Recommend me an insanely long book

[Bara_no_Hime]

2. No fantasy. It doesn't interest me a bit, with very few exceptions. And absolutely no "I know you said that you don't like fantasy, but I think you'd like this one..." Ehehehe, I think I wouldn't. Thanks, but no thank you.
3. No series. What I want is a long book that offers a complete story in one novel.

How broadly do you define fantasy?

I've got one that takes place in an alternative world France. There is some minor magic, but (with one exception) only fairly light hints of it. It's mostly a book about politics, espionage, and courtesans - more historical fiction than fantasy.

Also, it is technically part of a series, but each novel is stand alone. And the first novel clocks in at 800 to 1000 pages, depending on publisher, with around 100 chapters.

 

[Darth Sea Bass]

Try the pillars of the earth and world without end both by Ken Follett.

 

[Ti0k0]

The Secret History by Donna Tartt; it's not the longerst book ever, I'm sure you've read larger books, but it's great.
It really gives you that I've conquered this book and afterwars you realise how great it really was (a feeling, which you can relate to, I'm sure)

 

[The Funslinger]

Cryptonomicon, by Neal Stephenson. Worth it for the "Captain Crunch" section alone. I don't love all of Stephenson's newer stuff, but IMO Cryptonomicon is a masterpiece.

I am surprised that you said no fantasy and no series, but yet you list The Lord of the Rings as one of the books you've read. It's only the most famous fantasy series of all time! (But maybe that's what put you off fantasy...)

Oh yes, while I enjoyed Lord of the Rings, the prose was quite stuffy, and since all the characters had a very similar degree of well-spokenness, none of them really stood out. Gave me a bit of a headache, if I'm honest.

I'm not recommending it to the OP, as it violates two rules, but I'm getting to the end of the third book in the Wheel of Time series, and enjoying it much more than I did the LoTR trilogy.

 

[RyQ_TMC]

The Brothers Karamazov is my constant contender for Best Novel of All Time. So I pretty much have to recommend it.

 

[snyperal]

All of my favourites have already been mentioned, the count of monte cristo, shogun by james clavell and insomnia by stephen king.

Anything tom clancy is usually a good read too...

 

[spartan231490]

I just finished a long book. I want a new long book. Do you have a new one for me to read?

Spoiler: Here is what I've read already

The Journey to the West
Miyamoto Musashi
The Lord of the Rings
It
The Stand
Crime and Punishment
The Count of Monte Cristo
In Search of Lost Time
Water Margin (also known as Outlaws of the Marsh)
The Ingenious Knight Don Quixote of La Mancha

A couple of rules:
1. Don't diss anyone else's recommendation. I just want to find books that somebody else can vouch for; if I don't like it I can find that out for myself.

2. No fantasy. It doesn't interest me a bit, with very few exceptions. And absolutely no "I know you said that you don't like fantasy, but I think you'd like this one..." Ehehehe, I think I wouldn't. Thanks, but no thank you.

3. No series. What I want is a long book that offers a complete story in one novel.

Edit: After some thought, I highly recommend Deception point based on all of your rules

with rule 2, I was limited, with rule 3, I've got nothing. Really, why so against series if you like long reads?

OT: I'm not going to post just that, so I'll be giving a few suggestions anyway. With the above in mind, these recommendations will be series, so be aware, you might Like Vlad Taltos/Dragaeran series by Steven Brust. It's got a fantasy setting but the story isn't fantasy at all, so I'm not sure if you would consider it fantasy. It is also an ongoing series with around 13 short books

Attikus Kodiak series, by Greg Rucka. It's a modern drama/action type story, and it's really good. about 6 moderate sized books.

Brent Weeks and Robert Jordan are both really good authors who write large books. I haven't gotten around to reading their non-fantasy stuff, but they each have a few.

That's really all I can suggest that is both substantially large and not-fantasy.

Kingkiller Chronicles, by Patrick Rothfuss. I need to suggest it because of how good it is, despite it being fantasy. It has transcended the genre. Don't read if you don't want, but if you ever feel like giving another fantasy story a try, read this one.

