Top Five Books

[Takeshi Kovacs]

Amongst my top 5 books of all time would be 'The Executioner's Song' - which I was reminded of recently when hearing about Norman Mailer's death.

[tommymooney]

1. Nineteen Eighty four
2. Great Expectations
3. The Great Gatsby
4. Lord of the Rings
5. Danny the Champion of the World

(honourable mention to Brighton Rock)

[Vannie]

1984 - George Orwell
Beyond a Boundary - CLR James
Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevksy
Far From the Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
Nathaniels Nutmeg - Giles Milton

Well ressurected TM and some good choices. Change in mine from a couple of years ago, Hardy's not been doing much lately so is out, Takami offers a cutting edge.

Far From the Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy Battle Royale - Koushun Takami

[Billy Whiz]

I continue to be amazed at how many votes 1984 gets. I can only assume it's because people "did it" a long time ago at school, they can remember how original the basic idea was, but they've forgotten how badly written and executed it is. I'd be interested to hear from anyone who's read it recently...

Vannie - big mistake transferring out Thomas Hardy. Form is temporary, class is permanent

[Beerfuelledman]

Must be in the name. I'm thinking Franklin W. Dixon's - The Hardy Boys

[Vannie]

I continue to be amazed at how many votes 1984 gets. I can only assume it's because people "did it" a long time ago at school, they can remember how original the basic idea was, but they've forgotten how badly written and executed it is. I'd be interested to hear from anyone who's read it recently...

Vannie - big mistake transferring out Thomas Hardy. Form is temporary, class is permanent

I've read it a few times. It's in my 5 for cultural impact rather than for its stylistic merits (though I don't agree that it's as badly written as you think it is).

Hardy had been resting on his laurels for a while and getting sloppy. He must have misspelt Essex a thousand times in one book I read

[Knulpuk]

One of the two advantages if a long commute every day (the other being a reprisal of long forgotten albums on the ipod) is quality reading time. I have interpreted the lists as sort of favourite novels - I tend to go in mainly for travel writing and biogs (especially sport). After a bit of head scratching though and shelf perusing, and in no particular order:

Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
A Prayer for Owen Meany - John Irving
Lake Wobegon Days - Garrison Kellor
Jeeves in the Offing - PG Wodehouse
The Rotters Club - Jonathan Coe

[unc]

Early thoughts would be:

1984 - Orwell (possibly one of the greatest ever and almost a cop out naming it really)
Slaughterhouse 5 - Kurt Vonnegut (OK - silly in places but a truly great anti war novel. So it goes)
Cider House Rules - Irving (All of Irvings come pretty close but this is the one that struck a chord with me the most)
Secret History - Donna Tartt (Not sure really - only read once and loved it, but don't know yet whether it will stand the test of time with me. I like Dostoyevski, and this was really an updated version of Crime and Punishment)
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance - Robert Pirsig (bit of a hippyish choice, but I just love it and the theories of what 'quality' is made me really think about my work in my engineering days).

But that misses out LOTR, which I loved when I was young, Ullyses, Catch 22, All quiet on the Western Front, Catcher in the Rye, Animal Farm, Lolita, The Trial, etc etc...

Have to have a look through my book collection one evening and have a proper think!

1984 stays in. I understand the reservations - in fact I read it last year and did think that it wasn't that well written, but you can't underestimate it's impact. A bit undecided, but still in.

Zen is also not the greatest book in terms of the writing, and it hasn't dated well, but I still love it.

Cider House Rules remains one of my all time favourites so that stays in.

However, good as Slaughterhouse 5 is, reading Birdsong recently made me read All Quiet on the Western Front again, and if there is a definitive book about the horrors of war, then AQOTWF is it, so Erich Maria Remarque gets in in place of Vonnegut.

