Let's Talk Books.

[Elementary - Dear Watson]

My 3 favourite series:

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland/Through the Looking Glass.

Sherlock Holmes

and Steven King's Dark Tower series!

The Alice books are just damn good though, nobody reading it for the first time expects any of what happens, but the whole thing is absurd, but insanely clever, and Alice herself is the perfect character to take you on the journey! Her constant questioning of things that we just take for granted is just hilarious, like why certain words are they way they are, or why some things are just plain silly! It is great stuff!

 

[Death God]

In no real order:

The Hunger Games Trilogy
The Bartimaeus Trilogy
The Pendragon Series (not sure how many there were)

I love reading books so it is hard to narrow it down to my top 3 favorite but I did enjoy these ones the most.

 

[CAPTCHA]

Vampire World (trilogy) by Brian Lumley

Ringwold by Larry Niven (or Possibly Rama by Arthur C Clark)

Them: Adventure with Extremists by Jon Ronson

 

[Azahul]

Alright, my favourite author is Terry Pratchett, but I'm going to ignore the Discworld series because if I did the top three books would all be from there...

As it is, that makes my top three all from Kim Newman's Anno Dracula series! In order:

1. The Bloody Red Baron - the second book in the series
2. The Judgement of Tears - the third book in the series
3. Anno Dracula - the first book in the series

All awesome books. Anno Dracula is set in 1888, three years after Dracula triumped over his attackers. Now married to Queen Victoria, with a good chunk of England's population turned into vampires, the undead across the world have come out of hiding. Many have made their way to England to join in Dracula's new world order, but immortality is being embraced across the world.

Then, in 1888, in the streets of Whitechapel, someone begins to murder vampire prostitutes, carving them up in a truly gruesome display. So yeah, the alternative title of the book could very easily be, "Jack the Ripper: Vampire Slayer". Fascinating books, with some pretty unique takes on vampires. Not to mention cameo appearances by a whole swathe of characters in the public domain. Professor Moriarty comes in at one point, the master of the Tower of London is Count Orlock, the coroners on the Jack the Ripper case are Doctors Jekyll and Moreau, not to mention a raft of historical figures as well.

The sequel, The Bloody Red Baron, is my favourite. Set during 1918 in the days leading up to Germany's last big offensive, it mostly concerns itself with the Baron Mannfred von Richtofen, more commonly known as the Red Baron, one of Germany's flying aces with the ability to shapeshift into a giant bat-thing and tackle planes in mid-air. The other prominent characters include a squad of Allied flyers tasked to bring him down, Edgar Poe, living in exile in Austria, who is called in to write the Red Baron's biography, and a number of characters from the first book. If you thought the first book was gory, well... it seems as if Kim Newman decided to use the resilence of vampires to subject them to as many agony as was inhumanly possible. Still, great book.

The third book is the Judgement of Tears, which is hard to talk about if you haven't read the first two. It's set in Rome during the 1960s and is mostly about wrapping up a lot of the major themes built up during the first two books. I really like it, because it basically highlights all the things I find amazing about Kim Newman's take on vampires.

Great series, and Kim Newman is writing a new one (called Johnny Alucard, set in the 1980s), which I believe is set to come out this year (coinciding with the 20th anniversary of the release of the original book). I heartily recommend them to anyone who... well, anyone really. The series has some of the most interesting takes on vampires that I've ever seen. The books are pretty messy and probably not for the squeamish, but hey, that could be a selling point for a lot of people.

 

[MelasZepheos_v1legacy]

My favourite book?

Probably Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson.

Spoiler

If sailor tales to sailor tunes
Storm and adventure, heat and cold
If schooners, islands, and maroons
And buccaneers, and buried gold
And all the old romance, retold
Exactly in the ancient way
Can please, as me they pleased of old
The wiser youngsters of today:

So be it, and fall on! If not
If studious youth no longer crave
His ancient appetites forgot
Kingston, or Ballantyne the brave
Or Cooper of the wood and wave:
So be it, also! And may I
And all my pirates share the grave
Where these and their creations lie!

