Recommend me books!

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AuthorTopic: Recommend me books!
Warrior
Member # 126
Profile Homepage #0
Summer time has come once more, and with it, a period of approximately 2 months largely free from responsibility. It is during this time that I often choose to indulge in.... uhmm... reading.

I think I just used up my smart words.

So, um.

Yeah, recommend me books, please?

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Check out the DIARY, why doncha? It won't bite. Probably.

"We were heart companions,
We were companions in the woods,
We were fellows of the same bed,
Where we used to sleep the balmy sleep.
After mortal battles abroad,
In countries many and far distant,
Together we used to practice, and go
Through each forest, learning with Scathach".
Posts: 161 | Registered: Monday, October 8 2001 07:00
Shaper
Member # 496
Profile #1
Fiction or nonfiction? Which genre of which? It's gotta be pretty long to fill the whole summer though, right?
Posts: 2333 | Registered: Monday, January 7 2002 08:00
BANNED
Member # 3121
Profile Homepage #2
Read Wheel of T.. No wait! That's gonna take a year! :P

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- WITH LOVE, THE OL' RELIABLE BOYLOVE, TO BE EXACT
Posts: 761 | Registered: Thursday, June 19 2003 07:00
Warrior
Member # 2893
Profile #3
Wheel of endless books? More than a year, I don't think it will ever be done.
Posts: 97 | Registered: Friday, April 18 2003 07:00
Warrior
Member # 126
Profile Homepage #4
Hm, yeah, good point, I ought to specify a bit. I think they yelled at me a bit about that the last time I did a 'recommend me books' post, back in the misc board.

::few moments of silence and thought for the dear departed board::

Well, then. Onward we go, toward the insane black nothingness that is the end of all.

Anyway, fiction or nonfiction is of little consequence to me. Strangeness, comedic elements, and enjoyment take precedent. Nothing heavy please, I've been reading Elie Wiesel(correct spelling? I'm rarely good with names), Shakespeare, and other oft-depressing material during the school year, and i'm sick of having to slop through discussions about morals and madness to get a proper understanding of what's going on in the stories.

Genre? Meh, fantasy, reality, scince-fiction or interesting and bizarre science-fact, very nearly anything goes.

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Check out the DIARY, why doncha? It won't bite. Probably.

"We were heart companions,
We were companions in the woods,
We were fellows of the same bed,
Where we used to sleep the balmy sleep.
After mortal battles abroad,
In countries many and far distant,
Together we used to practice, and go
Through each forest, learning with Scathach".
Posts: 161 | Registered: Monday, October 8 2001 07:00
BANNED
Member # 3121
Profile Homepage #5
Read Pratchett, or the first three parts of Hitchiker's blah blah blah (btw, the first one who says the number 42 will die. Slowly.), or.. oh, well, I would have recommended at least a few more, but they're finnish. ;)

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- WITH LOVE, THE OL' RELIABLE BOYLOVE, TO BE EXACT
Posts: 761 | Registered: Thursday, June 19 2003 07:00
Shaper
Member # 496
Profile #6
You mighht check out some of classic HP Lovercraft anthologies.

'Wheel of Time' series reads pretty quickly when you get into it, though it's inexcusable that it has now degenerated into nearly 1,000 pages / book to move events on only a week or so. Looks like someone's cashjing in at the expense of long-suffering readers to me.

I prefer Primo Levi to Elie Wiesel myself - less ideologically dogmatic and mystifying.
Posts: 2333 | Registered: Monday, January 7 2002 08:00
Warrior
Member # 2893
Profile #7
If you've not read some sci-fi classics you could try: The Foundation series by Isaac Asimov which is a great read. Also, if you've never read it try Starship Troopers by Heinlein. The movie is based off it but the book is much, much better. For that matter, if you've not read Heinlein before he has many worth a looksee.

It is still hard to recommend as I'm not sure what you've read so I could be naming much that you already have read. More clues perhaps from you?