Secret History goes though. Good book, but not an all time classic. Mulled over the 5th choice - Chandler is hard to miss out - the tightest writing I've ever read - unmistakeable and defined a whole 'genre'. Catch 22 loses out because of AQOTWF and the Catcher in the Rye, fantastic as it is doesn't quite get in there. Gatsby is nearly perfect, The Trial is a genuine one off classic but neither make it. Crime and punishment is bubbling under along with The Magus. Steinbeck has at least 2 contenders, 3 if you count short stories. Ulysses is great, but you need a lifetime to study it, along with an encyclopedic knowledge of Irish history and at least two dictionaries (but it does have the most stunning ending of any novel - absolute perfection). The final spot is one of two.

The finest prose ever written, by a non-native English speaker, or a book that is as close to perfection as it's possible to get.

Nabakov's Lolita is gorgeous - the first paragraph is as good a piece of writing as you will ever find and it just draws you in, despite the (much misunderstood) subject matter.

However, the final spot goes to an absolutely beautiful story that works on at least 3 levels. Not a single word out of place and surely the greatest of all novels. Everyone should read it. At least twice. Attacus Finch is one of the greatest literary figures, and as good a role model as you're likely to find anywhere. If you're a Dad, you have to read this book. Can't believe I missed out Mockingbird the first time out, but should have been the first name on the teamsheet.

Remind me to come back in 12 months to change my mind again!!

[Pouzar]

Good idea Unc. The books won't change in 12 months but you likely will.

[mephisto]

Interesting to see how dominant muscular american literature is but then we have few roads in landscape so its women who plump for the english social novel, Jane Austen, Dickens, Wolfe etc

a few goodies
Lolita...already mentioned is perfect
One Flew Over The Cuckoos Nest...muscular american
Vanity Fair...Thackerays puppets..english, social
Garp..ubiquitous Irvy baby..muscular..oh dear all that wrestling
Dice Man..good student masturbatory flick
As I Lay Dying..muscular american
Cider With Rosie........english hooray
Undermilkwood..not american, not a novel, not english...best by miles

[tommymooney]

I've read it a few times. It's in my 5 for cultural impact rather than for its stylistic merits (though I don't agree that it's as badly written as you think it is).

It does 'tail off' a bit I think (1984) but cultural impact scores a 5 for me too. I love all Orwell though, including Keep the Aspidistra flying and coming up for air. The only one I struggle with is Homage to Catalonia...can't get into it!

[Billy Whiz]

The Top 50 books of all time, according to a survey by play.com (in other words, voted for by real people who actually read books):

1. To Kill A Mockingbird - Harper Lee
2. Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien
3. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe - C.S Lewis
4. Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
5. The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
6. Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
7. Animal Farm - George Orwell
8. Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
9. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban - JK Rowling
10. Lord of the Flies - William Golding
11. The Time Travellers Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
12. Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
13. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest - Ken Kasey
14. Gone With the Wind - Margaret Mitchell
15. The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
16. War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
17. Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
18. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night -time - Mark Haddon
19. The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald
20. The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
21. Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
22. Sons and Lovers - DH Lawrence
23. Anna Kareninia - Leo Tolstoy
24. Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
25. Emma - Jane Austen
26. Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks
27. The Catcher in the Rye, JD Salinger
28. My Sister's Keeper - Jodi Picoult
29. A Clockwork Orange - Anthony Burgess
30. A Passage to India - E.M Forster
31. Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
32. Captain Corelli's Mandolin, Louis de Bernieres
33. Atonement - Ian McEwan
34. Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie
35. In Search of Lost Time - Marcel Proust
36. Middlemarch - George Eliot
37. White Teeth - Zadie Smith
38. To the Lighthouse - Virginia Woolf
39. It - Stephen King
40. Little Women - Louisa M. Alcott
41. Vanity Fair - William Thackeray
42. David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
43. The Horse Whisperer - Nicholas Evans
44. Robinson Crusoe - Daniel Defoe
45. Moby Dick - Herman Melville
46. Gulliver's Travels - Jonathan Swift
47. Frankenstein - Mary Shelley
48. Huckleberry Finn - Mark Twin
49. Three Men in a Boat - Jerome K. Jerome
50. The Island - Victoria Hislop

I've read 31 of them. Two I haven't read but really should do before long are Madam Bovary and Midnight's Children. Also, It - I've never read any Stephen King so I guess I should start with that one.

