Recommend some good books to read while on a month long break from work

[AbrahamoLincolni]

I'm on a month long medical break from my work and will be spending a lot of time at home so I want to use the time to read some good books.  My tastes in books vary so you can recommend almost any book you want, but no mindless smut or cheap drivel like 50 Shades or Twilight or Hunger Games.

[Volbet]

While Hunger Games weren't really my cup of tea, I wouldn't call it mindless smut. 

The series is actually really well written.

 

Some recommendations would be

• The Brothers Karamazov
• 1984
• Cloud Atlas
• Catch-22
• Fathers and Sons
• Lolita
• A Clockwork Orange
• Brave New World
• Crime and Punishment

[AbrahamoLincolni]

7 minutes ago, Volbet said:

While Hunger Games weren't really my cup of tea, I wouldn't call it mindless smut. 

I didn't say Hunger Games was mindless smut.  I said don't recommend books that are mindless smut or cheap drivel.  I put Hunger Games in the latter part of the "mindless smut OR cheap drivel".

[OhadShwartzman]

The hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy is really good. You can buy the ultimate version which has all of the books in it.

[AbrahamoLincolni]

3 hours ago, Volbet said:

Some recommendations would be

• The Brothers Karamazov
• 1984
• Cloud Atlas
• Catch-22
• Fathers and Sons
• Lolita
• A Clockwork Orange
• Brave New World
• Crime and Punishment

 

2 hours ago, NoGravityPanda said:

The hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy is really good. You can buy the ultimate version which has all of the books in it.

These recommendations are good but I have read them and they are too mainstream.  I want something interesting, something new.  Something I haven't heard about before.

[cekkonen]

Have you read Terry Pratchett's Discworld books? I think they're great, not like traditional fantasy but much more humouristic in a sarcastic and dark kind of way.

Also anything Tolkien is very good when you really get into reading it.

[Volbet]

1 hour ago, AbrahamoLincolni said:

These recommendations are good but I have read them and they are too mainstream.  I want something interesting, something new.  Something I haven't heard about before.

OK then.

I can recommend reading Wolves Among Sheep. The book is examinating the NSBM scene and explorers its ideological roots.

[AkiraDaarkst]

Have you read the following?

• Isaac Asimov: The Robot Series, Foundation Series
• Joe Haldeman: The Forever War
• Robert A. Heinlein: Starship Troopers
• Arthur C. Clarke: The Rama series
• Frank Herbert: The entire Dune series, including the ones written by his son
• Orson Scott Card: The Ender series and the Jason Worthing series
• M.M. Kaye: The Far Pavilions
• James Clavell: The Asian Saga
• Carl Von Clausewitz: On War
• David Weber: The Honorverse collection including the sub-series (Saganami Island, Kingdom of Torch and Manticore Ascendant series)
• Wu Cheng'en: Hsi Yu Chi
• Luo Guanzhong: Romance of the Three Kingdoms
• Shi Nai'an: The Water Margin
• Mahabbharata and Ramayana
• Daidoji Yuzan: Budoshoshinshu
• The Poetic Edda
• Miyamoto Musashi: Go Rin No Sho
• Yoshiki Tanaka: Ginga Eiyu Densetsu (Legend of the Galactic Heroes)
• Murasaki Shikibu: Genji Monogatari (The Tale of Genji)

Yeah I'm a bit heavy on sci-fi and Asian or Asian related literature.

 

4 hours ago, AbrahamoLincolni said:

 

These recommendations are good but I have read them and they are too mainstream.  I want something interesting, something new.  Something I haven't heard about before.

Let me know if any of the stuff I mentioned isn't interesting enough and I'll recommend more.  The ones with non-western authors will have English translations available.

[Monte_Carlo]

Eagle Against the Sun: Ronald H. Spector

The Reckoning: David Halberstam

A Short History of Reconstruction: Eric Foner

The World of the Shining Prince: Court Life in Ancient Japan: Ivan Morris

That Noble Dream: Peter Novick

 

Yeah, all history.  Eagle Against the Sun and The Reckoning both proved to be damn interesting reads.  Currently working through Shining Prince.  Pretty interesting as well.  Now if you really want to go deep on the topic of history... That Noble Dream is a history of the study of history.  Actually proved to be way more interesting than I expected.  

 

Failing that.  David Weber's Honor Harrington series has kept my attention over the years. 

