Eephus
Footballguy
Leamas could have used an exploding briefcase
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The FBG Top 300 Books of All Time (fiction edition) | #25 Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov | Running list in posts #3 and #4 (7 Viewers)
- Thread starter kupcho1
- Start date
Leamas could have used an exploding briefcase
shuke
Black Ice Skeptic
I've had this on my list for a very long time. But after trying Pynchon via Vineland, I just don't think I can do it again.
shuke
Black Ice Skeptic
kupcho1
Footballguy
That's interesting. I think it'd be right up your alley.
The paperback i have is 152 pages. It's an easy read.
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Chaos34
Footballguy
You've read too much Fleming
shuke
Black Ice Skeptic
Steppenwolf by Herman Hesse. It has been so long since I have read this I'd do a horrible job of summarizing the plot, so here is Amazon's summary that sounds so underwhelming it's almost like it was done in a disparaging manner:
Harry Haller is a sad and lonely figure, a reclusive intellectual for whom life holds no joy. He struggles to reconcile the wild primeval wolf and the rational man within himself without surrendering to the bourgeois values he despises. His life changes dramatically when he meets a woman who is his opposite, the carefree and elusive Hermine. The tale of the Steppenwolf culminates in the surreal Magic Theater―For Madmen Only!
I was enthralled with this book and the description of one man's struggle with his identity and sense of self, and his transcendence. Powerful enough that I ranked it 16.
Harry Haller is a sad and lonely figure, a reclusive intellectual for whom life holds no joy. He struggles to reconcile the wild primeval wolf and the rational man within himself without surrendering to the bourgeois values he despises. His life changes dramatically when he meets a woman who is his opposite, the carefree and elusive Hermine. The tale of the Steppenwolf culminates in the surreal Magic Theater―For Madmen Only!
I was enthralled with this book and the description of one man's struggle with his identity and sense of self, and his transcendence. Powerful enough that I ranked it 16.
shuke
Black Ice Skeptic
Sometimes I think I'm just not smart enough of some authors, and I'm fine with that.
Psychopav
Help us, Joebi-Wan Brynobi, you're our only ho
Loved the Michener I read. I read Space and one other of his that I can't recall, it was so long ago.
Also ranked a couple Clancy books, another exception to my series rule because there were a couple that were very much a cut above but loved all of the Jack Ryan books.
I have never read Falkner. Maybe it's time to correct that.
Dennis Castro
Footballguy
:sehorn:
this batch has stuff I know.
292. The Sum of All Fears by Tom Clancy. rank 35 - I like the Jack Ryan books. Politics, intelligence, military. This had terrorists trying to instigate a nuclear war. Despite being a long book it kept me engaged. The intensity kept building which made the last third gripping.
Rendezvous with Rama. not ranked but I liked it. solid scifi
Hawaii. read somewhere that if you liked Shogun this book may work. been on my tbr list.
She's Come Undone. Years and years ago I bought this for my mom for mother's day or maybe birthday. Don't remember why I picked this, maybe i saw a review or asked a salesperson. Anyway I don't think my mom read it. She hadn't got to it yet she would tell me. I stopped asking and she never said anything about it. She probably still has it. Last book I bought her. The Guess Who has made sure that I never forget my ungrateful mother.
Hunt for Red October. the first of the five that I thought were all great.
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timschochet
Footballguy
IMO Hawaii is Michener’s best book, and a very worthy book to read at the present time, as it makes an argument for immigration and multiculturalism that would be in contrast to the present way of thinking. I also want to add: the story of the Japanese American division, the 442, towards the end of the novel, is so gripping that it could have been its own novel (and still would make a terrific movie.)
I also had She’s Come Undone towards the top of the list, along with Lamb’s second novel even higher. After that he dropped off.
I also had She’s Come Undone towards the top of the list, along with Lamb’s second novel even higher. After that he dropped off.
kupcho1
Footballguy
Phase 2: Books 300 - 201 continued
Two notes:
1. I will be including who selected each book.
2. I won't be moving off of dark mode. I like it. My eyes like it. And trying to find a font color that works for everyone seems to be impossible.
Starting with a 14-way tie for 263rd place
I'm now hitting Post reply and hoping that the table above (which looks perfectly fine to me pre-click) will look the same the it posts.
I am not confident.
Two notes:
1. I will be including who selected each book.
2. I won't be moving off of dark mode. I like it. My eyes like it. And trying to find a font color that works for everyone seems to be impossible.
