Book rec time!

[penmage]

All right, people, I want book recs. I'm looking for good things to read over the summer.

There are 80-odd people who read this journal, and most of you read a lot. I want at least one rec (though feel free to give me more) from each of you.

I'm looking for something I've never read before. It doesn't have to be SF/F - in fact, I think I'd prefer if it wasn't (not that you can't also recommend SF/F.)

Thanks to y'all in advance.

Comments

[celtic4.livejournal.com]

Not sure if you've read either of these...apologies if you have...

The Coldfire Trilogy, by C.S. Friedman
The Sun Sword Series, by Michelle West (not yet completed)

Both are incredible authors. ^_^

Non-SF/F

[fireborn.livejournal.com]

The chances are vanishingly small that you haven't read Janet Evanovich's Stephanie Plum series. But if you haven't, you will be forced to at hamsterpoint. One for the Money kicks it off.

Rex Stout wrote about a gazillion Nero Wolfe books before he died. He died in the 70's; he started writing them in either the thirties or the fourties. They are all set in those decades. However, I have read almost all of them, and only encountered two which felt dated: Fer-De-Lance and Over My Dead Body. Even Too Many Cooks, which I just reread, and features the word "Negroes" a lot and the like, does not feel dated, just period. These are probably some of the best detective stories ever written. If you prefer wit instead of action, I'd go out on a small limb and say they're the best. They're also mostly stand-alones, so you could probably begin reading with any book you can find.

SF/F--I blame all errors on my exhaustion.

[fireborn.livejournal.com]

Michael Woodring Stover has written two books that ar... well, they're actually true sf/f, containing both science fiction and fantasy. It's bloody difficult to do, but he does it brilliantly, creating a bleak future earth ruled by a corporate caste system, where the primary form of entertainment is experiencing the lives of Actors--people sent through a portal to another world where magic is real, and nobody knows a world of technology even exists. It's got a great... I don't think Caine is a complete anti-hero, but he comes close some times. Dark, occasionally deeply depressing, sometimes gory and disgusting, but absolutely amazing. Heroes Die is technically the first, but I read Blade of Tyshalle, it's sequel, before that, and didn't even realize it was a sequel--I just thought it was really well back-storied.

Rakie, Rorbie, and I routinely recommend The Black Jewels Trilogy (Daughter of the Blood being the first), and if one of us hasn't already gotten you to read them, take this opportunity. Dark--though by no means as gory as Stover's stuff, though you'd never be able to tell by the opening chapter--it's a beautiful world that completely inverts your expectations of good and bad, dark and light, beauty and... well, actually, beauty runs pretty consistent. I maintain these aren't as dark as my previous recs because they have more high notes, but they definitely dwell in the shadows.

You already know about Midori Snyder, but here's a pair of my used-bookstore obscure finds. The first, Rick Shelley, has a great series called the Varayan Memoir. I can't tell you anything plot-wise without giving away a lot of the fun, and they are fun--fun as in Jim Butcher sort of fun, but with less of the hero getting beat up and more dragon-slaying. The first book is Son of the Hero, and if you ever run across copies of The Hero of Varay or The Hero King (although it might be Hero and King -- these are so out of print it's well-nigh impossible to even get titles, damnit) that you don't want for yourself, SEND THEM TO ME, DAMNIT.

(I own the first. Finding the other two is obviously not panning out.)

The other is much less obscure, although the trilogy I recommend you start with isn't easy to find. No, I take that back. I can find oodles of copies of the second book, Moonscatter. It was the first of hers I even found, for $.25 at the Goodwill. I finally located a copy of Moongather, the first book, a few years ago, but I cannot for the life of me find a copy of Changer's Moon. I can't even intralibrary-loan a copy. The second trilogy with the character is a lot easier to find, at least, but at any rate, Jo Clayton does great stuff with ideas and language so that you feel like what you're reading about really is another world, not just this world in different clothes. They can be a bit tricky to get into, but worth it.

I'll hork out some more recs tomorrow--assuming anyone doesn't beat me to them. Then again, some of these are not popular--though not as obscure as some of the ones I've already mentioned.

[alecto23.livejournal.com]

Any of these and, in general, anything else by the authors that you can find.

