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What is the best book you've ever read?

Though it felt like a slog at the time, Underworld really stuck with me once I finished it.


What’s everyone’s favorite McCarthy?
 
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inspectah said:
Read Pilgrim in Pat Johannson's American Lit seminar back in the day. Great book and great prof
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Had Prof. Johannson freshman year for a seminar thing, but the Lit part was Eudora Welty. Johannson passed away somewhat recently.
 
Homage to Catalonia -- Orwell
2001 -- Clarke (Childhood's End and The City and the Stars are also great)
Radetzky March -- Roth
All the King's Men -- Warren

Y'all are making me want to re-read Vonnegut and Asimov. Though I hate Kafka, lol.
 
mako1331 said:
Though it felt like a slog at the time, Underworld really stuck with me once I finished it.


What’s everyone’s favorite McCarthy?
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Underworld is amazing imho, definitely a top 5er.

Blood Meridian is my favorite. He does to language what the western landscape and dynamics did to the individuals portrayed in the novel. Just an amazing piece of literature, imho.
 
mako1331 said:
Though it felt like a slog at the time, Underworld really stuck with me once I finished it.


What’s everyone’s favorite McCarthy?
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I felt the same way about Libra. Once the different plot lines started coming together it really hit. Seems to be a constant with DeLillo's work. Underworld is high up there on my goodreads queue.
 
I'm older than pretty much everyone on this thread but I only discovered James Michener about 25 years ago when I was in my early 40's. Michener writes novels with historical and cultural background better than anyone I've ever read. I recommend SPACE, ALASKA, CARIBBEAN, POLAND, CHESAPEAKE, TEXAS, MEXICO, HAWAII, THE COVENANT and THE SOURCE. He's written a few more but those are my favorites. I learned so much and enjoyed the story in all of those, and my only regret is Michener never wrote about India, Russia, South America, China and England or Western Europe. That would've covered the world beautifully.
 
Just finished “Joan is Okay” by Weike Wang.

It was really interesting but I can’t say I liked it. Written in stream of consciousness it was more a set of interactions that built a theme than a traditional plot.


It was also the first novel I’ve read that incorporated the pandemic which was a little surreal to experience early pandemic life and it’s impact on people ( especially from the perspective of a Chinese American)
 
Fusiondad10 said:
I'm older than pretty much everyone on this thread but I only discovered James Michener about 25 years ago when I was in my early 40's. Michener writes novels with historical and cultural background better than anyone I've ever read. I recommend SPACE, ALASKA, CARIBBEAN, POLAND, CHESAPEAKE, TEXAS, MEXICO, HAWAII, THE COVENANT and THE SOURCE. He's written a few more but those are my favorites. I learned so much and enjoyed the story in all of those, and my only regret is Michener never wrote about India, Russia, South America, China and England or Western Europe. That would've covered the world beautifully.
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Along these lines, I became happily engrossed in Trinity by Leon Uris when I picked it up preparing for a trip to Ireland in my early-mid twenties. Would recommend.
 
For the Wake/Winston connections, I've read Bitter Blood and Barbarians at he Gate several times over the years. More recently, Going Down Tobacco Road by former RJR employee Gene Hoots was also enjoyable for me.
 
DownEastDeac said:
For the Wake/Winston connections, I've read Bitter Blood and Barbarians at he Gate several times over the years. More recently, Going Down Tobacco Road by former RJR employee Gene Hoots was also enjoyable for me.
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Bitter Blood is chilling. When Bledsoe describes the path that Klenner took to get to the Valley Rd house, I could visualize every place he mentioned. I have so many connections to that story. Hattie Newsom was a member of Bethabara Moravian Church and I know the man who was pastor there when it happened. He was one of the first ones called to the house when they realized something was wrong. He told me the whole story when we were on a ministers retreat. Then a member of one of the churches I served was involved in the final police chase from GSO to Summerfield. And when I was pastor in Mayodan, a few of my congregation members had been patients of Dr. Klenner in Reidsville.
 
LilburnDeac said:
Bitter Blood is chilling. When Bledsoe describes the path that Klenner took to get to the Valley Rd house, I could visualize every place he mentioned. I have so many connections to that story. Hattie Newsom was a member of Bethabara Moravian Church and I know the man who was pastor there when it happened. He was one of the first ones called to the house when they realized something was wrong. He told me the whole story when we were on a ministers retreat. Then a member of one of the churches I served was involved in the final police chase from GSO to Summerfield. And when I was pastor in Mayodan, a few of my congregation members had been patients of Dr. Klenner in Reidsville.
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Both my boys read the book while in high school and became pretty obsessed with the story. One football weekend we did the whole Bitter Blood tour thing to all the mentioned spots, including random stuff like the gun shop on Hawthorne where Fritz bought his pistols.
 
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