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I need a new book to read, and I need your opinion of the greatest book ever written.
Thank You

By Zephyrmaster (Zephyrmaster) on Wednesday, March 10, 2004 - 11:42 pm: Edit

In my personal opinion:

One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez

By Welshie (Welshie) on Wednesday, March 10, 2004 - 11:45 pm: Edit

"On the Road" by Jack Kerouac, or
"Dharma Bums" by Jack Kerouac.

By Meandthemoon (Meandthemoon) on Thursday, March 11, 2004 - 12:19 am: Edit

"Faith of the Fallen" by Terry Goodkind
"The Brothers Karamazov" by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
"Atlas Shrugged" by Ayn Rand

By Dschnapps (Dschnapps) on Thursday, March 11, 2004 - 12:39 am: Edit

Maybe not the best, but "East of Eden" is VERY good if you can take the time to read it.

By Parabolic_Line (Parabolic_Line) on Thursday, March 11, 2004 - 01:30 am: Edit

I'm reading East of Eden right now. Its great.

BTW Dschnapps, can I talk to you about a paper on East of Eden I have to write?

By Just_Forget_Me (Just_Forget_Me) on Thursday, March 11, 2004 - 08:38 am: Edit

Maybe not the "greatest books ever written" but if you want some incredible modern literature, check out Chuck Palahniuk and Dave Eggers.

I just reread Huckleberry Finn for English class, I had forgotten how amazing the book is.

By Dragonreborn (Dragonreborn) on Thursday, March 11, 2004 - 12:15 pm: Edit

-THE ELFSTONES OF SHANNARA by TERRY BROOKS

GOOOOOOO SHANNARA!!!!

-Robert Jordan's The Eye of the World and The Shadow Rising.

-R. A Salvatore's Icewind Dale and Dark Elf Trilogy.

By Athlonmj (Athlonmj) on Thursday, March 11, 2004 - 12:24 pm: Edit

A is for Admission

By Clickspring (Clickspring) on Thursday, March 11, 2004 - 01:38 pm: Edit

Don't know about greatest ever, but some of my favs include:

Beloved by Toni Morrison

Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte

By Chardonnay (Chardonnay) on Thursday, March 11, 2004 - 02:07 pm: Edit

wuthering heights by emily bronte (heathcliff!)
david copperfield by charles dickens
catch-22 by joeseph heller

By Karie (Karie) on Thursday, March 11, 2004 - 03:24 pm: Edit

A Lesson Before Dying - Ernest Gaines

By Ml41588 (Ml41588) on Thursday, March 11, 2004 - 04:05 pm: Edit

there are the oldschool favorites which could never be replaced:
catcher in the rye
a tree grows in brooklyn
to kill a mockingbird
etc...

right now im reading
How they got home by ema burston
AMAZING book

By Fhmamii (Fhmamii) on Thursday, March 11, 2004 - 04:12 pm: Edit

Door to December - Dean Koontz

By Mazzo (Mazzo) on Thursday, March 11, 2004 - 04:17 pm: Edit

Lolita - Nabokov

read it now

By Koopatroopa (Koopatroopa) on Thursday, March 11, 2004 - 05:08 pm: Edit

I second One Hundred Years of Solitude. If you happen to like Marquez's style, try reading Love in the Time of Cholera.
Here are some more recommendations:

Classics:
Lord of the Flies - William Golding
The Sound and the Fury - William Faulkner
To Kill A Mockingbird - Harper Lee

Modern:
Battle Royale - Koushun Takami (I've yet to meet a person that doesn't like it...)
The Secret History - Donna Tartt
Disgrace - J.M. Coetzee
All The Pretty Horses - Cormac McCarthy

I would do more, but that'd just be superfluous, no?

By Caitlan2005 (Caitlan2005) on Thursday, March 11, 2004 - 05:27 pm: Edit

The Picture Of Dorian Gray, A Brave New World, The Handmaid's Tail, A Clockwork Orange, 1984 are my favorites

By Purgeofdoors (Purgeofdoors) on Thursday, March 11, 2004 - 05:39 pm: Edit

Finnegan's Wake - James Joyce

By Kewlkiwi102 (Kewlkiwi102) on Thursday, March 11, 2004 - 05:43 pm: Edit

Everyone is so traditional! mostly going with "classics"!
My fav is The Hot Zone, by Richard Preston

By Haithman (Haithman) on Thursday, March 11, 2004 - 06:23 pm: Edit

How about War and Peace and The Wealth of Nations?
I know that these are considered great books, but enjoyable to read?

