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View Full Version : What's the best book you ever read?


Alexia
03-05-2006, 07:51 AM
TITLE: "Toxin"
AUTHOR: Robin Cook

Well, I really enjoyed reading "Toxin", by Robin Cook. It's about hamburguers and ... well, I don't wanna spoil the book ;)
I give it an 8 out of 10!!!
Geoffrey
03-05-2006, 01:21 PM
Ulysses
James Joyce
Whifflingpin
03-05-2006, 01:36 PM
The last one
Geoffrey
03-05-2006, 03:03 PM
I never understand how people can say that they love every book they read - or the 'last one' approach. Do people not read critically?
Whifflingpin
03-05-2006, 03:13 PM
Oops - soorry

Equally, out of thousands of books, written in different ways for different purposes, how could any one decide on the best book?

In the last week:
The book that that I feel closest to - "Walden Pond" Thoreau
The book that I feel most "ought to read even though I did not like it at all" - "Atomised" Houellebeqc
The most inscrutable but most enjoyable "Pilgermann" Hoban
The most suitable to be included in a course for high school students on Critical Pedagogy - "Birthday of the World" Le Guin

.
Dippy Daydream
03-05-2006, 03:26 PM
Precious Bane by Mary Webb.
rachel
03-05-2006, 05:59 PM
a book that really impacted me that I read when I was still a child was Paris in the terror by Stanley Loomis.Charlotte Corday's mental strength and determination and the subsequent murder of Marat in his bath-the fact that she did something I usually thought was the providence of men was astounding to me. I of course did not agree with what she did but is opened my mind to the possibilities for a female in what I perceive is a man's world.
blp
03-05-2006, 06:14 PM
My favourite book is 'Blood and Guts in Highschool' by Kathy Acker. Objectively speaking, if it's possible to speak objectively about this, which it isn't, but what the hey, it's probably not the best book I've ever read.

'Vanity Fair' I like too.
silence782
03-05-2006, 06:53 PM
Hmm... Ive read so many books that it's hard to choose a favorite...
steve12553
03-05-2006, 08:22 PM
I never understand how people can say that they love every book they read - or the 'last one' approach. Do people not read critically?

I rarely read a book critically. I read for enjoyment. I've been reading for nearly half a century and my "favorite" book probably changed a hundred times. If I sit and think long enough I could probably narrow my favorite to a few dozen or so but it still would be the most recent of this group that would get the title "favorite" if I had to choose. My most recently read favorite might be "the Hound of the Baskervilles" . Original, clever, atmospheric,and quite chilling the first time around. Still a good read.
Geoffrey
03-06-2006, 04:14 AM
Oops - soorry

Equally, out of thousands of books, written in different ways for different purposes, how could any one decide on the best book?

In the last week:
The book that that I feel closest to - "Walden Pond" Thoreau
The book that I feel most "ought to read even though I did not like it at all" - "Atomised" Houellebeqc
The most inscrutable but most enjoyable "Pilgermann" Hoban
The most suitable to be included in a course for high school students on Critical Pedagogy - "Birthday of the World" Le Guin

.

your rite. that does make the most sense.
Geoffrey
03-06-2006, 04:18 AM
I guess I was just answering in terms of what I think is the most well written book that I have read; without refference to how close I feel to it or weather or not I feel I ought to be reading it.
thats just how I choose my favorite anyways.
Mililalil XXIV
03-07-2006, 12:45 AM
The best breath I ever took?
davoarid
03-07-2006, 03:13 AM
My "favorites" list (for both cinema and literature) change very frequently, but there are a few constants on my book list:

1. The Catcher in the Rye
2. 1984
3. King Lear

I'm also a big fan of Stephen King's "The Long Walk," which I first read when I was 11 and have tried to read at least once every year since then. It gets worse with each passing year (or do I get better? hehehe), but it had a very strong impact on me.
EAP
03-07-2006, 03:55 AM
The Book of Love...
ElizabethSewall
03-07-2006, 06:22 AM
Choosing only one favourite seems really difficult since many books have made a lasting impression on me...
I guess I may write the title of the books I've read a lot more than once. :nod:
-Romeo and Juliet, W. Shakespeare.
-La Nuit des Temps (I think it was translated as The Ice People), R. Barjavel.
-Little Women and Good Wives, L.M. Alcott.

:D :D :D
ArcherSnake
03-08-2006, 04:59 PM
Stephen King's The Stand...its way more than just another horror/si-fi book. Its got everything, and has so much to say about life, love society, good and evil, etc. Stephen King is really a genius; it's a shame he gets typecast as a "horror writer".
Zippy
03-09-2006, 08:31 AM
Up to two months ago I would have said I, Claudius by Robert Graves, but since then it's been usurped by Tom Wolfe's Bonfire of the Vanities.

Why did I wait so long to read this? It was brilliant.
papayahed
03-09-2006, 02:56 PM
The Book of Love...


Who wrote that?? :D
NNoah3
03-09-2006, 03:31 PM
I never understand how people can say that they love every book they read - or the 'last one' approach. Do people not read critically?


Equally, out of thousands of books, written in different ways for different purposes, how could any one decide on the best book?


As an avid reader it is very difficult to choose one book as the best book I have ever read. I have really enjoyed every book that I have read until now, sometimes I have been disappointed by the end but them have kept my attention from start to end. Some of them are:
The Count of Monte Cristo - Alexander Dumas
Les Miserables - Victor Hugo
The Alchemist - Paulo Coehlo
One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
and the list keep going......... :D
Geoffrey
03-10-2006, 04:46 PM
Who wrote that?? :D

Duh! Robert Burton did. Its called 'The anatomy of Melancholly' written in the 1600's (really an incredible piece of lit.!)
Vedrana
03-10-2006, 05:49 PM
Hmmm...I am not really sure which one I would say is a dead favourite, since there are a few I have just loved and gone back to.

