Favorite Books Revisited
So quite some time ago I asked people what their favorite books were, so that I could read them. Allow me to circle back.
At the time of the post I was reading theferrett's favorite, The Pillars of the Earth. It is quite easily the best of the dozen or so Ken Follett novels I have read. I strongly recommend it for those who like historical fiction. At the time I read it I joked that it basically told a story about the resource gathering you'd have in Civilization. Apparently somebody anticipated me, because it has been turned into a German-style board game. Presumably the point of the game is to build a cathedral, just like the book. This leads to a question: if you spend several decades building a cathedral in your town, what do you do for an encore?
zoethe contributed the book Dancing at the Rascal Fair, which is the middle book a trilogy of novels set in Montana by Ivan Doig. Doig grew up in Montana on a sheep farm, and you can tell he paid attention with vivid descriptions of late 1800s Montana. I read through it when I was i New York City last December, and although I blazed through it I don't, in retrospect, think it made that much of an impression on me. I recommend it to my father, but it's not my kind of western.
I always enjoy a good Cthulu book, so khiron1416's suggestion of The Mind Parasites was spot on. I enjoyed it. Will it be one of my favorites? No, but if I had read it in junior high it very well might have been. I recommend it to anyone who likes psionics or who thinks the idea of August Derleth appearing as himself in a Cthulu book is awesome.
eirias kicked in two books. The first was The Namesake which has to be one of the best debut novels ever. It's really more of a series of thematically connected short stories than a proper book as each chapter can nearly stand on its own, but that's just quibbling. I greatly enjoyed this book, and it's possible that I may have cried a bit while reading it, although of course I'd deny that if pressed. I was sufficiently impressed with it to go snag Jhumpa Lahiri's short story collection Interpreter of Maladies, which was nearly as good.
The other suggestion eirias kicked in was a non-fiction piece of academic writing by Richard Hofstadter titled Anti-intellectualism in American Life, which took home the Pulitzer in 1964. Well, actually Hofstadter took home the Pulitzer, but you know what I mean. There was a lot of interesting bits about the teaching colleges put together by various strains of American Christianity that I was totally unfamiliar with. However, the thing I'll remember most about this book is that for some reason that hardcover copy I got from the library had its cover put on upside down - so when you were reading this copy of "Anti-Intellectualism in American Life" it looked like you were holding the book upside down!
She didn't specifically respond to my post, but anyone who follows aiela for any length of time will quickly learn that she loves the book Ready Player One by Ernest Cline. I myself had a good time reading it; if I had any complaint it is that the book is too concerned about name dropping 1980s references and that I suspect the book is more fun if you have a deep knowledge of 1980s culture. Since I was a little kid during the first half of the decade I can't claim I recognized all, or even most, of the references, but overall I still enjoyed it greatly.
bart_calendar also did not respond specifically to my post, but he has not been shy about proclaiming his love for White Jazz. This is the fourth book in James Ellroy's LA Quartet; two of the other books were turned into the movies L.A. Confidential and The Black Dahlia. Of all the books on this list, White Jazz was quite possibly the most fun to read. I've always dug noir, which can perhaps be summed up as "revealing the dark beating heart of Los Angeles". I really dig the brief, slang-ridden stream-of-consciousness style of the novel. The corrupt cop who drives this story is a terrible person, but he's quite possible a better person than all the other corrupt cops he is up against.
After reading this I promptly got the book L.A. Confidential from the library. It was very good, but not up to the standards of White Jazz. I will say that having read the book and seen the movie they did a masterful job adapting the book for the screen. The book of The Black Dahlia is on hold. After that, I'm sure I'll go with the last of the LA Quartet books, The Big Nowhere.
Thank you everyone for your suggestions. Although I liked some more than others not one of them was a waste of my time. I still intend to read a few of the other books that were dropped in the comments (mostly by my sister, sorry) but if you've got other favorites you'd like to recommend, feel free to let me know!
At the time of the post I was reading theferrett's favorite, The Pillars of the Earth. It is quite easily the best of the dozen or so Ken Follett novels I have read. I strongly recommend it for those who like historical fiction. At the time I read it I joked that it basically told a story about the resource gathering you'd have in Civilization. Apparently somebody anticipated me, because it has been turned into a German-style board game. Presumably the point of the game is to build a cathedral, just like the book. This leads to a question: if you spend several decades building a cathedral in your town, what do you do for an encore?
zoethe contributed the book Dancing at the Rascal Fair, which is the middle book a trilogy of novels set in Montana by Ivan Doig. Doig grew up in Montana on a sheep farm, and you can tell he paid attention with vivid descriptions of late 1800s Montana. I read through it when I was i New York City last December, and although I blazed through it I don't, in retrospect, think it made that much of an impression on me. I recommend it to my father, but it's not my kind of western.
I always enjoy a good Cthulu book, so khiron1416's suggestion of The Mind Parasites was spot on. I enjoyed it. Will it be one of my favorites? No, but if I had read it in junior high it very well might have been. I recommend it to anyone who likes psionics or who thinks the idea of August Derleth appearing as himself in a Cthulu book is awesome.
eirias kicked in two books. The first was The Namesake which has to be one of the best debut novels ever. It's really more of a series of thematically connected short stories than a proper book as each chapter can nearly stand on its own, but that's just quibbling. I greatly enjoyed this book, and it's possible that I may have cried a bit while reading it, although of course I'd deny that if pressed. I was sufficiently impressed with it to go snag Jhumpa Lahiri's short story collection Interpreter of Maladies, which was nearly as good.
The other suggestion eirias kicked in was a non-fiction piece of academic writing by Richard Hofstadter titled Anti-intellectualism in American Life, which took home the Pulitzer in 1964. Well, actually Hofstadter took home the Pulitzer, but you know what I mean. There was a lot of interesting bits about the teaching colleges put together by various strains of American Christianity that I was totally unfamiliar with. However, the thing I'll remember most about this book is that for some reason that hardcover copy I got from the library had its cover put on upside down - so when you were reading this copy of "Anti-Intellectualism in American Life" it looked like you were holding the book upside down!
She didn't specifically respond to my post, but anyone who follows aiela for any length of time will quickly learn that she loves the book Ready Player One by Ernest Cline. I myself had a good time reading it; if I had any complaint it is that the book is too concerned about name dropping 1980s references and that I suspect the book is more fun if you have a deep knowledge of 1980s culture. Since I was a little kid during the first half of the decade I can't claim I recognized all, or even most, of the references, but overall I still enjoyed it greatly.
bart_calendar also did not respond specifically to my post, but he has not been shy about proclaiming his love for White Jazz. This is the fourth book in James Ellroy's LA Quartet; two of the other books were turned into the movies L.A. Confidential and The Black Dahlia. Of all the books on this list, White Jazz was quite possibly the most fun to read. I've always dug noir, which can perhaps be summed up as "revealing the dark beating heart of Los Angeles". I really dig the brief, slang-ridden stream-of-consciousness style of the novel. The corrupt cop who drives this story is a terrible person, but he's quite possible a better person than all the other corrupt cops he is up against.
After reading this I promptly got the book L.A. Confidential from the library. It was very good, but not up to the standards of White Jazz. I will say that having read the book and seen the movie they did a masterful job adapting the book for the screen. The book of The Black Dahlia is on hold. After that, I'm sure I'll go with the last of the LA Quartet books, The Big Nowhere.
Thank you everyone for your suggestions. Although I liked some more than others not one of them was a waste of my time. I still intend to read a few of the other books that were dropped in the comments (mostly by my sister, sorry) but if you've got other favorites you'd like to recommend, feel free to let me know!