By Abrandel05 (Abrandel05) on Thursday, March 11, 2004 - 06:45 pm: Edit

paradise lost, john milton, not really a book as much as homer style epoch, but still what genius

By Arow (Arow) on Thursday, March 11, 2004 - 07:49 pm: Edit

The Elegant Universe

The answer to all your questions is here. You will be satisfied after you read this.

By Mundanesundays (Mundanesundays) on Thursday, March 11, 2004 - 09:08 pm: Edit

My favourite book of all time is "A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius" by Dave Eggers. It's maybe not great classical literature, but it's fantastic writing, and funny as hell.

for other great contemporary stuff, check out Nick Hornby ("High Fidelity", specifically), and Chuck Palahniuk ("Choke", especially).

As for classic stuff, "The Picture of Dorian Gray" is one of my favourites, as is "Catcher in the Rye"

By Matthias (Matthias) on Thursday, March 11, 2004 - 09:12 pm: Edit

"Lolita - Nabokov

read it now"


Yup

By Daggerlee (Daggerlee) on Thursday, March 11, 2004 - 09:25 pm: Edit

Mundanesundays - you are totally cool for having a toothpastefordinner comic in your profile, and for liking the World/Inferno Friendship Society.

By Frenchfries (Frenchfries) on Thursday, March 11, 2004 - 09:33 pm: Edit

In my opinion, the Harry Potter books are among the best books ever written, but I assume everyone's already read those. My advice: never judge a book by it's cover! Some books may not look serious or enlightening, but if you actually sit down and read them, they can be pretty enjoyable. I just finished "Bridget Jones' Diary" a few days ago and loved it. And I highly recommend "Sloppy Firsts" to every girl on this website. My choices don't exactly seem erudite so I guess I'll also say "A Separate Peace," one of the few school books I've ever enjoyed, and "The Joy Luck Club," a beautiful, funny, bittersweet and all around perfect book.

By Glamourbaby19 (Glamourbaby19) on Thursday, March 11, 2004 - 10:01 pm: Edit

Besides all the aforementioned "classics" (Catcher in the Rye, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, To Kill a Mockingbird), I have always liked Sue Townsend's "The Queen and I." It is no Woolf, but it is the funniest thing I have ever seen in print...

By Yellowcard05 (Yellowcard05) on Thursday, March 11, 2004 - 10:08 pm: Edit

The Virgin Suicides, The Bible, The Great Gatsby.


Hows that for variety.

By Xindianx (Xindianx) on Thursday, March 11, 2004 - 10:22 pm: Edit

heh, my favs are from the jazz age, great gatsby, and a farewell to arms, i love hemingway and fitzgerald, but if u really want a good book, sounds of fury by william faulkner, book is great, u can think of a kadrillion diff themes..=)
one book i loath, moby dick, seriously, i mean do u think aliens will ever understand why a dum ass like melville wrote a 1000000000 page book on fishing lmao

By Altsuperhero (Altsuperhero) on Thursday, March 11, 2004 - 10:26 pm: Edit

Vonnegut ... you'll become addicted quite quickly

Just finished the Sirens of Titan - very good book ... yes, it's science fiction; no, it's not just science fiction

everything Vonnegut says has a bit of sarcasm and takes a small jab at the stupidity, senselessness, and unbelievable dumb luck of society

Slaughterhouse-Five: a good Vonnegut-intro book ... isn't as wild, meandering, or Vonnegut-esque as his other works, but it's just the bait to reel in new converts ... got me interested in the Dresden firebombings, which I had not really known about/cared about before reading the book

Cat's Cradle: Bokononism. Enough said.

(My favorite part was when Newt compares religion to a cat's cradle. See the cat? See the cradle? Yes, my amusement with that is really childish.)

