“The English Patient” by Michael Ondaatje

This book is beautifully written, and expresses some beautiful ideas, but I can’t say that I enjoyed it. The writing is too poetic and ephemeral for my taste.

“The Black Book” by Ian Rankin

A decent read. The first half of the book was actually quite boring, but then it picked up.

“The Quarry” by Iain Banks

This last book by Iain Banks is almost totally useless. Written from the point of view of a young autistic man, it consists almost solely of dialogue among a group of friends visiting the one who is dieing, who is the father of the autistic boy. So so useless!!