Favorite Books (excluding Rowlings and Tolkien works)

[mParadox]

A Song of Ice and Fire.

Anything by Dr. Susse and Roald Dahl. >.>

Bill Bryson is a pretty damn good author too.

Clive Barker is also a rather accomplished author. Love Imajica.

John Grisham, Robin Cook, Dan Brown, Michael Crichton, Agatha Christie and Terry Pratchett.

Everything by them. Every book ever.

 

[Fiz_The_Toaster]

The Count of Monte Cristo.
The Divine Comedy.
Paradise Lost.
Any by Edgar Allen Poe.
Mogworld.
Crime and Punishment.
Any by H.P. Lovecraft.
The Graveyard Book. (Really, anything by Neil Gaiman)

[sub][sub]From what I've gathered thus far I should probably read a Terry Pratchett book since I haven't yet, and I should probably fix that. >.>[/sub][/sub]

 

[b4k4]

The Wheel of Time. Seriously, read those books. The best series I know.

The world is just so massive, Robert Jordan really did a great job with the politics, the environments, the different characters and their stories.
It gets slow at time, but it's totally worth it to read to the end. A Memory of Light was a really satisfying book and I feel it got the ending it deserved.

Exactly this. Wheel of Time is the biggest reason I'm still such a big reader.

Also, The Night Angel Trilogy by Brent Weeks, it was recommended to me in a thread here a few years ago, and it's become my go-to recommendation ever since (besides WoT, but that's a bit daunting for some people to try and jump into). The first book is a pretty satisfying read even if you never take a look at the other two, but if you read the whole set you'll get a very satisfying experience.

And if you're into Star Wars, I suggest trying to hunt down the X-Wing novels by Aaron Allston and Michael Stackpole (among others, I think), they're possibly my favorite part of the whole universe.

 

[crazy_coug99]

Kitchen Confidential by Anthony Bourdain. His first book that he wrote.

 

[juyunseen]

The Big Over Easy by Jasper Fford
1984 by George Orwell
Dragon Rider by Cornilia Funke

 

[Gypsyssilver]

-Dresden Files series - Can't go wrong with a smartass, cynical wizard-for-hire
-Dexter series by Jeff Lindsay - The life and times of a darkly humorous sociopath (awesome!)
-Most books by Dick Francis. British writer who wrote mystery/adventure/crime novels - all of them are connected to Horse-racing in some form, but the great part about them is the main character. Without fail, it's someone who just plain gets shit done. My favourite was 'Hot Money'.
-The Belgariad/Malloreon and Elenium/Tamuli series by David Eddings. Each series pair has a cast of amazing characters that just get more awesome as time goes by.

 

[Waykunbayk]

I'll recommend Wise Children by Angela Carter. It's hilarious and stunningly written - really, really good. Also, Oryx and Crake & The Year of the Flood by Margaret Atwood are wonderful dystopian novels, thought-provoking, imaginative and, again, excellently written.

Maybe it's a bit of an obvious choice but I'd highly recommend Money by Martin Amis, and if you liked that then you'd probably enjoy The Pregnant Widow as well, which is different in almost every way but, like Money, showcases some brilliant writing.

 

[CrazyHatMan]

As always i highly recommend the Hitchiker series by douglas adams, as well as his works about Dirk Gently.

 

[Vanorae]

Here's books or series I enjoy in no particular order:
- A song of Ice and Fire by George R.R Martin is an obvious one that I think a lot of people on here will adore just as much as I do.
- Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky (Yes, I did have to Google that spelling). It's a tough read but overall very interesting.
- The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald does a great job questioning the American Dream and all the greed and destruction that might come with it. Plus, only 200 pages guys.
- Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series by Adam Douglas. Very well known and loved for a reason.
- Looking for Alaska by John Green. Can't really explain this properly but it's good.

 

[fwiffo]

Anything by Kurt Vonnegut. I just dig his style. Also like Philip K. Dick. Sorry, it's hard to pick a favorite (maybe Cat's Cradle).

 

[SoranMBane]

-White Fang by Jack London, the first "classic" novel I ever read.

-Pretty much anything by Richard Morgan, especially Altered Carbon and the Land Fit For Heroes series.

-The Redwall series by Brian Jacques. Where White Fang was my first classic, Redwall was my first novel period, so there's a lot of nostalgia backing this series up.

-Anything by Ayn Rand.

-Mogworld by You-Know-Who. Definitely the best comedy book I've ever read.

 

[Westaway]

Snip

Considering I'm an over privileged middle class white boy living in the suburbs I could be completely wrong, but that sounds fairly absurd. Unless we're talking about third world countries (we aren't, we're talking about the average Escapist) most cities have dozens of book stores littered across them filled with classics. Even places like Indigo and Chapters have a section dedicated to classics. As for being aware of famous literature, it's really up to you, but considering they have access to the internet it's not that hard.

