What book do you like to recommend?

[MonkeyFunk]

I've probably gotten 10 people to read "Geek Love" by Katherine Dunn.

I read it when it first came out in 1989, and just adored it. It's weird, creepy, funny, fascinating. I've probably bought 4 copies myself after giving away my own copy to friends to read.

So what book do you most recommend to friends who ask "I'm looking for something good to read..."?

[saltpoint]

1. I haven't tried the Dunn book but might give it a try.

I like to push Joan Didion's novel DEMOCRACY, Edmund White's FORGETTING ELENA, John Irving's A PRAYER FOR OWEN MEANY, Don DeLillo's LIBRA, and Reynolds Price's THE SURFACE OF EARTH.

[pitohui]

6. libra, that's one i've bought for people

yeah, that one's a keeper

[wake.up.america]

2. "The Art of Loving" by Eric Fromm.

[msedano]

3. geek love's a masterpiece of US fiction

i recommend geek love, too. other than todd browning's movie freaks, geek love is sui generis, though paul beatty's white boy shuffle has some connections with arty. go ahead now and read Dunn's Truck for something completely different.

i recommend whatever i've most recently enjoyed. right now, it's their dogs came with them by Helena Viramontes.
http://labloga.blogspot.com/2007/08/review-their-dogs-came-with-them.html

others in the 'You gotta read this author this book' list:
gilb woodcuts of women
ramos moony's road to hell
atwood the handmaid's tale
taibo return to the same city


thanx for asking,
mvs

http://readraza.com

[Orrex]

14. Good God! Wiki says that Tim Burton may want to direct the film

How does that over-praised hack continue to get work?

(sorry for a parenthetical rant)

[superconnected]

18. I love the handmaids tale

but everyone I suggested it to had preconcieved ideas - often from the movie, and got mad.

They wouldn't give the book a chance.

[SCDem]

4. Several

The Story of B - by Daniel Quinn - great read - mind transforming - gets you to think of the world and it's history from a completely different perspective.

Sophie's World - by Josef Gaarder - delightful read

and now reading almost everything by Alexander McCall Smith - and I started with 44 Scotland Street

[yellowdogintexas]

12. I love Alexander McCall Smith, I started with "#1 Ladie's Detective Agency"

haven't gotten to the other series yet

[pitohui]

5. oh god i hate that book

but a lot of people do like it so what the hey

there isn't any one book i recommend, i tailor my recommend to the person, actually, so it varies

[YankeyMCC]

7. There are many I would recomend depending on the person

In general if I could get a few people to read William Cronon's "Change's in the Land" I would be extremely happy.

I'll recommend almost any Steinbeck novel to anyone :)

And Asimov's Robot/Empire/Foundation novels to almost any SF fan.

But I really can't think of any time I've made a recommendation to someone who followed up with the exception of my son and that's only been recently when I handed him "Escape From Earth: New Adventures in Space" and anthology edited by Gardner Dozois and Jack Dann. He's really enjoyed those stories.

[Richardo]

8. Most often: 'The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time'

Also:
'Catch-22' (Joseph Heller)
'Isaac's Storm' (Erik Larsen)
'1776' (David McCullough)
'Lucky You' (Carl Hiaasen)
'Lincoln Lawyer' (Michael Connelly)

[fadedrose]

16. Dogs?

Dogs appear in mysteries by Robert Tanenbaum (18 in the series, but some are heavier into dogs than others) and books by David Rosenfelt...I like anything by James Crais. Robert Ludlum is good, but his books tend to be long, no dogs.

You can find books by these authors and others at:

http://www.stopyourekillingme.com/index.html

Enjoy the site, I do. I open the site, then open my library link, and find out if what's listed is available. I then click "request" on my library link and my library pulls them all and calls when the books are ready to be picked up - no bending or standing on stools - it's marvelous.


martha

[Sequoia]

9. I read that book also when it came out.

Another quirky spooky book you might like it "The Obscene Bird of Night". Downright crrepy as heck.

I'd recommend "Jitterbug Perfume", by Tom Robbins as fiction. For non-fiction..

The Devil in the White City

Mayflower

Death in the Haymarket

Food of the Gods

The Secret Knowledge of Water

Lots more..but these are my favorites so far.

[raccoon]

10. ALAS, BABYLON by Pat Frank. nt

[freesqueeze]

11. hmmmmm....

number 1> Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood
number 2> Lucky Jim by Kingsley Amis
number 3> Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison

[yellowdogintexas]

13. George R R Martin's series "A Song of Ice and Fire"

is the #1 book I seem to recommend to people lately.

Of course I have my list of everyone ought to read this ..

the newest book I have added to that list is "The Kite Runner"

but my list includes:
Tom Sawyer
To Kill A Mockingbird
Jane Eyre
Auntie Mame
GWTW
Diary of Anne Frank
Cry, The Beloved Country

among others

[Forkboy]

24. I'm reading Martin's A Game Of Thrones right now.

Outside of Robert E. Howard I'm not really into fantasy type settings (never read any of the Lord of the Rings, for instance), but Martin's writing is, like Howard's, very vivid and evocative.I'm looking forward to the rest of the series.

[Rowdyboy]

15. "Confederacy of Dunces" by John Kennedy Toole.....

Its laugh out loud funny and an overall delight.

[JitterbugPerfume]

17. Hi Steve!

I love that book1:hi: :loveya:

[superconnected]

19. I've recommended enders game and the stand to people.

I've recommended classics but nobody ever reads them. Handmaids tale was impossible to recommend because of the vehemence it recieved from people who never read it and seen parts of the movie.

