Speaking of books: need a list of Stuff to read
Friday, July 16th, 2004 - 3:12pm
Basically I am looking for a list of *excellent* books to read, as I've run dry on all my current authors (damn them for only being able to write so many pages in a week).
examples:
George R.R. Martin :Fire & Ice (Fantasy)
Orson Scoutt Card: Enders series (Sci Fi)
Robert Jordan: Wheel of Time series (Fantasy)
Doctor Suess: Horton Hatches the Egg (Childrens)
Isaac Asimov: Everything he wrote (Sci Fi)
David Brin: Everything he wrote (sci fi)
Terry Goodkind: First 4 books of the Sword of truth series (fantasy)
"Also, I have four legs and am covered in wool. Baa!" *Legion* reveals his inner furry.
Philip Pullman
HIS DARK MATERIALS trilogy
http://www.randomhouse.com/features/pullman/
Very enjoyable multiverse tale of a world(s) that is almost but not quite our own.
Cyrana Mage 72 ~ Artesia Druid 70
Cyranna Shaman 62 ~ Acereri - DK 61 ~ Artasian - Priest 59 ~ Lenna - Rogue 60
I recommend:
China Mieville:
Perdido Street Station
The Scar
Iron Council (out soon).
Sharon Shinn
Arc Angel Series
Sean McMullen
Souls in the Great Machine Series
Neil Gaiman
Neverwhere
American Gods
Eragon by Christopher Paolini
A nice light fantasy read. First in a proposed trilogy, so unfortunately you''ll have to wait for the next 2 books if you enjoy the first.
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Dan Simmons. Pretty much anything he writes, but if you like good scifi, you can''t go wrong with Hyperion.
Money can't buy you happiness...but it can buy you a boat big enough to sell right up next to it!-David Lee Roth
James Ellroy
LA Quartet:
Black Dahlia
Big Nowhere
LA Confidential
White Jazz
American Tabloid
The Cold Six Thousand
Densely plotted, wonderfully corrupt noir. Superb stuff.
Kurt Vonnegut
Everything really. Although you should start with Slaughterhouse 5. He defies description most of the time.
Max Barry
Jennifer Government
I believe I''ve mentioned it before.
Also, since you''ve a mostly fantasy/sci-fi on that list, I''d better mention Robin Hobb''s Farseer trilogy. (Assassin''s Apprentice, Royal Assassin, Assasin''s Quest.) The only fantasy in recent years besides Martin''s that really caught my attention.
Steven Erikson allegedly writes some great elfie-welfies too, although I haven''t bothered to confirm it myself. Supposed to be rather hard to get a hold of in North America, mind you.
"The trouble with fighting for human freedom is that one spends most of one's time defending scoundrels. For it is against scoundrels that oppressive laws are first aimed, and oppression must be stopped at the beginning if it is to be stopped at all."
William Faulkner''s The Bear
Neal Stephenson''s Cryptonomicon
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Looks like you enjoy fantasy so I''ll list some of my favorites. I consider all these to be pretty solid authors,
Steven Erikson
R. Scott Bakker
Greg Keyes
Guy Gavriel Kay
Sean Russel
J.V.Jones
Janny Wurts
"Beer is proof that god loves us and wants us to be happy." - Benjamin Franklin
Stop now... for the love of all that is good, stop now. You''ve read all the decent books in the series. Trust me.
I''ll go with a non-sci fi/fantasy recommendation: Nick Hornby. ""High Fidelity"" and ""About A Boy"", both turned into good movies, both fantastic books in their own right.
Everything can be debated, but that doesn't necessarily mean it's debatable.
--Chuck Klosterman, Fargo Rock City
Everything else by Orson Scott Card. Pastwatch: the Redemption of Christopher Columbus is a very cool book, and I really like the Alvin Maker series (although it too is unfinished; currently at 5). Also, he has another trilogy who''s name I can''t recall, but the books are The Memory of Home, The Ships of Home, and something else. Worth reading.
The Dark Tower books by Stephen King. Then everything else by Stephen King, with particular attention to his short stories/novellas, and avoiding Dreamcatcher, The Regulators and probably Gerald''s Game.
Also, I''m in the middle of Mists of Avalon, and it seems, though dense, a good read.
MechaSlinky wrote:
-on L4DHey, ALG, if you are going noir, then so will I!
Jim Thompson
The Grifters
The Getaway
The Killer Inside Me
Dashiel Hammet
The Thin Man
Raymond Chandler Sam Spade, baby!
