(A quick post this week, simply because life is manic.)
Having recently enjoyed Citylit London and CityLit Berlin, it’s odds-on that I’ll be visiting Citylit Dublin, Paris and Amsterdam when they hit the bookshelves.
However, before that Lizzy is taking a BIG trip and with only a month to go, it’s time to get in the mood. Las Vegas, San Francisco and Los Angeles, here I come!
And I need your help in compiling a virtual citylit volume. Please recommend the must-reads associated with my destinations and even more importantly, tell me where the best bookshops are. You all know there’s no better kind of sightseeing!
Talking About Detective Fiction - P D James
Dismissed Dead - Ron Brammer
The Assassin's Song - M G Vassanji
Hysteria - Andrew Scull
The White Castle - Orhan Pamuk
Fighting It - Regi Claire
Foolish Mortals - Jennifer Johnston
The Bethlehem Murders - Matt Rees
Basil - Wilkie Collins
The Suspicions of Mr Whicher
Adam Gould - Julia O'Faolain
The House at Riverton - Kate Morton
Der Struwwelpeter auf Englisch - Translated by Mark Twain
Three Bags Full - Leonie Swann
Mystic Pig - Richard Katrovas
The Blue Fox - Sjon
The Latin American Challenge
1. The Blue Fox 
Inkheart - Cornelia Funke
The Enchanted April - Elizabeth von Arnim
Hm, for LA there’s the obvious “LA Confidential” by James Ellroy. How about “Me Cheeta”? I’ll happily send you my copy.
For San Fran and Las Vegas, I can only think of films.
What an excellent trip you have planned. San Francisco would be my favourite of those to revisit.
Well I am not sure on LA or Los Angeles I will have to rack my brains harder but for San Francisco there can be no other choice than the Tales of the City series which is light and yet dark all in one and is funny and saddening all in one, in fact I think I might have to revisit them now!
Will be back if have any LA or Los Angeles revelations.
Of course you MUST go to the Beats bookshop in SF – City Lights.
The only book I can think of set in Las Vegas is ‘Void Moon’ by Michael Connelly. One of his few non-LA, standalone crime novels. Not his best but still worth reading. His LA-based Harry Bosch series are brilliant.
For Vegas, You can’t go wrong with Hunter S Thompson’s _Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas_.
For San Fran, I think _Tales of the City_ is a fantastic suggestion.
Jean Baudrillard wrote a fascinating meditation on the American West in _America_ with wonderful sections on the desert and its cities.
Some good suggestions coming in I see. I wonder, do I have any in the TBR ….
Colette: Not me, Cheeta, I’m afraid. (Thanks for the offer.) I suspect the joke may wear thin after a dozen pages. However, I do have a copy of “The Moon’s A Balloon” – surely one of the original celebrity memoirs. I remember reading it in my teens. Might be worth a revisit.
Simon, Marieke: Tales of the City – the inspiration for Alexander McCall Smith 44 Scotland Street, apparently. Love 44 Scotland Street. Maupin might be worth a punt.
Annabel – Michael Connelly’s a must, isn’t he. I’m pretty sure I have one of his somewhere. I read everything he wrote up to 3 or 4 years ago. “Then I began to suspect that he had his eye more on the potential films than on the plot of his novels. (It was that OTT chase in “The Narrows” what did it.) But a break is maybe all I needed and thrillers are my reading matter of choice on long flights.
Talking of crime, which city is associated with Hammett’s Thin Man?
Lizzy: The Phillip Marlowe books are coming up to their 70th anniversary but Raymond Chandler’s novels are still the best at portraying the Hollywood/Santa Monica parts of Los Angeles, for my money. John Fante’s Bandini quartet is also excellent (more about the Port and Bunker Hill, near downtown) but probably too much reading given your time horizon — might be better scheduled for after your visit.
Bookstore recommendations in LA are tough since I don’t know where you are staying — if you are close to Pasadena, Vroman’s in downtown Pasadena is California’s oldest and largest independent (I think) and was Publisher’s Weekly’s bookstore of the year in 2008. It is very good and highly recommended.
It’s been several years since I lived in Vegas, but the only good bookshop I can remember, besides a Borders, was the Albion, out on East Desert Inn. A nice secondhand place.
Putting aside Hunter S. T.’s book, which has already been recommended, the only two Vegas books I can think of are Leaving Las Vegas, and Tim Powers’ Last Call, a fantasy novel about a poker player who finds himself wound up in the legend of the Fisher King.