 

[Echopunk]

I'd like to make a recommendation, but quite a few of my favorites (Snow Crash, Diamond Age, Cryptonomicon, Reamde and The Descent) have already been suggested, along with almost all of the classics I had to bludgeon my through for school and self enrichment.

That said,

Neal Stephenson's Anathem. You can have two entirely different experiences with that book. If you just read it as a story, you get an interesting narrative that, while it does take some time to get its engines fully spun up, is highly entertaining. Essentially, Shaolin Monks with Slide Rulers, designed from first principles, of course.

If you have a even a hint of the working knowledge of the mathematics and philosophy involved, or if you've ever fancied yourself an armchair cosmologist, you will get a lot more out of it.

It takes place on Arbe, which we'll refer to as "not quite earth," but I wouldn't file it away under fantasy. It is more science fiction, or speculative fiction, if you will. Between a personal edition, and gifts for friends of mine, I've purchased this book five times and never regretted it.

 

[maninahat]

books

I'm just about to start In Search of Lost Time. Any good?

 

[KaosuHamoni]

Maaaaaaan. I was going to say La Comte de Monte Cristo... My favourite book.

Fine! More Dumas! The Three Musketeers.

Edit: Or try The Picture of Dorian Gray. Those are my three favourite books.

 

[LadyDeadly]

20,000 leagues under the sea and Around the moon. I have a book which has both stories. Both are huge. But the 1870 version not any new ones.

 

[Cybele]

As someone who reads almost only fantasy I don't have all that much to recommend. Two books that are pretty long and that I quite enjoyed (and that aren't fantasy) are Arc De Triomphe by Erich Maria Remarque and The Mysterious Flame of Queen Loana by Umberto Eco.

 

[Chris Mosher]

Shogun is pretty good , I don't think anyone has recommended it yet. It has some problems with the whole white guy saves the natives thing like the Last Samurai, but I still think that its not that bad.

 

[danm36]

The Uplift trilogy by David Brin. Now, while it 'is' a trilogy you can easily find a book that contains all three stories in one neat package. The first one is a little...eh... but do keep reading, it's an excellent series.

 

[Total LOLige]

Insomnia by Stephen King is pretty decent and like 800+ pages I think, not sure if that counts as insanely long.

Speaking of Stephen King, 11. 22. 63. is a very good book.

Aside from featuring mysterious time travel, it's not fantastical at all, and is very well researched and enthralling. It's also a complete brick, so it should satisfy the OP.

Sounds interesting I might have to buy that myself, thank you Binnsyboy. Although I'm in no position to start reading a new book, three(two are short story collections though) King books and a PKD(Man in The High Castle).

 

[adamsaccount]

2666 by roberto bolano

 

[Blaze the Dragon]

The House of Leaves? It's about a family that moves into a house and the Father is a professional photographer/filmmaker, so he sets up some cameras to make a documentary of how he and his family got their lives back on track after moving into a new house. But then at one point they leave for a week and when they return a new addition has been made to the house, which I think was a closet that connects the parent's and children's rooms. They decided to measure the house and they discover that it's 1/4" bigger on the inside. at which point shit just gets strange. And no, this is not a ghost story.

Actually, that is not what the book is about at all.

I don't recall exactly how long it is, but it'll probably take a while to read with it's unique writing style.

 

[CriticalMiss]

Red Mars by Kim Stanley Robinson is pretty damn long (a few thousand pages) and is a fairly detailed look in to the colonisation of Mars and how politics messes everything up! It's the first in a series of three, and whilst I would recommend reading all three (Red Mars, Green Mars and Blue Mars) the first works as a standalone. It can get a bit dull at times because the author goes in to horrendous detail about pretty much everything, but it is rather compelling and seems like it would actually happen some day. I read pretty fast but it took me a couple of weeks to get through all three books.

Not sure if you count omnibuses (omnibi?) as a series, but the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy omnibus is amazing, required reading for nerds and fairly long when all four books are squished together.

 

[BeeGeenie]

I'll put in another vote for Victor Hugo: Les Miserables, or The Hunchback of Notre Dame.

They're good stories, but Vic desperately needed an editor. Les Mis. contains a sentence that is 823 words long!