Best book you ever read

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  • 8835

    I don't know if this is the right category in which insert this thread, but...

    What is the best book you ever read, and what's you favourite author? What kind of book genre do you prefer?

    I personally prefer epic fantasy, and I love The Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson, whom is also my favourite author ;). I like The Wheel of Time, too...

  • 8875

    Good topic! The best book/author I ever read is impossible, they are too different. But I can maybe narrow it down to a few candidates.

    · J.R.R. Tolkien – Big surprise, but Tolkien was an amazing author. Unrivaled in many respects. · Jonathan L. Howard's Johannes Cabal series (4 books to date) – brilliant dark humour / fantasy · John Grisham also writes excellent books. The Firm and The Testament are my favorites.

    I've also found a few great non-fiction books, most notably · Don Norman's The Desing of Everyday Things (which is a must for designers and a good recommendation for anyone else) · Thomas S. Kuhn's The Structure of Scientific Revolutions

  • 8876

    I really loved 'The Martian' - Andy Weir. Absolutely fantastic novel! (The movie was good too)

    I read the 'Sword of Truth' series by Terry Goodkind once a year (just about time to start again this year). It's pretty incredible... it gets a little convoluted by the latter books, but the first half is some of my all time favorite fantasy writing!

    And obviously my namesake... I'll read anything Oscar Wilde, any day, any time.

  • 8941

    Pentateuch of The Witcher saga, Andrzej Sapkowski the author. Although I don't know if its translated to english in total.

    Beside of above I really like Terry Pratchett books.

  • 8947
    • Terry Pratchett - The Disc World
    • Philip Pullman - His Dark Materials, trilogy whose the first book, The Golden Compass, was (poorly) adapted to the big screen
    • Dragonlance - A huge serie of novels (over 100 I think) inspired by Dungeons & Dragons game
    • Rand Miller - Myst, three books in the universe of the Myst games
  • 9002

    Impossible to say. So I am listing my Top 5 authors (not in any particular order)

    • J.R.R Tolkien - You know who he is!
    • Michael Connelly - Detective novels and crime fiction
    • Jo Nesbø - Crime novels
    • Joseph Wambaugh - Fictional and non-fictional crime novels
    • Fredrik Backman - Novels

    Also listing my Top 5 ever read books (not in any particular order)

    • Lifeguard - James Pattersson
    • En Man Som Heter Ove (A Man Called Ove) - Fredrik Backman
    • Hundraåringen som klev ut genom fönstret och försvann (The Hundred-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared) - Jonas Jonasson
    • The Hobbit - J.R.R Tolkien
    • The Overlook - Michael Connelly
  • 9128

    A good book I read was "The Count of Monte Cristo" by Alexandre Dumas.

    I don't like many books.

  • 9202

    The Wheel of Time by Robert Jordan, ending was a bit naff since Brandon Sanderson couldn't write himself out of a hole.

  • 9247

    J.R.R. Tolkien.

    Charles Bukowski.

    The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas.

    Cervantes.

    There continues...

  • 9285

    All Dan Brown novels, Deception Point was my fav

    Now I'm obsessed by Tom Clancy, he's such a genius. currently reading Red Storm Rising

    Other great books I read: And Then There Were None - Agatha Christie The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini Guantanamo Boy - Anna Perera Holes - Louis Sachar (great movie as well) Face - Benjamin Zephaniah

  • 9314

    I do not read books/novels very often, but my favorite is Fear and Loathing In Las Vegas by Hunter S. Thompson (the movie was terrible).

  • 9316

    JB00GIE said:

    I do not read books/novels very often, but my favorite is Fear and Loathing In Las Vegas by Hunter S. Thompson (the movie was terrible).

    Hmm.. I usually like to read books based on movies I've seen (since 99% of the time they're way better). Never actually knew Fear and Loathing was a book as well... May have to check that out!

    AgEnTx19 said:

    Now I'm obsessed by Tom Clancy, he's such a genius. currently reading Red Storm Rising

    Always wanted to read Clancy's stuff but I've never known where to start... he wrote like 20 fiction novels! And 17 of them were #1 best sellers! Any recommendation for a starting point? Just chronological? Or are some better than others?

  • 9321

    OscarWilde Definitely start with his very first book (and best selling) The Hunt For Red October. I also recommend it's movie. really well made despite being a 1990 movie.

    You don't have to read them in chronological order. Although each set of books feature the same main character, they are mostly unrelated to each other. The plot is completely different every time. e.g. The Hunt for Red October and the couple of books following it all feature the main character CIA agent Jack Ryan. Sometimes they are identified as Jack Ryan #1, Jack Ryan #2, Jack Ryan #3.....etc

    Also recommend the 2014 movie Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit. Although it's based on the same character from the books, the plot doesn't follow any particular book.

  • 9323

    AgEnTx19 said:

    OscarWilde Definitely start with his very first book (and best selling) The Hunt For Red October.

