Favorite books / What are you reading?

S

Snackpack

It Wandered In From the Wastes
What's crackin NMA?

I've got about 40 bucks in unused Barnes and Nobles gift cards to blow, looking for some recommendations from my fellow Fallout nerds :)

I'm currently reading Pattern Recognition by William Gibson, I'm about 1/3 of the way through and it's pretty intriguing so far. The only other book I've read by him was Neuromancer (classic!). It's funny, I got into the P&P game Shadowrun when I was a kid, and having read Neuromancer for the first time last year I was amazed that FASA ripped him off almost at a 1:1 ratio (minus elves and dwarves) without giving him credit!

Also wanted to recommend anything by Neal Stephenson to anyone who hasn't checked him out, mind blowing stuff in my opinion. Start with Snow Crash, then Cryptonomicon (changed the way I perceive the ebb and flow of information) and if you dig that and have the time, The Baroque Cycle is epic and fairly awesome.
 
i loved cryptonomicon. anyway, i read a lot - mostly german authors from the sixties and seventies. right now, ingeborg bachmanns "undine geht" :crazy:

last english books were kerouacs on the road (i always read it when i travel) and some stephen king. either i forgot my ritalin or the story was so generic i completely forgot it.

in the non-fiction department i read "megaphilosophie" from joachim koch. nice read, its more like following a conversation. basically, he follows the development from, say, the socialistic internationale to the culinary internationale. exchange that with: "revolution" to "suburbia", "art" to "marketing", etc etc. he deviates more often from his topics than twinkie when hes drunk, but very entertaining read.
 
we've had quite some interesting topics about this in the past, i think you can find them by searching for "summer reading" in General Discussion.
 
Eh? I thought we had a thread like this... In fact I'm almost sure we do. I recall Welsh and Simple Minded posting frequently in it.

At any rate, I'm re-reading Robert Zubrin's 'The Case for Mars' after finishing 'Slip String Drive' by Andrew L. Bender. The latter is great for those struggling to understand M-Theory and String Theory as well as the TOE. It's put quite simply as well as describes an interesting theory for a faster than light ship and propulsion system for the ship.
 
one of these days...i have to start reading "This Immortal" by roger zelazny.....AFTER I AM DONE WITH THIS DAMN MATHS AND PHYSICS !!!!
 
yo sorry if this is a repeat thread. I did dig a little bit and didn't come up with much, I'll root around some more.
 
Yep- we probably do have one somewhere-
I have recently finished Into the Wild- but I generally buy my books from used dealers.

Currently reading The Descent but probably won't finish it.

Will probably try The Terror next.

Or perhaps Nathaniels' Nutmeg

Or - to satisfy my craving for cannibalism-
The Heart of the Sea which tells the tale of the whale ship, the Essex, the basis for Melville's Moby Dick.

Otherwise, I have a pile of horror and detective pulp stories to get through.

Edit- best book I have read in a while was McCarthy's Blood Meridian, although I would read this other stuff first as this book helps explain his other work.
 
welsh said:
Currently reading The Descent but probably won't finish it.
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Welsh - I'm reading this one too ATM, I've read it a couple of times before, and while it gets slow at times, and the writing is a bit meh, it does pick up.
 
I would recommend 'Heart of Darkness' by Joseph Conrad, 'Nineteen Eighty-four' and 'Animal Farm' by Orwell and of course Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit.
Great classics.

Of newer books I liked Anne Rice' Vampire Chronicles. (Only read the three first so far)
 
Currently reading:
"A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man" by James Joyce. Quite enjoyable and very eloquently written, but the last chapters focus a lot on religious issues which I don't find so fascinating.

"The Town", second book in William Faulkner's Snopes trilogy. I wouldn't recommend it unless you have a specific interest in Faulkner.
 
Red Storm Rising by Tom Clancy.

Actually, I just finished The Stand by Stephen King. Most fucking epic book I have ever read
 
I just finished Journey to the End of the Night, by L-F Celine. Probably one of the books that've made the biggest impression of me as of late.

I'm currently reading VALIS, by Philip K.Dick

Reading, slowly but surely, Milton's Paradise Lost. It's absolutely amazing, but I can only read it slowly, as one page of this book has more content than twenty pages of a novel.

For bus rides, etc, I'm re-reading Lem's Cyberiad.
 
Phil the Nuka-Cola Dude said:
Just finished Dune for the second time to get me caught up before I start Messiah.
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One of my favorites, read it a few times. I never have checked out the rest of the series. One of my friends who has read them all recomended that I keep it that way. Any thoughts from anyone on that?

Jack The Knife said:
I would recommend 'Heart of Darkness' by Joseph Conrad, 'Nineteen Eighty-four' and 'Animal Farm' by Orwell and of course Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit.
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I've been meaning to check out Heart of Darkness, Apocalypse Now (which is based on/inspired by that) is one of my favorite flicks. If you like 1984 or dystopian settings in general I'd recomend Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury and Brave New World by Aldous Huxley as well.

And of course for any die-hard LOTR ' er theres The Silmarillion, an interesting read to be sure... a bit slow though, kind of reads like genesis cept with fantasy names "ektor begat snooglin begat..." hehe
 
Pope Viper said:
welsh said:
Currently reading The Descent but probably won't finish it.
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Welsh - I'm reading this one too ATM, I've read it a couple of times before, and while it gets slow at times, and the writing is a bit meh, it does pick up.
Click to expand...

Brother- life is too short to reread some books. But also too short not to miss Blood Meridian.
 
I hear ya, but there are times I get in a mood to re-read something.


Oh, and I'm reading the Deathlands series
 
Aye, we've had a lot of these in the past. Still, always good to see them again.

The most memorable book I've read in the last few weeks has to be John Irving's "The World According To Garp." Unbelievable book, loved every page of it. Too bad the movie was pretty bland.

Now, I'm reading a bunch of books on William Jennings Bryan. Just finished "A Righteous Cause" and working my way through "Uncertain Trumpet." The dude was such a crazy part of American history and I highly recommend them if you're a fan of history and don't know much about him (especially the latter... the former's a little too negative).

As for recommendations, I highly recommend the following:

The World According to Garp by John Irving
The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
Gods Go Begging by Alfredo Vea
Replay by Ken Grimwood
 
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