Here I am once again to talk about my last readings. This has been one of the few times that I’ve truly enjoyed everything I read.

Tender is the Night

Scott Fitzgerald and I met again with Tender is the Night (I’ve read The Great Gatsby). It’s the story of charming, intelligent psychoanalyst Dick Diver and his not-so-mentally-stable wife/ex-patient Nicole. As the book develops, the reader is able to see the truth behind what seems to be a perfect couple in a marriage full of disappointment and grudges.

This novel is a piece of Fitzgerald himself, since he put down on paper the struggles of his own marriage, his alcoholism and his wife’s mental illness.

A book recommended for everyone who enjoys a good classic.

The Club Dumas

This book by Arturo Pérez-Reverte came to my bookshelf because of the book The Night Frankenstein read Don Quixote, which I commented on an earlier post.

Lucas Corso is a «book mercenary». His job is to find antique books and sell them to the highest bidder, sometimes leaving morals aside. He gets two different assignments: prove if an old Dumas manuscript is original and find the only three existent copies of The Book of the Nine Doors in Kingdom of Shadow, an old book burned during the Inquisition along with its author and supposedly a manual to summon the devil. Soon, Corso finds himself in the middle of a race against time, as there are other dangerous parties interested.

Recommended for fans of mystery novels, thrillers and the story behind literature.

The First World War told for Sceptics

I’m not sure there’s an English copy of the next book, but if you want to give it a try in Spanish, you won’t regret it.

History told from another perspective; full of footnotes, fun facts and witty comments about the Great War. This is definitely worth reading.

The Old Man and the Sea

Ernest Hemingway arrived to my bookshelf with The Old Man and the Sea. All it took was an old man, a big fish and a sweet boy to make me fall in love with this story.

Hemingway said once, «my aim is to put down on paper what I see and what I feel in the best and simplest way». That sums up this tale; he took an ordinary story and made it extraordinary in less than a hundred pages. I should probably mention that this book also earned him the Nobel Prize in Literature.

Recommended for anyone who loves a beautiful, yet simple story.