 

[Matilda Ward]

A Song of Ice and Fire by George R.R. Martin
Much to my surprise I really liked Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte
The Inheritance series by Christopher Paolini
The Unknown Terrorist by Richard Flanagan
The Sisters Brothers by Patrick DeWitt
Terry Pratchett of course
The Rise Iron Moon by Stephen Hunt
The Japanese Devil Fish girl and other unnatural attraction by Robert Rankin
The Shiny Guys by Doug Mcleod


I spend many hours in Libraries as you can probably tell

 

[the_hoffs_ego]

In no particular order...

The Inheritance Cycle (it has its issues, but I still thoroughly enjoyed them.)
Percy Jackson and the Olympians (and Heroes of Olympus for that matter)
Fahrenheit 451, of course. 1984 as well.
Raven's Shadow: Blood Song - Amazing fantasy book. Not too well known (I got it for $3 on Amazon I believe) but it's worth the read.
The Post-Human Trilogy by David Simpson is on there too. I won't claim that they're perfect books (the third gets a little whacked toward the end), but this kind of sci-fi always stimulates my imagination. I still think about them, and that's the mark of a good book/movie/game whatever.

I'm looking for a new sci-fi book to read now, any suggestions, Escapists? I'd love another with transhumanist themes. But really, any sci-fi that I should definitely not miss.

 

[Vault101]

That's my favorite book. So I wonder what you mean by brilliant literature.

I know fuckall about litature.....and I do know that stephen king can be....a bit silly at times

but then it this case it really is a great book (Ive read it several times) so mabye it is

 

[RedDeadFred]

Man, not sure what I expected but after browsing a few of the posts I'm disappointed in the Escapist. Do you guys even READ?

Remarks like this always confuse me. What exactly disappoints you? That the majority of people here prefer fantasy to period drama? That you don't recognise many of them to be classics? Or that people aren't listing enough books (or wearing enough hats)?

I would suggest pretty much everyone here has read the classics, if not for pleasure, then at least for school. Not listing them as their favourites has no bearing on whether or not they enjoyed them. And wouldn't it be rather boring if every post listed the same selection of books? True, there's very little diversity in terms of genre going on here, but that excludes those who flat-out dislike science fiction or fantasy novels; for everyone else this thread must be a goldmine of opportunity.

I'm sorry if this comes across as confrontational, I'm just disappointed people criticise each other for the type of fiction they enjoy.

See, the thing is that most people haven't read the classics, which is why I bothered making the comment. But, like I said, I don't know what I was expecting. The thing that got to me was all the pulp fiction and teen-trash books people were posting like The Hunger Games. That really shouldn't have bothered me though, considering I'm posting on a video game forum, which is easily the trashiest and least intellectually stimulating form of media existing, so the average person on here really wouldn't be reading James Joyce I guess. Especially since the Escapist's descent into a majority of people under 18.

I'm sorry if this comes across as pretentious, I'm just disappointed people don't care if they read shit mass produced for the lowest common denominator.

Wait... how did you get "bash other people's tastes in literature" out of "list your favourite books"? Sorry but it's comments like these that create the "trashiness" on forums.

OT: A Song of Ice and Fire -I enjoy pretty much all of the characters and I love the huge world Martin created.

Hitchhiker's Trilogy -Funny and very interesting. Just don't expect a spectacular ending...

Into Thin Air -I'll go into more detail about this one since I think fewer people have heard about it. It's a book about the commercialization of Mt. Everest and how that commercialization causes a disaster. It's extremely interesting and tense. I don't know if this was intended to be a very emotional book but when you realize that everything written (although the author obviously has his biases) actually happened. It's kind of tortuous to see the mistakes that occur and know that all of the deaths could have been prevented.

Misery -My favourite Stephen King book. The book does a great job with creating a desperate situation, slowly giving you hope for the character, and then abruptly tearing it down.

 

[GeekFury]

For me, anything by H.P. Lovecraft, High Fidelity by Nick Hornby, The Tome of Fire series by Nick Kyme if we're going W40K, though I am shocked not a single mention of Frank Herberts Dune series, admitedly I only liked the first four books and even God Emperor of Dune was abit on the 'Ok this is getting dull now...' side.

As for Tolkien I don't love Lord of the Rings, it's a good series, I did prefer The Hobbit as it didn't drag half as much as the Lord of the Rings trilogy and for Harry Potter and Miss Rowling, she maybe a local of my home town but I care nothing for her Harry Potter series, I read one book back in high school as I was forced to do it for my English class and I'd sooner drive nails into my eyes than read the rest.