John
Posts: 97 | Registered: Friday, April 18 2003 07:00
Dance the Banned Dance
Member # 3052
Profile #8
Get any Star Wars books. Those always prove to be good and worth reading. Unless you've read them all. ;)
Posts: 543 | Registered: Sunday, June 1 2003 07:00
Triad Mage Banned Veteran
Member # 165
Profile Homepage #9
As I always do, I recommend Turtledove's series beginning with How Few Remain and currently terminating in The Center Cannot Hold {with the, uh, seventh book coming out early August}.
In order, How Few Remain, American Front, Walk In Hell, Breakthroughs, Blood and Iron, and The Center Cannot Hold. Great books which I'd recommend reading in that order; if you read them out of order you know how the previous books end, and that's no fun.
{Out of all of them, the first is probably the least essential, as the others take place 30+ years after it does.}
Genre? Uh, alternate history; the first book takes place in 1883 and the others range from 1914 to 1933. Fun stuff, especially if you know your real history.
Of course, it loses SOME meaning if you aren't American, as it's mostly written for an American audience.

[ Thursday, June 19, 2003 11:22: Message edited by: La Mort ]

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desperance -- je me souviens
arena -- et je me souviens de vous
Posts: 2449 | Registered: Monday, October 15 2001 07:00
Apprentice
Member # 3125
Profile Homepage #10
richard matheson - i am legend
groovy book bout vampires, i jus finished reading it, an it rocks :cool:

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we are all individuals and with being individual comes being alone
Posts: 3 | Registered: Thursday, June 19 2003 07:00
Agent
Member # 464
Profile #11
Try the classic Black Beauty by Anna Sewell.
The Halloween Tree by Ray Bradbury
The Mermaid Summer by Mollie Hunter
Magic Can Be Murder by Vivian Vande Velde
Things Not Seen by Andrew Clemens
Calling the Swan by Jean Thesman. This one is kinda slow at first, but somewhere towards the end there's a flashback that will help you understand almost completely what's going on. It's kind of a sad book.

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You go girl!
All are lunatics, but he who can analyze his delusion is called a philosopher. - Ambrose Bierce
If at first you don't succeed, destroy all evidence that you tried.
Posts: 1158 | Registered: Monday, December 31 2001 08:00
Dance the Banned Dance
Member # 3052
Profile #12
I also like the book Holes, but that is only I think 233 pages. Not enough to last you the whole summer. You should try it if you haven't already. It's by Louis Sachar.
Posts: 543 | Registered: Sunday, June 1 2003 07:00
BANNED
Member # 4
Profile Homepage #13
Black Boy by Richard Wright
Lone Ranger and Tonto: Fistfight in Heaven by Sherman Alexie
Henry IV Part 1 by Shakespeare
I'd recommend The Trial, but virtually anything by Franz Kafka is good.

(Also, there's another book I enjoyed that I can't remember the name or author of. It's about a retard named Charlie who is a guinnea pig in an experiment that makes him become gradually more intelligent and then back to where he started. Thanks to anyone who knows what I'm talking about.)

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We're all amazed but not amused
By all the things that you said you'd do.
You're much concerned but not involved by
Decisions that are made by you
But we are sick and tired of hearing your song,
Telling us how you are going to change right from wrong,
'Cause if you really want to hear our views,
You haven't done nothin'.

Posts: 6936 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00
Triad Mage Banned Veteran
Member # 165
Profile Homepage #14
Flowers for Algernon, I think you mean.

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desperance -- je me souviens
arena -- et je me souviens de vous
Posts: 2449 | Registered: Monday, October 15 2001 07:00
Shock Trooper
Member # 3026
Profile #15
Ursula K. LeGuin, Arthur C. Clarke, Richard Adams, Philip Pullman, Virginia Woolf, W.B. Yeats, George Orwell, Jane Yolen, Kurt Vonnegut - but only Cat's Cradle.

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And this was very odd because
It was the middle of the night
- Lewis Carrol

well well well aren't we resilient

Oh the fun

Most generalizations are, unfortunately, true.
Posts: 212 | Registered: Sunday, May 25 2003 07:00
Fire! Fire! Fire! Fire!
Member # 919
Profile #16
AHHHHH Flower for Algernon is the best short story ever! (This from a kid who hates short stories usually.) Anyway, I like Cecilia Holland books (historical fiction with an emphasis on the "fiction" part), The Thief and The Queen of Attolia (in that order) by Megan Whalen Turner (deepness? What deepness? This is young adult, or maybe even children's literature, if you stretch it, yet it's still one of my favorite series). Orson Scott Card has two great series that I know of, the Ender series and the Bean series. The only titles I can think of right now for those are Ender's game and Shadow of the Hegemon.

