What would you choose for ‘A Good Read’?

My husband drunkenly ponders and lists the eight songs he would choose for Desert Island Discs (Pixies, Bowie, Can, Dylan blah, blah, blah…). ‘You are spoilt!’, I cry. ‘When I’m on A Good Read with Harriet Gilbert, I can only choose one book.’ ONE BOOK. The impossibility of such a task.

So in my ongoing quest to select the perfect good read for a show I will never be invited to appear on, here is my current short-list* of three:

The Book of Daniel by E.L. Doctorow. If I have to commit to my favourite novel, this is it.

The Girls’ Guide to Hunting & Fishing by Melissa Bank. This book is simply pitch perfect. Every sentence so beautifully wrought. Every vignette is a joy.

NEW ENTRY! Clothes Clothes Clothes, Music Music Music, Boys Boys Boys by Viv Albertine. By turns hilarious and harrowing, it’s a searingly honest memoir from the guitarist of British punk band ‘The Slits’.

A single selection will be made when the producer calls…

*One of my rules is it can’t be a book already recommended on the programme, which rules out a couple of favourites – The Hours by Michael Cunningham and Hangover Square by Patrick Hamilton.

BREAKING NEWS: Disaster – Hadley Freeman chose The Girls’ Guide To Hunting And Fishing on A Good Read this week, so I’ve had to drop it from my list… But she loves it as much as I do, so all ends well.