Favorite Writers / Books ?

[ila]

Originally Posted by orion

OK .. we've had favourite Television shows .. so what sort of Books do people read (when they're not watching Tele) and why do they like them ??

There is an existing thread on books and authors, right here

http://forum.transladyboy.com/showth...ighlight=books

[orion]

Ahhh .... sorry .....

[ila]

Originally Posted by orion

Ahhh .... sorry .....

It's no problem. I just thought you might like to know. It is possible to search the site using the search tool near the top right of each page.

[orion]

Thanks for the "heads up" Ila .. perhaps you'd be so kind as to move these posts to the appropriate place ?

Keeps everything nice & tidy then ...

[SusanMichelle]

The top three favourite's are:

J.R.R. Tolkien, Terry Pratchett and third I have to say has an unfortunate name, Michael Moorcock.

[liesjeversteven]

I love all the books by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. He's just fantastic. I'm not much of an SF or fantasy fan, but I did really enjoy Isaak Asimov and Terry Pratchett.

[irishmike136]

For Sci-Fi :john ringo's "posleen war series"
Historical Fiction: Anything by Bernard Cornwell
Waiting for "Without Warning" by John Birmingham
"What would happen if America vanished?"
and anything by Harry Turtledove.
Irish

[ila]

Originally Posted by irishmike136

Historical Fiction: Anything by Bernard Cornwell

For historical fiction with a military theme I like the Sharpe series from Bernard Cornwell. I also like the Horatio Hornblower series from C.S. Forester. A third series I like are the books from Sven Hassel that give a perspective of the German army during WWII from a common soldier's perspective.

For historical fiction I like all the books from James Clavell.

[The Conquistador]

I love anything by Ray Bradbury, Isaac Asimov and Edgar Allen Poe. My most favorite book though, is Siddhartha by Herman Hesse. I'll read some Stephen King once in a while and my favorite book series is the Resident Evil series by S.D. Perry. Honorable mention goes to Max Brooks and the most influential zombie themed writings The Zombie Survival Guide and World War Z.

[transjen]

Originally Posted by irishmike136

Historical Fiction: Anything by Bernard Cornwell
Irish

I think i read one of his novels it was about King Arthur but i can't recall the title Jennifer

[transjen]

Any LOUIS L'AMOUR fans or western fans. hello is this mic on? Jennifer

[orion]

For those who enjoy "historical" military fiction like the "Sharpe" series .. may I recommend a series by Simon Scarrow ... set in Roman times & following the "adventures" of Centurion Macro & his sidekick Cato ...

http://www.scarrow.co.uk/page12.html

Another author well worth seeking out is Conn Iggulden .. he's written two major trilogies .. one in Roman times .. the other, the story of Genghis Khan from boyhood to his death .. enthralling ...

http://www.conniggulden.com/

[fatbloke]

Really like Terry Pratchett,Stephen King,just getting into Tom Holt,i like Fredrick Forsythe.I also Collect cookbooks and anything on history

[orion]

Ha ha ... Cookbooks ...

The favourites on my shelf include .. Ken Hom, Rick Stein, Nigel Slater & Pat Chapman ...

[irishmike136]

Originally Posted by transjen

I think i read one of his novels it was about King Arthur but i can't recall the title Jennifer

Maybe it was the Warlord Chronicles?

1. The Winter King: A Novel of Arthur
2. Enemy of God
3. Excalibur: A Novel of Arthur

Irish

[transjen]

Originally Posted by irishmike136

Maybe it was the Warlord Chronicles?

1. The Winter King: A Novel of Arthur
2. Enemy of God
3. Excalibur: A Novel of Arthur

Irish

It was the winter king Jennifer

[irishmike136]

Originally Posted by transjen

It was the winter king Jennifer

Cool,
He has a new one out called Agincourt.
Irish

[orion]

Thanks for that info Mike ..

I'll keep an eye open for that one ...

[transjen]

Originally Posted by irishmike136

Cool,
He has a new one out called Agincourt.
Irish

Heck i still have to get Excalibur Jennifer

[GRH]

Originally Posted by orion

Ha ha ... Cookbooks ...

Cookbooks that are well-written can be fun reads! I don't know any particular authors...But cookbooks prove utilitarian time and time again.

Right now I'm enjoying a textbook on soil microbiology that is coauthored by David Sylvia among others.

[transjen]

Originally Posted by GRH

Cookbooks that are well-written can be fun reads! I don't know any particular authors...But cookbooks prove utilitarian time and time again.

Perhaps someday i should get one as i can burn water Jennifer

[irishmike136]

I know a good website if ur looking for something to read
http://www.fantasticfiction.co.uk/
Irish

[barry]

bukowski
dickens
eliot
whitman
dunn
hughes
plath
kooser
ethan coen

[bigd631]

I m just curious whats everyone's favorite book is in here?

