So, having mocked Paul Raven for his pathetic attempt at coming up with a list of obscure books, I suppose I should take up the same challenge, which is:

What ten books do you own that you think no one else on your friends list does?

Well obviously I have no friends’ list – after all that would assume I had “friends”. But if we swap “friends” for “acquaintances”, I’m sure we can proceed on amicable lines. Here we go:

1. Spartan Women (Susan Pomeroy)

A really interesting book, fantastically researched, on a surprisingly complex and interesting subject.

2. Ships and Seamanship in the Ancient World – Lionel Casson

From the earliest rafts to Roman merchantmen it gathers together what we know (or what we think we know) about ancient boats – more footnotes than you can shake a stick at, pages of illustrations and digressionary appendices after most chapters on really fascinating stuff like the schedule of grain shipments between Alexandria and Rome and Odysseus’s Boat. I’ve just wasted half an hour flicking through this book.

3. Cavalry Operations in the Ancient Greek World – Robert E Gaebel

If you thought the first two were nerdy… Not a book you’re likely to pick up for pleasure, pretty dry style but not without interesting bits.

4. Into the Slave Nebula – John Brunner

I’ll take a risk with a sf novel – if only because of all the books I own, this one has to have the geekiest title. Though even a weak Brunner novel is still worth your time.

5. The Crossman Diaries (complete in three volume) – Richard Crossman

Because I’m betting there aren’t that many people out there who could be bothered to read the diaries of the housing minister in the Harold Wilson government. Oddly compelling, Crossman was a relatively minor figure but his diaries are a fascinating insight into how government works and, at the same time, an obvious inspiration for the vain, scheming, slightly barmy (but ultimately likeable) protagonist in Yes, Minister.

6. Against Postmodernism – Alex Callinicos

A book that manages to be wrong about almost everything. It’s always struck me as hilarious that two of the groups most opposed to postmodernism are Marxists and religious conservatives. These are people who look at two texts (the writing of Marx on one hand and the bible on the other) and manage to come up with such divergent readings of the same words that people have (literally) fought and died over their interpretations but they still can’t get their head around the idea that “truths” might be understood in different ways…

7. No Gods No Masters: An Anthology of Anarchism (volumes one and two) – Daniel Guerin

Part of my ongoing attempt to understand the claims that anarchism and libertarianism can somehow be progressive and aren’t just jumped up excuses for selfishness and “the devil take the hindmost”. Still working on that…

8. Neil Kinnock – Eileen Jones

For a brief period in the late 1990s I was fashionable. Or rather two of the things by which I define myself were fashionable – being Irish (Irish-style theme pubs and restaurants were opening everywhere) and the Labour Party. Both fads have now passed – but even then a book about Neil Kinnock’s leadership probably didn’t find pride of place on everyone’s coffee table. It isn’t fashionable to admit you admire politicians but I have always admired Kinnock – politically brave and fiery for what he believed in but not hidebound, he was able to separate tradition from principle (some people still assume these are indivisible), and he seemed a genuinely nice man on the two (very brief) times I met him. This biography was done just after 1992 and is, therefore, probably too negative about his legacy.

9. A Short History of Financial Euphoria – JK Galbraith

Actually I might be taking a risk here, since I’ve no doubt copies of this classic study of the economics of speculation are flying out of bookshops as fast as they can be printed. Galbraith was a rare thing – an economist who managed to hang on to his humanity. He was also a remarkably accessible writer, dealing with complex economic issues in a way that was accessible to the general reader (which is probably why so many “professional” economists either ignore him or despise him). Reading and understanding “The Great Crash” (another book I bet some bankers are wishing they’d heard of before last week), “Money” and “The Affluent Society” should be prerequisites for entry into polite society. (And then there’s “The Anatomy of Power” and then “The Age of Uncertainty” and “The Age of Contentment”…)

10. Discrete Mathematics and Its Applications – Kenneth Rosen

A course book I picked up at university – a course which I failed and a which almost drove me from academia entirely. Sometimes, when I’m feeling a bit overconfident or things are going too well, I open a copy of this book at a random page and stare uncomprehendingly at it for a few minutes. It always brings me back down to earth.

How did I do, dear reader? Any of you got any of those?