What Is The Best Book (Fiction or Non Fiction) You've Ever Read?

[BigBrodieFan]

Originally Posted by undercoverbrother

In no order

Birdsong
Enemy at the Gates
Book of Days
Ghost of the Medal Pocket


Will scratch my brain a bit more.

I read Enemy at the Gates about three months ago, could not put it down for a minute. My husband thought I was crazy, I'd be standing at the stove with that book in my hand, and staying up way too late to finish it. I didn't know it was a movie as well.

[dissentowner]

Greatest book ever

[BigBrodieFan]

Originally Posted by Dion

I read this book as well as 'A Child Called It' in one sitting. I think I had to read it for a psych course in University but I still recommend both books.

[Matty81]

Hard to pick just one. Hitchhiker's Guide and 1984 are two books I really enjoyed - great picks.

Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad is probably it if I had to isolate one. Count of Monte Cristo was pretty awesome too. There are a couple Dickens books I really like too. I probably get more enjoyment out of more contemporary pop lit kinda stuff but ultimately I forget the really light and witty books entirely within half a year.

[flylock shox]

I was thinking Hitchhiker's might take the cake too.

But since it's already on the big board, I'll nominate Different Seasons by Stephen King. If I really thought about it, I'm sure i could think of something I liked better, but it's hard to go wrong with a book that contains both Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption, and The Body (the basis for Stand by Me).

[Flames Draft Watcher]

Well if you expand it to include series then I'd say the Dune series by Frank Herbert tops my list of Fiction.

A Song of Fire and Ice by George R.R. Martin is my top Fantasy series so far.

For philosophy I find Nietzsche pretty fascinating and tough to figure.

[Magnum PEI]

I think Kim will always be my favorite. It's so awesome. The Deptford Trilogy is good too. You can read those books in any order and it still works. I read The Manticore first and 5th Business last.
It and The Stand were really good too.

For non-fiction I would say The Game by Ken Dryden. AJP Taylor's The Origin of the Second World War is another. I think everyone should read it.

[rogermexico]

[csnarpy]

Favorite Military Fiction:



Favorite Science Fiction Series:



Favorite Bio:

[peter12]

Good call on Moby Dick.

For me, Plato's Republic, but you knew that.

[para transit fellow]

A Prayer for Owen Meanie - John Irving
Armour - John Steakly
illusions - richard bach

[JimmytheT]

Nineteen Eighty Four - Orwell

The Road - McCarthy

A Tale of Two Cities - Dickens

Dune - Herbert

David Copperfield - Dickens

Rendezvous with Rama - Clarke

A Scanner Darkly - Dick

[Schultzie]

[Trolleydodger]

Olsen's Standard Book Of British Birds {expurgated version}.

[Dion]

[scotty2hotty]

Pillars of the Earth

[troutman]

Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

Celebrating the genius of 'Huckleberry Finn'
Mark Twain's novel, lauded as the genesis of all American literature since, turns 125 this year and doesn't show its age.

http://articles.latimes.com/2010/nov...twain-20101114

"All modern American literature comes from one book by Mark Twain called 'Huckleberry Finn,'" Ernest Hemingway famously declared in 1935. "It's the best book we've had. All American writing comes from that. There was nothing before. There has been nothing as good since."

[Mike F]

The truth about the universe is more amazing than anything else I've ever encountered. Blew my mind.

[octothorp]

Of ones already mentioned, Heart of Darkness, Moby Dick, and Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy are all near the top of my list. I'd go with Hundred Years of Solitude, with Year of the Death of Ricardo Reis, and Sound and the Fury as a close second and third.

[Wormius]

Does anybody really *enjoy* reading Heart of Darkness? Conrad's style is great for short stories, but trying to get through Heart of Darkness, mainly due to the "Apocalypse Now" connection, was a gruelling experience. I guess it is an accomplishment to get through it.

My book list:

Life, the Universe, and Everything - Adams (only one of the Hitchhiker Quadrilogy that I really liked)

Frankenstein - Shelley (classic)

Neuromancer - Gibson (hard to get through, but this is pretty much the cyberpunk bible)

Brave New World - Huxley (similar to 1984 in some respects, but an easier read)

Microserfs - Coupland (brilliant book that pretty much captures the essence of Microsoft during the tech boom).

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance - Pirsig (I read this when I was younger, and it didn't mean
much to me then but it was a good read, I might take a look back and see if I can some meaning from it)

Outliers - Gladwell (essentially like Freakanomics, but different stories and analysis)

To Kill a Mockingbird - Lee (just an enjoyable read)

Private Parts - Stern (funny book into the life of Howard Stern)

Uncle Tungsten - Sacks (biography on Oliver Sack's childhood growing up in a very scientifically-inclined household)

Surely you must be joking, Mr. Feynman - Feynman (great bio on Nobel prize winning physicist Richard Feynman and his adventures becoming a physicist, working and getting into trouble at Los Alamos, etc)