I like to read. A lot. And I like to expand my reading horizons.
I've particulary enjoyed doing that through such threads as this and this.
But now I've read all the books suggested (well, at least all of those that my local library has..). What's more, I've just finished semester - so the next 4 weeks are stretching ahead, just begging to be filled with good reading.
So here's my plea: what books should I read?
Soem background info: I like sci/fi fantasy... I guess I don't really have to state my favourite author.
When I was at a school I went through a big David Eddings phase, as well as the books co-authored by Janny Wurts & Raymond Feist. I love Asimov. I liked the first couple of Stephen Baxter books I read, but then I got fed up with how the story would somehow skip milleniums, yet one original character would end up alive. (Or Mammoths would end up on Mars - yeesh.) I enjoy Terry Pratchett.
I do read other types of books... Don't mind a bit of chick-lit, but only if it's well written. (I really liked Divine Secrets of the Ya-ya Sisterhood.) I can handle 'heavier' books, but only if they're interesting. The Ground Beneath her Feet & Midnight's Children (Salman Rushdie) are two of my all-time favourite books.
So.... suggestions please?
Posted by suntranafs (Member # 3318) on :
I've said it before and I'll say it again: Lloyd Alexander's Prydain Chronicles. Gotta read em. All six of em. And if you like really really weird books, a good one is 'Snow Crash'.
Posted by MyrddinFyre (Member # 2576) on :
The Bean Trees!
Posted by Scythrop (Member # 5731) on :
Have you read "Crime and Punishement"? A little novel by some Russian Dude.
Joyce's Ulyssis is also a nice light holiday read...perhaps on a plane flight?
Posted by Annie (Member # 295) on :
I made a point of reading the scifi greats this summer. Have you read Philip K. Dick? Good stuff. Also, Bradbury is absolutely brilliant. Read everything of his.
I absolutely love the Earthsea series by LeGuin, and have an inexplicable attatchement to everything ever written by Madeleine L'Engle.
What I should be reading right now is Anouilh, but once again, assigned reading fails to put up much of a fight when pitted against The Crystal city. Posted by imogen (Member # 5485) on :
quote: Have you read "Crime and Punishement"? A little novel by some Russian Dude.
Joyce's Ulyssis is also a nice light holiday read...perhaps on a plane flight?
(I hate the 'taunt'/ hey-look-at-me-I-have-hands-for-ears smiley, but you deserve it...)
Annie - I've read pretty much everything of Ursula Le Guin's (and loved it), but the only Madeline l'Engle book I've read is A Wrinkle in Time. Hmmm, will have to seek out some others. will also investigate Phillip K Dick (read some Bradbury already. Loved some, ambivalent towards others)
Suntranafs - What's the first book in the Prydain Chronicles? My library has an eclectic assortment of titles...
[ November 19, 2003, 08:43 PM: Message edited by: imogen ]
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
I didn't like the Wizard of Earthsea. It's been so long since I tried, I can't remember why.
Posted by Tzadik (Member # 5825) on :
Recently I've read a book that made huge impression on me and made it to my all time TOP list.
Try "Watership Down" by Richard Adams. I highly recommend it!
By the way, how did your exam go the other day? Posted by Mrs.M (Member # 2943) on :
I just reread Gloria Naylor's Linden Hills and it's even better than I remembered. Read it with The Inferno. My favorite Naylor book is still Mama Day, though.
I Know This Much Is True and She's Come Undone by Wally Lamb are great.
Laurell K. Hamilton's Anita Blake and Merry Gentry series are awesome, but very adult (i.e. filled with vampire-wereanimal-human sex and violence).
Everything by Garth Nix is fantastic. Start with Sabriel, Lirael, and Abhorsen.
Posted by imogen (Member # 5485) on :
Thanks Mrs M - I will start hunting them down at the library.
Tzadik - my exam was much better than expected! And now I've finished for the year which is even better...
Posted by ana kata (Member # 5666) on :
Mark Salzman's The Laughing Sutra
Louis McMaster Bujold's Cordelia's Honor
If you liked Asimov, then have you read Clarke and Heinlein?
I second the recommendation for Dostoyevsky. Either Crime and Punishment, The Idiot, The Brothers Karamazov, The Gambler, or The Insulted and the Humiliated.
Nevil Shute's Round the Bend, No Highway, or Trustee from the Toolroom.
