Here are 4 books that Virago Modern Classics fans have personally recommended once you finish the Virago Modern Classics series.
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For someone who loves sci fi *and* historical fiction, this book was a perfect merge of the two, with the added bonus of stylistic homage to Jerome K. Jerome if you like that sort of thing (and I very much do). It is gently witty and full of personality; the characters are well filled out, and the frequent oscillations of the plot from the sublime to the absurd are delightful.
Ned Henry is a time-travelling historian who specialises in the mid-20th century - currently engaged in researching the bombed-out Coventry Cathedral. He's also made so many drops into the past that he's suffering from a dangerously advanced case of 'time-lag'.
Unfortunately for Ned, an emergency dash to Victorian England is required and he's the only available historian. But Ned's time-lag is so bad that he's not sure what the errand is - which is bad news since, if he fails, history could unravel around him...
This is a sad book in that the central character dies at the end; the knowledge that this death is inevitable tinges the whole story with melancholy.
Yet it is also a story of hope, of joy in the beauty of nature, and of human endeavour and determination in the face of one of the Earth’s great, inaccessible, wild places.
The story is told so skilfully that the reader forgets she is reading and feels as if she herself is experiencing the story; and Buchan’s compelling descriptions of the landscape of north-west Canada – vast forests, powerful rivers, its local peoples, and its wildlife – remain in the imagination long after the book is finished. The story closes in peace, with a sense of a life well lived and fulfilled.
Sir Edward Leithen - perhaps the autobiographical of Buchan's characters - is dying of tuberculosis and has been given a year to live. After this prognosis, Leithen undertakes a profoundly heroic quest from London to the Canadian Northwest, tracking down a missing man who is literally 'sick at heart'. In the course of this epic journey, Leithen finds redemption for himself.
Sick Heart River is John Buchan's most powerful novel, completed just days before his death. The rich, authentic descriptions of the rugged Canadian landscape were influenced by a voyage down the Mackenzie River in 1937, at which time Buchan…
With detailed description and her characteristic wit, Georgette Heyer transports her readers to the English village of Thornden and the various characters who inhabit it, each painted in vivid yet realistic colours and engaging her readers' whole interest, if not necessarily our sympathy. The murder mystery is familiar (who shot the most unpopular man in the village?) but nonetheless baffling, and the slow, painstaking and often frustrating unravelling of the mystery by Heyer's Chief Inspector Hemmingway (a familiar figure from her earlier detective novels) makes for a most satisfactory absorbing read. As each of the respectable inhabitants of the village tries to throw doubt on the others and exonerate themselves we see the shadier aspects of these apparently respectable individuals, who from being slightly stereotypical become fully rounded personalities as the investigation progresses, and Thornden a real village with its roads and paths, houses and cottages, common and gravel-pit. This…
It was a hot June evening in the village of Thornden, the Hasells celebrate a tennis party at the Cedars, their mansion. The young Haswell had just motored the lovely Abby Dearham back from social event of the week. Nearly everyone of the village uppercrust had come to the party--the Squire, the Vicar, the sharp-tongued heir to five centuries of local real estate. But the unpopular solicitor Sampson Warrenby had declined, and no one was sorry. Why this charmless social-climber was invited was beyond Abby. Had he some sinister hold on the social leaders of Thornden? All joking was cut…
D. E. Stevenson (d. 1973) was best known for her light romantic novels, a genre in which she excelled. 'The Portrait of Saskia', however, steps into detective novel territory. At first I assumed that the plot would follow the usual well-trodden lines, but was delighted to find that it doesn't; with a deft twist, Stevenson defies expectations and takes the story in a refreshingly different direction. Light, bright, well-written, with believable well-drawn characters, this is an upbeat and delightful read. (Also in the volume are four previously unpublished short stories by Stevenson and a novella, which are not as enjoyable, although worth a look.)
Kenneth Leslie, needing money to start a new life in Canada after a broken engagement, answers an advertisement in the Daily Clarion - Retired Army Officer offers a large sum of money to a Young Man who wants Adventure. Must be of good appearance and free from dependants - and finds more than he dreamed of: fishing, art, family skulduggery, rogues, thieves and fisticuffs, friendship - and romance. Also included are four short stories, Moira, The Mulberry Coach, The Secret of the Black Rock, The Murder of Alma Atherton, and a novella, Where the Gentian Blooms. Previously unpublished, this is…
