Good Monday to you lovely folks and welcome to the third instalment of End of World Books where I take blogger victims and they tell me the five (yes only five) books that they’d pack incase of an apocalyptic event. If you haven’t already, you should check out my previous post with the Batman to my #Orentober Robin: Kelly Vam Damme!
Today I’d like to welcome the wonderful Mac to my bloggish abode, he blogs over at MacReviewsBooks and his reviews are always so insightful and I know that I’ll love any books that he reviews! If you’re not following Mac’s blog or Twitter, what are you waiting for?
As I’ve said, Mac is only able to pack five books, these are the ones he chose!
Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone by J.K Rowling
Harry Potter has never even heard of Hogwarts when the letters start dropping on the doormat at number four, Privet Drive. Addressed in green ink on yellowish parchment with a purple seal, they are swiftly confiscated by his grisly aunt and uncle. Then, on Harry’s eleventh birthday, a great beetle-eyed giant of a man called Rubeus Hagrid bursts in with some astonishing news: Harry Potter is a wizard, and he has a place at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. An incredible adventure is about to begin!
This was the first series of books I’d ever read and fallen in love with. I’ve spent nights on the street in a queue to buy the next one and then gone home and read all night. This book has my favourite chapter of all time; Olivander’s, where Harry chooses his wand. I get goosebumps every time I read it!
The Outsider by Albert Camus
‘My mother died today. Or maybe yesterday, I don’t know.’
In The Outsider (1942), his classic existentialist novel, Camus explores the alienation of an individual who refuses to conform to social norms. Meursault, his anti-hero, will not lie. When his mother dies, he refuses to show his emotions simply to satisfy the expectations of others. And when he commits a random act of violence on a sun-drenched beach near Algiers, his lack of remorse compounds his guilt in the eyes of society and the law. Yet he is as much a victim as a criminal.
Albert Camus’ portrayal of a man confronting the absurd, and revolting against the injustice of society, depicts the paradox of man’s joy in life when faced with the ‘tender indifference’ of the world.
I read this book for my French GCSE and loved it. The phrasing of the French language can be beautiful and I loved the story. Mersault is a misunderstood man and his journey through the book is heart wrenching. The cast of characters he meets are interesting too! I do have an English translation but still love the French one!
War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy
Now this is a book that everyone says that they’ve read to impress, but they haven’t actually. Well Mac has! And he loved it!
At a glittering society party in St Petersburg in 1805, conversations are dominated by the prospect of war. Terror swiftly engulfs the country as
Napoleon’s army marches on Russia, and the lives of three young people are changed forever. The stories of quixotic Pierre, cynical Andrey and impetuous Natasha interweave with a huge cast, from aristocrats and peasants to soldiers and Napoleon himself. In War and Peace, Tolstoy entwines grand themes – conflict and love, birth and death, free will and faith – with unforgettable scenes of nineteenth-century Russia, to create a magnificent epic of human life in all its imperfection and grandeur.
I’ve not read this one, but if I was staring down the end of the world and had time on my hands, I’d like too! Also, at over 1000pages, I could use the book as a weapon if anyone tried anything funny! (Am I taking the end of the world theme too literally?)
*D: Damn it Mac, you’re prepared!*
Worst Case Scenario by Helen Fitzgerald
Mary Shields is a moody, acerbic probation offer, de
aling with some of Glasgow’s worst cases, and her job is on the line. Liam Macdowall was imprisoned for murdering his wife, and he’s published a series of letters to the dead woman, in a book that makes him an unlikely hero – and a poster boy for Men’s Rights activists.
Liam is released on licence into Mary’s care, but things are far from simple. Mary develops a poisonous obsession with Liam and his world, and when her son and Liam’s daughter form a relationship, Mary will stop at nothing to impose her own brand of justice … with devastating consequences.
This book has everything. It’s funny, it’s twisty, it’s very clever and Mary May well be my favourite protagonist in a book ever! It has also got the best opening line and one of the best ending to a book ever. Overall, stellar!
Nothing Important Happened Today by Will Carver
Nine people arrive one night on Chelsea Bridge. They’ve never met. But at the same time, they run, and leap to their deaths. Each of them received a lette
r in the post that morning, a pre-written suicide note, and a page containing only four words: Nothing important happened today.
That is how they knew they had been chosen to become a part of The People Of Choice: A mysterious suicide cult whose members have no knowledge of one another.
Thirty-two people on that train witness the event. Two of them will be next. By the morning, People Of Choice are appearing around the globe: a decapitation in Germany, a public shooting at a university in Bordeaux; in Illinois, a sports team stands around the centre circle of the football pitch and pulls the trigger of the gun pressed to the temple of the person on their right. It becomes a movement.
Not out for a while yet, but read that description again! It sounds soooooo good!!!
*D – if Nothing Important Happened Today by Will Carver floats your reading boat, the e-book is out on the 14th of September, or if you can wait for the glorious paperback you can pre-order from indie bookseller Bert’s Books here for it’s November release!*
Thank-you everyone for popping along to find out what Mac’s apocalyptic bookish choices are, are you on the same wavelength in terms of books? What books would you choose
The Reading Closet 
Love it! Good thinking about war and Peace 🤣
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