Tuesday, December 06, 2005
Maybe I should start playing chess again
I quit chess in primary school as I found it too difficult. But now Nigel Short and some others may have given me a reason to take it up again.
About Me
- Name: Matt Getz
- Location: The Hague, Netherlands
An aspiring lawyer. A South African. A journalist. Interested in everything (except gardening).
Previous Posts
- Back in London again
- Bar talk
- Two incredibly useful sites
- Smoke gets up your...
- Local is lekker
- Sam's the man
- Comics at length and briefly
- You should laugh more
- Ars longa Hague brevis
- Bookpages (and others)
Friends' Blogs
- Marching Orders
- Beijing Diary
- Thinking Fool
- Zones 2 and 3
- Port McClellan
- it's good to be alive
- Negative Mode
Top 10 sports books
- The Willow Wand by Derek Birley (cricket)
- Football Against the Enemy by Simon Kuper
- How Soccer Explains the World by Franklin Foer
- Ball Four by Jim Bouton (baseball)
- Moneyball by Michael Lewis (baseball)
- Beyond a Boundary by C.L.R. James (cricket)
- Brilliant Orange by David Winner (football)
- Full Time: The Secret Life of Tony Cascarino by Tony Cascarino as told to Paul Kimmage(football)
- The Glory Game by Hunter Davies (football)
- A Season with Verona by Tim Parks
Top 13 works of personal non-fiction
- My War Gone By, I Miss It So by Anthony Loyd
- Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer
- My Traitor's Heart by Rian Malan
- Dirt by Motley Crue
- Down and Out in Paris and London/The Road to Wigan Pier by George Orwell
- The Liars' Club by Mary Karr
- Spike Milligan's War Memoirs (all of them)
- If This Is a Man & The Truce/The Periodic Table by Primo Levi
- The Bang-Bang Club by Greg Marinovich & Joao Silva (here are some photos)
- Kitchen Confidential by Anthony Bourdain
- The Songlines by Bruce Chatwin
- Fever Pitch by Nick Hornby
- Country of my Skull by Antjie Krog
Top 10 works of fiction
- Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy trilogy (the first 3 books) – Douglas Adams (also cool)
- Lord of the Rings – J.R.R. Tolkein (also cool)
- Tender is the Night – F. Scott Fitzgerald
- Midnight’s Children – Salman Rushdie
- The Tin Drum – Gunter Grass
- One Hundred Years of Solitude – Gabriel Garcia Marquez (check out Kennedy's review)
- The End of the Affair/The Power and the Glory/virtually everything else – Graham Greene
- The Music of Chance/New York Trilogy/virtually everything else – Paul Auster
- American Tabloid/LA Confidential/virtually everything else – James Ellroy
- The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay – Michael Chabon
