Favorite books thread

[philly and the phanatics]

i know i know americans don't read, but how about you people from the rest of the world.

I just finished re-reading my favorite book, slaughter house 5.

i also really like one flew over the cuckoos nest and fear and loathing in las vegas. (i know they are both movies but i actually read those books lol)

[rong]

1984 is my fav book of all time.

Loved the dark tower series by Stephen King.

And I also love the Jack Reacher series by Lee Child.

[dneureiter]

1984 is my fav book of all time.

Loved the dark tower series by Stephen King.

And I also love the Jack Reacher series by Lee Child.

Nice, loved the last two and will check out the first.

[kiwiMark]

catch 22

[Hawk]

1984 was assigned to me in high school, which was enough reason for me at the time to NOT read it. I've been meaning to pick it up for a long time now, and just haven't got around to it yet.

I also recently read slaughter house 5 and really enjoyed it.

Mostly I've been reading Chuck Palahnuik lately. I love his warped writings.

In the past I've enjoyed stephen king, anne rice (before the whole born again stuff happened).

And of course the whole hitchhikers guide series was great.

[oskar]

I've read Naked Lunch to death... it literally fell apart. Haven't read it in years tho. It might not be as good the 10th time through anyway.
Gallapagos and Slaughterhouse Five.
Last Chance to See by Douglas Adams - don't be put off if you didn't like Hitchhikers Guide so much... I didn't like it either, but LCTS is really good.

Right now I'm reading the John Hodgeman books: Areas of My Expertise and More Information than you require. Got them both half way through cos I've left one at my dads house. - If you like him as a minor TV personality then you'll love his books. I got two Karl Pilkington Books lined up. Before that I've mostly read nonfiction. - Climbing Mount Improbable is insanely good.

I'll definitely get something by Chuck Palahnuik. I've read some excerpts and shorts and they were brilliant.

[couriermike]

David Copperfield is my favorite. I especially like Mr. Micawber who's constantly in debt, and how his wife is always proclaiming, 'I will never leave Mr. Micawber!' even though no one asked her.

After that, Sherlock Holmes, basically a 19th century superman.

Also the last page of Shogun was great when, after the battle of sekigahara, Toranaga says to himself, 'Ah, the dream I have had all my life, to be shogun of all Japan, is now mine!' when the whole novel he was saying he had no desire to be shogun. Right! Plus, alot of the novel is based on the life of Toyotomi Hideyoshi, supposedly one of the greatest generals of all time.

Douglas Adams is hilarious. Of course there's alot of great science fiction. Heinlein and Herbert are classic. Herbert wrote this novel The Jesus Incident where people build this interstellar spaceship and they make the computer so complex that it wakes up and has god-like powers, like god in the old testament it talks to some people and interferes in the world. 'You must decide how you will worShip!' Alrighty then.

[philly and the phanatics]

David Copperfield is my favorite. I especially like Mr. Micawber who's constantly in debt, and how his wife is always proclaiming, 'I will never leave Mr. Micawber!' even though no one asked her.

After that, Sherlock Holmes, basically a 19th century superman.

Also the last page of Shogun was great when, after the battle of sekigahara, Toranaga says to himself, 'Ah, the dream I have had all my life, to be shogun of all Japan, is now mine!' when the whole novel he was saying he had no desire to be shogun. Right! Plus, alot of the novel is based on the life of Toyotomi Hideyoshi, supposedly one of the greatest generals of all time.

Douglas Adams is hilarious. Of course there's alot of great science fiction. Heinlein and Herbert are classic. Herbert wrote this novel The Jesus Incident where people build this interstellar spaceship and they make the computer so complex that it wakes up and has god-like powers, like god in the old testament it talks to some people and interferes in the world. 'You must decide how you will worShip!' Alrighty then.

i didnt say RUIN THE END OF YOUR FAVORITE BOOKS lol -____-

[rong]

1984 was assigned to me in high school, which was enough reason for me at the time to NOT read it. I've been meaning to pick it up for a long time now, and just haven't got around to it yet.

Yeah I never read it at school although it was an option, it was only when I was in my 20s that I first read it, and it completely blew me away. I've seince read it three times and every time it just amazes me how good it is. Especially when you bare in mind when it was written, it's just amazing.