[murf]

Rating the ones I've read:

1. To Kill A Mockingbird - Harper Lee
2. Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien
3. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe - C.S Lewis
4. Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
5. The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown /
6. Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
7. Animal Farm - George Orwell
8. Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
9. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban - JK Rowling
10. Lord of the Flies - William Golding
11. The Time Travellers Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
12. Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
13. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest - Ken Kasey
14. Gone With the Wind - Margaret Mitchell
15. The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
16. War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
17. Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
18. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night -time - Mark Haddon
19. The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald
20. The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
21. Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
22. Sons and Lovers - DH Lawrence
23. Anna Kareninia - Leo Tolstoy
24. Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
25. Emma - Jane Austen
26. Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks
27. The Catcher in the Rye, JD Salinger
28. My Sister's Keeper - Jodi Picoult
29. A Clockwork Orange - Anthony Burgess
30. A Passage to India - E.M Forster
31. Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
32. Captain Corelli's Mandolin, Louis de Bernieres
33. Atonement - Ian McEwan
34. Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie
35. In Search of Lost Time - Marcel Proust
36. Middlemarch - George Eliot
37. White Teeth - Zadie Smith
38. To the Lighthouse - Virginia Woolf
39. It - Stephen King
40. Little Women - Louisa M. Alcott
41. Vanity Fair - William Thackeray
42. David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
43. The Horse Whisperer - Nicholas Evans
44. Robinson Crusoe - Daniel Defoe
45. Moby Dick - Herman Melville
46. Gulliver's Travels - Jonathan Swift
47. Frankenstein - Mary Shelley
48. Huckleberry Finn - Mark Twain
49. Three Men in a Boat - Jerome K. Jerome
50. The Island - Victoria Hislop

Suprised how few I've actually read....

[Darbyand]

I'd heartily recommend Lucky Jim by Kingsley Amis. One of the rare books that I've been back to time and again since first reading it over 10 years ago. It was written about 50 years ago so is inevitably a little dated...but some things never change so things like having a few pints, slacking off work, scheming on how to meet attractive ladies are all covered in an amusing way - certain parts i.e. the "face pulling" are literally .

[I've always assumed the average Fiso member is male aged 20-40 and this book is spot on for that demographic]

[Bumiac]

Ulysses
The Sun Also Rises
Anything written by Emerson
Neuromancer
A Canticle for Liebowitz

[DalianAtkinson]

A few:

The Brothers Karamazov - Dostoyevsky: Stunning book, surprised it hasn't been mentioned yet.
Chandler
Scoop - Waugh
Grapes of Wrath - Steinbeck
Homage to Catalonia - Orwell (Second half of Road to Wigan Pier (The manifesto) is good too
All Kafka, although something of an acquired taste.
The Prince - Machiavelli (One sharp mind at work)
L'Etranger - Camus
I Am David - Not sure who wrote this
Possibly my favourite: Day of the Triffids - Wyndham: Can't believe no-one's mentioned him yet, possibly the starting point for the rash of post-apocalyptic movies etc we have now. Great, great author.

As an aside, Tell No One has now been made into a very good French film, although possibly not as good as Cache (Hidden) by Haneke, which is on a similar theme.

Has anyone read Tinker, tailor... I've heard good things?

(PS: Disappointed to find no Proust mentions in here)

[Achiles74]

Has anyone read any Lee Child novels?