Galapagos: Not among Vonnegut's best works. But any reference to the legendary Kilgore Trout is a welcome one. Even if it comes in the form of Trout's son, Leon. Some friends complain that the thought of old people having sex to perpetuate the human race (and the evolution of furry, aquatic-based humans) was not a very appealling

Breakfast of Champions: I've talked to a lot of Vonnegut fans, and this book is usually their favorite. Interesting illustrations - of "wide beavers" ... One giant meandering ... Finally, Kilgore Trout gets a lead role. And Dwayne Hoover isn't bad. Mr. Rosewater also in this book.

God Bless You Mr. Rosewater: enjoyable ... details the life of a person who inherited aristocracy and traded it all for a place among the common people ... and we get to see origins of Norman Mushari, the scheming lawyer ...

Slapstick: pretty good ... genius twins who tap their geniusness by being close to each other (yes, lots of disturbing incest references ...)
genius twins are separated ... blah blah blah ... humans enter new middle ages ... norman mushari reprises his role as the scheming lawyer trying to con rich families out of their treasure chests by arguing on behalf of neglected relatives ... the book is much more interesting than what i've described


the sirens of titan: granted, i'm quite biased since I just finished the book. yeah, so far, this is the best vonnegut book i've read.
Salo and the Tralfamadorians are back (always cool)
Malachi Constant/Unk - rich, spoiled brat ... falls prey to destiny ... intergalactic travels ... life amounts to nothingness ...

wow, a lot of vonnegut's books deal with the tragic, yet humorous, fall of a rich person ...

yeah, vonnegut likes to recycle a lot of his characters ... adds to the reader's enjoyment (okay, maybe it just adds to my personal enjoyment -sort of like when people tend to choose SAT answers of words they know even(cough, especially) when they don't know what's being asked)

sirens of titan also reminded me a lot of 1984 when Unk was in the Mars Army ...

and the way vonnegut makes it seem like all of the troubles that his characters go through amounts to nothing ... seems like camus's theory of the absurd ... some traces of fatalism as well since vonnegut usually maps out the beginning and ending of his stories ... he mentioned the theory in one of his books - how life isn't about the beginning or the end but the journey in between; books should be like that as


(As if I hadn't already demonstrated my propensity for loquaciousness)
I agree with previous posters:
Brothers Karamazov - read it ... what's the purpose of life -> I wouldn't be surprised if Dost weaved it in here somehow .... my favorite parts were the Grand Inquisitor, Ivan's hallucinations, every scene with Kolya, ... (drifts off into rambling similar to the way hobbits talk days on end about the Shire)

The Picture of Dorian Gray - very dark ... I felt very ashamed that I was following some of Lord Henry's catchy epigrams after reading the book ... with the exception of the middle parts of the book where Wilde meanders about the extant in which Dorian partook in debauchery, this book moves at a brisk pace and is pretty enjoyable

Star Rover - Jack London dabbling w/ sci-fi ... and doing a surprisingly good job ... Darrell Standing ... traveling through time while physically confined ... in solitary (well sort of)

Yes, most (all) of these books are classics ... I hate how most people are just turned off by hearing that word ... so what if it was published more than 20 (or 200) years ago ...

By _Holly (_Holly) on Thursday, March 11, 2004 - 10:37 pm: Edit

The Master and Margarita - Mikhail Bulgakov

Not the most original of choices, I know, but I still adore it.

By Parabolic_Line (Parabolic_Line) on Friday, March 12, 2004 - 07:01 am: Edit

I didn't like "The Hot Zone" that much. It got repetitive after the first case.

Some more great books:
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series
Ender's Game series
Song of Solomon by Toni Morrison

By Mundanesundays (Mundanesundays) on Friday, March 12, 2004 - 08:47 pm: Edit

wow, you guys definitely reminded me of some of my favourite books that i completely forgot to mention. "The Master and Margarita" is fantastic - I absolutely reveled in it. "Sirens of Titan" by Vonnegut is also a favourite.
good choices, kids.

also, daggerlee: thanks!! I'm surprised you've heard of the World/Inferno; very few people have. I'm impressed.