Posted by beatnix19 (Member # 5836) on :
quote: Don't mind a bit of chick-lit, but only if it's well written.
Not a huge fan of this type of fiction but these are two very good authors.
Posted by eslaine (Member # 5433) on :
If you don't want to get into anything heavy, try A Stainless Steel Rat is Born. I read Harrison's series in order, but this later, more mature, book is a real hoot, and a great place to start the series.
Slippery Jim Lives!
Posted by DanielW2 (Member # 5861) on :
Wolf in Shadow - David Gemmell (fantasy, sort of) Perdido Street Station - China Mieville (fantasy) The Crow Road - Iain Banks (lifi) Gates of Fire - Steven Pressfield (historical, about the battle of Thermoplyae) Sharpe's Eagle - Bernard Cornwell (historical, Napoleonic Wars)
All these I have very much enjoyed (I know that the last one is a little off your stated beaten track, but I've always thought that the reasons one likes Ender's game would probably make one like this also)
[ November 20, 2003, 05:17 PM: Message edited by: DanielW2 ]
Posted by solo (Member # 3148) on :
Since suntranafs hasn't answered yet, I will. The Prydain Chronicles are as follows:
The Book Of Three The Black Cauldron The Castle Of Llyr Taran Wanderer The High King
The sixth book is a short story collection that gives some background stories on some of the characters and it is called "The Foundling and Other Tales of Prydain" or something like that. It is good, but not essential to enjoying the series.
I recently read "The Iron Ring", also by Alexander, and I really enjoyed it.
Posted by imogen (Member # 5485) on :
Wow, thanks everyone.
So far I have about 10 books on hold at my library - now off to do more....
Beatnix19: I've read Barbara Kingsolver, and actually really liked her writing. Just nice, easy to read stories. Great for plane trips, not too trashy.
Ana Kate - I have tried Crime and Punishment about 60 times and never got very far. I have a bad habit of forgetting which character is who. Scythrop knows this very well.... He was teasing me. Still, maybe I should give Dostoyevsky another try.
Haven't read any Heinlein... another one to go hunt down.
Daniel - thanks for all the suggestions. I'll try Sharpe's Eagle (and the others).. Have no problem with going off my stated path - in fact, detours just make it all the more interesting (I've just finished Bryson's A Walk in the Woods and for some reason that sentence reminded me of the AT... hmm).
And ta Solo
[ November 20, 2003, 05:51 PM: Message edited by: imogen ]
Posted by Fitz (Member # 4803) on :
For good sci-fi, you can't go wrong with John Varley. Some of his older books are hard to find, but are all worth the search.
I just finished Wolves of the Calla, by Stephen King. It has given me a renewed interest in King's universe, and I now feel compelled to look back through my collection and find all the connections the Gunslinger's world. There was even a nod to Harry Potter in there.
Lonesome Dove, by Larry McMurtry. One of the best books of all time, though not fantasy or sci-fi. Well, maybe a little bit of fantasy.
Everything by Robin Hobb.
Posted by ae (Member # 3291) on :
imogen, I second Daniel's suggestions of Mieville and Banks.
If you like sf/f, you really have to check out the short stories of Michael Swanwick. Gravity's Angels and Tales of Old Earth are both wonderful collections. His novels are pretty good, too, but they don't appeal to me as much. YMMV.
Kelly Link, Ray Vukcevich and Shelley Jackson are three other excellent fantasy short-fictioneers that come to mind. Link's Stranger Things Happen is an excellent, mind-bending collection in the most perfect prose you'll ever find in the genre. Shelley Jackson's The Melancholy of Anatomy is much the same, except it's themed; each story is based on one organ or humour or whatnot. Ray Vukcevich's Meet Me in the Moon Room is all over the map, from gonzo surrealism to sad little vignettes, all shot through with endless good humour.
I'll be back later to post links to some of their stories, if I can find them. Hope this is useful to you.
Posted by imogen (Member # 5485) on :
Thanks ae. I've read quite a bit of Banks - both the sci fi ('Iain M Banks') and the lit-fic (just plain Iain Banks) and so far I've liked everything except Canal Dreams.
At this rate I'm going to have about 50 holds on my library card! Oh well, I did ask...