Mostly I've been reading Chuck Palahnuik lately. I love his warped writings.

In the past I've enjoyed stephen king, anne rice (before the whole born again stuff happened).

And of course the whole hitchhikers guide series was great.

Yeah Chuck does some great stuff, the short stories book is awesome but just so fucked up, I'm half way through it, but just don't have the time to finish it right now.

The entire series of Anne Rice's vampire chronicles is also really good, the sense of history she creates, the depth of charachters and the way it's tied in with Egyption mythology is pretty special.

[rong]

i didnt say RUIN THE END OF YOUR FAVORITE BOOKS lol -____-

lol

I so wanna give away the end of 1984 now

[mbiz]

catch 22

cant believe i read this one till the end - boring! doesn't surprise me kiwi likes it. My fav. author for a long time was Phillip K Dick; Collections of short stories are great and various short novels - i cant remember specific ones because they are all similar and most of them are good. Still been meaning to read 'Man in the high castle'. Blade runner/total recall/minority report are all based on his books, but so are some bad movies like that shitty rastorised keanu reeves one..whatever it was
edit: since when do we need to use html to format our posts? was it always like this

[oskar]

lol

I so wanna give away the end of 1984 now

Is there anyone left on the planet that hasn't read it? If I had never heard about it and I just found it browsing the library then I'd probably think it was a lot better. I did like it a lot tho... but I wouldn't put it in the top whatever. Kind of the same with catcher in the rye and uncle tom's shed and such.

[wufwugy]

Hard to say. I don't read fiction anymore, but used to quite a bit. I'm also more of an author person than a book person.

If I had to choose a book from the past, it would likely be Cannery Row by Steinbeck. IMO, he's the greatest writer to ever live, and he showed his expertise in Cannery Row by making a story about nothing into a masterpiece. His more famous ones, Of Mice and Men and Grapes of Wrath, are excellent, but they're frankly more popular than they should be relative to what critics consider his true masterpiece, East of Eden

Nobody writes dialogue and "normal" characters like Stephen King, and it's not even close. It's a shame he has done so much frivolous horror crap because some of his talent is just out of this world

I'd say Crichton is the best author of the modern age. All very unique, well researched, and well formatted

The most entertained I've ever been is by Prometheus Deception by Ludlum. In fact, that is the last fiction I will ever read. I'm a very emotional person, and I got way too depressed after I was done with that book that I decided I wouldn't read another one. I don't handle heartbreak well, and when my mind is so entrenched into something, then it's all over, it hurts me enough that I don't wanna do it anymore

There is also a soft spot in my heart for the Drizzt Do'Urden books by Salvatore

[rong]

I think once you've been forced to read it, it's already lost some of its value.

[rong]

Def agree about crichton, state of fear is one of my fav science fiction books, but more for the political and sociological point which it made. Ludlum is fantastic too. Man I miss having time, to read and do whatever, sigh, growing up sucks!

[Roid_Rage]

I'm a fantasy noob myself. Have read a decent number of the Drizzt Do'Urden books wufwugy mentioned.

I also highly recommend the monster 13 book series by Robert Jordan, The Wheel Of Time. Sick sick books. Its like Lord of the Rings, but interesting. (The books ldo, movies were obv awesome.)

There's also a new series on HBO coming out in 2011, The Game of Thrones or something; its based on the series by George R.R. Martin. Also a great series if you have the time.

[flomo]

clock work orange

[couriermike]

i didnt say RUIN THE END OF YOUR FAVORITE BOOKS lol -____-

Lol, yeah, sorry if you haven't read that. He's not a major character though.

Crichton is good. Philip K. Dick is a genius. I also liked the William Gibson books, but my favorite cyberpunk novel is Schismatrix by Bruce Sterling, really really good.

Ludlum is awesome. I really liked The Road to Gandolfo, where the general with the four hot secretaries (ex-wives?) decides to kidnap the pope. That was hilarious.

Another guilty pleasure is The Descent by Jeff Long. It has a great opening scene. The plot is kinda like 'The Exorcist Goes Spelunking.'

[philly and the phanatics]

i didnt even realize clock work orange was a book...and a shit load of these are books i was going to read (ie catch 22) and will now do so based on your guys recommendations .