Starting with a 14-way tie for 263rd place
| 263 | The Magic Christian | Terry Southern | Long Ball Larry |
| The Second Coming and Other Poems | W.B. Yeats | rockaction | |
| Being Dead | Jim Crace | krista4 | |
| Tom Mix & Pancho Villa | Clifford Irving | Eephus | |
| The Martian Chronicles | Ray Bradbury | Dr_Zaius | |
| The Painted Bird | Jerzy Kosinski | Oliver Humanzee | |
| The Dark Forest | Liu Cixin | Barry2 | |
| Rebecca | Daphne Du Maurier | ilov80s | |
| Jonathon Livingston Seagull | Richard Bach | guru_007 | |
| Jaws | Peter Benchley | Dr. Octopus | |
| Don Quixote, Volume 2 | Miguel de Cervantes | Don Quixote | |
| A Time to Kill | John Grisham | timshochet | |
| The Idiot | Fyodor Dostoevsky | Long Ball Larry, Psychopav | |
| Strange Case of Dr Jekyl and Mr Hyde | Robert Louis Stevenson | KeithR, Frostillicus |
I'm now hitting Post reply and hoping that the table above (which looks perfectly fine to me pre-click) will look the same the it posts.
I am not confident.
Don Quixote
Footballguy
263. Don Quixote, Volume 2 - Miguel de Cervantes (my #15)
Well, username checks out. One of those times that the sequel is just as good as, if not better than, the first. Cervantes wrote this about 10 years after Volume 1. There was a fake sequel published, and Cervantes decided to respond to it by writing one of his own. I think the characters get a little more depth in Volume 2, and a bit more interesting from a writing perspective as all of the characters in the book have read and are aware of the events in Volume 1. That said, yeah, there will be more Don Quixote to show up here.
Well, username checks out. One of those times that the sequel is just as good as, if not better than, the first. Cervantes wrote this about 10 years after Volume 1. There was a fake sequel published, and Cervantes decided to respond to it by writing one of his own. I think the characters get a little more depth in Volume 2, and a bit more interesting from a writing perspective as all of the characters in the book have read and are aware of the events in Volume 1. That said, yeah, there will be more Don Quixote to show up here.
I've had three books listed so far. My list I tried to incorporate my favorite books (weighted heavily towards the top) as well as books I thought were great, while doing my best to take away recency bias, as I'll be honest, most of the "classics" I read from ages 12-24, and the past 5-10 years have been either rereads of some of my favorites, or else heavily leaning towards a fantasy/sci-fi genre as I find these easier reads.
Anyhow, the three books were each read in different times of my life.
A Separate Peace I read in early years of high school, and it's a book about friendship, jealousy, and entering into adult hood during war time between two high school boys. I was a high school boy and had a lot of the same issues (sans war - and it's questionable whether I ever matured into an adult or not). It always stuck with me.
Jonathon Livingston Seagull I read as I was nearing the end of my college years. Some people hate this book, some people love it. It's a parable I suppose about springing into freedom, learning who you are and may become (adulthood). See a theme here? It's a short, easy read and it always made me feel good, like I was not the only one that had these thoughts/struggles. I am very similar to a seagull. Oh, and it would be cool to fly.
Rendezvous with Rama I read probably 10 years ago. When I was younger, I was a voracious reader. I read quite a bit of sci-fi, as well as magazines (there was a time before the internet) and I was always enraptured with space. I suppose I still am. And I never read a book by Clarke. I picked this one up, and this is a great sci-fi story, quickly and easily sucked me in. Some authors take liberties with laws of psychics to move their story along, or else they start off strong, but move into pure fantasy. I dunno, if I'm getting this point across right as I'm not particular strong with words, but it was clear why Clarke was so liked. He made everything "reasonable" as far as his stories were concerned, taking great lengths to make sure his world was reasonable. He consulted with the likes of Carl Sagan on other books he read so it made sense he wanted his world to be fiction, yet reasonable. This book was written over 50 years ago, and thinking of all the advance humanity has made since that time, it's pretty neat that this story is still pretty relevant. It's one of those books that once it's done, you cannot wait to tear into the next one (at least I couldn't).
Anyhow, the three books were each read in different times of my life.
A Separate Peace I read in early years of high school, and it's a book about friendship, jealousy, and entering into adult hood during war time between two high school boys. I was a high school boy and had a lot of the same issues (sans war - and it's questionable whether I ever matured into an adult or not). It always stuck with me.
Jonathon Livingston Seagull I read as I was nearing the end of my college years. Some people hate this book, some people love it. It's a parable I suppose about springing into freedom, learning who you are and may become (adulthood). See a theme here? It's a short, easy read and it always made me feel good, like I was not the only one that had these thoughts/struggles. I am very similar to a seagull. Oh, and it would be cool to fly.