[trampie]

Dont read much in the way of books and rarely read fiction, my favourite five books that I own are {in no particular order}:-

Homage to Catalonia by George Orwell
{The authors personal account of the Spanish civil war having fought in it}

The goddess and the American girl by Larry Engelmann
{An account of possibly the greatest ever rivalry in sport, certainly tennis although they only played once, Lenglen and Wills}

Land of my fathers, 2000 years of Welsh history by Gwynfor Evans
{pure historical, written by one of Wales greatest modern figures, if you can call somebody deceased as modern}

The fight by Norman Mailer
{About the 'rumble in the jungle' between Ali and Foreman}

The Outsider by Albert Camus
{Fiction about a murder written in the first person narritive, Le Monde rate it as the greatest book of the 20th century}

Books I would like to read include Cancer ward by Solzhenitsyn, any biography of Ho Chi Minh and a Clockwork orange by Burgees.

[Achiles74]

Dont read much in the way of books and rarely read fiction, my favourite five books that I own are {in no particular order}:-

Homage to Catalonia by George Orwell
{The authors personal account of the Spanish civil war having fought in it}

The goddess and the American girl by Larry Engelmann
{An account of possibly the greatest ever rivalry in sport, certainly tennis although they only played once, Lenglen and Wills}

Land of my fathers, 2000 years of Welsh history by Gwynfor Evans
{pure historical, written by one of Wales greatest modern figures, if you can call somebody deceased as modern}

The fight by Norman Mailer
{About the 'rumble in the jungle' between Ali and Foreman}

The Outsider by Albert Camus
{Fiction about a murder written in the first person narritive, Le Monde rate it as the greatest book of the 20th century}

Books I would like to read include Cancer ward by Solzhenitsyn, any biography of Ho Chi Minh and a Clockwork orange by Burgees.

another welsh fiso member we are taking over, soon we will have everyone singing the men of harlech

[Mike_]

Has anyone read any Lee Child novels?

Hotpot is yer man there

[padmole]

I read Anna Karenina about three years ago (I have a long commute to work!) My advice is - don't bother. It's well over 1,000 pages and it could have been done better in, say, 600 (just how interested in the financial problems of 19th-century Russian farmers can you be?) And the key event of the book (when she throws herself under a train) is dealt with in a couple of paragraphs, and barely referred to again. Also, at that point, when Anna dies, you've still got another 200 pages to plough through, having lost your central character.[/quote]


Wont bother reading now I know she dies ;0)

Have read 90% of the classics (say read when listened to the classic audio books 1-100)

Like my Sci fi being a sad Dr who geek so some ASIMOV would have to make it in there along with maybe HITCHHIKERS but I find it easier to like authors than single books.
Just listened to NICK HARKAWAY - the goneaway world (He is son of John le carre) - if into mixed sci fi then worth a read /listen in spite of a few lulls).

if anyone wants the audio CD then let me know and ill ship it over

[Achiles74]

I read Anna Karenina about three years ago (I have a long commute to work!) My advice is - don't bother. It's well over 1,000 pages and it could have been done better in, say, 600 (just how interested in the financial problems of 19th-century Russian farmers can you be?) And the key event of the book (when she throws herself under a train) is dealt with in a couple of paragraphs, and barely referred to again. Also, at that point, when Anna dies, you've still got another 200 pages to plough through, having lost your central character.

Wont bother reading now I know she dies ;0)

Have read 90% of the classics (say read when listened to the classic audio books 1-100)

Like my Sci fi being a sad Dr who geek so some ASIMOV would have to make it in there along with maybe HITCHHIKERS but I find it easier to like authors than single books.
Just listened to NICK HARKAWAY - the goneaway world (He is son of John le carre) - if into mixed sci fi then worth a read /listen in spite of a few lulls).

if anyone wants the audio CD then let me know and ill ship it over[/quote]

shouldnt you have added a spoiler for the gal dying, it has spoiled the book for countless fiso members who wished to read it now

[Billy Whiz]

I read Anna Karenina about three years ago (I have a long commute to work!) My advice is - don't bother. It's well over 1,000 pages and it could have been done better in, say, 600 (just how interested in the financial problems of 19th-century Russian farmers can you be?) And the key event of the book (when she throws herself under a train) is dealt with in a couple of paragraphs, and barely referred to again. Also, at that point, when Anna dies, you've still got another 200 pages to plough through, having lost your central character.

