Best books...

Best books... Sandra Howard
Sandra Howard, author and wife of former Conservative Party leader
Michael Howard, chooses her favourite recent reads. Her latest novel,
A Matter of Loyalty, is out in paperback (Pocket Books £7.99)


A Scattering

by Christopher Reid, 2009 (Arete £7.99). I was a judge for the 2009 Costa Book of the Year and this was the winner. Rcid's poetic account of his wife's illness and death is an intensely moving tribute; in no sense morbid, it recalls a vibrant life with honesty and warmth.

The Finest Type of English Womanhood
by Rachel Heath, 2009 (Windmill £7.99). This dark novel blends fact and fiction to gripping effect. Set mainly in postwar South Africa, the story revolves around the true-life shipboard murder of a young actress. Circumstances and friendships are imagined, the
sense of time and place powerfully evoked.

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
by Stieg Larsson, 2008 (Quercus £7.99). I just had to include this! Leap over the long Swedish names and settle into a seriously good thriller. Lisbeth Salander, the cyber-busting punk heroine, is a poignant waif who will soften any disbelieving heart of stone.

The Strangest Man
by
Graham Farmelo, 2009. (Fabcr 6c Fabcr £9.99). This is an extraordinarily sensitive biography of the Nobel Prize- winning Paul Dirac, who pioneered quantum mechanics. Farmelo brilliantly uncovers
this reticent scientist's deepest layers. Not an easy task given that at the height of his creativity in the 1920s at Cambridge, Dirac was unable to communicate and betrayed no emotions. Even those who, like me, know less than an atom about physics will find this a compelling read.


Beauty
by Raphael Selbourne, 2009 (Tindal Street Press £7.99). Winner of the Costa First Novel award, Beauty is about a young Bengali woman fleeing a forced marriage. It is raw and uncompromising, yet pitch-perfect and overflowing with wit and compassion. My mouth still turns up at the corners recalling some of the scenes.