What Book Should I Read?

[Urederra]

The last fantasy book I read was Hart's hope by Orson Scott Card. and I must say that the first three chapters of the book is the best thing I have read from Scott Card, even better than Enders saga books. The rest of the book is also very good but not as good as the beginning. It might not be suitable for young adults since he relates sex scenes, though.

 

[El_Machinae]

I liked Ender's Game, but I could not stomach the others; at all.
It was years ago, but I remember liking Donaldson's Gap series.

 

[Phlegmak]

Read the Dungeon Master's Guide, 1st edition.

 

[nc-1701]

Thanks, for all the help guys! I shall right all these down and see how many are available at my local library. Oh, I also liked some of L. Ron Hubbards stuff Battlefield Earth, and the Mission Earth series.

I shall definetly look at the I. Asimovs foundation as my dad also suggested this.

@Aneeshm I will definetly look for it.

@Cheezy I didn't likle the X-wing series much I read "The Bacta War" and thought it somewhat ridiculous. "The Truce at Bakura" was really good though.

 

[The Last Conformist]

I don't think anyone's mentioned Gene Wolfe's The Book of the New Sun? It's a great work, in a "science fantasy" type of setting.

 

[Sidhe]

If you're a fantasy fan anything by David Gemmel. Tolkein's worth it The Lord of the Rings if you bear with it delivers in spades. Stephen Donaldson's: Thomas Covenant series is excellent, as are his Sci Fi Gap series, sublime, Raymond E feist isn't bad either. Nor are the Gormenghast Books, by Mervyn Peake, Pratchett for humour. Too many good authors to name.

Horror, stephen king, or Clive barker, + Poe and Lovecraft(very wierd)

Sci Fi, Frank herbert(Dune), Asimov,Julian May, P.K Dick(Blade Runner) et al, to be honest the list is endless

Historical fiction: James Clavell(Shogun, King Rat)

Classics, Moby Dick(like a rolling sea of a read, paced that way anyway), Don Quixote(funny), anything by Dostoyevski(deep and absorbing), too many to name.

Modern books:

For a good laugh read the Brentford Trilogy by Robert Rankin, The Anti pope, East of Ealing, The sprouts of Wrath.

American God's by Niel Gaiman.

Other: Robert A Heinlen

 

[sanabas]

I am currently reading Jasper Fforde's 'Thursday Next' series for the first time, and they are very, very good. They might fail the weird criteria though.

If you want complex, non-weird, real-world based sci fi, you should be at the library asking for Snow Crash, by Neal Stephenson. Or any of his other stuff, or Michael Marshall Smith's stuff. I'll stop the list there for now. Go and read Snow Crash.

 

[vikingruler]

A great fantasy trilogy is Phillip Pullmans trilogy, His Dark Materials. The books are fantastic but somewhat long.
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[CenturionV]

If you like Sci-fi I'd check out David Weber's Shiva Option
Its an awesome sci-fi epic.

Two older ones if you have never read them already are Robert A. Heinlein's Starship Troopers it so much better than the movie its not even funny.

Also Goerge Orwell's 1984 is an interesting one for the ideas it throws around, though quite depressing.

Definitely check out starship troopers if you have not read it already, that book is awesome.

 

[innonimatu]

Well, there are certainly lots of very good books recommended already. I'd recommend against starting reading George R. R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire before he publishes the last book, through. I started some, what, 10 years ago when he published the firs book, and just hope he will finish the series before dying of old age or something... Pick something that's already finished, and spare yourself some frustration.

If you wished something weird, you should really try Gene Wolfe’s Book of the New Sun. Or the Soldier in the Mist. Those are some extraordinary books! But most people don’t like his style, and the fact that he never fully explains anything.

 

[Elrohir]

I am at the moment at a loss for any good fiction to read I am looking for good sci-i or fantasy that is relatively complex, but not "weird" I want to be able to understand it based on the real world.

I have very much enjoyed the Star Wars expanded universe books especialy those by Timothy Zahn.
I have enjoyed many Arthur C. Clarke books including the Rama & 2001 series's, Earthlight by him was probably one of my fav. books ever.
I also greatly liked Harry Potter, Michael Crichton, and Tom Clancy.

Unfortunatly I have read all that my library has to offer on all of these except Tom Clany who I don't feel like trying to get into right now. So who else might I want to try?

Fantasy:
-Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series if you haven't read it. Awesome series, even if it's taking him forever to finish it. (Only one more main sequence book, though!) So far there are eleven books in the main series, and one prequel, and are paperback about 400-500 pages apiece. So that will probably last you a good long while, unless you read like I do, in which case you'll be desperately waiting for the next installment by late spring.

