-born painter seeking entry to the art world; Malcolm, a frustrated architect at a prominent firm; and withdrawn, brilliant, enigmatic Jude, who serves as their centre of gravity.
Over the decades, their relationships deepen and darken, tinged by addiction, success, and pride. Yet their greatest challenge, each comes to realize, is Jude himself, by midlife a terrifyingly talented litigator yet an increasingly broken man, his mind and body scarred by an unspeakable childhood, and haunted by what he fears is a degree of trauma that he’ll not only be unable to overcome – but that will define his life for ever.
Nexus by Yuval Noah Harari
Want to do some learning while on holidays this year? Well Yuvan Noah Harari is back to teach you everything you could possibly need to know about the last 100,000 years, in just 528 pages!
For the last 100,000 years, we Sapiens have accumulated enormous power. But despite all our discoveries, inventions and conquests, we now find ourselves in an existential crisis. The world is on the verge of ecological collapse. Misinformation abounds. And we are rushing headlong into the age of AI – a new information network that threatens to annihilate us. If we are so wise, why are we so self-destructive?
Nexus considers how the flow of information has shaped us, and our world. Taking us from the Stone Age through the Bible, early modern witch-hunts, Stalinism, Nazism and the resurgence of populism today, Yuval Noah Harari asks us to consider the complex relationship between information and truth, bureaucracy and mythology, wisdom and power. Information is not the raw material of truth; neither is it a mere weapon. Nexus explores the hopeful middle ground between these extremes, and of rediscovering our shared humanity.