I did recommend interview with the vampire when it came out and several of my friends ended up reading the series.

[Daveparts]

20. The Servants of Pilate

http://www.gather.com/viewArticle.jsp?articleId=281474977145775

But then I'm Partisan

[LWolf]

21. It depends on the person I'm recommending them to.

Just because I like a book doesn't mean someone else will.

Some books that I've recommended to various people recently include:

A Man Without A Country

The Golden Compass

The Dark is Rising

Horsemanship Through Life

Onion Girl

The Celestine Prophecy

Macbeth

Women Who Run With Wolves

[eileen fleming]

22. "KEEP HOPE ALIVE" has nothing to do with J. Jackson

Eileen Fleming's first of five journeys into Israel Palestine resulted in "KEEP HOPE ALIVE".

This tale is a fictionalized retelling of the well remembered memoirs of a 1948 refugee from the Upper Galilee who made his way to the USA and realized the American dream. After a lucrative career in the Defense Industry during the Cold War and THAT DAY we call 9/11, Khaled Diab brought together American Jews, Christians and Muslims to respond to evil with good by founding the 501 3-c Olive Trees Foundation for Peace.

"Keep Hope Alive" tells his story and is an historical chronology with connections to antiquity, and hope for the future.

"Keep Hope Alive" is also Eileen's spiritual journey told with humor and insight through six fictional characters who represent six ways to intuit God.

---------------------------------------

Book Reviewer from www.midwestbookreview.com:

"At first I thought this had something to do with the famous line of Jessie Jackson. I'm delighted to say it is much, much more. The author shows that there are many people from all over the world who are moving in the right direction to establish peace in the Middle East. The organization Olive Trees Foundation for Peace/OTFFP is Arabs, Jews, and Christians who have formed a non profit non political group who have one goal; to have Israelis and Palestinians live side by side in peace.

"These are people from all walks of life who are committed to changing the area into a peaceful region. Social movements like this grow until finally government jumps on-board. This is so counter to the policies of the Bush administration. As dialogue continues to grow on this subject government will be forced to rethink its approach to the region. This is a book that should be read by anyone does not believe there can be peace in the Middle East. It should also be included in schools and on the college level to help focus on how the area can move toward peace." – Gary Roen


"KEEP HOPE ALIVE" is available as a hard cover edition with a 45% DISCOUNT to Book Stores that they should pass onto readers.


100% of ALL royalties to the author for "KEEP HOPE ALIVE" are being donated to the non-profit OTFFP to provide fruit bearing trees in Israel Palestine until Dr. Diab's dream of blanketing the Holy Land with one million trees planted in peace is realized.

[jcla]

23. WALTER MOSLEY, OCTAVIA BUTLER AND STEVEN J. GOULD

Any book by these authors are thought provoking and a good read.

I also like the # 1 Ladies Detective agency series by McCall Smith. Precious, her friends and co-workers are people I would want as neighbors as well as friends. Observation, curiosity and compassion...

I love Easy and Fearless... two knights in shining armor I wouldn't mind being rescued by. Mosley's Mysteries are a fascinating look at the world...with violence and love.

Octavia Butler's books have always stood things on their heads and stretched me. I mourn her passing.

Gould is fun to think. Fun to follow his thought process. We are lessened by his leaving.

[Forkboy]

25. The Years of Rice and Salt by Kim Stanley Robinson.

This is a good summation;

The book is set between about AD 1405 (783 solar years since the Hegira, by the Islamic calendar used in the book), and AD 2002 (1423 after Hegira). In the eighth Islamic century, almost 99 per cent of the population of medieval Europe is wiped out by the Black Death (rather than the approximately 30-60% that died in reality). This sets the stage for a world without Christianity as a major influence.

The novel follows a jāti of three to seven main characters and their reincarnation through time, in very different cultural and religious settings. The book features Muslim, Chinese (Buddhist, Daoist, Confucianist), American First Nations, and Hindu culture, philosophy and everyday life. It mixes sophisticated knowledge about these cultures in the real world with fictional developments, partly resembling the actual history, but shifted and reflected by different cultural settings.

The main characters, marked by identical first letters throughout their reincarnations, but changing in gender, culture-nationality and so on, struggle for progress in each life. Each chapter has a different style, reflecting its setting.

Key issues of the novel are hybrid cultures; Progress and science; alternate history; philosophy, religion and human nature; politics; feminism and equality of all humans; and the struggle between technology and sustainability.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Years_of_Rice_and_Salt

[ncabot22]

26. So many books to recommend!

But I will start with two:

"The Life and Loves of a She-Devil" by Fay Weldon and
"The Haunting of Hill House" by Shirley Jackson

[pscot]

27. Catch 22

Still the funniest novel I've ever read, and a very wise book.

[fadedrose]

28. Butch Karp series

There's about 17 or so of the Butch Karp/Marlene Ciampi series written by Robert Tanenbaum (ghost writers involved).

They're not great literature, but they always give me a smile and a laugh, the characters age and it helps if you start from the beginning (I think somewhere in the 80's) and work up. Karp is a DA/atty always in trouble, caused by wife usually, but not always. The critics panned the last few books, but I am so fond of the characters that I could care less.
Lots of humor, dogs (in some of the books), sex, bombs, killings, tunnels, bums, crazy cops, etc., all the things 70-year olds like me shouldn't be reading. ;)

I am going to read them all over again, maybe after Christmas.

Characters are wonderful and memorable. Takes place in NYC.

[rhett o rick]

29. I agree. I love those and have read most. nm

[rhett o rick]

30. I recommended "Pillars of the Earth", long before Oprah. nm