I guess I really liked "The Tenant of Wildfell Hall" by Anne Bronte, "The Catcher in the Rye", by J.D. Salinger, "Pride and Prejudice" by Jane Austen, and "I Capture the Castle" by Dodie Smith. Of course this list isn't exhaustive, but I think they are the ones I've really liked.
EAP
03-11-2006, 06:36 AM
Duh! Robert Burton did. Its called 'The anatomy of Melancholly' written in the 1600's (really an incredible piece of lit.!)

I don't know whether to laugh or cry.

Buuuuttt,

:lol:


papayahead,

It's an open secret. :D
dreamsbegone
03-11-2006, 07:48 AM
"the kite" by sommerset mougham is the best but i also think that "men without women" by ernist hemengway is great too.
elpidi26
03-18-2006, 12:29 AM
Someone above wrote they loved Stephen King's The Stand. Yeah, that was a great book. Spent two months reading it but I loved it

My favorite book would have to be a toss up between Mark Twain's Huck Finn and Fyodor Dostoevsky's The Brothers Karamavoz.

I loved that Huck was willing to give up his salvation instead of giving up the runaway slave Jim, "All right then, I'll go to hell."

I was also hooked to the intense mental struggle Alexey Fyodorovitch Karamazov endured in attempts to keep his faith strong through the crime of patricide committed against his father and his sense of duty toward his brothers. A very interesting book.

So there, I have--two--my favorite books
Honey_Ryder62
03-20-2006, 05:52 AM
I will say the last one, I'm very selective of the books I read and have never refused to finish one and have loved every book I've read.

The last book I've read would have been Tao of Pooh and The Idiot
Sunflower05
03-20-2006, 07:41 AM
My favourites gotta be memoirs of a geisha by arthur golden!
PocoLoco
03-20-2006, 04:51 PM
Have to go with Catch 22 by Joesph Heller. It actually made me laugh outloud and also to feel pretty sorry for the guys in the story. I found myself rooting for the guys and hoping that they were able to make it out alright.
malwethien
03-20-2006, 08:29 PM
Have to go with Catch 22 by Joesph Heller. It actually made me laugh outloud and also to feel pretty sorry for the guys in the story. I found myself rooting for the guys and hoping that they were able to make it out alright.

I would have to agree with you on that. Catch-22 is one of my favorite books.

A great book I've read recently is Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell. Looks daunting at first, but it's worth it, believe me!
Boris239
03-20-2006, 09:02 PM
It's difficult to name just one book, but for me it is either "Brothers Karamazov" or "Master and Margarita".
"One hundred years of solitude" and "Impatience of the heart" by zweig are pretty close
vinide
03-20-2006, 11:57 PM
The Ambassadors
Henry James.

No other one could be such a painter and a deep investigator into human reality, til the slighest changes of emotions of characters.
And the general sense of the book, fantastic...
Leper
03-21-2006, 02:34 AM
I have not finished it as yet but I would say City of Saints and Madmen by Jeff Vandermeer. Honorable mention to George R.R. Martin's The Hedge Knight, The Fifth Business by Robertson Davies, William Faulkner's Barn Burning, Ernest Hemingway's Old Man and the Sea, and Don Quixote.
EAP
03-21-2006, 06:33 AM
Leper,

Have you checked out Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire saga?
shri
03-21-2006, 04:22 PM
Favorites do indeed change with my "phase of life". Crime & Punishment at one time, to Ninety-Three (Hugo) at another time.
Azaril
03-23-2006, 12:49 AM
"La chartreuse de Parme" of Stendhal
"Le Comte de Monte-Cristo" of Dumas
"The King Lear" of Shakespeare
"Il Gattopardo" of Lampedusa
"Antigone" of Sophocles
"El estudiante de Salamanca" of Espronceda
Theshizznigg
03-27-2006, 03:33 PM
Sir Walter Scotts

Ivanhoe

I've read a great many books, all that hold special places in my heart, but this one take the prize.
I loved the tournament, as I was reading the pages almost came alive, and I could see lances shattering, swords swinging, people being crushed in their armour, blood spurting, hammers flying.
It was all too glorious, especially the siege.
I also loved the characters, not so much Ivanhoe, but Rebecca, Brian De Bois Guilbert, and King Richard.
chook
03-28-2006, 03:53 PM
What is the best book I ever read? I cannot single one out but there are a few that have kept me up all night reading them. These are some of the books to which everthing else has given sway until they were finished- as far as I can remember. But these are the recent ones.

The Hound of the Baskervilles
Watership Down
The Day of the Trifids
On the Beach
The 39 Steps
The Secret Garden
All of the Narnia series

The last one is one over which I have received some funny looks. Much as I liked Middle Earth I liked Narnia better
chook
03-28-2006, 03:56 PM
"La chartreuse de Parme" of Stendhal
"Le Comte de Monte-Cristo" of Dumas
"The King Lear" of Shakespeare
"Il Gattopardo" of Lampedusa
"Antigone" of Sophocles
"El estudiante de Salamanca" of Espronceda

I notice the Count of Monte Christo among your favorites. How long did it take you to read? I remember staying up late for days getting through it. There have been a few attempts to make movies based on the book but in my opinion they have all missed the mark hoplessly.