The Big Sleep
Farewell my Lovely
Mickey Spillane Mike Hamner.
My Gun Is Quick
I, The Jury
Andrew Vachss
Strega
Down in the Zero
Robert B. Parker
The Early Spenser Novels are great, but in particular
A Catskill Eagle
Ceremony
Paper Dolls
Godwulf Manuscript
God Save the Child
Anything in ""The Culture"" series by Iain M. Banks
""One for the Morning Glory"" by John Barnes
""The Red Pavilions"" series by Kim Hunter
The Fencer Trilogy & The Scavenger trilogies by K.J. Parker
*anything* by Douglas Preston & Lincoln Child.
"Eat Keel, Hellbug!"
I''ll up the ante:
Past noir - Cold Copper Tears, by Glen Cook.
Future noir - Gun, With Occasional Music by Jonathan Lethem.
Everything can be debated, but that doesn't necessarily mean it's debatable.
--Chuck Klosterman, Fargo Rock City
The vampire trilogy by Christopher Golden - Of Saints and Shadows is one of the titles I think. Great take on vampire mythos. Blows Anne Rice away, but that doesn''t take much.
Anything by Terry Pratchett.
Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse - no, not that Hermann Hesse.
There''s a very odd little book somewhat like Good Omens(Pratchett & Gaiman) called A Dog Named Demolition or A Dog Called Demolition. Very, very good, if you can find it.
The new Stephenson novels can easily eat a month of your reading time. Each.
And there''s a ton of good recommendations in the ""Watcha Reading Thread"" in this forum.
Edit: And The Watchmen(graphic novel/comic book) as well as From Hell(ditto) which, I think, were both written by Alan Moore. I''ve never been much of a comic book fan, but these are both amazingly well-written and the art is gritty, fitting the mood. Good stuff even if you don''t dig ""comic books"". Being able to read the entire storyline all at once makes these very attractive.
"And my son, too, thinks everything is a launchpad, every bug a meal, and every sunny day a reason to take all your clothes off and roll around in the grass." - rabbit
It''s also worth mentioning that Steven Erikson''s ""Gardens of the Moon"" is now out through Tor in hardcover. His Malazan series of books are fantastic and well worth reading. The first book sort of throws you right into the middle of the story and can be a bit overwhelming but it finds its focus pretty quickly.
Certis beat me to it. - Elysium
Liann Hearn''s Tales of the Otori
Book 1: Across the Nightengale Floor
Book 2: Grass For His Pillow
Book 3: Brilliance of the Moon
Everyone that I''ve ever recommended to loved this trilogy... so I''ll recommend it to all of you too ^_^
"Just remember that sometimes you need to allow problems to just roll like water off of a duckilama's back." ~Reaper
To Reign In Hell by Steven Brust. The Taltos series by Brust is also good.
The Anita Blake series by Laurell K Hamilton is damn good as well.
Unfortunately, if I slash my wrist with my lightsaber it cauterizes instantly. - PurEvil on emo Star Wars plots.
I echo anything by Terry Pratchett as well as Neil Gaiman (even better together with Good Omens, as duckilama mentioned).
Are you looking for any particular genre? Open to anything? Fiction and non-fiction? I really branched out my reading preferences over the last few years and encountered (in my opinion) some pretty stellar books. Overall, I think the best books I''ve ever read have been in the last few years, which consisted of very little ""fantasy"" or popular fiction.
no particular interest, no particular talent
Tsk. You mention Chandler, but not The Long Goodbye? Pah. It''s his bestest book ever! (Well, out of the four-five I''ve gotten hold of.)
"The trouble with fighting for human freedom is that one spends most of one's time defending scoundrels. For it is against scoundrels that oppressive laws are first aimed, and oppression must be stopped at the beginning if it is to be stopped at all."
Matthew Woodring Stovers little 2 part series is pretty cool. It consists of Heroes Die and The Blade of Tyshalle. Basically a scifi/fantasy combo where a dystopian future world finds an alternate reality that is essentially your standard D&D fantasy land, and they turn it into a reality TV show.
Very cool series, not as goofy as i''m making it sound
Heroes Die
[url=http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0345421434/ref=pd_bxgy_text_1/102-2562912-8713753?v=glance&s=books&st=*]The Blade of Tyshalle[/url]
My days of not taking you seriously have certainly come to a middle.
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Terry Pratchett is the best humorous fantasy writer out there, you won''t be disappointed. No one has mentioned William Gibson and Bruce Sterling, and the mention of Stephenson left out his first name, Neal.
For him, start with Snow Crash.
And there''s always the extremist Irvine Welsh. Start with ""Trainspotting"", if you''ve got the stomach for it.
"Sometimes I go around saying, 'Kommisar Paulson has seized the commanding heights of the economy!'" - Paul Krugman, asked if recent changes to banking are socialistic.
For a good sci-fi read:
""Truth Machine"" - James Halperin
""The First Immortal"" - James Halperin
Both are well researched semi-parallel universe stories that delve into the 21st century on Earth if a) the perfect lie detector were and invented and b) cryogenics was perfected..really quite fascinating.
And while I saw you had Asimov and Card on the list I didn''t see Heinlein.
""The Moon is a Harsh Mistress"" - Revolution on the moon!
""Starship Troopers"" - Way different and 10x better than the movie.
For something quick and light, Ben Bova has done some good books too..
If we allow these people to marry, they'll be dancing in the streets, making everyone gay and poking pee-pees together. Do you really want that!? We need to stop this gay madness before it destroys us all! - baggachipz
Note on Anita Blake: I thought the first 4 or 5 books were really good. The next however-many-are-left were still pretty good plot wise, but the woman is seriously jonesing to get laid. There''s an awful lot of pseudo-softcore in some of the later books...
MechaSlinky wrote:
-on L4DMy bad. I just assume everyone has read Snowcrash and Diamond Age. Buy ''em both at the same time, just like the Christopher Golden vampire trilogy. They''re unrelated, really, but you''ll want more.
Better yet, buy some Gibson at the same time as well. Read through Gibson, but leave off before you get to stuff like Idoru and the other later-1990s stuff, and flow right into Stephenson. The old Gibson paired with the 1990s Stephenson really flows well and shows a natural succession, IMO.
Also, Stephenson''s work(with his dad, I think) under the nom de plume Stephen Bury is pretty good stuff. Not what I expected after reading Snowcrash and Diamond Age, as I was on a Gibson/Stephenson tear, but really good all the same.
"And my son, too, thinks everything is a launchpad, every bug a meal, and every sunny day a reason to take all your clothes off and roll around in the grass." - rabbit
Robert Sawyer - ""Calculating God""
Roger Zelazny - First Amber Series
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Blog: Triple Point Blank Fire
I''ll second both zelazny and mieville. Both Lord Of Light and The amber series are great reads and mieville seems to improve upon his already exelent style and writing with each new book.
I''d also like to recomend Gene Wolfe, His Book of the New Sun series is fantastic, though a bit difficult read. However his new book, Knight i heard was an easier read, but i havent gotten around to reading it.
If you can get your hands on one (might be reprinting but not sure) Mervyn Peake''s Ghormenghast series is awesome.
The most dangerous thing in the combat zone is an officer with a map.
Aside from excellent suggestions above, I''m very fond of Peter F. Hamilton''s Night''s Dawn trilogy. Space opera writ large, really good read.
Rock Band Name Generator!... too funny to merely be coincidence.
"Truly, this mishap has set back the swamp sciences several years." - H.P. Lovesauce, lamenting a tragedy.
Most of the books in the Anita Blake series are incredibly good (the quality decrease started with ""Obsidian Butterfly"" IMHO). Her take on the vampire/werewolf/etc. mythos was really original and interesting at the time; too bad it''s being copied by every 2-bit hack out there and she''s become waaaaaaay overly fascinated by the sex lives of her characters.
Everything can be debated, but that doesn't necessarily mean it's debatable.
--Chuck Klosterman, Fargo Rock City
Two more books that just came to mind that I thought were really good reads:
When Gravity Fails - sci-fi dark future (a la Blade Runner). ''Gritty'', I think you''d call it.
Aristos by Walter Jon Williams (I think) - Also sci-fi. Lot of neural interfaces and fancy networks and nano-machines. I really liked it.
MechaSlinky wrote:
-on L4DIf you enjoy some historical fun...
Gates of Fire by Steven Pressfield is second to none.
And if you''d like to give the classics a spin, there''s a great new translation of Dostoevsky''s Notes From Underground out now.
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XBL Tag: Prederick
Just finished reading Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson. Very enjoyable.
First time posting BTW. Been lurking for quite a while. Love GWJ!