By Socalnick (Socalnick) on Friday, March 12, 2004 - 09:04 pm: Edit

The 4th K!!!!!!!!
By Mario Puzo


My favorite book is The 4th K by Mario Puzo(the guy who wrote the godfather). I can alamost garentee you wont read it in any engilish due to some of it's subject matter, but it is an outstanding piece of liteature. For a quick summery the book is about President Francis Xavier Kenedy (the 4th Kenedy) and the problems of his presidency, some of which include terrorist and impeachment. Puzo is a genius in the way he works in seamingly minor charters and gives them major roles. This is generaly a guy's book, but some girls may like it.

By Cubfan (Cubfan) on Friday, March 12, 2004 - 09:39 pm: Edit

anybody read shibumi by trevanian?

By Ndcountrygirl (Ndcountrygirl) on Friday, March 12, 2004 - 11:55 pm: Edit

Where the Red Fern Grows and Summer of the Monkeys both make me cry when I read them..so i guess I call them good books.

I love Harry Potter, and just read the Da Vinci Code...pretty amazing book, really makes you think about the history told in the Bible. Anyone else read it?

By Layne (Layne) on Saturday, March 13, 2004 - 01:05 pm: Edit

In my view, The Brothers Karamazov is the greatest book ever written.
Crime and Punishment - the second greatest.
(For me)

By Rayo (Rayo) on Saturday, March 13, 2004 - 03:18 pm: Edit

Fahrenheit 451

The Great Gatsby

By Just_Forget_Me (Just_Forget_Me) on Saturday, March 13, 2004 - 07:41 pm: Edit

ND-I read Da Vinci Code... incredible thriller, and raises a lot of interesting questions. The actual history in it is somewhat debatable -- a lot of details are stretched -- but that doesn't really take anything away, it is fiction.

Mundane-you impress me once again with Palahniuk + Eggers. Have you read Trainspotting? Or anything else by Irvine Welsh.

By Chemgirl04 (Chemgirl04) on Sunday, March 14, 2004 - 01:12 am: Edit

To Kill A Mockingbird - without a doubt

and...
Rabbit, Run - John Updike
A Seperate Peace
A Farewell to Arms (can't decide if i loved it or hated it)
...ill try to think of more

By Mundanesundays (Mundanesundays) on Sunday, March 14, 2004 - 09:14 am: Edit

I read the Da Vinci Code too...I enjoyed it well enough - there were some clever aspects to it, but honestly, the writing is god-awful. I'm not used to reading cheap thrillers, but I don't plan to anymore, because I cannot stand that level of awful writing. The characterization is cheesy and the descriptions are horrible. I did get wrapped up in the plot for a few days, though. However, do a little research on the so-called "facts" of that book. You'll find that barely any of it is anywhere close to fact, which really pisses me off, because he's so insistant that all of it is true.

Anyway, don't mind my ranting. Just Forget Me, I haven't read Trainspotting, but it's one of my favourite movies, and it's been on my list of books to read for a while now.

By Yugekorb (Yugekorb) on Sunday, March 14, 2004 - 09:49 am: Edit

best: (order doesnt matter)
crime and punishment
to kill a mockingbird
brothers karamazov
catcher in the rye

worst:
a farewell to arms
the awakening

By Benzo415 (Benzo415) on Sunday, March 14, 2004 - 02:39 pm: Edit

The Bonfire of the Vanities by Tom Wolfe has to be one of my favorites. It's a wonderful, sprawling epic about NYC in the mid-80's. It touches on all social classes, all ethnicites, many parts of the city, just really awesome; it's satirical and funny, yet dramatic and serious in some parts too. Definitely recommend that highly, along with anything by Vonnegut or Hunter Thompson. "To Kill a Mockingbird" and "Catcher in the Rye" are awesome too. It's tough for me to get into anything written before 1900, though (especially those Bronte sisters or Jane Austen!).

As for Harry Potter and Da Vinci Code, while they are captivating works and fun to read, they're not exactly the best pieces of literature ever.