[AbrahamoLincolni]

23 minutes ago, AkiraDaarkst said:

Have you read the following?

• Isaac Asimov: The Robot Series, Foundation Series
• Joe Haldeman: The Forever War
• Robert A. Heinlein: Starship Troopers
• Arthur C. Clarke: The Rama series
• Frank Herbert: The entire Dune series, including the ones written by his son
• Orson Scott Card: The Ender series and the Jason Worthing series
• M.M. Kaye: The Far Pavilions
• James Clavell: The Asian Saga
• Carl Von Clauswitz: On War
• David Weber: The Honorverse collection including the sub-series (Saganami Island, Kingdom of Torch and Manticore Ascendant series)
• Wu Cheng'en: Hsi Yu Chi
• Luo Guanzhong: Romance of the Three Kingdoms
• Shi Nai'an: The Water Margin
• Mahabbharata and Ramayana
• Daidoji Yuzan: Budoshoshinshu
• The Poetic Edda
• Miyamoto Musashi: Go Rin No Sho
• Yoshiki Tanaka: Ginga Eiyu Densetsu (Legend of the Galactic Heroes)
• Murasaki Shikibu: Genji Monogatari (The Tale of Genji)

Yeah I'm a bit heavy on sci-fi and Asian or Asian related literature.

 

Let me know if any of the stuff I mentioned isn't interesting enough and I'll recommend more.  The ones with non-western authors will have English translations available.

I'm a big fan of Asimov and have read the entire Robot and Foundation series.  Also Forever War, Starship Troopers, Dune, Ender's Game and I love the Honorverse.  But you do mention a lot of books I've never heard of before.  Romance of the Three Kingdoms sound interesting, it sounds like an Asian Game of Thrones.

 

Thanks for the suggestions and feel free to suggest more.  I have an entire month for reading.

[AkiraDaarkst]

6 minutes ago, AbrahamoLincolni said:

Romance of the Three Kingdoms sound interesting, it sounds like an Asian Game of Thrones.

If you're a fan of the Song of Ice and Fire series (a.k.a. Game of Thrones) you'll definitely love Romance of The Three Kingdoms.  Speaking of GoT, which I believe G.R.R Martin took inspiration from The War of the Roses era of English history, there's a book by Robert Louis Stevenson called The Black Arrow: A Tale of the Two Roses.  I also recommend his other books of course, like Treasure Island.

[Misanthrope]

The Witcher books by Andrzej Sapkowski, 7 in total so it should take you through at least 2 weeks of your downtime.

 

I recently started reading the original white wolf saga, Eldric of Melniboné saga. It is also quite interesting but so far I am only on one of the early books the fortress of the pearl.

[AkiraDaarkst]

3 hours ago, AbrahamoLincolni said:

Thanks for the suggestions and feel free to suggest more.  I have an entire month for reading.

To give you more suggestions to fill up that month:

• Eric Van Lustbader: Nicolas Linnear series
• Jeffery Deaver: The Lincolm Rhyme series of crime thrillers (begin with The Bone Collector)
• Terry Goodkind: Sword of Truth series
• James Corey: The Expanse series
• Paul B. Thompson: Elven Nations Trilogy
• Anne McCaffrey: The Pern series
• Edward Elmer Smith: Lensman series
• C. J. Cherryh: The Alliance0Union and Foreigner series
• Jack Campbell (John G. Henry): The Lost Fleet, Beyond the Frontier, and Lost Stars series
• John Scalzi: Old Man's War series
• Edgar Rice Burrouchs: Princess of Mars (Barsoom) series, and of course his Tarzan series
• Frederik Forsyth: all of his spy thrillers
• Keven J. Anderson: Saga of Seven Suns
• Various works by Niel Gaiman
• Richard Feynman: Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman! and What do you care what other people think?
• Carl Sagan: Cosmos, Pale Blue Dot, Contact and other books
• Marion Zimmer Bradley: The Avalon series, and other works
• Mercedes Lackey: Valdemar series, Elves on the Road series, and other works
• Rudyard Kipling: he's the author of The Jungle Book and he has written so many amazing books
• George Orwell: every time someone mentions his name the first book they think of is 1984.  But he has written other wonderful books, one of my favorite being Burmese Days which I like even better than 1984 and Animal Farm

You want to read Asian fantasy/martial arts novels?  There's online fan-translation communities that have translated works by Chinese authors like Jin Yong, Gu Long, Wang Baoxiang, etc.  For example, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon the movie was based on a Chinese Wuxia novel.