Jonathan Carroll, Bones of the Moon
Guy Gavriel Kay, The Summer Tree
Gillian Bradshaw, The Beacon at Alexandria
Gene Wolfe, There Are Doors
F Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby
Madeleine L'Engle, A House Like a Lotus
Jeff Noon, Vurt
Emma Bull, Finder
Zilpha Keatley Snyder, The Egypt Game
Robin McKinley, The Hero and the Crown
John Birmingham, The Tasmanian Babes Fiasco
EM Forster, A Room With a View
John Crowley, Little Big
Ursula K LeGuin, Malafrena
Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice
Jack Vance, Lyonesse
Neil Gaiman, Neverwhere
Connie Willis, To Say Nothing of the Dog
Eleanor Cameron, The Court of the Stone Children
Arthur Ransome, We Didn't Mean to go to Sea
Peter S Beagle, The Innkeeper's Song
Diana Wynne Jones, Homeward Bounders
Dorothy L Sayers, Murder Must Advertise
Susan Cooper, Seaward
Diane Duane, So You Want to be a Wizard
Steven Brust, The Phoenix Guards
Margaret Mahy, The Catalogue of the Universe
Josephine Tey, The Daughter of Time
Cynthia Voigt, A Solitary Blue

[dhole.livejournal.com]

Based on the Locus booklist you posted, you haven't read, and don't yet plan on reading The Incomplete Enchanter, Fletcher Pratt & L. Sprague de Camp. It's highly worth reading.

Also recommended: Ressurection Man & The Night Watch, by Sean Stewart. They're in the same universe, but they're not exactly a series. I personally prefer The Night Watch, but they're both very good. Anything by Henry Kuttner; mostly he wrote short stories, and he worked under a number of pseudonyms. He worked closely with his wife, C.L. Moore, and trying to distangle their writing from each others is generally hopeless. Some great stuff there, though.

As far as non-SF goes, I'm currently reading through The Golden Bough, by Frasier. It's interesting, though the general problems with his starting information are fairly obvious -- he calls Ganesha "Gunputty", and seems to have rather confused ideas as to the relationship of Tibetian lamasaries to the Chinese government of the turn of the last century, and so on. But very interesting.

[richermes.livejournal.com]

Ok.. no big descriptions as to why I like them, but here's my two picks:

Hades' Daughter by Sara Douglass (Historical Fantasy)
A Density of Souls by Christopher Rice (quasi-murder-mystery/coming-of-age story).

They're two of the best books I've ever read.

[vass]

If you haven't yet read Dorothy Dunnett's Lymond books, now (i.e. a long period without school deadlines) is a good time. The first one's The Game of Kings. Reading them out of order is a very, very bad idea. The sort of bad idea accompanied thunder and ominous music in the low strings. Maybe a bassoon as well.

I just looked at your interests page, and yep, if you haven't read these already, I think they're a good pick.

Also, I'm not sure how you'd *find* them, since I'm not sure if they've made it out of Australia, but you might like Brian Caswell and Catherine Jinks. The former wrote A Cage of Butterflies and Merryl of the Stones and some others, YA science fiction and time travel respectively; and the latter wrote (chiefly) the Pagan quartet, which is YA historical fiction, accurate and irreverent, set in the Crusades. The first one's Pagan's Crusade. The title character is a Christian Arab who's become a squire. He was born in Bethlehem, "don't worry, Sir, it wasn't in a manger."

[aethereal-girl.livejournal.com]

Looking at your interest list, I would add to dhole's recommendation Sean Stewart's Nobody's Son, which is a fairy-tale-like children's book written by the guy recommended above.

[canthlian.livejournal.com]

I hereby command you to read Traci Harding's 'The Ancient Future' series, and The View From The Mirror Quartet, by Ian Irvine.

[jenavira.livejournal.com]

I'm reading David and Leah Eddings' Regina's Song right now, and although the prose really isn't up to standard - it might be a style choice on their part, but if it is, it isn't working very well - the story itself is fascinating. It's a murder mystery in which one half of the solution is blatantly obvious, and the other half...well, I'm about two-thirds through, and still stumped.

As an avowed Stephen King hater, I am happy to reccomend Eyes of the Dragon to anyone else who hates Stephen King. It's like an entirely different writer, one who's not only good but doesn't have that taste for splattering blood all over the place. And if you have read Stephen King, there's more of that characters-jumping-storylines bit going on.

