Show 11: The Goldsboro Books Book Club recommendation from Dave Headley
David Headley, Goldsboro Books in Covent Garden
“Goldsboro Books is the UK’s leading specialist in first edition signed books, and many of the shop’s customers are authors themselves. We are based in Cecil Court, which links St Martin’s Lane and Charing Cross Road. We are are also unique in that we stock exclusive limited editions by well-known authors.
I’m Dave Headley and I started Goldsboro Books in 1999. My book club recommendation is Ali Smith’s Girl Meets Boy. This is part of a myths series, where authors are asked to reinterpret myths with a modern-day twist. The myth of Iphis is one of Ovid’s happier Metamorphoses, where a girl is raised as a boy to prevent her being killed by her father at birth. She then falls in love with another girl, but fortunately the goddess Isis changes her gender so that they can marry.Ali Smith’s modern retelling is told with humour and versatility, exposing issues of fertility and homophobia, corporate and social responsibility, and the vertiginous feeling of falling in love. This book will make you smile; it may makeyou cry. This book will leave you in no dubt that Ali Smith is writing at the height of her powers. I thoroughly recommend it.”