Your favorite reading genre and a few good books in that genre
I know we have had some "what are some of your favorite book threads" around, but I want to organize what AIers like to read into a comprehensible list. I figure, we all seem to have similar tastes to some extent, so this would be a solid place to get book recommendations (ever read something your 60-year-old aunt said would be good and it was a snooze?)
anyhow, my idea is that those who consider reading a hobby or at least a decent way to pass time (read more than one book a month) to post their favorite reading genre(s) and their top book(s) in said categories. Don't just put the last one you read or the first that pops in your mind, but the truly great ones, so we all have some good recommendations on what to read.
this thread is largely selfish as i have been reading a lot lately (unemployed currently) in my free time and am running out of good books.
here, i'll start:
My fav. genre right now is Historical Fiction. My top reads in that are (1) Pillars of the Earth (Ken Follett) (2) The Heaven Tree Trilogy -- i just can't get enough of early england
As for general reading, I recently read "Life of Pi" and was really really impressed. I think it is a best seller you can pick up at wal-mart or somewhere.
Anyone else? I guess we could talk non-fiction too, but I was thinking novels when I started the thread
anyhow, my idea is that those who consider reading a hobby or at least a decent way to pass time (read more than one book a month) to post their favorite reading genre(s) and their top book(s) in said categories. Don't just put the last one you read or the first that pops in your mind, but the truly great ones, so we all have some good recommendations on what to read.
this thread is largely selfish as i have been reading a lot lately (unemployed currently) in my free time and am running out of good books.
here, i'll start:
My fav. genre right now is Historical Fiction. My top reads in that are (1) Pillars of the Earth (Ken Follett) (2) The Heaven Tree Trilogy -- i just can't get enough of early england
As for general reading, I recently read "Life of Pi" and was really really impressed. I think it is a best seller you can pick up at wal-mart or somewhere.
Anyone else? I guess we could talk non-fiction too, but I was thinking novels when I started the thread
Comments
The Demon, by Hubert Selby, Jr.
Once you get used to the writing style, the book blows you away.
And when you're done that, you can of course read Last Exit To Brooklyn, Requiem For A Dream, etc. Dude rocks.
(NOTE TO SELF: As a second year English major, I have to get more well-read!)
i have programming books (cocoa, objective c etc) at night table. sick? other enjoyable books .. hmm? leonie sandercock, brian weiss (i hav ea pile, in portuguese and spanish), marya hornbacher, .. i'm so far from the novels again. oh - found 3 interesting books yesterday; a japanese cookbook, an origami manual, and a painting/drawing techniques manual.
i guess the next novel i'll read will finally be neuromancer, i was actually looking for a novel yesterday, it should be somewhere on a cd ..
originally posted by Giaguara
i guess the next novel i'll read will finally be neuromancer, it's somewhere on a cd ..
Neuromancer is great, but out of Gibson's stuff I really recommend "Virtual Light", "Idoruo" and "All Tomorrow's Parties" a trilogy dealing with nanotech, the web, the media and AI. Though Neuromancer is far more dramatic in storytelling I think this trilogy and the new one "Pattern Recognition" is far more relevant to our current vision of the future.
Which ones? It doesn't matter. This boy is twisted and so is his stories!
Fight Club is a gem but try Choke for a laugh.
beard on pasta
a cook's guide to chicago
the babbo cookbook - mario batali
jazz books
beneath the underdog - charles mingus
lush life (biography of billy strayhorn) - david hajdu
straight, no chaser-the life and times of thelonious monk - leslie gourse
dance of the infidels-a portrait of bud powell - frances poudras
(basis for the movie 'Round Midnight and is a good read even if you don't care for jazz.)
and all books by Edna Buchanon, and Calvin Trillin.
originaly posted by tonton
Jeff Noon - Vurt, Pollen, Nymphomation, Needle in the Groove
Jasper Fforde - The Eyre Affair, Lost in a Good Book, The Well of Lost Plots
Cool, I'll check it out.
For the last couple weeks I have been re-reading some of the Science Fiction stuff ... Larry Niven is excellent.
Prior to that I read a couple of Hemingway novels ... "Islands in the Stream" is one of my favorite books off all time.
2nd on the favorites list would probably be "Wind, Sand, and Stars" by StExupery (the guy who wrote "The Little Prince"
Mark Twain ... My favorite of his is "Following the Equator" ... people actually used to travel like that !!!
For light reading ... Jimmy Buffett's novels are quite entertaining !
I'm gonna quit for now.
then Aesthetic Theory and art criticism texts: Hal Foster, Peter Burger
but these have slowed down in the past few years . .
now I am renjoying reading History texts particularly about the ends of great Empires or the beginings of great empires
I just read Michael Grant's The Fall of Rome a Reapraisal
and am now reading 'Rome In the Dark Ages' which is not very well written
also very interested in the history of Carthage and, of course, Hannibal . .
-
I also enjoy Epic Space-Opera Science Fiction:
Vernor Vinge
Alastair Reynolds (allthogh Chasm City satrted out good and sank as fast as a rock into a crap book without a thought-out reason for being)
I am interested in this genre but there really is very very little decent stuff out there
Atlases...
Dictionaries ( all kinds ),
Encyclopedias.
Telephone directories.
Those four are enough to establish the plot and substance to any book I want to write...8)