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And though the musicians would die, the music would live on in the imaginations of all who heard it.
-The Last Pendragon

TEH CONSPIRACY IZ ALL

Les forum de la chance.

In case of emergency, break glass.
Posts: 3351 | Registered: Saturday, April 6 2002 08:00
Apprentice
Member # 3004
Profile #17
The Flowers for Algernon I read was a novel, not a short story.

I would recomend books by Dorothy Gilman.

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Sandwichs and Apples.
Posts: 19 | Registered: Tuesday, May 20 2003 07:00
BANNED
Member # 4
Profile Homepage #18
Alec- Yeah, Flowers for Algernon was the book I was referring to. Thanks.

David- Most short stories you'll read are either compressed novels or sections of novels.

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We're all amazed but not amused
By all the things that you said you'd do.
You're much concerned but not involved by
Decisions that are made by you
But we are sick and tired of hearing your song,
Telling us how you are going to change right from wrong,
'Cause if you really want to hear our views,
You haven't done nothin'.

Posts: 6936 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00
Erudite*
Member # 3042
Profile #19
I'd reccomend books by John Grisham. They're all about lawyers, except for A Painted House and one other. You've probably heard of them, though, since almost all of them were bestsellers.

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The Club of All
Chance Forums
I was once member #2475, but then my account was deleted because of a bug.
Post count=406+whatever it says below.
Posts: 402 | Registered: Thursday, May 29 2003 07:00
BANNED
Member # 3121
Profile Homepage #20
quote:
Originally posted by Nye:
..Ursula K. LeGuin..
The ones about Ged (TEH MAGE DUUD)? I don't know what the series would be called in english, since.. well, if you don't know, it's beeter for you.

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- WITH LOVE, THE OL' RELIABLE BOYLOVE, TO BE EXACT
Posts: 761 | Registered: Thursday, June 19 2003 07:00
Guardian
Member # 2476
Profile #21
I like that author too. I think the one you are refering to is the 'Earth Sea Trilogy', TGM.

Is John Brunner still being printed? He wrote some fine and rather critical SF in the seventies. Should still make interesting reading. And then how about Lem and the brothers Strugatzki?

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Polaris
Posts: 1828 | Registered: Saturday, January 11 2003 08:00
Triad Mage
Member # 7
Profile Homepage #22
Authors to try:

Umberto Eco
Hermann Hesse
Herman Wouk
Carlos Casteneda
Elizabeth Haydon

Also, The Tin Drum by Günter Grass is very good.

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"At times discretion should be thrown aside, and with the foolish we should play the fool." - Menander
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Drakefyre's Demesne - Vahnatai Did Do It
desperance.net - We're Everywhere
The Arena - God Will Sort The Dead
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You can take my Mac when you pry my cold, dead fingers off the mouse!
Posts: 9436 | Registered: Wednesday, September 19 2001 07:00
Guardian
Member # 2476
Profile #23
You read Castaneda, Drakey? His books were a revolution when first printed. A mental challenge.

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Polaris
Posts: 1828 | Registered: Saturday, January 11 2003 08:00
Shaper
Member # 496
Profile #24
The Trial? This guy's after light summer reading! Hey, why not Metamorphosis where the guy turns into an enormous cockroach and his family keep him in his room without evenh a PC to pass the time and he eventually dies of neglect. A barrel of laughs, that one!

Starship Troopers is one occassion where the film is better than the book, IMHO. Heinelan actually approves of the fascistic military society he describes, whereas the movie hilariously rips into the 'all-Amerikan' characters and their 'vile ambitions'. I Am Legend is the opposite and more typical, a damn good book turned into a movie that totally missed the point (i.e. extreme loneliness, alienation and 1950s-style sexual repression) for the sake of a happy ending.

Interesting ef mentioned John Brunner, a man of greater foresight and pessimism than most of today's vacuous sci-fi cyber-hypers. I even have an author-signed copy of Sheep Look Up!
Posts: 2333 | Registered: Monday, January 7 2002 08:00

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