What's your favourite book(s)?

[Oddysseus]

1984 by George Orwell.  Great read; of course, it's pretty depressing being an American and watching your government use tactics right out of it.  It's a cautionary tale, not a how-to book, guys.

But let's not drag this thread down with politics:

Watchmen by Alan Moore.  If there's any comic book that actually deserves that pretentious "Graphic Novel" designation, it's this one.

I'd also like to second the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy recommendation, especially if anyone here has only seen the movie version.  Read all five books of the trilogy- you won't regret it.

[LUniqueDan]

Hard to choose a favorite one, but I'll say :

The Foucault's Pendulum by Umberto Eco. Deep inquiries into conspiracy theories by 3 editors who get fed up by all the crap they received for publication. So they decide to write their own. Each chapter of this book handle more material than 10 DaVinci Codes.

Burning Chrome : A compedium of short cyberpunk novels wrote by (EDIT: Mostly by) William Gibson. I think most of them are public domain today. And I strongly recommend Fragments of a Hologram Rose for anyone who believe that cyberpunk is olny about Shoot-Em-Up Stories.

[Kweepa]

Some books that I can (and have) read over and over:

[Shane 'ProgZmax' Stevens]

Ah yes, The Case-Book of Sherlock Holmes.  Good read.

Also:

High Crusade by Poul Anderson

The Hobbit obviously by J.R.R. Tolkien

Shadow of Sorcery by Andrew J. Offutt

The Elenium Series by David Eddings

[cat]

The cuckoo's egg is great, a journey to the beginnings of internet and hacking
Smilla's Sense of Snow by Peter Høeg, great mixture of crime story, thriller and descriptions of greenland
Confessions of Felix Krull (Bekenntnisse des Hochstaplers Felix Krull) by Thomas Mann, really funny book
The Hollow Chocolate Bunnies of the Apocalypse by Robert Rankin, completely absurd fantasy story with very weird ideas

[auriond]

Generally, the books I've read to the point of nearly being able to recite passages from memory are:

- The Belgariad, The Malloreon, The Elenium and the Tamuli series, all by David Eddings
- The Sherlock Holmes series by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
- The Robot novels by Isaac Asimov

Sad but true.

[Paper Carnival]

I don't have a favourite book, but I enjoy fantasy most of all.

Currently I'm reading the books based on the Realm of the Elderlings. In particular, I'm on the third book of the first trilogy, the Assassin's Quest.

I'm really enjoying it so far, there's some great use of language, believable and unexpected plot development (no, I'm not speaking of cheesy "twists"), with interesting characters. I'd recommend it to more than just fantasy fans.

[Kweepa]

I forgot these classics

[Stupot]

I'm sure this has been discussed before, but why don't we have some kind of a book club?
Every 2 weeks or so we'll agree upon a book which we all have to read, and then we'll discuss it as we go.  Each book can have its own thread so we can always keep discussions open even after going onto the next book.

If this isn't really deemed suitable for an AGS forum then Id be happy to host such a thing on the forum at my website.

Any takers?

(I am quite sure this has been proposed before, but theres no harm in asking again).

[Tuomas]

A book club would be great Though for the busy 2 weeks could be a bit too short. Or depending on the book of course. I'm starting work in 3 weeks, but some literature would do great on freetime! I'm in if there's more people to this.

[Ponch]

Last Stand of the DNA Cowboys by Mick Farren.
Love this book. I must have read it a dozen times. Also love Phaid The Gambler by the same guy. Something about it just clicks with me. Very strange but self-consistent world. It was a nice change of pace from all the increasingly generic cyberpunk that was swamping my local Waldenbooks back in the day.

An Artist of the Floating World by Kazuo Ishiguro
Someone got this as a gift for me years ago. I lived in Japan for a while and this book really "brings that place back" for me every time I read it.

American Journeys: An Anthology of Travel in the United States Edited by E. D. Bennett.
A collection of letters written by people who were traveling America when it was still a brand new country. Makes me appreciate the interstate and air conditioning!

Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain.
Best coming of age story I've ever read. Also one of the last truly great things Twain wrote before he got old, cranky, and bitter.

Hunt for Red October by Tom Clancy.
Not a big fan of techno thrillers, but Clancy more or less created that genre with this book, and it's still about the only book of its kind I actually want to read (and for a while there, books of this sort were about all I could find to read at airports! -- thank goodness that fad, along with so much of the uninspiring cyberpunk that followed in Gibson's wake, seems to have faded at last.)

Faerie Tale by Raymond E Feist.
Another one of those book I purchased while I was desperate for something to read and my options were limited. I bought this thing while my sister was in the hospital. Maybe it was the circumstances, but this book really struck a chord with me (this sort of thing isn't normally my cup of tea) and I still read it from time to time all these years later. The poor paperback is practically falling apart by this point!