Science fiction:
-The Foundation Trilogy by Isaac Asimov. The sequels and prequels kind of sucked, but the three main novels are excellent. Asimov's short stories and robot novels are very good as well. (Nightfall is his best, in my opinion.)

-Starship Troops by Heinlin. Very interesting book, a real classic. You can play "spot the fascist undertones"! Actually, I thought the supposed fascist influence in that book was made too much over, they're society really isn't too terrible.

-Armor, by John Steakley. Kind of like Starship Troopers, in a way, but longer and more interesting.

-Enders Game, as well as the other books in the Ender and Bean series's, by Orson Scott Card. If you haven't read at least Enders Game, then you should. The rest are all good, but none as good as the first one.

Have you read the New Jedi Order series? If you're interested in Star Wars (And I believe you said you are) then you should check them out; on the whole decent books and quite a long series, 18 books I believe.

I hope that helps!

 

[Sidhe]

Crap I forgot about Robert Jordan, I second Elrohir's nomination: The Wheel of Time is an excellent series.

 

[McManus]

In the fantasy realm: George R.R. Martin's Song of Ice and Fire series will keep you busy for a while. The first is A Game of Thrones. Complex characters and plot twists, favorably reviewed by several other CFC posters (check out one of the Harry Potter threads for more comments).

Quoted for truthery. Not your standard hollywood novels where the good guys win, in this series, everyone loses. Love it.

 

[Riffraff]

Crap I forgot about Robert Jordan, I second Elrohir's nomination: The Wheel of Time is an excellent series.

I would be quite careful with those, I've read the first 10 books of that series (each about 800 pages long) and I have no idea why.

 

[Elrohir]

I would be quite careful with those, I've read the first 10 books of that series (each about 800 pages long) and I have no idea why.

If you don't like them, why read 10 books in the series?

If you aren't enjoying it by the time you finish the first book, it may not be for you. If you don't like it much by the time you finish the third, then you should stop.

 

[CartesianFart]

Don't read too many books.It will rot your brain.

I suggest reading only a handful of literatures and then read them over and over till you can practically be a university professor acting as they are reading in their mind when speaking.

 

[Sidhe]

Don't read too many books.It will rot your brain.

I suggest reading only a handful of literatures and then read them over and over till you can practically be a university professor acting as they are reading in their mind when speaking.

That's the funniest thing I've read all night, you almost have the irony of an Englishman, I hereby give you the title of honorary sarcastic b'stard. Wear your medal with pride.

In all honesty read as much as you can, for fear of becoming a professor, he that learns only about one subject becomes an idiot in all others.

 

[CartesianFart]

That's the funniest thing I've read all night, you almost have the irony of an Englishman, I hereby give you the title of honorary sarcastic b'stard. Wear your medal with pride.

(ahem) I want to thank my mom,my dad,my brother and sister for supporting me for whatever i do and last but not least,i thank God for the gift of being the ironic bastard that i am.

In all honesty read as much as you can, for fear of becoming a professor, he that learns only about one subject becomes an idiot in all others.

True.

 

[Turner]

If you don't like them, why read 10 books in the series?

If you aren't enjoying it by the time you finish the first book, it may not be for you. If you don't like it much by the time you finish the third, then you should stop.

For myself, I kept reading the next book hoping something would finally happen. The first four or five books moved along okay, but the next three or four I read after that were tedious. Finally, I gave up. I seem to recall one book where Rand spent most of it moping around his tent waiting for something or trying to do something. I don't recall, I've read hundreds of books since then.

I'll second Armor, that was a good read. I thoroughly enjoyed it. The ending was an interesting twist.

Speaking of David Weber, the Honor Harrington books were pretty good. And his Mutinous Moon series was interesting.

The Legion of the Damned by William Dietz was a pretty good series as well. He had another series, two books actually, DeathDay was the first, can't remember the second book. Those were good.

And I'm surprised no one's mentioned Frederick Pohl. There's the heechee saga, and the Eschaton series. Those were good. Also The World at the End of Time. That was different. Along the same lines, Charles Sheffield's
Tomorrow and Tomorrow was interesting. Actually, just about anything by Sheffield is good.

 

[sanabas]

Robert Jordan looks to me like somebody who's realised he has a cash cow, and is attempting to milk it for as much as possible, by making the serious as long as possible. The stuff of his I have read is incredibly tedious, longwinded, and boring. Heaps of better books out there to read.

I'll second Pohl, Sheffield I haven't heard of, I'll have a look next time I buy more stuff.