For the others, would be a lot harder to say, but for arguments sake

2. Percy Jackson and the Olympians (Really the whole series, I couldn't pick one)
3. Harry Potter (Same)

Because the three listed above are always the books I return too. My first copy of Chamber of Secrets literally fell apart from overreading, which should give you some idea.

Close seconds:

Chronicles of Narnia
Artemis Fowl
Selina Roth

 

[Thespian]

1. Death Note
2. The Bartimaeus Triolgy
3. Hunger Games Triolgy

I wanna stop you right there, right now, and give you a big hug for including Bartimaeus in your top three.

Does your inclusion of Death note mean we can include comics? If so...

1. Sandman Vol. 1 (Or just all of it)
2. His Dark Materials Trilogy
3. Millennium Trilogy

Possibly. Bartimaeus, Inheritance, some Ray Bradbury books, V for Vendetta, Watchmen, Hitchhiker's, I Am Legend and others are also contenders.

 

[Tips_of_Fingers]

Favourite book is Catch-22 by Joseph Heller. Almost everything is perfect.
One book that has almost knocked Catch-22 off the top spot (it's been there almost 6 years):

Leviathan by Paul Auster. This book is fucking incredible. It just ends too soon.

Honourable mention should also go to Cormac McCarthy's The Road, Philip K Dick's A Scanner Darkly and Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-Five.

I've just finished Crime and Punishment. It took me so long to get through...I enjoyed it but it was damn taxing at times. I will read Cormac McCarthy's Outer Dark next. I'm looking forward to it.

As for adaptations... I think of them as the director's interpretation of - or homage to - the book rather than something that should stay completely faithful. Sometimes it's impossible to completely capture aspects of a book in a film. (Catch-22 and Watchmen's adaptations are pretty good examples of this.)

The prose is simplistic to the point of being blatant, there's no mystery or poignancy to anything that is said.

I don't think there's meant to be much mystery. The characters just exist...There is no underlying motive between the man and his son. I think I loved it because of it's sparseness...It felt unlike anything I had ever read before.

 

[Korenith]

You didn't think The Road was good? Not even from a "not my thing but technically very clever" standpoint? The sparseness of the prose, the stripped down dialogue, patterned language dealing in disease and decay and sterility all creating a terrifyingly emotive post-appocalyptic wasteland? I mean hey, not enjoying it I can understand. I thought it certainly deserves a healthy amount of respect though. What put you off if you don't mind me asking?

The prose is simplistic to the point of being blatant, there's no mystery or poignancy to anything that is said. It can't be technically clever because there is no real "technique", not in the way that one could call, for instance, Woolf's "The Waves" interesting from a technical standpoint (being stream of consciousness). It wasn't bad, but it certainly didn't come across as a modern masterpiece or one of the most important novels of the last decade, or any of the other hyperbolic titles people were throwing at it.

And I love to debate books with people, so ask away!

@ All those who's read Nineteen Eighty-four - how many of you have read Zamyatin's "We", upon which Orwell based a lot of his material. It's an underrated classic.

No I agree it's not technical in the way writers like Woolf or Joyce or any of the great masters of innovative ways of writing were but I think the simplicity is part of what makes The Road great. The world MacCarthy writes about is stark and barren and I think the writing should reflect that, which to me it totally does. It's so blatant because its a deliberate reflection of the emptiness of mystery and poignancy in the characters lives. I think he knows exactly what he's doing when he writes that way.

But I get what you mean in the sense that it doesn't have a more traditional literary flair. I'm a nut for books which reflect the content stylistically but for some it kills the flow and just isn't what people enjoy reading. Judging from your own top three we go to books for very different things.