I am geek my self and my 2 favorites are The Hitchhikers Guide to The Galaxy and Zen and the Art of Motorcycle maintenance.

[Enoch Root]

Originally Posted by bigd631

I m just curious whats everyone's favorite book is in here?

I am geek my self and my 2 favorites are The Hitchhikers Guide to The Galaxy and Zen and the Art of Motorcycle maintenance.

You would be well rewarded reading "The Road" by Cormac McCarthy.

[bigd631]

Originally Posted by Enoch Root

You would be well rewarded reading "The Road" by Cormac McCarthy.

I have it on my list to read right after I finish the new Game of Thrones. I saw the movie and loved it!

[connie]

I have a lot, many that I read and re-read again and again, the Discworld Novels, especially the Nightwatch ones, The Rings Trilogy and the Hobbit, the Silmarillian, the Chronicles of Prydain, The Chronicles of Narnia, The Zanth series, the Myth Novels and the Phule novels, Hitchhikers Guide, The Harry Potter series and oh so many others, I love to read.

[shadows]

I literally have hundreds of books. I am currently organizing and writing down all of them to prevent getting anymore doubles! I really like the "Swords" books by Fred Saberhagen.

[transjen]

I have a feeling two of my three favs will be unknown to most but in order my three fav novels of all time are
1] Sword of Shannara by Terry Brooks
2] Azure Bonds by Jeff and Kate Grubb
3] Interview with the Vampire by Ann Rice

Jerseygirl Jen

[shadows]

Originally Posted by transjen

I have a feeling two of my three favs will be unknown to most but in order my three fav novels of all time are
1] Sword of Shannara by Terry Brooks
2] Azure Bonds by Jeff and Kate Grubb
3] Interview with the Vampire by Ann Rice

Jerseygirl Jen

I must not be like most people, as those are familiar to me.

I really enjoy Terry Brooks's 'Shannara' series. The original trilogy is great, but I haven't read it in many years(I have to pick up The Elfstones Of Shannara before I read it again).

Azure Bonds was a great book, and they made a computer game based off it(you didn't play as Ariel, but you met with her during the game). It was the first book of a trilogy, The Wyvern's Spur and Song of the Saurials were the second and third respectively.

I have also read a couple of Ann Rice's books. Good stuff!

[transjen]

Originally Posted by shadows

I must not be like most people, as those are familiar to me.

I really enjoy Terry Brooks's 'Shannara' series. The original trilogy is great, but I haven't read it in many years(I have to pick up The Elfstones Of Shannara before I read it again).

Azure Bonds was a great book, and they made a computer game based off it(you didn't play as Ariel, but you met with her during the game). It was the first book of a trilogy, The Wyvern's Spur and Song of the Saurials were the second and third respectively.

I have also read a couple of Ann Rice's books. Good stuff!

Be still my heart, a guy who not only loves hockey but also knows great books
But Azure Bonds the herion's name is Alias not Ariel, Ariel was the little mermaid from Disney

Jerseygirl Alias

[connie]

Love the Shannara series, read them all and his Magic Kingdom for sale series as well. Loved the Dragonriders of Pern series, for that matter all of pern, but my favorites were the Dragon Harper books. I really loved the Elven Airship, the Disappearing Dwarf, and The Stone Giants, by Blaylock. The Borribles triology by Larabetti and the Redwall books, which are just wonderful. I read a lot of classics as well.

[shadows]

Originally Posted by transjen

Be still my heart, a guy who not only loves hockey but also knows great books
But Azure Bonds the herion's name is Alias not Ariel, Ariel was the little mermaid from Disney

Jerseygirl Alias

Ack! You are quite correct that her name was Alias, not Ariel. I honestly don't know why I made that error.

Enjoying good books and hockey are just two of my wonderful qualities. LOL!

I don't suppose you enjoy working on jigsaw puzzles, do you?

[shadows]

Originally Posted by connie

Love the Shannara series, read them all and his Magic Kingdom for sale series as well. Loved the Dragonriders of Pern series, for that matter all of pern, but my favorites were the Dragon Harper books. I really loved the Elven Airship, the Disappearing Dwarf, and The Stone Giants, by Blaylock. The Borribles triology by Larabetti and the Redwall books, which are just wonderful. I read a lot of classics as well.

The Magic Kingdom: For Sale! series is an enjoyable one, as is the entire "Myth" series by Robert Asprin.

Another series I enjoy(and have to dig out of storage in my spare room so I can read it all over again) is the 'Guardians Of The Flame' by Joel Rosenberg. One of my favourites by far!

I own a few of Katherine Kerr's books but I haven't read them yet. I am missing one or two, and I would prefer to get the entire series before reading them.

I love getting my books either from a used book store(there are two of them in my city) or from the thrift shops!