Wont bother reading now I know she dies ;0)

Have read 90% of the classics (say read when listened to the classic audio books 1-100)

Like my Sci fi being a sad Dr who geek so some ASIMOV would have to make it in there along with maybe HITCHHIKERS but I find it easier to like authors than single books.
Just listened to NICK HARKAWAY - the goneaway world (He is son of John le carre) - if into mixed sci fi then worth a read /listen in spite of a few lulls).

if anyone wants the audio CD then let me know and ill ship it over

I was reading the bit in bold and thought - this guy's hit the nail on the head, I coudn't have put it better myself. Then I realised that I had written it myself - padmole was quoting an old post of mine but the quote box hadn't worked properly . Anyway, anyone considering reading Anna Karenina would surely already know that she kills herself, just as they would probably be able to quote the famous first line: 'All happy families are alike; but each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.'

[Mister Talons]

In my time, I have enjoyed the writings of Robert Graves, Roger Lancelyn Green, Saki, Rider Haggard, Carlos Castaneda and Sven Hassel, amongst others..

..but when I hear the word "classics", here are my top 5:

1) "The Art of War" by Sun-Tzu;
2) "The Art of Raw" by Su-Shi;
3) "The Art of Awr" by Ti-Po;
4) "The Art of Whore" by Ban-Ksi;
5) "Heart of Wart" by Anagh Ram.

Of course, many of you will be clamouring for the inclusion of "The Art of Knorr" by O-Xo, but the plot crumbled into pieces as far as I'm concerned...

..and as for "The Art of Hoar" by Jack Frost? I just couldn't warm to it.

Am currently reading "Piscatori Romani" by Titus Linus.. and although I'm struggling to get the angle, it's still got me hooked.

[Surprised]

Haven't heard Sven Hassel mentioned much!
I enjoyed his novels

[golden bear]

Haven't heard Sven Hassel mentioned much!
I enjoyed his novels

I liked them as well but all made up allegedly as Sven is really called Børge Villy Redsted Pedersen and he spent the majority of World War II in occupied Denmark and his knowledge of warfare comes second-hand from Danish Waffen SS veterans whom he met after the end of the war.

That sounds like research to me and they are still good books so good on him.

[Surprised]

Haven't heard Sven Hassel mentioned much!
I enjoyed his novels

I liked them as well but all made up allegedly as Sven is really called Børge Villy Redsted Pedersen and he spent the majority of World War II in occupied Denmark and his knowledge of warfare comes second-hand from Danish Waffen SS veterans whom he met after the end of the war.

That sounds like research to me and they are still good books so good on him.

May well be made up but when I read them I never knew they were meant to based on real life so it didn't matter. As you say they are still good books.

[Mister Talons]

... but all made up allegedly..

One man and one man only is responsible for all the "Sven Hassel is a fake" stuff.. and his name is Eric Haaest. He is also the man who stated that there were no gas chambers in the concentration camps and that "The Diary of Anne Frank" was a forgery.

That tends to shed a different light on anything that this man says... not that I'm suggesting that he's just a sensationalist money-grabber, cashing in on others' work.. Heaven forfend.

Sven Hassel books were banned in Germany until EU Law superceded, but to my knowledge (I may be out of date) only one has ever been published in Germany in the German language.

Alles gute!

[murf]

I thought Sven Hassel was just a chapter in Nancy del Olio's autobiography

[bluenosey]

Brave New World ---- Aldous Huxley ---I though was better than 1984 considering the time of writing and of the man himself.

Great shout. Uber cool book