Wylin Posted:

After catching up with the Wheel of Time series by Robert Jordan I’m reading the Stephen King Dark Tower series, and wishing I had done it sooner!

As for a newer author, I really liked The Lies of Locke Lamora by Scott Lynch.

The Dark Tower is a great series, up until book 5 or 6. That’s just my opinion, though, and I know many people who disagree.

Jalapeno Bootyhole Posted:

...light reading suggestions…

Irvine Welsh, Marabou Stork Nightmares

To paraphrase the movie “Crazy People,” this book won’t just scare you, it will **** you up for life.

Holy ****, I only made it about 1/3 of the way through that book, and that was more than enough to **** me up for life. I would hesitate to call it “light reading.” It is well-written; I just think it should come with a Surgeon General’s warning. Take that as a recommendation or a dissuasion, depending on what you like.

A lot of my favourite books fall into the category of magic realism. My favourite book of all time is A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry. Anothe of my favourites is Blindness by Jose Saramago. If you like magical realism, I also recommend The Beggar and his Talismans by Anosh Irani. It’s very surrealistic. The whole thing seems to be available to read online (legally) at GoogleBooks.ca.

Sirens of Titan

Slapstick

Breakfast of Champions

Cat’s Cradle

Catch-22

It’s pretty funny that 4/5 of my favorite books are Vonnegut. If you haven’t read any of the above, go and read them you bumhole.

Jalapeno Bootyhole Posted:

Irvine Welsh, Marabou Stork Nightmares

To paraphrase the movie “Crazy People,” this book won’t just scare you, it will **** you up for life.

E.L. Doctorow, “World’s Fair”

Just a great book by one of my fave writers. No relation to Cory Doctorow, by the way, as far as I know!

World’s Fair was an awesome book! What makes Marabou Stork Nightmares so crazy, without spoiling it?

Evil Trout Posted:

I read a lot of science fiction. Here’s some of the last few books I read and loved:

The Player of Games – Iain M. Banks.

A Fire Upon the Deep (currently reading, but awesome!) – Vernon Vinge

Quarantine – Greg Egan

I loved A Fire Upon The Deep! I picked up quarantine a while back, but haven’t read it yet. In fact until you mentioned it, I forgot I had it.

On the subject of messed up books, has anyone read Twisted Little Vein by Warren Ellis?

I think it’s safe to say it’s like nothing else I’ve read.

Chuck Palahniuk is cool until you realize almost all of his books are the same. They’re still worth reading up to Lullaby though.

In high school I wrote a letter to him and he sent me back his reply along with a box containing trick candles, a box of chocolates, a Virgin Mary night light, and a necklace that the letter said he made for me. He signed the box the necklace was in and his reply letter. Pretty cool dude.

Edit: I forgot there was also a stuffed musk rat. Not taxidermied, but a stuffed animal. The letter said it was my power musk rat.

PhineasPoe Posted:

Chuck Palahniuk is cool until you realize almost all of his books are the same. They’re still worth reading up to Lullaby though.

I agree completely. My favorite was Choke, but after Lullaby I haven’t liked anything.

Evil Trout Posted:

I agree completely. My favorite was Choke, but after Lullaby I haven’t liked anything.

Are his novels connected, or completely individual stories?

coreyjess Posted:

World’s Fair was an awesome book! What makes Marabou Stork Nightmares so crazy, without spoiling it?

You know, I asked that of someone who had read it previously and they struggled to explain, and now I find myself in the same position. It’s the way he injects psychological horror into the mundane. It’s replete with dark, ugly images, and contains some disturbingly violent acts, as you’d expect from Welsh. But a very good read nonetheless.

People have argued that Thomas Harris is a ****ty writer or something but I was reading the Hannibal books a while ago and thought they were fantastic.

I went through Hannibal rising (weird + obviously made to cash in on Lecter but still interesting) and Red Dragon (really liked it, creepy as hell). I’m dieing to find Silence of the lambs and the other one.

coreyjess you might have even been there when i was talking about them in IDC, i can’t remember at all. Just in case you weren’t Log in to see images!