Well, there you have it. Sort of a long list, but these are the books I can't get enough of.

- Ponch

[Neil Dnuma]

Roadside Picnic - Boris & Arkady Strugatsky

Have you seen the film "Stalker" by Tarkovsky? If so, how do you feel it was, compared to the book? "Stalker" is one of my favourite films.

My favourite author is Dostoevsky, and "Brothers Karamazov", "Crime and Punishment" and "The Idiot" in particular. His "The Insulted and Humiliated" is also a great, great novel. "Apart from him, Kafka, Joyce, Chekov, Proust, Mann. Also Hemingway, his short stories in particular.

[Baron]

So that my recommendation will not seem diluted I will list only the most mind blowing book I can remember reading:

A Short History of Progress by Ronald Wright.  I caught a part of it in lecture form on public radio and I was hooked.  Only a hundred or so pages but very compelling.  It is basically an essay about how civilization is doomed.  Most of it is about human history (hence the title) which is one of my great interests, but the implications for the future are manifest.

Re:  Book Club.  Good idea, since many folk in these forums share similar interests, but I don't think many students or employed people can read a book in two weeks.  I would be interested in a non-fiction club, but only if the time period is stretched to at least a month.

[dasjoe]

http://www.lovelybooks.com/

[OneDollar]

I've read a fair number of detective stories, recently Colin Dexter's Inspector Morse series: usually fun and a (fairly) easy read, with clever plots. But the most interesting detective novels I've read recently are

Dissolution and Dark Fire by C.J. Sansom, the first two books in the Matthew Shardlake series. The main character's a hunchbacked lawyer working for Thomas Cromwell in Tudor England. Its been very well researched and is pretty historically accurate, yet also well written with very interesting plots. Definitely a good read whether you're into mysteries, history or whatever.

I'll also 4th (5th, 6th?) The Hitch-hikers Guide To The Galaxy series, both intelligent and funny.

I also keep going back to certain books that I read when I was younger. They're not really recommendations (unless you know, or secretly are a 12 year old), but I have to admit I still enjoy them
Alex Rider series (and any other books) by Antony Horowitz - teenage spy books, but actually believable
The Edge Chronicles by Paul Stewart and Chris Riddell - fantasy series with an expansive world and wonderful line art illustrations

[Stupot]

Actually I'd like to mention I'm currently reading Bill Bryson's Mother Tounge.  It's about language and linguistics.  I've only just started it but it's already fascinating and Bryson has a wonderful way of telling his readers facts without making it read like a text book (anyone who's read his A Brief History of Everything or indeed any of his travel books, will know what I mean).

************

Re:  Book Club.  Good idea, since many folk in these forums share similar interests, but I don't think many students or employed people can read a book in two weeks.  I would be interested in a non-fiction club, but only if the time period is stretched to at least a month.

Actually to be honest I'm hard pressed to read a book in 2 weeks aswell.  Lets call it a month, and like I said we'd always leave the threads open anyway, so discussions can continue way after the month.

One thing though, I said I would host it on my forum, but its freewenbs one and that would probably mean having to sign up to freewebs to use the forum which seems a bit silly if your not actually planning to use freewebs.  Would anyone mind, or shall we think of another way?

[Lamak]

A confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole
Dune by Frank Herbert
The Robots series by Isaac Asimov (Robots and Empire, the Ending... Just great)

(by alphabetical order)

[Blackthorne]

Fierce Invalids Home From Hot Climates by Tom Robbins was one of the best books I have ever read.


Bt

[JimmyShelter]

I used to read almost all sf and fantasy I could get my hands on, but these days I tend to shy away from the epics minimum three books series after Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series spoiled those for me.

These days I'm more into less formulaic fiction (still mostly science fiction and fantasy), more intelligent if you will.

On my top list can be found:
- Most books by Terry Pratchett, especially the later Discworld books (which are both serious as funny).

- The books of Iain (M.) Banks, both his sf as his more literary works, with a special mention to Player of Games.

- The books of China Miéville. Highly innovative fantasy, great worldbuilding, great politics.

- Recently I discovered Neil Gaiman, at the moment I'm thoroughly enjoying American Gods. Haven't finished it yet, but so far it's great.

[bicilotti]

The Republic by Plato - we always remember him as the greatest above all Philosophers, but he was a marvellous storyteller too. I reread the Republic a least once every nine months and am fascinated and lost in the dialogues every time.

The Rime of the ancient mariner by Samuel Taylor Coleridge - there's a famous edition with the prints of Gustave Doré. Never has a book been such a pleasure to the mind and the eyes.

and probably somethin by Ernst Junger (I don't know how to make the umlaut above the "u"!), Heliopolis maybe. In Italy this author is widely overlooked and I feel  in the rest of Europe too, sadly. Many great ideas and a tactile feeling in everyone of his words.