Favorite Book(s) / Reccomendations...

[ChefChiTown]

I know we have the "What Are You Reading" thread, but I was interested in seeing what everybody's favorite book(s) is.

(I already did a search and didn't find anything)

Personally, I'm a huge fan of the following...

- To Kill A Mockingbird, Harper Lee
- A Case Of Need, Michael Crichton
- Angels & Demons / The Da Vinci Code, Dan Brown
- Eye Of The Needle, Ken Follett
- Mr. S: My Life With Frank Sinatra, George Jacobs

So, what are some of your favorites?

(I'm asking because I plan on buying a decent amount of books soon)

 

[Ace Boobtoucher]

"The Hot Kid" and "Up in Honey's Room" by Elmore Leonard
"Hollywood Crows" by Joseph Wambaugh (or anything else he's written, really)
"Child 44" by Tim Robb Smith was one of the best books I've read in a few years.
Anything by W.E.B. Griffith, Steve Berry and Raymond Khoury.

Even though I really enjoy most of John Steinbeck's work I absolutely hated "To a God Unknown." Just to make sure I really disliked it I read it twice and yup, I really hated it.

 

[Blink]

I already mentioned some of my favorites in the 5 Favorite Books thread. Here are more:

Eon, Eternity, and Legacy by Greg Bear
Hyperion and The Fall of Hyperion by Dan Simmons
The Dragonbone Chair (Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn) by Tad Williams
A Game of Thrones (A Song of Ice and Fire) by George R.R. Martin
Vampire of the Mists by Christie Golden

 

[Patrick_S]

Books of Blood by Clive Barker

 

[slither]

Diary Of A Drug Fiend by Aleister Crowley (currently reading this again for the third time this year)

I usually read what can relate to me.

 

[bustybbwlover]

valis by philip k dick
the illuminatus! trilogy by robert shea and robert anton wilson
boys from brazil by ira levin
child of god by cormac mcarthy
on the genealogy of morals by friedrich nietzsche
off the top of my head...i'd probably switch a few if i thought about it for a while

 

[Galactic]

I'm a fan of fiction, but here are some of my favorites, though the list changes with each passing week......

1.) My Antonia - Willa Cather
2.) The House of Mirth - Edith Wharton
3.) Crime and Punishment - Dostoyevsky
4.) Where I'm Calling From - Raymond Carver
5.) One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest - Ken Kesey
6.) Light In August - William Faulkner
7.) The Sun Also Rises - Ernest Hemingway
8.) The Stranger - Albert Camus
9.) The Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
10.) Would You Please Be Quiet, Please? - Raymond Carver

 

[calpoon]

wow, great list BBL, I think that we'd get along well.

Hmm. I'll try to avoid some of the more obvious choices and go with lesser known books...

Greg Rucka's Atticus Kodiak novels- Keeper, Finder, Smoker.

Crime dramas about a professional bodyguard, kind of like a bluecollar version of Tom Clancy. There's a couple more in the series and all of them are good, except the very last one Patriot Acts, which fuckin sucks. Well, Ok, so it's not bad if you go through it and cross out and change all the chacrter's names and pretend like it's not part of the same series.

His Queen & Country novels- A Gentleman's Game and ugh.. I forget the other one are pretty good too. Not as good as the comic book that they are based on though. His Batman: No Man's Land novelization isn't bad either.

 

[Embryoyo]

Desperation by Stephen King, by far the best book I've ever read. I'm pretty big on the full version of The Stand too.

 

[calpoon]

If I could only recommend one book it would be House Of Leaves by Mark Danielewski.

It's about a guy who finds and publishes a manuscript that is a dissertation on a documentary film. The subject of the film is a house that appears to be a portal into another dimension.

The bulk of the book is the "actual" text of the manuscript and is footnoted by the "publisher's" notations, commentaries and personal diary. So in other words it's as if the story is actually true and the manuscript was published and you are now reading it.

From the all the reviews I've heard you either love it and it speaks to you, or you hate it and you think it's nonsense.

 

[Embryoyo]

This book sounds really GAY, but extremely COOL at the same time... Long as it's not like those stupid "crazy house" movies I'm willing to check further into it

 

[calpoon]

"crazy house" movies? I don't know what you mean?

 

[Embryoyo]

Amityville Horror type shit... LAME!

 

[calpoon]

well, no, it's not exactly an M. Night Shyamalan movie. While it does have a definite resolution, it doesn't hold your hand and walk you there, ya dig? In other words it has complexities that aren't hammered into you and it is open for personal interpretation, which seems to be what people like about it. I think that there are genuinely entertaining and suspenseful scenes, so don't get me wrong, but like most great books it's more about the journey than the destination. and I think it's people who have that point of view, perhaps the people that do want Ammityville, that don't like it.

 

[Embryoyo]

I wouldn't consider Amityville Horror an Shyamalan movie either, it's been around much longer than him... I'd just consider it lame and boring. Thanks for the tip though.

Oh yeah, I just realazed Mr. Night remade the Amityville Horror... Yeah, I haven't seen it.... I was speaking on behalf of the original, which I'm assuming is equally as terrible.

EDIT... that made no sense... The original AH was terrible, and I can assume the MNS remake is equally as bad because his movies are terrible. There

 

[calpoon]

I just meant that M. Night's movies are all about this "twist" ending where the whole point of the thing seems to be the big pay off in the last five minutes where everything is revealed as if you are James Bond shackled to the floor in the villain's lair.

As for what is lame and boring, I guess that's just a matter of opinion, and not for me to say.

Here's another one for the list Chuck Palahniuk's sci-fi epic Rant, which I think is generally underrated. It's subtitled as "an oral history" and that is exactly what it is, a series of interview-style segments piecing together all the different perspectives of the characters that were involved in the life of Buster "Rant" Casey. I think it's pretty incredible in the fact that it's the only book I can recall whose protagonist never gets to tell his side of the story.

 

[CunningStunts]

Anything by Herman Hesse.

 

[BlueBalls]

I thought I should point this thread out: 5 Favourite Books

I'm not to happy with my list ^ but I cant be bothered to change it now :hatsoff:

 

[STDiva]

White Noise - Don Dellilo - No relation to the shitty Micheal Keaton movie.
Cats Cradle - Kurt Vonnegut
World War Z - Max Brooks
Eric Clapton Autobiography
The Crying of Lot 49 - Thomas Pynchon

 

[Neutron66]

The Three Musketeers

Greatest.

Book.

Ever.