By Astrobobocop (Astrobobocop) on Sunday, March 14, 2004 - 04:29 pm: Edit

the lord of the rings has always been my most beloved set of books, all 6. If you raised an eyebrow as to 6 being the number of books, there really are six, two each in fellowship, two towers, and return of the king. I'm a bit of tolkien junkie, so bear with me.
If you wanted something outside the realm of fantasy and into the realm of science fiction, pick up Red Mars, it is an extremeley detailed portrayal of the colonization of Mars, not to mention some great characters.
Also, if you want up your verbal score on your SAT I, try reading some shakespeare, such as macbeth or hamlet. Quite a few of the words shakespeare made up are still in use today.
Books rock
Astrobobocop

By Wo4567 (Wo4567) on Sunday, March 14, 2004 - 05:01 pm: Edit

nectar in a sieve (kamala markyandaya), siddhartha (hesse), the reprieve (sartre), sometimes a great notion (kesey), island (huxley), the idiot (dostoevsky), the age of faith (paul durant), the once and future king (t.h. white), restoring hope (cornel west), the best christmas pageant ever (barbara robinson), faust (goethe), a ring of endless light (l'engle), nine stories (salinger)...

By Jenlikewhoa (Jenlikewhoa) on Sunday, March 14, 2004 - 07:09 pm: Edit

youth in revolt- c.d. payne

one flew over the cuckoos nest- ken kesey

By Tabmasterflash (Tabmasterflash) on Sunday, March 14, 2004 - 09:18 pm: Edit

i'm reading a handmaid's tale by margaret atwood right now.

it is...interesting

By Meandthemoon (Meandthemoon) on Sunday, March 14, 2004 - 09:22 pm: Edit

Wow, I thought I was the only kid who read Dostoyevsky for pleasure.....

By Cheetah (Cheetah) on Sunday, March 14, 2004 - 09:25 pm: Edit

How could anyone just choose one!?!?

Anna Karenina (Tolstoy)
Jane Eyre (Bronte)
Slaughterhouse Five (Vonnegut)
The Picture of Dorian Gray (Wilde)
Roots (Haley)
ANYTHING L'Engle

By Legallyblonde (Legallyblonde) on Sunday, March 14, 2004 - 10:08 pm: Edit

Has anyone heard of these novelists?
Violet Winspear, Ann Hampson and Sandra Marton?

By Neo (Neo) on Sunday, March 14, 2004 - 10:39 pm: Edit

What about...

The Neverending Story -- Michael Encke.

Or...

ANYTHING by Madeline L'Engle, like...
A Wrinkle in Time. <--Brilliance.

Or how about...

Matilda -- Roald Dahl. Witty, charming, lovely, and on par with The Narnian Chronicles (C.S.Lewis). These, in my opinion, are two of the best children's authors EVER.

Jurassic Park/The Lost World -- Michael Crichton (1001 times better than the stupid movies).

The Great Gatsby (one of the few books I enjoyed reading for English). Incredible. Entrancing. One of my 3 favorite books, perhaps?

The Bell Jar -- Sylvia Plath. Tragic, but beautiful.

Rainbow Six -- Tom Clancy. Maybe not the greatest book of all time, but for an action thriller, it's hard to beat.

By Athlonmj (Athlonmj) on Sunday, March 14, 2004 - 11:01 pm: Edit

some good books i've read:
the grapes of wrath
brave new world
the giver
pride & prejudice
atlas shrugged
slaughterhouse five

some bad books i've read:
the scarlet letter
a separate peace
a prayer for owen meany
wuthering heights

By Pupsingh (Pupsingh) on Tuesday, March 16, 2004 - 11:03 am: Edit

in cold blood
-truman capote

By Salamanda (Salamanda) on Wednesday, March 17, 2004 - 10:45 am: Edit

This House of Stone...sorta a prequal to October Sky...but still really good

The Ishbane Conspiracy...gets into religon, so if you aren't a Christian you probably won't like this book

My Father's Daughter...you gotta be a Sinatra fan for this...

The Firm and The Runaway Jury...and John Grisham book is EXCELLENT

By Crypto86 (Crypto86) on Wednesday, March 17, 2004 - 11:20 am: Edit

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest - Kesey

What an amazing book!

We are reading Invisible Man [by Ralph Ellison - not The Invisible Man by Wells ;)] and it's pretty good too.

Worst book ever IMO - Robinson Crusoe. It's uber dry and just boring.