    For a second there I thought you were saying that Oscar Wilde wrote The Hunt for Red October. That didn't seem quite right. xD

  • 9329

    For me, there has been one notable instance where I picked up a book and then was instantly mesmerized by it from the first page onwards. That is [color=#ffff66]The Gunslinger[/color] by Stephen King. The very first words were "The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed.", and I remember thinking... epic! I later learned it was part of [color=#ffff66]The Dark Tower[/color] book series, and I just could not stop until I read all the books in the series. The way the books seamlessly go from a western to fantasy creatures to magic to romance and heartbreak to mad modern tech and back again, it was just a fantastic experience. These are the only books of King I have read, but I am a fan for life. I am not a fan of comics in general, but the tie-in comics to this series, I have read them all. (To be honest, the last 2 books seemed hurriedly written and that kinda spoiled the experience a bit, but those first 5 books...hot damn!)

    The other notable one for me is the [color=#ffff66]Harry Potter[/color] books. I saw the first 2 Potter movies and thought, lemme find out what happens in the 3rd one in advance. So I started reading them, and while the world building is all fine, the thing that impressed me about this allegedly children's book series is how dark it got in the later books. The movies made a mockery out the later books, in that they reduced it to teenage drama, whereas the books did not shy away from dark themes of betrayal and death and fascism.

    Added 2016-06-26 02:14:52

    P.S: I dont get the Tolkien love. Honestly, I have tried. But I found them overly detailed and bloated to the extent that it affected the narrative of the story negatively.

    Last updated
  • 9339

    I really enjoyed American Gods by Neil Gaiman. It's a magnificent book, quite long, with a great story and without the bloated descriptions of some other books which I might have liked but just couldn't get myself to read them. It's truly fantastic, and in a way similar to the Lord of Light by Roger Zelazny, another one of my favorite books.

    If you really liked fairytales as a kid, but you'd like a book to be a deep story, I would recommend The ocean at the end of the lane, also by Gaiman.

    I also recently started reading Catch 22 by Joseph Heller. I'm just half way through, but I can already wholeheartedly recommend this book, it's hilarious and the theme is great, I've never read anything like it.

  • 9418

    lezboyd said:

    P.S: I dont get the Tolkien love. Honestly, I have tried. But I found them overly detailed and bloated to the extent that it affected the narrative of the story negatively.

    No kidding... I mean the stories are incredible... but I agree. He's a damn hard read at the best of times, and a painfully impossible one at others... The prologue for 'Fellowship' is enough to drive one off a bridge. So much description in such a short amount of time.. it's impossible to retain it all anyway.

    AgEnTx19 said:

    Definitely start with his very first book (and best selling) The Hunt For Red October. I also recommend it's movie. really well made despite being a 1990 movie.

    This actually blew my mind.. I've seen Shadow Recruit and am familiar with Jack Ryan, but I never realized it was the same character from Red October (and I've seen that movie as well!) Just not a connection I ever made! Really cool... will definitely need to read some Clancy. All the movies from his books are great (I think I've seen most of them..)

    Thanks for the info!

  • 9422

    shadomare said:

    Philip Pullman[/b] - His Dark Materials, trilogy whose the first book, The Golden Compass, was (poorly) adapted to the big screen

    Quite a good trilogy: I particulary loved the ralationship between dæmons and people.

    KrimzinZV said:

    The Wheel of Time by Robert Jordan, ending was a bit naff since Brandon Sanderson couldn't write himself out of a hole.

    Do you mean the hole of Shadar Logoth? :D That's my favourite series! Sanderson took a bit to write the end, but I believe it's fantastic.

    Holy said:

    A good book I read was "The Count of Monte Cristo" by Alexandre Dumas.

    Starting it right now :).

    I also suggest:

    • Codex Alera series, by Jim Butcher
    • Raven's Shadow series, by Anthony Ryan (I've only read the first book, Blood Song)
    • Immortal rules series, by Julie Kagawa (vampires and such in a different style, I really liked it)

    I've already added some titles to my "to read" list. Thank you!!!

    Last updated
  • 9423

    shadomare Holy "The Count of Monte Cristo" by Alexandre Dumas It's probably the longest novel I've ever read, the ending is totally unexpected.

  • 9426

    AgEnTx19 I've finished it on a dark rainy Sunday. I've spent the entire day reading it. Totally worth it.

  • 9529

    David Gemmel - White Wolf & Waylander III

  • 13655

    Recently started reading Steven Erikson's Malazan Book of the fallen series, using The Wertzone's recommended reading order, which includes the books written by his friend Ian Cameron Esselmont. What an EPIC series. A little difficult to get into, but once you get started you won't want to stop. It's a very mature epic military fantasy series.

    Also have to agree with a previous poster, I am also quite a fan of John Grisham's novels.

  • 13792

    The best, most important, revealing, captivating, exasperating and challenging book is all the same which I've read in Phenomenology of Spirit by G.W.F. Hegel.

    My other favourite author is Edward Gibbon. Then: Conrad, Wilde, Huxley and Blake among others.

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