That being said, it does have moments of poetry like this line from the opening paragraph:

"Nights dark beyond darkness and the days more gray each one than what had gone before. Like the onset of sone glaucoma dimming away the world"

Might also have to give "We" a look though since 1984 is a book I really enjoyed.

 

[SirDeadly]

I have so many favourite series of books that I can't really number them but if I had to pick #1 would definitely be The Rangers Apprentice series.

Other include:
The Night Angel Trilogy
The Black Prism
The Chronicles of Siala
The Temeraire series
Brotherband
The Tomorrow Series
Mogworld

 

[Redryhno]

I'd have to say:

1.Riptide by Douglass Preston and Lincoln Child (or anything they do together, except for Fever Dream.This one's my favorite though)
2.Island in the Sea of Time series by S.M. Sterling
3.Drizzt Do'Urden series's
4.Wheel of Time series
5.Sword of Truth (an episode of the show they made me have to re-read the series,damn you LOTS)
6.David Eddings
7.Anything by Neil Gaiman

 

[Alssadar]

I like most books, but they're mainly around characters who do things. I find literature interesting and an amazing historical record of life for others.
Nonetheless, my top 5.
1) Warhammer 40,000: Space Wolf Omnibus (1 & 2). I guess I'm just a raving fan, but nothing beats steroid-pumped super vikings in space.
2) Brave New World. A Utopia setting that actually makes sense, and easy to recognize similarities.
3) Great Gastby. Once you get past all of the symbolism, I realize I'm a bit like Nick-I despise the wealth and waste, but Gatz in amazing.
4) Sphere. A Michael Crichton book, to say the least, that is freaking amazing with other-world encounters and speculation.
5) Jig the Goblin. A series of small novels, but nonetheless, one of my favorite fantasy stories about your favorite runts.

EDIT: How could I have forgotten the joys of Ray Bradbury, from Martian Chronicles, Fahrenheit 451, and Dandelion Wine?

And there we go. Oh boy, I just love the power of Novels!

 

[deckpunk]

3. The Running Man - Stephen King

2. Men At Arms - Terry Pratchett

1. Neverwhere - Neil Gaiman

Love Neil Gaiman, 'neverwhere' is excellent, as are 'American Gods' and 'Anansi Boys'. His short stories are also fantastic with 'The Price' and 'Snow,Glass and Apples' being my favourites.

I completely agree with you about 'The Running Man'. It is a great book and deserved a faithful adaptation as opposed to that godawful ahnuld scwa-howeveryouspellhisname movie. It would be awesome to see that final moment in the book (you know what I'm talking about) translated to the screen.

I have not read any Pratchett, but considering how many people have recommended him to me I would be fool not to grab a few of his books.

Now for my own choices,

3) Storm Front (& all the subsequent books in the Dresden files) - Jim Butcher
2) Sirens of Titan (And pretty much everything else ever written by) - Kurt Vonnegut
1) Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas/The Rum Diary (I just can't choose between these two) - Hunter S.Thompson

 

[BathorysGraveland]

My favourite book isn't so much one book, but a compilation of short stories. The series is 'Conan the Cimmerian' (the original 30's works, not the other junk) and the book is 'The Complete Chronicles of Conan' released in 2006. Contains all of the original, unchanged Conan writings of Robert E. Howard, including some fragments and unfinished work. So that, good man, is my all-time favourite book.

The Conan the Barbarian film (1982) was fucking brilliant as well, but not really true to the original character.

 

[Smiley Face]

I'm not real big on 'favourites' for my books - I'm in the midst of reorganizing my room, it's got 3 bookshelves and it's hard to arrange things so they all make sense. So I'll limit myself to echoing ones that have already been stated, but not enough - meaning that I'll only briefly say Terry Pratchett again because his stuff is awesome.

Patrick Rothfuss' Kingkiller Chronicle Series is fantastic. The imaginative fantasy setting manages to evoke some small reminiscence of Harry Potter as the main character is a mischievous prodigy seeking a magical education - but it strikes a darker, more intelligent, and funnier tone - for example, the magical university, rather than just being lead by a quirky genius, has a dedicated insane asylum due to the troublesome nature of magic. If you like fantasy, READ IT.