 

Or read manga like:

• Rurouni Kenshin
• Ravages of Time
• Lone Wolf and Cub, Samurai Executioner, Path of the Assasin, Lady Snowblood
• Kingdom

There's lots of good history books that cover military events such as The War of the Roses, The Punic Wars, World Wars I and II, The Gallic Wars, Hundred Years War, The Great Game (i.e. European involvement in Afghanistan during the 1800s).  Julius Caesar's commentaries on the Gallic Wars is a good read.  Obviously Sun Tzu's The Art of War is also a good book to read.

 

Since you're also a photographer:

• The Bang Bang Club
• Unreasonable Behavior by Don McCullin

If you want to read poetry I recommend reading the works of the Chinese poets Li Bai and Du Fu.

[AbrahamoLincolni]

@AkiraDaarkst man you've given me a ton of suggestions I think I will need more than a month to read all of them.  And you've read all of them?

[AkiraDaarkst]

3 minutes ago, AbrahamoLincolni said:

@AkiraDaarkst man you've given me a ton of suggestions I think I will need more than a month to read all of them.  And you've read all of them?

I'm giving you choices to fill up that month, you don't have to read all of them.  Also I'm only giving you suggestions of books that I've read.  I grew up reading and collecting books that every time my family had to move to another country, my mom would complain about the 2-3 big boxes full of them that we had to pack and I felt remorse over the ones I had to leave behind.  Now I've turned my physical collection of about 1000 books into a digital library that's easier to carry around whenever I need to travel.  It's a collection of almost 10,000 now ranging from fiction to non-fiction that includes literature, history, reference/text books, etc..

[AbrahamoLincolni]

2 minutes ago, AkiraDaarkst said:

I'm giving you choices to fill up that month, you don't have to read all of them.  Also I'm only giving you suggestions of books that I've read.  I grew up reading and collecting books that every time my family had to move to another country, my mom would complain about the 2-3 big boxes full of them that we had to pack and I felt remorse over the ones I had to leave behind.  Now I've turned my physical collection of about 1000 books into a digital library that's easier to carry around whenever I need to travel.  It's a collection of almost 10,000 now ranging from fiction to non-fiction that includes literature, history, reference/text books, etc..

WOW! 10000 books.  If you don't mind my asking why did your family have to move from country to country, were your parents diplomats?

[AkiraDaarkst]

3 hours ago, AbrahamoLincolni said:

WOW! 10000 books.  If you don't mind my asking why did your family have to move from country to country, were your parents diplomats?

Yep.  I've lived in over a dozen countries.

[Aereldor]

The Lord of the Rings Trilogy.
War and Peace.
Both have excellent film/T.V. adaptations if that's more your thing (note that I'm referring to the 2016 War and Peace with Paul Dano and Lily James).

If you're down with non-fiction;

Charlie Chaplin's Autobiography

Economics in One Lesson by Henry Hazlitt

 

This is one of my favourite reads while not being a conventional book. Check out 'Oyasumi Punpun' by Inio Asano. I think it's the most brilliant thing to come out of Japan, and that's saying a lot, seeing as they produced many of my favourite games, movies, and T.V. shows.

If you're really hardcore, check out the Critical Edition of the Mahabharata; the most iconic and arguably the most important piece of Indian literature to date.

[SpaceGhostC2C]

It all boils down to what do you like to read. If you like thoughtful books where a good story is combined with a bit of philosophy, I can strongly recommend the first two novels by Umberto Eco (The Name of the Rose and Foucault's Pendulum). In the same line, if you like science fiction I could add Solaris, by Stanislaw Lem. Arthur Clark's 2001 and its sequel 2010 are also pretty good reads.

There are many other suggestions I share with previous posters, but no point in duplicating recommendations  

[KuJoe]

My two favorite series are Lone Wolf and Cub by Kazuo Koike and the Cleric Quintet by R.A. Salvatore. They're the only series I keep paper copies of and I re-read them every few years.

[AbrahamoLincolni]

50 minutes ago, AkiraDaarkst said:

Yep.  I've lived in over a dozen countries.

Must be nice, I've only been to 3 or 4 countries on vacation and never lived anywhere else outside of my own.  Which ones did you live in?  Do you also speak multiple languages?