Keep the suggestions coming
Posted by ae (Member # 3291) on :
By Kelly Link (all from her collection Stranger Things Happen):
Another excellent sf/f short story writer (sorry for dumping all this on you, but I have a thing for short fiction): M. John Harrison. Here's a wonderful story of his, "Isobel Avens Returns to Stepney in the Spring", which is included in his new collection Things That Never Happen.
Posted by MoonRabbit (Member # 3652) on :
Anything by Octavia Butler: Wild Seed or the Dawn, Adulthood Rites, Imago series is incredible. She is able to make totally believable, totally alien aliens. Also the only truly believable 3-sex aliens I've read.
Robert Sawyer is great if you like hard sci-fi. My favorites are Frameshift and Factoring Humanity. Posted by ana kata (Member # 5666) on :
Oh, someone else I have to recommend that's literary fiction is Thornton Wilder. He's so great! You may know him as the author of the play "Our Town", but he also wrote novels, the most famous of which is The Bridge of San Luis Rey.
Posted by ae (Member # 3291) on :
Bump!
Posted by Dan_raven (Member # 3383) on :
There are so many......
Charles DeLint helped define the genre-Urban Fantasy. Any of his books are good, with strong female characters. I'd call it Fantasy Chick Lit.
Spider Robinson, especially "Calahan's Bar" series is light and fun, jumping from Pun contests to physics in the plink of a paragraph.
Tolkien Dune
but what helped me find a lot of the readers I love now, and might be a fun day trip for you, browse the shelves in the library until something jumps out at you.
Asimov edited a lot of short story collections. Delve into them. In fact, any short story collection that is not a school text, can be fun.
Posted by imogen (Member # 5485) on :
quote: but what helped me find a lot of the readers I love now, and might be a fun day trip for you, browse the shelves in the library until something jumps out at you.
Just off to the library now... to pick up 17 books waiting for me!
The only problem with the browse approach is I find I miss some authors - either cos the book doesn't look interesting (well, what else am I going to judge it by?) or the books are out on loan.
Posted by ae (Member # 3291) on :
Is anyone reading these things? Because, you know, they're really good. Posted by imogen (Member # 5485) on :
An update after plowing through some of the books (and having 20 others waiting!).
Got some Madeline L'Engle (thanks Annie) - the Austin series (thanks for your parachat suggestions rivka) and really enjoyed them. I found it interesting that the characters are so much more (conventionally) religous than those in A Wrinkle of Time.
Mrs M - I read the first two Anita Blake books, and quite enjoyed them, in a light 'n fluffy way. Very good end of a long day at work reading. Linden Hills, Mama Day and I Know This Much is True are still waiting for me at home. Read Sabriel (and now Scythrop is onto it) - I hadn't realised Garth Nix was Australian. His style seems much more English to me. Really enjoyed it though - now to hunt out the others.
I started Lillith's Brood on the train this morning (all three books in one) and I am absolutely loving it. Thanks a heap MoonRabbit - Octavia Butler is definately a new favourite author (if I can judge by 23 pages...).
Oh, and I read the first book of the Pyrdain Chronicles - enjoyed it a lot. It reminded me a bit of Emily Rodda's two fantasy series for children (the Rowan series, and the Deltora Quest) - have you read those suntranafs/anyone else?
And ae, I will read them: I just find it hard to read stories on screen. I might try and hunt down hard copies instead (a good chunk of the joy of reading for me is the tactile sensation of a book anyhow.)
So thankyou everyone - of course, not that I expected anything less. Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
I thought I had read all of Octavia Butler's stuff. Is Lilith's Brood the three books about the Oankali? My three-books-in-one of that series is called Xenogenesis. Posted by imogen (Member # 5485) on :
Yup, it's Dawn, Adulthood Rites & Imago.
Wait a minute... the inside page says 'originally published as The Xenogenesis Trilogy'... so there we are.
(This is a 2000 edition)
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
Yeesh. I didn't originally care for the title Xenogenesis, but it's grown on me. But Lilith's Brood? *shudders* Ah well, they're great stories, by whatever title.
Posted by Fyfe (Member # 937) on :
Dr. Zhivago is a wonderful book. So are The Three Musketeers and the Count of Monte Cristo, if you're in the right mood for them.
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Is Lilith's Brood the three books about the Oankali? My three-books-in-one of that series is called Xenogenesis. ![[Dont Know]](graemlins/dontknow.gif)