Everyone in the entire universe should read The Adept and its sequels by Katherine Kurtz and Deborah Turner Harris. It's clever, fascinating, well-paced, and theological. If you can find it, Kurtz' Lammas Night is a good companion to the series, but it's been out of print for a while.

And there you are. :D

[klimtomaniac.livejournal.com]

By Canadian Authors:

All books by Guy Gavriel Kay, especially The Fionavar Tapestry, Tigana, and The Lions of Al-Rassan.

By Kelley Armstrong you want to read Bitten and Stolen.

You might want to also try Charles de Lint but I personally haven't read any of his stuff yet (he's on my list).

Keep us informed of what you're reading and such. Happy Summer Holiday!!

[klimtomaniac.livejournal.com]

Guy Gavriel Kay, The Summer Tree

Have you read the whole Fionavar Tapestry? It has been years since I last read it and it is still one of my favourites. I think that is a must re-read for me this summer. His other books are also excellent and his recent book of poetry is phenomenal.

[ciri.livejournal.com]

The Lovely Bones by Alice Seabold
Angels on Fire by Nancy Collins

[rosaleendhu.livejournal.com]

I havent read it yet, but i've heard awesome things about The 20th Wife by... Indu Sundaraani(sp? I'm sure I butchered it.)

[ellahalfling.livejournal.com]

Don't know if you've read it, but Isabelle Allende's House of Spirts is very good. And it's not sf/f. I'm reading it for school.

[thunderemerald.livejournal.com]

Mmmm, books! Well, first of all, I finished Pterry's 'The Wee Free Men' today, and yeah, it's really great. It's sold as a children's book in most places, apparently. It starts off as a terribly entertaining fairy tale, then slowly becomes this complicate existentialist drama that, of course, ends in the usual ridiculous Pterry fashion. There are lawyers in it.

Let's see... I've no idea if you've read any of these, but here are some of my favourite books:

Phantom (Susan Kay)
Wicked (Gregory Maguire)
Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister (Gregory Maguire)
The Scarlet Pimpernel (Baroness Orczy) -- and then, any of the 15 sequels
Bridget Jones' Diary (Helen Fielding)
A Tale of Two Cities (Charles Dickens)
Dracula (Bram Stoker)
Tailchaser's Song (Tad Williams)
The Cider House Rules (John Irving)
Flowers For Algernon (Daniel Keyes)
The Hunchback of Notre Dame (Victor Hugo)
Black Like Me (John Howard Griffin)
Cat House (Michael Peak)
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (Maya Angelou)

[tabbyclaw.livejournal.com]

My favorite murder mystery ever, "Nevermore" by Harold Schrecter. You know it's gotta be good when the narrator is a young Edgar Allan Poe. THe author has his style down pat, and it's a wonderful read.

[alecto23.livejournal.com]

Yep, I have read the whole thing. I cheated and just cut and pasted the title-author list I did of one of those book memes that was going around earlier. Full text of the two entries on the subject is here and here, if you're interested.

Tigana is possibly my single favourite book of his; I'm finding his later stuff kind of repetitious thematically. Although there were nice bits in The Lions of Al-Rassan. But even repetitious GG Kay is pretty good! Haven't read his poetry; will have to see if I can find it.

[maedbh7.livejournal.com]

Written on the Body Jeanette Winterson
A Beautiful Mind Sylvia Nasar

[ladyluna.livejournal.com]

I think you were one of those that hadn't read Brave New World. Read it.

[ladyarian.livejournal.com]

Er..

Picking at complete random off my bookshelves (no idea if you've read these or not) I grabbed:

--The Probability Broach, by L. Neil Smith (SF), and
--Blind Assasin, by Margaret Atwood (which, as with all of her works, is categorically non-genre)

[arib.livejournal.com]

hrm... I'd reccomend either The Man Who Mistook His Wife For A Hat or An Anthropologist on Mars (which has nothing to do with Mars or anthropology) by (if I recall correctly) Oliver Sacks. Both are great non-fiction books dealing with mental illness case studies.

Yes, I'm a psych geek. :-)

As for SF, nothing says cool like Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson.