Favourite books

By joining our community you will have the ability to post topics and access other forums reserved for members. Registration is quick, simple and absolutely free. Join our community today by clicking here.

Hello I'm New here! Joined: 05 Apr 2007 Posts: 6

For well written fantasy try Jack Vance.

Kurt Vonnegut is good.

Quirky but best read in order, Robert Rankin.

Mark Twain's travel books (not Huckleburry Finn or Tom Sawyer) are really interesting and very amusing. I would recommend them to anyone.

A compendium of his quotes:

http://www.quotationspage.com/quotes/Mark_Twain/

demonstrate what a brilliant wit he was. Smile

Posted: Wed Apr 11, 2007 2:17 pm

Colin Dexter's 'Inspector Morse' series, if you haven't already seen the TV programmes.

Posted: Wed Apr 11, 2007 6:59 pm

I can endorse Robert Rankin. Of the 29 books he has written I have all but 6.

In the same vain (comic sci/fi) there is Tom Holt. (of the 37 he has written, I am also missing 6)

Posted: Thu Apr 12, 2007 1:46 am

Fro Autobiographies (I read about one a day coz I'm sad and love other peoples misery..)

The Disillusioned - DW Scott

(think you can only get it on fishpond.co.nz)

Posted: Thu Apr 12, 2007 1:28 pm

@Gemo52

Sadly Vonnegut died yesterday aged 84 following injuries sustained in a fall.

Posted: Thu Apr 12, 2007 1:35 pm

^^^^^^

And so it goes.

Posted: Thu Apr 12, 2007 3:38 pm

The Black Dahlia, The Big Nowhere and L.A. Confidential by James Ellroy are the best books I've ever read.

Posted: Thu Apr 12, 2007 4:34 pm

This is an interesting thread. My favourite book is probably Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell, but I also like lots of Kafka, Doestoyevsky, Camus and that kind of thing.

At the moment, I'm reading Ulysses by James Joyce and it's starting to get very confusing and complicated about 600 pages in. It was surprisingly easy-going at the start but it's got a bit too much now. I'd like to finish it but I'm not sure if I will at this rate.

Posted: Thu Apr 12, 2007 4:43 pm

I don't read too much, but Andy McNabs Bravo Two Zero hooked me big time.
I also tend to read Lonely Planet books while travelling.

Annoying Stuck-Up Cow Joined: 10 Aug 2006 Posts: 222

Olivia Joules and the Overactive Imagination by Helen Fielding.

I know its hardly intellectually challenging, but by god is it a fun girly spy book.

Posted: Thu Apr 12, 2007 7:00 pm

Donald Jack's 'Bandy' series always makes me smile.

Posted: Thu Apr 12, 2007 10:42 pm

BadKarma wrote:

I don't read too much, but Andy McNabs Bravo Two Zero hooked me big time.

I just can't get past the fact that it's fiction portrayed as fact, I'm afraid! Smile

Baiting Guru Joined: 19 Mar 2007 Posts: 2628

Ah yes, Aretmis, where would Brentford be without Robert Rankin?

Has Tom Holt really written 37 books?!
I'm a bit behind in my reading then, must catch up
I've only ever read the ones in the local library

RIP Vonnegut ,read Slaughter House 5 in my teens. Left a lasting impression
Also read Ulysses then. In later years I've gone back to it and thought the best take on it is to think like you're really, really drunk, listening to someone really, really, really drunk ( and Irish )

This thread has given me many good ideas and reminders.
Think I'll be found in my local bookshop this weekend.

Anyone mention Tom Sharpe?

Posted: Thu Apr 12, 2007 11:14 pm

Asking what my favourite book would be like asking what my favourite relationship memory was! They were all good, and I can't really point a favourite over another.

Posted: Fri Apr 13, 2007 12:22 am

Some fantastic books listed so far. One of my favourite authors at the moment is Dean Koontz. I'm yet to find one of his books I haven't enjoyed thoroughly - most have made me laugh and 2 made me cry (yep, it's true!).

Anyone unfamiliar with him, he writes a mix of suspense/thriller/sci-fi/supernatural which sounds odd, but just seems to work!