[GRH]

I like books of all stripes. I used to read a lot of Star Wars books...Don't really do this anymore. I have a decent swathe of classic literature...Stuff like the complete works of Shakespeare, Milton, Poe, Tolkien, etc.

What I read the most are nonfiction books. I just don't have a lot of time for flights of fancy when there is so much REAL knowledge to be read. I have a lot of plant/nature books, finance books, books on drugs, and spirituality. I probably spend most of my time in spirituality books. I like a lot of Eastern religion books (Tao te Ching, Bhagavad Gita, Upanishads, etc.), but I'm really a fan of Brennan Manning (author of the Ragamuffin Gospel).

[Enoch Root]

Originally Posted by GRH

I like books of all stripes. I used to read a lot of Star Wars books...Don't really do this anymore. I have a decent swathe of classic literature...Stuff like the complete works of Shakespeare, Milton, Poe, Tolkien, etc.

What I read the most are nonfiction books. I just don't have a lot of time for flights of fancy when there is so much REAL knowledge to be read. I have a lot of plant/nature books, finance books, books on drugs, and spirituality. I probably spend most of my time in spirituality books. I like a lot of Eastern religion books (Tao te Ching, Bhagavad Gita, Upanishads, etc.), but I'm really a fan of Brennan Manning (author of the Ragamuffin Gospel).

You might be a good person for my inquiry. There is much I would learn of science and history, etc. Yet I have no love for textbooks. Dry old things they tend to be. I would rather welcome something scholarly that isn't so marvelously boring. Have you any idea of books like that? I know about Carl Sagan's books but that's about it.

[smc]

I am a voracious reader. I read a lot of classics, and to the degree possible I always read in the original languages if they are ones I know. I love to read poetry, especially German poetry of the Romantic and Late Romantic periods and American poetry of the twentieth century. On the rare occasions when I "allow" myself to read something purely for fun, it is usually a novel suggested by a friend or colleague. Right now, I am reading the Harry Potter books ... a summer reading "project" that just feels right, since I missed out on the Pottermania that swept through people younger than me. I'm in the middle of the second book, and enjoying it immensely.

[connie]

Originally Posted by shadows

The Magic Kingdom: For Sale! series is an enjoyable one, as is the entire "Myth" series by Robert Asprin.

Another series I enjoy(and have to dig out of storage in my spare room so I can read it all over again) is the 'Guardians Of The Flame' by Joel Rosenberg. One of my favourites by far!

I own a few of Katherine Kerr's books but I haven't read them yet. I am missing one or two, and I would prefer to get the entire series before reading them.

I love getting my books either from a used book store(there are two of them in my city) or from the thrift shops!

I too quite enjoyed the Guardiansof the Flame series, losing track of it only when Carls or was it Karls' son took over for him in the books. I also loved the spell singer series, by alan dean foster.

[SluttyShemaleAnna]

Wahh, why's it gotta be my favourite one? Can I give a top 5 in no particular order? Ok, and restricting to fiction only I'll do non-fic later

Mother Night - Kurt Vonnegut
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep - Phillip K Dick (can this count as 1/3 of a book as it's not a novel?)
The Wasp Factory - Ian Banks
Strata - Terry Pratchett
Day of the Triffids - John Wyndham

Wahhh, Can it be a top 10?

ok, i'll just add A Scanner Darkly and be done...

Ok actually, I will pick a favourite; Mother Night, a totaly brilliant book, written as the autobiography of a nazi who wasn't a nazi, but also was a nazi. The book stands on it's truely brilliant creation on a confused and bizarre, but ultimately believable and relate-able character in an even more confused and bizarre world.

Ultimately I like scifi novels the best, I've never been one for classics or character/narrative driven books, I like concept driven books best, and sci fi delivers on that (by that I mean proper scifi though, not some space opera drivel, Dune fans, i'm ripping on you here...) , not that I don't like good narrative driven books, I just like it better when a book is less a story, and more a trojan horse for some unnatural thought process.

[GRH]

Originally Posted by Enoch Root

You might be a good person for my inquiry. There is much I would learn of science and history, etc. Yet I have no love for textbooks. Dry old things they tend to be. I would rather welcome something scholarly that isn't so marvelously boring. Have you any idea of books like that? I know about Carl Sagan's books but that's about it.

Whoa, that's two REALLY broad fields that I don't have a terrible amount of experience with. As for science, I have some books on astro physics. A really accessible read is anything by Stephen Hawking. Of course, he talks about astronomy, the origin of the universe, things like that. As for natural history/science, a quintessential read would be Darwin's "On the Origin of Species." I have a lot of old National Geographic books that cover some interesting topics. Regarding history, this is a topic I don't do much reading on. Autobiographies and biographies are perhaps one of the less dry methods of getting a feel for a certain time period.