I've downloaded sample chapters from Amazon for some of the books you suggested and while I want to broaden my horizons by reading non-English literature some books may take me time to get used to reading.  So I've decided to start with James Clavell's Shogun and my wife said your recommendation of M M Kaye's The Far Pavilions is interesting.

[schwarzerrogen]

I'd take a look at the Hyperion series by Dan Simmons

[AkiraDaarkst]

 

11 minutes ago, AbrahamoLincolni said:

I've downloaded sample chapters from Amazon for some of the books you suggested and while I want to broaden my horizons by reading non-English literature some books may take me time to get used to reading.  So I've decided to start with James Clavell's Shogun and my wife said your recommendation of M M Kaye's The Far Pavilions is interesting.

Shogun and The Far Pavilions would be a good start.  I was hesitant to recommend stuff like Three Kingdoms or Tale of Genji because if you're not used to or familiar with Asian names, especially Chinese and Japanese names, after a while you may become confused between the characters in the novel. 

 

With Romance of the Three Kingdoms you are introduced to dozens of characters and several with similar sounding names, especially because in the Chinese language certain characters can have similar pronunciation while having different meanings.  After a while you can become lost in keeping track of which Liu or Zhang or Yuan the author is talking about.

 

The Tale of Genji in the original Japanese the author doesn't really specify everyone using their names.  Murasaki Shikibu referred to people by their rank or position in the court or station in life or even just by color of their clothes.  It is only in the translations where some translators choose to give people names or titles in order to make it easier to identify and keep track of characters.  But it is one of the most important, if not the top most important, piece of literature to come out of Japan.

 

I do recommend that you take your time and give them a chance, they are wonderful novels.

 

22 minutes ago, AbrahamoLincolni said:

Must be nice, I've only been to 3 or 4 countries on vacation and never lived anywhere else outside of my own.  Which ones did you live in?  Do you also speak multiple languages?

In alphabetical order:  Austria, Brazil, Burma, France, Italy, India, Japan, Nepal, Singapore, Switzerland, Thailand, United Kingdom, USA.  And I speak five languages, English, French, Portuguese, Japanese and Burmese because I spent the most time in Brazil, Burma, the US and France, and Japanese partly because my fiancee speaks it.

[AbrahamoLincolni]

47 minutes ago, KuJoe said:

My two favorite series are Lone Wolf and Cub by Kazuo Koike and the Cleric Quintet by R.A. Salvatore. They're the only series I keep paper copies of and I re-read them every few years.

Lone Wolf and Cub has already been mentioned to me, but I'll look at the Cleric.

 

8 hours ago, cekkonen said:

Have you read Terry Pratchett's Discworld books? I think they're great, not like traditional fantasy but much more humouristic in a sarcastic and dark kind of way.

Also anything Tolkien is very good when you really get into reading it.

I've read that series already.

 

11 hours ago, NoGravityPanda said:

The hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy is really good. You can buy the ultimate version which has all of the books in it.

Also read them already.

[AbrahamoLincolni]

8 hours ago, AkiraDaarkst said:

If you're a fan of the Song of Ice and Fire series (a.k.a. Game of Thrones) you'll definitely love Romance of The Three Kingdoms.  Speaking of GoT, which I believe G.R.R Martin took inspiration from The War of the Roses era of English history, there's a book by Robert Louis Stevenson called The Black Arrow: A Tale of the Two Roses.  I also recommend his other books of course, like Treasure Island.

 

15 minutes ago, AkiraDaarkst said:

With Romance of the Three Kingdoms you are introduced to dozens of characters and several with similar sounding names, especially because in the Chinese language certain characters can have similar pronunciation while having different meanings.  After a while you can become lost in keeping track of which Liu or Zhang or Yuan the author is talking about.

Yeah I download a sample of this for the kindle from Amazon because of your earlier comment.  It looks to be an interesting book but I had a bit of trouble keeping track of the names as you just mentioned.  But I will give it a chance, don't worry.  It really looks like an interesting book.

 

15 minutes ago, AkiraDaarkst said:

In alphabetical order:  Austria, Brazil, Burma, France, Italy, India, Japan, Nepal, Singapore, Switzerland, Thailand, United Kingdom, USA.  And I speak five languages, English, French, Portuguese, Japanese and Burmese because I spent the most time in Brazil, Burma, the US and France, and Japanese partly because my fiancee speaks it.

You're lucky.  I wish I had grown up traveling around the world like that.