My personal favourite is Dragon Tears. Could say it'd be good to make into a film, but they tried it with Sole Survivor and unfortunately failed miserably to make it half as good as the book was.

Not quite a Newb Joined: 14 Jul 2005 Posts: 41

^^Currently my favorite Dean Koontz books are the 'Odd Thomas' series.

I'd also like to put in a plug for Nelson DeMille- author of 'The General's Daugher' (crappy movie) and 'Lion's Game', to name a few. Top notch mystery/suspense novels.

Robert Littell also for very well written espionage thrillers.

Posted: Fri Apr 13, 2007 12:30 am

^^^^^ Funnily enough, it was the 1st of the 3 Odd Thomas books that got me in tears. Such a big twist at the end! I love how he's stalked by Elvis too hehehehe..

Posted: Fri Apr 13, 2007 6:46 am

If you want a good book try

The Teachings of Don Juan by Carlos Casta�eda 8 book series about an
anthropologist who is taught, well actually tricked by a brujo (medicine man ) into becoming a shaman and developing
his powers. ( Nonfiction)

Posted: Fri Apr 13, 2007 7:58 am

Nanny Ogg wrote:

Anyone mention Tom Sharpe?

Yes me in an earlier post. The 'Wilt' books are laugh out funny. I used to read them on the train as a student Got funny looks from the other passengers in the compartment. Those were the days when UK trains still had compartments - good old British Railways - RIP.

Luke Rheinhart's 'The Dice Man' is also worth a read.

Posted: Sat Apr 14, 2007 3:50 am

Love Reading!

However I am in the habit of downloading them to my PPC or treo to read that way. I love that I can have 50 or so books on a single SD card.

GMF, Anything by him, I'll third or 4th that.

RZ, Amber is great but I liked Lord of Light the best.

Two authors that I really Like and don't see mentioned much.

Don Dilillo who wrote running dog, very good novel with a great CI character in it.
Good quote from an Amazon review "Running Dog is essentially a witty and sarodnic spy/intrigue/romance. DeLillo in a bar room brawl with Ian Fleming, Graham Greene, Charles Willeford and Larry Flynt. It's like punk rock DeLillo. Filled with porn, sex, violence, apathy, lecherous men and empowered women"

Mark Helprin: Amazing writer. Read "A soldier of The Great War" first. Nice description over at his web page. http://www.markhelprin.com/index.cfm?page=overview&start=1&pid=18

And let me throw in my .02 worth for poetry. I have always enjoyed Ted Hughes's book of poetry Crow.

Posted: Sat Apr 14, 2007 1:15 pm

I'm reading the Greenworks Xfrog and Xfrog tune manual for the standalone software at the moment.

Grippig stuff.

Posted: Sat Apr 14, 2007 1:37 pm

Saki (Hector Hugh Munroe) is good - as mentioned before, but for sheer title value I bought "Been Down So Long It Looks Like Up To Me" and found it was great. The author, Richard Farina, celebrated its release a little too hard and fell off his motorbike on his way home from the party and was killed..

Baiting Guru Joined: 19 Mar 2007 Posts: 2628

Christopher Brookmyre - Boiling a frog; The sacred art of stealing; (and a few more ).
Absurd, Scottish, funny

Posted: Sat Apr 14, 2007 1:46 pm

Koji Suzuki, chap who wrote the 'Ring" trilogy and many more. Extremely readable.

Posted: Sat Apr 14, 2007 2:16 pm

Quote:

The e-mail home is an essential part of every gap-year back-packers journey. Where once the news of a fresh tattoo, the purchase of a gold Mercedes or a village chief's proposal of marriage would have had to wait until a traveller's return, those left at home are now able to follow every trial and tribulation of their loved one's attempt to 'find-themselves'. Simon Hoggart and Emily Monk have collected together the funniest, most surreal, most alarming gap-year e-mails into a treasure-trove of correspondence. Accompanied by their wicked commentary, "Don't Tell Mum" invites us to live the gap-year experience without even having to leave the country.

I didn't read it, but sounds great

that could be me on that parashute btw.
I send my Tandem Parashute Certificate home in lieu of a postcard Smile