By Kiwee (Kiwee) on Wednesday, March 17, 2004 - 04:40 pm: Edit

The best book ever written in my opinion is The Shepherd of the Hills by Harold Bell Wright. It's such a great book, and when you are done with the book you can go to Branson, Missouri and visit the homestead and see the play it is awesome! My other two favorite books are The Da Vinci Code, a new bestseller that is amazing for anyone who loves art and history, and The Kitchen Boy by Robert Alexander, which I only like because the Romanov story fascitnates me for some reason. I am reading East of Eden right now. I'm only a few chapters in and I'm wondering if it has an actual point or if it will continue to be a chronological memior of the narrators geneology? But I have been told it is good so I'll stick with it.

By Kiwee (Kiwee) on Wednesday, March 17, 2004 - 04:43 pm: Edit

One book that I absolutely loathed was The Lord of the Flies by William Golding. He takes three pages describing the leaves on the trees and then the kids kill each other! It is so gross I hated that book!

By Slacker007 (Slacker007) on Wednesday, March 17, 2004 - 05:09 pm: Edit

Fight Club- Chuck Palahniuck

Lord of the Flies- William Golding

The Fountainhead- Ayn Rand

By Ishuku (Ishuku) on Wednesday, March 17, 2004 - 06:37 pm: Edit

Fight Club, Survivor, and Invisible Monsters, all by Chuck Palahniuk

Ender's Game by Orsen Scott Card

American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis

Satan: His Psychotherapy And Cure By The Unforunate Dr. Kassler, J.S.P.S. by Jeremy Leven

Eating The Cheshire Cat by Helen Ellis

Le Petit Prince by Antoine St-Exupery

The Outsiders by S. E. Hinton

By Priglet (Priglet) on Thursday, March 18, 2004 - 08:35 pm: Edit

Go Bulgakov and Vonnegut! Hilarious!
Just finished The Power and the Glory (Graham Greene)... What an incredible book!
Other goodies are About a Boy (Nick Hornby),
The Closing of the American Mind (Allan Bloom),
War and Peace (truly a heartbreaking work of staggering genius),
Decline and Fall (Evelyn Waugh)
Bridget Jones Diary--kind of girly, though...,
Tigana (Guy Gavriel Kay),
Anything C.S. Lewis,
Anything Georgette Heyer, lol, and, of course,
Lord of the Rings!

By Priscillama (Priscillama) on Thursday, March 18, 2004 - 08:43 pm: Edit

THE LIFE OF PI
THE BLUEST EYE- TONI MORRISON- disturbing but compelling
BLACK LIKE ME!
ONE HUNDRED YEARS OF SOLITUDE

bad ones:
wuthering heights for sure..
one flew over the cuckoo's nest
*want to read atlas shrugged- good?

By Majinjou1 (Majinjou1) on Thursday, March 18, 2004 - 08:45 pm: Edit

Guns, Germs, and Steel: The fates of human societies.

By Untie_The_Cows (Untie_The_Cows) on Sunday, March 21, 2004 - 02:19 pm: Edit

The Power of One

A CONFEDERACY OF DUNCES!! I don't think anyone mentioned it!

The Awakening (am I the only Chopin fan in the world?)

The Great Gatsby

Jane Eyre

One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest

By _Holly (_Holly) on Sunday, March 21, 2004 - 02:46 pm: Edit

Confederacy of Dunces is definitely my number 2, that book is a classic!

By Hannah86 (Hannah86) on Sunday, March 21, 2004 - 08:49 pm: Edit

not the greatest books ever written but here are some of my favorites:

"Memoirs of a Geisha"
Arthur Golden

"Pride and Prejudice"
Jane Austen

"Jane Eyre"
Charlotte Bronte

"Anywhere but Here"
Mona Simpson

"A Cup of Tea"
Amy Ephron

"Girl, Interrupted"
Susanna Kaysen

LOTR!!!
JRR Tolkien

Harry Potter series!! :D

and all Amy Tan books, "The Kitchen God's Wife" being the favorite

i've read "The Da Vinci Code" also. very fast-paced, reminds me John Grisham books. i really liked John Grisham's "The Pelican Brief" and speaking of thrillers i also enjoyed "Presumed Innocent" by Scott Turrow very much.

I HATE STEINBECK BOOKS. especially Grapes of Wrath, it was the first book that ever made me sleepy reading it

By Glowingamy (Glowingamy) on Sunday, March 21, 2004 - 08:59 pm: Edit

I like Haruki Murakami and Richard Brautigan's books, also The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath.