I am about to start reading cat's cradle, most Slaughter House 5 lovers ive talked to dont like it, but most people who do love it think its better than SH5

[Donachello]

Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card and it's not even remotely close.

Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson was pretty awesome too. I used to read a TON but meh life comes first now .

[lolzzz_321]

harold and the purple crayon

tale of two cities

brave new world


ordering enders game on amazon now

[couriermike]

Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card and it's not even remotely close.

That is a great book.

[Roid_Rage]

Adding my recommendation to Ender's Game as well. I've read through it probably 6-7 times in the last 2 years alone. Never gets old. All that jazz.

[flomo]

K Vg fans should check out 'welcome to the monkey house'

[BennyLaRue]

K Vg fans should check out his whole collection because it's all pretty damn masterful

fyp

[flomo]

you fix my post again

I will fix your wagon

[BennyLaRue]

Also,

Ernest
Fucking
Hemingway

or he'll knock your teeth out. The Old Man and the Sea and Across the River and into the Trees are probably my faves.

Other faves:
SH5 is my fave, for sure. I bought my copy from George Whitman at Shakespeare & Company in Paris. That was sort of surreal since I'm sure he probably personally knew KV.
The Rum Diary by Hunter S. Thompson.
Animal Farm or Homage to Catalonia by George Orwell
A Star Called Henry or The Commitments by Roddy Doyle
Candide by Voltaire. It's 250 years old but hilarious. Trust me deeply on this one.
Lonesome Dove and the rest of the series by Larry McMurtry. Gus McCrae is a badass and one of my favorite literary characters ever.

[triumphant cracker]

call of the wild by jack london.
animal farm george orwell
where the red fern grows.

ya hick!

[rong]

1984 > animal farm

[Donachello]

There is also a soft spot in my heart for the Drizzt Do'Urden books by Salvatore

Absolutely this. I think I read something like 25 of them in a year back in high school.

[Sasquach991]

Without Remorse by Tom Clancy (even if you don't like Clancy books, you'll like this one.)

Rainbow Six by Tom Clancy

The Stand by Stephen King

Currently reading:
The Last Hero by Peter Forbath (taking forever as it's over 700 pages)

[drmcboy]

ender's game is OK but the rest of the series is far superior. It's the hobbit to the rest of LOTR and similarly was written as a prequel.

I think there is at least one other book thread

[bode]

I am about to start reading cat's cradle, most Slaughter House 5 lovers ive talked to dont like it, but most people who do love it think its better than SH5

i just started reading Cats Cradle a few days ago. Good so far and i love SH5. Also should be getting Sirens of Titan for xmas.

[oskar]

clock work orange

We had a young ambitious english teacher in school who ordered copies of A Clockwork Orange for the whole class, but she hadn't read it before. She knew it was short... and how difficult could it be. When she read it she panicked. She never picked up the books, but asked us to get them if we liked cos she felt bad after leaving the english bookstore around the corner with twentyfive copies of gobbedygoo, but it wasn't going to be required reading
I did read it and I still have it around somewhere. idk how much I understood as I don't remember anything. OOOOH


No I do! I hated the end. WTF was he thinking. Kubrick improved it by miles.

[Illfavor]

East of Eden, Steinbeck. It's just tits.

[spoonitnow]

Ones I've downloaded illegally from the Internet.

[boost]

I don't read much, but so far nothing from Orwell has let me down. Currently reading Homage to Catalonia and I really like it.

[a500lbgorilla]

ender's game is OK but the rest of the series is far superior. It's the hobbit to the rest of LOTR and similarly was written as a prequel.

I think there is at least one other book thread

What's the next book to read after Ender's Game?

[Roid_Rage]

I think the very next one is The Speaker for the Dead and after that is Xenocide if I'm not mistaken.

[philly and the phanatics]

roids right

[spoonitnow]

The Bible, though I don't usually read fiction.

[philly and the phanatics]

zing

[!Luck]

1) The Financier by Theodore Dreiser
2) An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser
3) Atlas Shrugged / Fountainhead
4) Anything by Issac Asimov (Foundation/Robot)
5) Youth In Revolt

[Imthenewfish]

stones in water, catch 22, the art of racing in the rain

[Muzzard]

[philly and the phanatics]

lol you and spoon share similar reading interests

[Imthenewfish]

lol you and spoon share similar reading interests

I SEE WHAT YOU DID THERE

[bigred]

The Sandman Slim books are a fun, quick read

[bigred]

I think the very next one is The Speaker for the Dead and after that is Xenocide if I'm not mistaken.