Rendezvous with Rama I read probably 10 years ago. When I was younger, I was a voracious reader. I read quite a bit of sci-fi, as well as magazines (there was a time before the internet) and I was always enraptured with space. I suppose I still am. And I never read a book by Clarke. I picked this one up, and this is a great sci-fi story, quickly and easily sucked me in. Some authors take liberties with laws of psychics to move their story along, or else they start off strong, but move into pure fantasy. I dunno, if I'm getting this point across right as I'm not particular strong with words, but it was clear why Clarke was so liked. He made everything "reasonable" as far as his stories were concerned, taking great lengths to make sure his world was reasonable. He consulted with the likes of Carl Sagan on other books he read so it made sense he wanted his world to be fiction, yet reasonable. This book was written over 50 years ago, and thinking of all the advance humanity has made since that time, it's pretty neat that this story is still pretty relevant. It's one of those books that once it's done, you cannot wait to tear into the next one (at least I couldn't).
Uruk-Hai
Footballguy
I never read this, but it had a massive pop culture footprint in the early '70s.
kupcho1
Footballguy
Dr. Octopus
Footballguy
Jaws is about a shark that eats a lot of things.
The book is quite different than the movie in many places but creates that same state of dread. I'm a little surprised I was the only one that ranked it.
The book is quite different than the movie in many places but creates that same state of dread. I'm a little surprised I was the only one that ranked it.
Dr_Zaius
Footballguy
I guess with the earlier Frog & Toad I'm now the kid's book guy, at least for now...
Diary of a Wimpy Kid
My kids and nieces and nephews loved these books. We have the first 10+, and I've read most of them. I chose the first one as frankly they all kind of blend together after awhile but I do remember it being one of the stronger installments. They're quite funny, and while they seem to be set in the modern world, the author being born in 1971 gives them a bit of a Gen X vibe. They're written in first person, but it becomes clear to the reader that the protagonist Greg Heffley is not always the most reliable narrator, as he sees everything through his own self-centered lens. Greg is always trying to move up in the social pecking order, but being unathletic and average in every way it never quite seems to work out for him. Consistently funny and many of the vignettes will remind you of similar things from your own childhood. Some subtle lessons thrown in as well. A fun series that one can read together with the kids.
Diary of a Wimpy Kid
My kids and nieces and nephews loved these books. We have the first 10+, and I've read most of them. I chose the first one as frankly they all kind of blend together after awhile but I do remember it being one of the stronger installments. They're quite funny, and while they seem to be set in the modern world, the author being born in 1971 gives them a bit of a Gen X vibe. They're written in first person, but it becomes clear to the reader that the protagonist Greg Heffley is not always the most reliable narrator, as he sees everything through his own self-centered lens. Greg is always trying to move up in the social pecking order, but being unathletic and average in every way it never quite seems to work out for him. Consistently funny and many of the vignettes will remind you of similar things from your own childhood. Some subtle lessons thrown in as well. A fun series that one can read together with the kids.
Uruk-Hai
Footballguy
I read this book in a jail cell
Chaos34
Footballguy
Of these I've read the Grisham and Jonathan Livingston Seagull. I guess a bunch of us share a blank space for Dostoevsky. I expected that one to be ranked way way higher.
Chaos34
Footballguy
Also, looking forward to @rockaction 's selection of Yeats.
Don Quixote
Footballguy
Showed up perfectly fine to me (non-dark user).
Psychopav
Help us, Joebi-Wan Brynobi, you're our only ho
Looks good from where I'm sitting!
How did "The Martian Chronicles" make the cut? I thought we weren't allowed to submit series.
Ilov80s
Footballguy
Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier
A gothic classic that you would assume is about a girl named Rebecca but it’s not. The protagonist is unnamed. Rebecca is never seen or heard from in the novel. Yet she’s everywhere, consuming everyone in the story. Our unnamed young woman finds herself marrying a wealthy widower and moving into the estate know as Manderly where he lived with his now deceased wife Rebecca. While it isn’t a ghost story in the traditional sense, Rebecca does haunt the estate and all those who come to it.
Men are simpler than you imagine my sweet child. But what goes on in the twisted, tortuous minds of women would baffle anyone.
A gothic classic that you would assume is about a girl named Rebecca but it’s not. The protagonist is unnamed. Rebecca is never seen or heard from in the novel. Yet she’s everywhere, consuming everyone in the story. Our unnamed young woman finds herself marrying a wealthy widower and moving into the estate know as Manderly where he lived with his now deceased wife Rebecca. While it isn’t a ghost story in the traditional sense, Rebecca does haunt the estate and all those who come to it.
