Joseph Ridgwell's favorite classic working-class novels of all time
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Joseph Ridgwell's favorite classic working-class novels of all time
Picked by
Joseph Ridgwell
What did I love about each book?
List by
Joseph Ridgwell
Website
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Why am I passionate about this?
As an authentic working-class author, I’m inevitably drawn to books that describe ordinary working lives, as I can instantly relate to the familiar subject matter. And these five books are classics of the genre. They are eye-openers, page turners, brilliantly written by exceptionally gifted writers, depicting the lives of ordinary folk and the poor and downtrodden, in an incredibly accessible and affordable format - The Novel.
I wrote...
Essex Nights
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Joseph Ridgwell
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Essex Nights is a coming-of-age tale set in the early 1990’s. This is early Ridgwell, the first installment in a…
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The books I picked & why
Post Office
By
Charles Bukowski
Why I love this book
This is a classic novel about working-class lives in America in the 1950s & 60s.<br>I love this book because the author, Charles Bukowski, somehow manages to make the mundane and often monotonous life of an American postal worker interesting to the reader. This is no mean feat, and to top this off, the novel is laugh-out-loud funny. There’s booze, women, sex, and hangovers, and also the dreaded Soup.<br>Buy a copy and find out for yourselves.
What is this book about?
Post Office
By
Charles Bukowski
Why should I read it?
authors picked
Post Office<br>as one of their favorite books, and they share<br>why you should read it.
What is this book about?
Henry Chinaski is a lowlife loser with a hand-to-mouth existence. His menial post office day job supports a life of beer, one-night stands and racetracks. Lurid, uncompromising and hilarious, Post Office is a landmark in American literature, and over 1 million copies have been sold worldwide.
The new edition is augmented with an anecdotal introduction by the modern Welsh cult-literary author, Niall Griffiths - a writer who was working in a British post office when he first read Bukowski's Post Office.
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Books like Post Office
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Topics
Los Angeles
California
Genres
Literary fiction
Funny
Classics
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Hating Olivia
By
Mark SaFranko
Why I love this book
Another classic novel about ordinary working-class Americans. This time, it is set in the 1970s and 80s.<br>Hating Olivia is a brutal love-hate relationship between two people seemingly hell-bent on destroying each other. This is the first of Safranko’s Max Zajack novels and is arguably the best. Zajack meanders from one dead-end job to another whilst battling it out with his lover, the eponymous Olivia, in a series of New York apartments.<br>I loved it from page one, it’s descriptions of working and socialising in the Big Apple, are devastatingly authentic, and it’s obvious the author has lived this life for real!
What is this book about?
Hating Olivia
By
Mark SaFranko
Why should I read it?
authors picked
Hating Olivia<br>as one of their favorite books, and they share<br>why you should read it.
What is this book about?
“A book of quiet horrors and beautifully expressed longing. . . . SaFranko's prose is precise, flawless, and the work of a man who truly loves and understands great writing.” —Tony O'Neill, author of Sick City and Down and Out on Murder Mile<br>“SaFranko writes from the heart, and the balls, crafting a furious and passionate piece of work that is entirely his own, with some scenes that would make even Bukowski blush.” —Susan Tomaselli, editor of Dogmatika.com<br>Hating Olivia is acclaimed underground author Mark SaFranko's darkly twisted story of two people's descent into sex, obsession, and mutual destruction. A…
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Books like Hating Olivia
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Topics
Romantic love
The working class
Genres
Literary fiction
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Virtual Insanity
by
Kevin Klehr,
A dystopian tale about Tayler's brush with deadly augmented reality players who are out to kill him, and a wise cracking robot keen to take over the world.<br>As reviewer Joseph Sullivan from Aurealis magazine wrote, “Virtual Insanity will resonate with readers who enjoy modern takes on science fiction…
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The Football Factory
By
John King
Why I love this book
If, like me, you come from a...