Xenocide was ok. Not great, but ok.

[XTR1000]

Ellis´ "Less than zero" and "Lunar Park"
Richard Milward´s "Apples"

favourite book of all time hasn´t been translated to English yet, but if you can read German or Norwegian grab a copy of "Macht und Rebel" by Matias Faldbakken

[oskar]

Ha! I forgot we have some more germans here.

Unortunately the german books I liked where all classics that everybody knows anyway. Mein Name sei Gantenbein, Homo Faber, Der Richter und sein Henker, Der Proceß... every now and then I read stuff from Jelineks homepage: Elfriede Jelinek Homepage - I couln't get into her books tho.
Thomas Bernhards autobiographic triology is pretty intense. Only recommended if you have strong masochistic tendencies.

[Roid_Rage]

Don't forget the greatest German book of all time:

[bigred]

I'm going to read the first book in The Dark Tower series. I'll let you know what I think.

[Roid_Rage]

They're really good if you get going.

[philly and the phanatics]

got bill simmons book of basketball for xmas and im already through 500 of the 700 pages. Its probably only for huge basketball junkies but its an incredible book and ive thoroughly enjoyed reading it. Bill simmons always has a great take on things and does a great job of presenting things in a funny/accessible manner. 2 thumbs up lol.

[kmind]

got bill simmons book of basketball for xmas and im already through 500 of the 700 pages. Its probably only for huge basketball junkies but its an incredible book and ive thoroughly enjoyed reading it. Bill simmons always has a great take on things and does a great job of presenting things in a funny/accessible manner. 2 thumbs up lol.

Whoa sweet thanks man. I might have to check this out.

[drmcboy]

I'm going to read the first book in The Dark Tower series. I'll let you know what I think.

stop reading after book 4!!

I guess read the whole thing, but imo he totally bricked the ending. That said, book 4 is probably the best thing he's ever written.

Book 1 is good but pretty slow, rest have better pace.

[Roid_Rage]

I didn't mind the ending, I don't want to give spoilers but if you just kind of remember everything that happened throughout the series it wraps it up ok because it implies there's a different ending.

[rong]

I'm going to read the first book in The Dark Tower series. I'll let you know what I think.

I miss those books, so good.

[rong]

stop reading after book 4!!

I guess read the whole thing, but imo he totally bricked the ending. That said, book 4 is probably the best thing he's ever written.

Book 1 is good but pretty slow, rest have better pace.

Yeah wizard and glass is freakin awesome, def the best of the bunch, but I enjoyed it all. Although some bits are a bit tedious I guess, the train thing was a bit dull. Ending is ok though, I mean lets face it, how the hell do you end something like that in a satisfying way.

[rong]

I didn't mind the ending, I don't want to give spoilers but if you just kind of remember everything that happened throughout the series it wraps it up ok because it implies there's a different ending.

Yeah, but it lacks closure I guess, which is the problem people seem to have with it.

[bigred]

Just finished the first book. I thought it was ok but some of it was a little vague/confusing (I usually have great reading comprehension) and I'm not a huge fan of Stephen King's writing style. However, I'm going to continue to read because I find a lot of the concepts intriguing.

Also, apparently universal has slotted a major deal to produce The Dark Tower as a trilogy with a mini tv series in between each movie to fill in the gaps. Ron Howard is supposedly the director and Roland's top two potential actors are Javier Bardem (bad guy from no country for old men) and Vigo Mortenson. Film news Javier Bardem in the running for The Dark Tower | TotalFilm.com

[rong]

There's been talk of a dark tower movie for years, gonna be a lot if disappointed readers when it happens

[drmcboy]

you could end any book the way he ended it, just felt like a cop out. I actually think it ruined his life - somewhere around Needful Things his endings all started to suck. I didn't know why at the time, but I think now that he realized that he didn't have an ending for DT which he thought of as his life's work. So at that point he either just gave up on endings all together in an attempt to convince himself it was OK, or the failure killed his muse.