Scott Lynch's The Lies of Locke Lamora is also a gem - similar feel to the Kingkiller Chronicles - fantastical city, less magic, but more of a michevious con-man feel because, well, the main cast are actually con-men. The premise alone pushes enough of my buttons, and it follows through.

Moving on to science fiction, we have Douglas Adams' immmensely humorous Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy and its immediate sequel, The Restaurant at the End of the Universe - and if you can find the audiobooks, the only way they could be better is if they were narrated by Stephen Fry - Oh wait, they are.

Last, but certainly not least, is the tremendously imaginative, and I do mean that, Dune, by Frank Herbert. It's not 'The Dune' by the way, just DUNE. I don't quite know how to describe it, it imagines new things at every turn and manages to weave them seamlessly into its intricate plot. Every other book in the Dune series, every adaptation that's ever been made of it, are all ultimately different creatures than the original - I read through most of them, but none of them really stand up to the first in my eyes. A classic staple that totally holds up to modern standards.


Joe Abercrombie's been mentioned a lot - his stuff his interesting, and his first book 'The Blade Itself' is amazing, but I really find that the plot just grinds to a halt in the second book and never really gets back on its feet. Still, The Blade Itself is a must-read.

I also feel obligated to place an entry for spy fiction, so I'll put down Tom Clancy's Cardinal of the Kremlin.

And Death Note was fun, but when the whole L thing resolved itself I couldn't enjoy it as much - possibly because every now and again people jokingly compare me to L, with my long, dishevelled hair, messy habits, and tendency to slouch and put my legs up in unusual ways.

 

[Whitewillow]

Can I go with favourite series? And top four?

4:The Lord of the Rings, J.R.R. Tolkein
3:Codex Alera, Jim Butcher
2iscworld, Terry Pratchett
1:The Sarantine Mosaic, Guy Gavriel Kay
Those are the fantasy choices. I also have lists for other genres. And there are so very many books.

And the book I read last was Hunting Party by Elizabeth Moon.

 

[scrambledeggs]

My top 3 books would probably be:

3: Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas by Hunter S Thompson
2: The Trial by Franz Kafka
1: Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy

There's been talk of a film of Blood Meridian for along time but it's fairly unlikely to be made just because of how violent to book is, I doubt they can make a film that goes that far.

Currently I'm reading The Satanic Verses which is very good from what Ive read but I'm not that far into it so maybe it goes downhill.

The first reponse I haven't gawked at. Very nice array.

3. The Road, Cormac McCarthy.
2. Eragon (I'm a fan of high fantasy)
1. The Live Ship Traders Trilogy, Robin Hobb.

 

[Kotaro]

I think my favorite book ever would be Bram Stoker's Dracula. That's the original Dracula story, kids! Most modern vampire mythology started right there.

As for what I'm reading right now, I'm trying to get through Stephen King's Dark Tower books. Kind of stuck on Wizard and Glass. Loved the previous ones, but this one is just dull... I'm making it through slowly, though, and hoping that the rest of the books are as gripping as the first two.

 

[Fijiman]

The Bartimaeus Trilogy

It's funny, I just read those recently and completely forgot to mention them. Loved every one of the Bartimaeus trilogy books from start to finish.

 

[MasterOfHisOwnDomain]

I think my favorite book ever would be Bram Stoker's Dracula. That's the original Dracula story, kids! Most modern vampire mythology started right there.

What I love about Dracula is the way in which it reads very much like a film: the pacing, the switch between locations, the action sequences. For those reasons, I absolutely blazed through it; I just couldn't put it down.

Similarly, The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde is so atmospheric and breathtakingly structured; essentially a plot in reverse. I'm so annoyed that the text has become such a myth that you know the ending though, because in its time the ending must have been absolutely shocking.