[shadows]

Originally Posted by smc

I am a voracious reader. I read a lot of classics, and to the degree possible I always read in the original languages if they are ones I know. I love to read poetry, especially German poetry of the Romantic and Late Romantic periods and American poetry of the twentieth century. On the rare occasions when I "allow" myself to read something purely for fun, it is usually a novel suggested by a friend or colleague. Right now, I am reading the Harry Potter books ... a summer reading "project" that just feels right, since I missed out on the Pottermania that swept through people younger than me. I'm in the middle of the second book, and enjoying it immensely.

I believe you will be quite satisfied when you are finished the series. It starts out light-hearted and the tone becomes darker each book starting with The Prisoner Of Azkaban. Also, you will see how her writing actually improves as the series goes along.

I read Deathly Hallows in 2 days! I will probably read the series again sometime in the future.

[shadows]

Originally Posted by connie

I too quite enjoyed the Guardiansof the Flame series, losing track of it only when Carls or was it Karls' son took over for him in the books. I also loved the spell singer series, by alan dean foster.

I have a few of Alan Dean Foster's books. I think I only have one from the Spell Singer series, but the rest can be found in the local used book store(I saw them there the other day). Andre Norton's 'Xanth' series of books are pretty interesting, and there are a lot of them to read!

[shadows]

Originally Posted by SluttyShemaleAnna

Day of the Triffids - John Wyndham

An excellent novel. I actually didn't mind reading it when it was chosen as the book everyone in the class had to read way back in Public School.

I also enjoyed the novel 'Shane' when it was chosen for us to read.

[transjen]

I thought the Xanth series was by Piers Anthony not Norton
Anywho the Spellsinger series is a good series but i only have the first two
Another series i love is the Elric series
I also like the first three Dragonlance novels
Jerseygirl Jen

[Enoch Root]

The Baroque Trilogy by Neal Stephenson. It'll keep you occupied for about a month at least, assuming you read 100 pages a day.

The Diamond Age is fantastic as well.

And if you want to view mankind at its most violent I doubt you couldn't do better than "Blood Meridian" by Cormac McCarthy.

[shadows]

Originally Posted by transjen

I thought the Xanth series was by Piers Anthony not Norton
Anywho the Spellsinger series is a good series but i only have the first two
Another series i love is the Elric series
I also like the first three Dragonlance novels
Jerseygirl Jen

That is the second error that I have made now. You are indeed correct, Jennifer. It was Witch World that I was think of earlier.

I have over 30 various Dragonlance novels, as well as numerous Ravenloft ones. I like the Ravenloft ones as they have a darker tone to them.

[transjen]

I love the Witch world books
and my fav Ravenloft novel is Knight of the blackrose

[shadows]

Originally Posted by transjen

I love the Witch world books
and my fav Ravenloft novel is Knight of the blackrose

I haven't read that one yet, but Lord Soth is one of my favourite villains in the entire Dragonlance mythos.

[Melissa Pink]

Originally Posted by SluttyShemaleAnna

Wahh, why's it gotta be my favourite one? Can I give a top 5 in no particular order? Ok, and restricting to fiction only I'll do non-fic later

Mother Night - Kurt Vonnegut
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep - Phillip K Dick (can this count as 1/3 of a book as it's not a novel?)
The Wasp Factory - Ian Banks
Strata - Terry Pratchett
Day of the Triffids - John Wyndham

Wahhh, Can it be a top 10?

ok, i'll just add A Scanner Darkly and be done...

Ok actually, I will pick a favourite; Mother Night, a totaly brilliant book, written as the autobiography of a nazi who wasn't a nazi, but also was a nazi. The book stands on it's truely brilliant creation on a confused and bizarre, but ultimately believable and relate-able character in an even more confused and bizarre world.

Ultimately I like scifi novels the best, I've never been one for classics or character/narrative driven books, I like concept driven books best, and sci fi delivers on that (by that I mean proper scifi though, not some space opera drivel, Dune fans, i'm ripping on you here...) , not that I don't like good narrative driven books, I just like it better when a book is less a story, and more a trojan horse for some unnatural thought process.

Phillip K. Dick and Kurt Vonnegut are two of my favorite writers. I like most of their work but "The Man in the High Castle" and "Mother Night" are two of my favorites. I like the social commentary of both men and the World War Two themes of both novels are especially relevant in today's turbulent world.

I read "Myra Breckinridge" by Gore Vidal years ago and really related to her.

My other favorite writer is Charles Bukowski. Anyone that has ever felt like an outsider in the "mainstream" world, been poor, drank too much, had gratuitous sex and worked a series of shit jobs can relate to Bukowski's life as illustrated eloquently in his prose and poems set mostly in Los Angeles in the 40's and 50's.

[jdawg]

I usually only read non-fiction so most books would be considered boring. My favorite book was Homage to Catalonia by George Orwell. I cant believe I let somebody have it! Great book.