@ red DT1 is different from almost anything else he's written in terms of pace and feel. If you want a 'standard' good SK I would go with Tommyknockers, Salem's Lot, or Misery, esp if you haven't seen those movies.

[bigred]

I read Salem's lot and Cujo. Just not a fan of his style.

[drmcboy]

oh... rest of the DTs are much more like 'him', I guess if you like DT2 you can roll with it.

[bigred]

Fantasy land makes up for the writing style, I'm willing to roll with it!

[rong]

At least get to number 4, its amazing

[TLR]

Neil Gaiman's books are great - especially neverwhere
Catch 22 is a classic
John Irving - especially the older novels (A prayer for owen minny and the new hampshire hotel)
I used to love the Drizz't's books series by Salvadore but kind of grew out of it

The Swedish trilogy (Girl with the dragon tattoo etc..) is great

[kiwiMark]

bump for more native-german books? am back in germanland and have a brand new kindle, so it's time to reeeeeaaad

Widow for One Year by John Irving is really good, so I'm not bumping this thread without adding to it.

[oskar]

What I don't get about the kindle stuff is that it seems only marginally less expansive than the real books. I've looked up the last couple I bought on the kindle store and they would have cost MORE had I bought the Kindle editions. o_O

Can't really recommend any more german books than I already have. Can't remember the last time I've read a german book.

I got The Art Of War along with another order cos I needed something to put me in the free shipping zone. I got the Penguin Publishing edition cos it had the nicest cover and I already read the Giles translation off the internet, which you can find here: Art of War by SunTzu [SunZi] -English Hypertext
maybe you can put that on your kindle :P
They were both good as far as the text goes. Cannot recommend on the quality of translation as my ancient chinese is a bit rusty.
You can finish it in one evening, easily.

I really liked the Karl Pilkington books (Karlology, Idiot Abroad), but it's hard to recommend cos either you like that kind of humor or you don't.

[UG]

I'm finishing up a book about Micky Mantle called "The Last Boy." It's been a pretty damn good read, that dude lived a helluva life.

If you're a conspiracy theory fan check out "The Rise of the Fourth Reich," by Jim Marrs. It goes into detail about how some surviving members of Nazi Germany, and Nazi sympathizers here in the US, have been working behind the scenes to create a Nazi state here in America without anyone noticing much.

[kiwiMark]

I was gonna grab mein name sei gantenbain but when I read something about it, it said something along the lines of how the author uses the book to show how confusing language can be and the limitations of words etc. -- that sounds like it'd be too hardcore for non-native-speaking me.

If we're all being honest I got my kindle 'cause I wanted a new toy. I have a few ebooks, both poker and other, and I really hate reading on the computer, so it's cool for that. And after like 23 books the kindle is more environmentally friendly than real books!

[jyms]

If we're all being honest I got my kindle 'cause I wanted a new toy. I have a few ebooks, both poker and other, and I really hate reading on the computer, so it's cool for that. And after like 23 books the kindle is more environmentally friendly than real books!

I have the same thing, ton's of PDF's poker and others that really suck reading on the computer. If I had a reader, I really think I would read a lot more than I actually do now. Is the Kindle the best option, price or otherwise? What I want is a PDF reader that can just load from my computer, I don't need 3G or even Wi-Fi because If I can't download it to my computer I doubt I would get it anyway. What is a good option for a reader?

[kiwiMark]

Yeah the wifi's cool I guess but seems kinda gimmicky, and paying extra for 3G is completely beyond me. I didn't do tooooo much careful research, but I think the general feeling is that the latest kindle is still the best thing on offer, but there might be others available considerably cheaper given that you're in north america, so I guess that's worth looking out for.

It has native PDF support which has worked pretty well for me thus far. The big difference between PDFs and kindle ebooks is that you can't make the font bigger (such that the text is bigger and wraps automatically onto the next line) on a PDF, you can only zoom in (so the text is bigger but doesn't wrap, so you have to scroll across to read to the end of a line if you're zoomed in that far). That said, I'm yet to try a PDF that hasn't been a perfectly readable size without having to zoom in and scroll from side-to-side, especially if you set it up so you're holding the kindle sideways.

Somebody told me about a program called Calibre, which appears to be free, and that can apparently convert PDFs into native kindle format so that would get around that problem too.