Help me get out of a really bad habit... (reccommend me some books!)

[phaeded0ut]

I'd recommend the following folks:
Iain M. Banks, "the Player of Games," "Matter," "Use of Weapons" and several others within the "Culture" series.

Tom Shapre, "Riotous Assembly," "Porterhouse Blue," "Blott on the Landscape" and "the Gropes."

George Crile, "Charlie Wilson's War"

Dambisa Moyo, "Dead Aid"

Vali Nasr, "Forces of Fortune"

A little lite and heavy fare.

 

[MFB]

Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas

 

[Bungle]

"1984", "Brave New World" and "The shape of things to come".

"Emergency" is pretty good too.

 

[Stealthdjentstic]

The Chrysalids.

 

[Daemoniac]

I'd recommend the following folks:
Iain M. Banks, "the Player of Games," "Matter," "Use of Weapons" and several others within the "Culture" series.

Tom Shapre, "Riotous Assembly," "Porterhouse Blue," "Blott on the Landscape" and "the Gropes."

George Crile, "Charlie Wilson's War"

Dambisa Moyo, "Dead Aid"

Vali Nasr, "Forces of Fortune"

A little lite and heavy fare.

"1984", "Brave New World" and "The shape of things to come".

"Emergency" is pretty good too.

Thanks to both of you Bungle, i've read 1984 and Brave New World, liked BNW much MUCH more.

 

[hairychris]

Iain Banks does some great contempory stuff too... But yeah, I have all his sci fi - the culture stuff's good but some of the stand-alone books (Against A Dark background, Feersum Endjinn, The Algebraist, etc) are equally entertaining.

Try Alastair Reynolds 'Revelation Space'. Some of the books that followed are iffy, but on the whole his stuff's great.

I see that Fear & Loathing has been mentioned. Yeah, recommended. HST has written some very entertaining stuff, I can recommend 'The Great Shark Hunt' which is a collection of articles from earlier on in his career.

 

[AvantGuardian]

I'll recommend a couple more modern boooks:

Perdido Street Station by China Mieville. He's a modern writer in the "new weird" genre, and he combines elements of steampunk sci-fi, fantasy, and gothic horror. I have always been a big "classic" sci-fi fan as well as being into horror stuff like Poe and Lovecraft. I've read four of his books now and he's definitely my favorite author at the moment.

Another book I recently enjoyed is As She Climbed Across The Table by Jonathan Letham. Its a really well written and quirky kind of slipstream sci-fi novel. Its a really quick read that just leaves you feeling kind of weird.

 

[cpnhowdy]

The Road - Cormac McCarthy

a very excellent suggestion, highly recommended

 

[Ben.Last]

If you like fantasy give Neil Gaiman a try. Neverwhere is one of the best reads I've had lately. Also, I'm a big sucker for anything by Chuck Palahniuk but I can see why most people are either take it or leave it with his stuff. Finally Clive Barker's stuff is always great.

 

[robotsatemygma]

OP... I'm the same as you, visual but I get massive ADD when I read sometimes. The fix... fast paced and short stories.

I'm huge on Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holme's. I picked up the complete set (Vol 1 & 2) for like 14 bucks at Barnes and Noble. I'm almost done with Volume 2 as of now. The stories are short (11-20 some odd pages) with the few "books" being under 150 pages. I'm pretty sad I breezed through it so quickly but I couldn't put it down!

I'm sure someone mentioned Dan Brown by now. DaVinci Code, Angels and Demons, whatever the new one is called. Interesting reads with interesting hypothesis about Christ. Angels and Demons is my favorite of the two.

 

[techcoreriffman]

The Eragon series is a great read for fantasy.

Michael Crishton is a good sci-fi writer. Just got done reading The Andromeda Strain, actually, a very very good book.

 

[Daemoniac]

I tried the Eragon series, but they just ended up annoying me. Nothing against his work, just not for me I suppose

 

[petereanima]

Mischa, start George Martins "A Song Of Ice And Fire" NOW!

 

[xmetalhead69]

Fight Club. nuff said.