Suggestions: Books To Read

[Notthe7]

I'm looking for some pretty amazing books to read over the Christmas break. This can include prose/poetry. Any Suggestions?

I'll throw out a list of books/readings that I've liked over the past few years:

Les Miserables
Heart of Darkness
The Professor's House
Turn of the Screw
Anthem
(Feminist Theory Readings were very interesting)
Any sort of political, religious text is welcome.

Essentially the only thing I'm ruling out is science fiction books!
Throw it at me

 

[ManlyBanisters]

Ruling out sci-fi? More fool you, but never mind...

Faulkner's The Sound and the Fury
Heller's Catch 22
Winterson's Written on the Body
Banks's Wasp Factory
Anything by Doris Lessing*.

And for something somewhat lighter but still solidly good Niffenegger's Time Traveler's Wife, which is lovely.

* EDIT: Including her sci-fi!! :tongue:

 

[Notthe7]

Hey, Don't Judge Me. I hate star wars too.

The Sound and The Fury was good once you dived into it.

 

[ManlyBanisters]

Hey, Don't Judge Me. I hate star wars too.

The Sound and The Fury was good once you dived into it.

That's the thing about Faulkner - you kind of just have to go with it and trust him.

If you've read all those try Orwell's Hommage to Catalonia.

On Sci-Fi - badly done it is awful, but sci-fi in the hands of a really good author is, forgive the pun, stellar.

 

[D_Gunther Snotpole]

The Original of Laura by Vladimir Nabokov.
Nabokov was one of the master writers of the last century, and this is his last book, written while he was slowly wasting away from the chronic and intractable infection that finally killed him.
The manuscript was never completed, and Nabokov gave instructions that his incomplete text ... written, like all his books, paragraph by paragraph on file cards in longhand ... be destroyed.
Thankfully, his wife and son kept the manuscript, which has finally been published.
As you look at the open book, you see, on the right side, a copy of the original file card, written in Nabokov's scrupulous hand.
The words are also in typescript below, so that reading is always easy.
These cards can be broken out of the book.
A reader who takes them all out can rearrange the whole book in the order that s/he believes works best.
No sacrilege here, because we don't know what sort of creative shuffling Nabokov himself might have done before turning out a finished manuscript.
For the right reader, this can be a fascinating exercise.
I'm giving this book to a close friend who's turning out to be a universal genius, lol. (Actually, he's a triple-threat writer, photographer, painter ... and at a solid level in all three.)
The critics agree this is not quite top-drawer Nabokov. But I've looked at the book and I can guarantee there's a lot of shimmer on those pages.
I know my friend will have fun with the book.
I also know that he'll lend it, soon enough, to me.:smokin:

 

[SilverTrain]

House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski (A very different kind of book. I found it fascinating. Fiction)

The Nine by Jeffrey Toobin ( A very interesting and well-written book about the current and recent members of the US Supreme Court. Non-fiction)

The Kite Runner. Lots of hype for this one. All of it, earned.

 

[D_Gunther Snotpole]

If you've read all those try Orwell's Hommage to Catalonia..

That's the rare edition.
If you can settle for second best, go for Homage to Catalonia.

 

[Bbucko]

If you were traumatized by The Great Gatsby and its super-dense, concentrated prose, you may have written Fitzgerald off completely, which would be a mistake. Tender Is The Night is his best book (IMO) and a much friendlier read.

City Of Night is brilliance.

 

[Florida Boy]

"Light on Snow" by Anita Shreve.

 

[vince]

The Kite Runner. Lots of hype for this one. All of it, earned.

The movie was gorgeous! and so sad to think what became of the country...

I'm enjoying The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho. Follow your dream...

 

[ManlyBanisters]

That's the rare edition.
If you can settle for second best, go for Homage to Catalonia.

Slip of the keyboard, you pedantic bunnghhole :tongue:

I agree with the above posters about the Kite Runner.

 

[D_Gunther Snotpole]

Slip of the keyboard, you pedantic bunnghhole :tongue:

Do they slip out easily? By now, I suppose they would.:slaphappy:

 

[D_Gunther Snotpole]

City Of Night is brilliance.

Yup.
Lots of Rechy grit.

 

[bigbulgelicker45]

If you're looking for a mystery check out Hounding the Pavement Mystery Writer to Donate Royalties - Associated Content - associatedcontent.com

The author is donating her royalties to a good cause too!

 

[nudeyorker]

I'll also vouch for Tender Is The Night,
Others I have enjoyed are When Everything Changed by Gail Collins
My Old Sweetheart by Susanna Moore
Maybe by Lillian Hellman
Hopscotch by Julio Cortazar
Perdido by Jill Robinson
Anya by Susan Fromberg Schaeffer
Pretty Little Mistakes by Heather McElhatton
Defying The Odds by Marcia Israel-Curley
A Match To The Heart by Gretel Ehrlich
Metropolitan Life and Social Studies by Fran Lebowitz
And I just reread The Cracker Factory by Joyce Burditt Rebeta

 

[DaveyR]

Banks's Wasp Factory

I can't rate Iain Banks highly enough. Another of his I enjoyed immensely was "The Bridge".

Lot's of serious stuff has been suggested but if you want a real funny read (we all need some humour now and again) try "The Queen and I". I read it years ago and it's one of the few books that made me laugh out loud constantly.

 

[Notthe7]

Hm.... interesting suggestions! They will all be filed and declined or accepted. Great for xmas break!

 

[Enid]

i want to 2nd nudeyorker's suggestion of hopscotch by cortazar and also suggest for fluffy fun armistead maupin's tales of the city series.

 

[D_Barzillai Whackingsauce]

Suggestions for Books to read:

Three Days Road, Joseph Boyden (Canadian)
The Sun also Rises, Ernest Hemingway
Underworld, Don Delillo (or anything by him for that matter)
The Amazing Adventures of Kavallier and Clay, Michael Chabon
Tropic of Cancer, Henry Miller
Blindness, Jose Saramigo
In the Skin of a Lion, Michael Ondaatje
Anil's Ghost, Michael Ondaatje
American Pastoral, Philip Roth

Need more?

 

[whatireallywant]

I mostly like sci-fi so I'm not much help there. :biggrin1:

If you want something light, but kind of thought provoking too, there's "The Genesis Code" by John Case (but that might be too close to sci-fi... it's a bio-technical suspense thriller).

And if you just want to keel over laughing, my favorite for that is "Anguished English" and "More Anguished English" by Richard Lederer.

AND... the books in my sig... "Myths of Gender" by Anne Fausto-Sterling, and "Same Difference: How Gender Myths Are Hurting Our Relationships, Our Children, and Our Jobs" by Barnett/Rivers, for some thought provoking counter-point to all those evo-psych sexist theories out there.