Men are simpler than you imagine my sweet child. But what goes on in the twisted, tortuous minds of women would baffle anyone.
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Don Quixote
Footballguy
This has been on my list to read. Love the movie and need to check out the book.
krista4
Footballguy
I had this one on my long list. Didn't end up on the final list because I hadn't read it since high school and just wasn't sure what I would think about it now, but it sure did affect me back then. Glad to see you chose it.
krista4
Footballguy
1. The table looks perfect.
2. I fully expected no one else to choose Being Dead by Jim Crace, though in looking up its year of publication I saw that it won the National Book Award for Fiction in 2000, so at least some other people read it. It's a fantastically written book in which a couple are murdered in the first chapter and then (let me let someone else tell it) the book becomes "a ‘quivering’ – an attempt to relive, through stories and recollection, the lives of Joseph and Celice before consigning them completely to death. The novel’s structure is fourfold. One strand moves backwards from the point of the murder to describe the events that immediately led up to it. A second strand recounts how the beginnings of Joseph and Celice’s love for each other were clouded by a fire that took the life of a fellow-student. The third strand describes in scrupulous detail the effect of the elements and the processes of decay on their undiscovered bodies. The final strand follows the efforts of Joseph and Celice’s daughter Syl to find her missing parents."
I'd recommend this book to anyone simply as a beautifully written book, but it is my #15 because I read it a couple of years after my dad died, and along with a non-fiction book I won't mention because it will be on my list when we do non-fiction (we will, right?), it gave me enormous comfort. It's a little weird and hard to explain, but as mentioned above one of the strands is bodily decomposition and another is the bereavement of the couple's daughter. Maybe reading about bodily decomposition doesn't sound like your jam, nor would I think it to be mine, but at the time and upon subsequent re-readings, it helped me feel peaceful and positive about our return to the earth after death. Somehow it is lovely in the telling.
krista4
Footballguy
+1 Have never read it (although have also not seen the movie) and should!
rockaction
Footballguy
True observation but that was a wonderful rest of the sentence and subsequent one. I’m glad it helped you through a tough time.
shuke
Black Ice Skeptic
How did "The Martian Chronicles" make the cut? I thought we weren't allowed to submit series.
It's one book.
shuke
Black Ice Skeptic
Adding to list.
Oliver Humanzee
Footballguy
Okay, fine.
A Perfect Spy -- John Le Carre'
Less an espionage thriller than an exhaustive and exhausting study of the nature of betrayal and what it means to love and what a person who learned to conflate the two would look like. A Perfect Spy is a picaresque and not too-tightly-wound glimpse into the mind of double-agent Magnus Pym. This is Le Carre’s most personal and personally revealing work--like Pym, Le Carre’s father was a con artist and a fabulist, immersed in a life where reality is frequently asked to conform to a rake’s fantasy, and to whom dissembling came naturally.
Though rich in cold-war intrigue and cool double-agent contratemps, this novel actually represents LeCarre’s (nee’ David Cornwell’s) attempt to reckon with own upbringing, his father’s crimes, his own manifold betrayals, and what it means to be a whole, complete person.
It is very rare to experience in an author as formally staid and buttoned-up as LeCarre, but after several re-readings, I have little doubt that Magnus Pym’s anguish is, in fact, Le Carre’s own.
Billiards at Half-Past Nine--Heinrich Boll
Billiards at Half-Past Nine is my favorite post WWII novel. Whereas mid-Century Americans like Updike and Roth wrote about the gnawing vacuousness at the heart of our victory in Europe, Billiards is purely a loser’s tale and all the more interesting for it.
The story, told over the course of one day in the late 50’s, shows one family’s--The Faehmel’s--attempts to live with their past after the horrors of Naziism (referred to in the novel as “The Host of the Beast”) and the attendant failures, indifferences, and miseries that they endured or caused to endure. It is a deeply felt novel of anger, anguish, a profound, radiating regret, and, finally, a kind of peace. It is an utterly human novel whose lessons, I predict, will prove very instructive to my fellow Americans in the not-too-distant future.
Further, it is formally inventive. Told in a series of first-person accounts, we only learn of each character through the eyes of the other characters--a style which reinforces the novels main themes: there is no 3rd person with a plan, no author, no God, who knows our hearts and will forgive us for what we do--our debt is not to God or our “true selves” (for indeed we cannot even know our own minds) but to our fellow humans.