By Slayer (Slayer) on Sunday, March 21, 2004 - 11:30 pm: Edit

Tender is the night by F. Scott Fitzgerald
and A Separate Peace by John Knowles

By Tarkus (Tarkus) on Monday, March 22, 2004 - 04:01 pm: Edit

Many writers consider James Joyce's *Ulysses* to be the best book ever written in modern times. For me it was the toughest, however it was the best example of characterization that I've ever seen. Also, about halfway through the book, I realized its "masterpiece status" came not from the story, but from the fact that Joyce took pleasure in the English language and seemed to break every one of the language's confounded rules! For light reading--Dennis Lehane's *Shutter Island* has a fantastic twist at the end, and of course anything by Carl Hiaasen will tickle your funnybone.

By Fallentear04 (Fallentear04) on Monday, March 22, 2004 - 04:54 pm: Edit

I was going to read the Life of Pi but then got turned off by the synopsis. How ridiculously mundane am I?

By Jnatkins (Jnatkins) on Monday, March 22, 2004 - 05:04 pm: Edit

I've always loved Fahrenheit 451

By Aim78 (Aim78) on Monday, March 22, 2004 - 07:24 pm: Edit

Timeline by Michael Crichton is pretty damn good.

If you're talking about classics, I like Of Mice and Men a lot and it's pretty short. That book is guaranteed to get your emotions riled up, it's like watching Old Yeller.

Best book ever? I can't say because I'm only now discovering the classics.

By Matthias (Matthias) on Monday, March 22, 2004 - 07:39 pm: Edit

"Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. Lo-lee-ta:
the tip of the tongue taking a trip of three steps down the palate to tap,
at three, on the teeth. Lo. Lee. Ta.
She was Lo, plain Lo, in the morning, standing four feet ten in one
sock. She was Lola in slacks. She was Dolly at school. She was Dolores on
the dotted line. But in my arms she was always Lolita."


"She was musical and apple-sweet ... Lola the bobby-soxer, devouring her immemorial fruit, singing through its juice ... and every movement she made, every shuffle and ripple, helped me to conceal and to improve the secret system of tactile correspondence between beast and beauty--between my gagged, bursting beast and the beauty of her dimpled body in its innocent cotton frock."


"Around Christmas she caught a bad chill and was examined by a friend of
Miss Lester, a Dr. Ilse Tristramson (hi, Ilse, you were a dear,
uninquisitive soul, and you touched my dove very gently). She diagnosed
bronchitis, patted Lo on the back (all its bloom erect because of the fever)
and put her to bed for a week or longer. At first she "ran a temperature" in
American parlance, and I could not resist the exquisite caloricity of
unexpected delights--Venus febriculosa--though it was a very languid Lolita
that moaned and coughed and shivered in my embrace."


Vladimir Nabokov......Lolita........classic.

By Mindyzhang (Mindyzhang) on Monday, March 22, 2004 - 08:29 pm: Edit

socrates cafe .. but that`s just me. i`m a philosophy freak.

By Dannysta45 (Dannysta45) on Tuesday, March 23, 2004 - 04:38 pm: Edit

The only four books I actually enjoyed reading for school well ones a two are plays

Wuthering Heights (Bronte)-I know a lot of people who read it who did not like it but I thought it was an amazing book

The Return Of The Native (Hardy)

The Crucible
Hamlet

Did not like
Grapes Of Wrath
Last Of the Mohicans
The Gilded Age there are some more

By Neo (Neo) on Thursday, April 08, 2004 - 03:54 pm: Edit

Top...

By Priscillama (Priscillama) on Thursday, April 08, 2004 - 04:45 pm: Edit

THE DA VINCI CODE- DAN BROWN

By Philntex (Philntex) on Thursday, April 08, 2004 - 07:18 pm: Edit

To Kill a Mockingbird (Harper Lee). Timeless classic, honestly

I've just started Native Son by Richard Wright, and it's pretty dang good, too.

By Taru (Taru) on Tuesday, April 13, 2004 - 10:33 pm: Edit

I agree w/everyone recommending Lolita...it is an incredible, INCREDIBLE novel.