Bookworm Friday: Five Books Recommendations from Pavel Yampolsky

In this series, we ask our William Hill colleagues to share their favourite book recommendations and tell us what specifically they learned from them. Today we present five recommendations from Pavel Yampolsky. Enjoy a good read!

On daily basis, Pavel is a Product Owner for the Ultrasonics team in International. He says: "Can’t really say I’m a bookworm by definition. The official reason is that my free time for reading books is limited, but maybe I’m just too lazy and prefer to deal with my phone instead. Here are my recommendations."

1. Roger Zelazny, Chronicles of Amber

A classic fantasy story with magic, love, tragedy and much more. I started to read this book when I was a kid in school. Back then it looked like a nice fantasy to me and I just skipped difficult to understand parts. While reading this book again a few years ago I was mostly amazed by perfectly build a fantasy world.

2. Liu Cixin, The Three-Body Problem

The first contact of earthlings with an alien civilisation. How does it seem to us and what impact can it have on the future fate of mankind? Will outsiders turn out to be friends or enemies? This book is very different from classic sci-fi literature. It takes time and a real effort at the beginning but it’s definitely worth it.

3. Mikhail Bulgakov, A Young Doctor’s Notebook

A short story collection by the Russian writer Mikhail Bulgakov. The stories were written in the 1920s and inspired by Bulgakov’s experiences as a newly graduated young doctor in 1916-18, practising in a small village hospital in Smolensk in revolutionary Russia. This is a relevantly short book, more a dairy really. I liked this book as it’s a real personal view on a dark Russia times after the revolution in 1917.

4. Adam Douglas, Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

Not much to extend when it comes to Adam Douglas and his books. An old classic but very much relevant at any time.Not really much to say. I love this book and hardly recommend to all

5. Stephen King, Insomnia

“Insomnia” is one of King’s standby classics, his 1990’s era of cult horror novels that gave him the legendary status he so rightly deserves. As all of King’s books, very slow introduction. Take quite some time to understand what is going on. And as any King's book, this is a great one.