A minor, meta-theme in the novel is Boll’s attempt to reconcile the wild, loving, poetic heart of German literature (Goethe, Rilke, etc) with the regimented, brutal, repression of it’s politics.
It is kind of bottomless. You should read it.
Reading Bag of Bones right now and it references this about every third page, so I've added it to my list that I need to read
kupcho1
Footballguy
This just made my to be read tab (you had me at Updike and Roth).
kupcho1
Footballguy
Phase 2: Books 300 - 201 continued
I'm glad that the table is working perfectly for everyone now.
Picking up where we left off, I know it's against the rules, but we're going to have to talk about it.
American Pastoral was a very near miss for me. It's a great book and a Pulitzer Prize winner (1998).
I'm glad that the table is working perfectly for everyone now.
Picking up where we left off, I know it's against the rules, but we're going to have to talk about it.
| 262 | Fight Club | Chuck Palahniuk | kupcho1, shuke |
| 261 | The Long Goodbye | Raymond Chandler | ilov80s, Oliver Humanzee, krista4 |
| 260 | Franny and Zooey | J.D. Salinger | guru_007, Dr. Octopus, |
| Burnt Offerings | Robert Marasco | shuke | |
| A Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich | Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn | Long Ball Larry | |
| Farewell My Lovely | Raymond Chandler | Eephus | |
| Looking for Alaska | John Green | Dr_Zaius | |
| The Case of the Sulky Girl | Erle Stanley Gardner | KeithR | |
| The Chosen | Chaim Potok | timschochet | |
| Light Bringer | Pierce Brown | guru_007 | |
| Life of Pi | Yann Martel | Dr. Octopus | |
| How the Light Gets In | Louise Penny | Barry2 | |
| Amittyville Horror | Jay Anson | Frostillicus | |
| 249 | American Pastoral | Philip Roth | Don Quixote, krista4 |
American Pastoral was a very near miss for me. It's a great book and a Pulitzer Prize winner (1998).
Frostillicus
Footballguy
Amittyville Horror - Jay Anson
Fantastic book. Blows the movie away. One of very few books that has every given me a nightmare.
Fantastic book. Blows the movie away. One of very few books that has every given me a nightmare.
Mrs.Marco
Footballguy
I also really enjoyed Hawaii and She's Come Undone.
The Dark Forest by Liu Cixin
This is the second book in the Remembrance of Earth's Past trilogy. Translated from Chinese. The 3 Body Problem was book 1
which won the Hugo for best novel. Aliens are on their way to take over Earth and exterminate humans. Because it will take them
400 years to reach Earth they have sabatoged all scientific research to maintain their technical superiority. Mankind must figure out
a way to defend themselves not only from a more advanced race but from an enemy that can observe everything they're
planning. Humans act like humans, the attack comes. oh boy.
How the Light Gets In by Louise Penny.
The ninth book in the Inspector Gamache series. The murder mysteries aren't the draw, it's the characters. The people you meet in the
first book are there throughout the series. As Gamache goes from book to book there is an underlying menace that finally comes out in
this book. Climactic with twists makes this the best entry in a very good series.
This is the second book in the Remembrance of Earth's Past trilogy. Translated from Chinese. The 3 Body Problem was book 1
which won the Hugo for best novel. Aliens are on their way to take over Earth and exterminate humans. Because it will take them
400 years to reach Earth they have sabatoged all scientific research to maintain their technical superiority. Mankind must figure out
a way to defend themselves not only from a more advanced race but from an enemy that can observe everything they're
planning. Humans act like humans, the attack comes. oh boy.
How the Light Gets In by Louise Penny.
The ninth book in the Inspector Gamache series. The murder mysteries aren't the draw, it's the characters. The people you meet in the
first book are there throughout the series. As Gamache goes from book to book there is an underlying menace that finally comes out in
this book. Climactic with twists makes this the best entry in a very good series.
Eephus
Footballguy
Similar story here. I bumped it out of my 70 because it's been so long since I've read it.
shuke
Black Ice Skeptic
But you changed back to this font? Noooo!!!!!!
shuke
Black Ice Skeptic
Mrs.Marco
Footballguy
I laughed so hard when I first read the thank you note about the "pants" that look good on my "legs." I regularly buy the whole series in bulk to slowly distribute in my Little Free Library. It's a fantastic series to get kids reading.
Ilov80s
Footballguy
Pretty sure I had Farewell, My Lovely in the 30s . I think I had a few Raymond Chandlers.
Mrs.Marco
Footballguy
I loved reading this one--such a delicious drama.
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