Here is our Virtual Book Club's favourite reads from 2005 to help you with your gift shopping!

Book Title: The Two of Us (My Life with John Thaw) Author: Sheila Hancock
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Date: 2004
(Mine was the paperback edition published in 2005)
Pages:301.
I bought this book to read about an actor I admired, John Thaw. Written just after John's death, by his wife Sheila, it is obvious that these two people loved each other to bits and lived that love to the full. I don't normally read love stories but I enjoyed this one.
Peter Holme Book Title:Everything is Illuminated
Author: Jonathan Safran Foer
Publisher: First Perennial
Date Published: 2003
Number of Pages:
Description/ why recommending: Jonathon is an American Jewish writer who travels to the Ukraine, clutching a picture of a woman who saved his grandfather from the Nazis. This narrative runs parallel to the storytelling of his Ukrainian ancestors, their lives, births, marriages, and deaths, in a style of writing that becomes magic realist at times. It's an unusual blend of humour, which is enjoyable, despite the fact that occasionally it is tempting to read on to the more amusing sections of the book written by the character Alex. 'Everything is illuminated' will be released soon in cinemas. I would like to recommend the story in its original form.
Book Title: Intimates
Author: Helen Farish
Publisher: Cape Poetry (Random House)
Date Published: 2005
Number of Pages: 52
Description/ why recommending: Cumbrian born Helen's first collection of poetry is best summed up by the cover blurb: provocative and tender, passionate yet wary. Carefully crafted and economical in style, Helen's voice is original, fresh and compelling, her art neatly hidden beneath the surface of highly charged poems that whisper, rather than shout. I know I'll read them again and again.
My name: Linda Graham
Book Title: The Lovely Bones
Author: Alice Sebold
Publisher: Back Bay Books
Date Published: 2002
Number of Pages: 352
Description/ why recommending: Brilliant tale of a family struggle after a murder, from the victim's voice from heaven... a great first novel. (*****)
My name: Kate Harrison Whiteside