What else are you reading that's not fantasy/sciene fiction?

[Caerlie]

We all obviously love all things fantasy/science fiction, but what else are you reading?

 

I need some inspiration. I love louis de berniere and isabelle allende.

Adored The Time Traveller's Wife

 

have just finished The Swallows of Kabul. short yet brutal and poignant story set in Taliban times.

trying to work my way through some of the classics of hemmingway etc.

 

What other genres, authors, books have you adored in recent months/years?

[Jhaenara]

Not sure if this would be considered slightly fantasy, but it's kept in the fiction area, but anyway, I'm on book 4 of the Earth Children series by Jean M. Auel. The first book is usually familiar to people, Clan of the Cave Bear (which was also made into a cheesy movie in the 80s with Darryl Hannah).

 

It's about a young Cro-Magnon girl whose parents are killed in an earthquake and she's found and raised by a Neanderthal Clan. That's the first book, then she's cast out and it continues her experiences as she struggles to survive and find her kind of people.

[Niamh Sedai]

I just finished 1984 by George Orwell which I loved. Right now I'm just starting rereading all the texts I have to learn for my English Literature exam in a couple of months.

 

There's Spies by Michael Frayn. It's about this Boy called Stephen who is growing up in the suburbs of London. He is friends with a boy called Keith and it is about how things turn out for him when a game surrounding Keith's Mum becomes a little bit more serious.

 

Then I have to read The Miller's Tale by Geoffry Chaucer- In middle english!! I still struggle with the whole language thing of it but the story itself is quite funny. But I still hate chaucer alot. lol ;)

 

Then I'm reading All My Sons by Arthur Miller. I like Miller but this definately isn't his strongest play. I wish we could have studied Death of a Salesman of the Crucible instead.

 

Sorry for rambling... lol

[Caerlie]

yep read all those clan of the cave beat books. remember feeling quite embarrassed when i first read them cause they were a little on the saucy side for a 15 year old!

love Arthur Miller, we did the crucible at school which i adored.

1984 was brutal but good.

Has anyone seen the film Brazil? it's kind of a similar theme, very surrealist.

 

right i'm off home and will be reading aCoS...time to branch out a bit.

[alCal]

I've just finished The Dice Man by Luke Rhinehart, and it was just wonderful. I can see why it has become a cult-classic. It's about a psychologist who, feeling bored and a little depressed, start making descisions based by the roll of a dice, letting it control his life. It's sometimes maniacal and definitely psychotic, the main character doing whatever the dice tells him, but it's just a wonderful book. If you haven't read it yet, do it now

[Guest Egwene]

Yes, the earth children series is amazing... it really brings pre-history to life. And Caerlie... I understand your comments about them being on the saucy side. Unfortunately in the last couple of books she seems to put a lot of that sauciness in without it being needed for the story line. It does feel a bit as if it is put in to sell the books. Maybe the publishers put pressure on the author? Anyway.... a ten year wait for the last one that came out.... thank god RJ didn't take that long inbetween installments :)

[Kadere]

I'm actually about to start the first none fantasy book I've read since last August, it's called Life of Pi, which is about an Indian boy on a boat with a giant Tiger.

 

I've also read, and higly recommend all of these:

 

Othello, Romeo and Juliet, and Hamlet (all by Shakespeare)

 

The Sound and the Fury by William Fulkner

 

Crime and Punishment, Demons, The Brothers Karamazov (all by Fyodor Dostevisky)

 

The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexander Dumas

 

A Farewell to Arms, The Old Man and the Sea, For Whom the Bell Tolls, The Sun Also Rises (all by Ernest Hemingway)

 

A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess

 

War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy

 

Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackery

 

The Maltese Falcon by Dashell Hammett

 

Gulliver's Travels by Johnathan Swift

 

State of Fear, Timeline, Airframe, Jurrasic Park, The Lost World, A Case of Need, The Great Train Robbery, Terminal Man, Sphere, Eaters of the Dead (all by Micheal Crichton)

 

The Time Machine and The Invisible Man (by H.G. Wells)

 

Farienhit 451 and Something Wicked This Way Comes (by Ray Bradbury)

 

Native Son by Richard Wright

 

Beloved by Toni Morrison

 

The Illiad and The Odessy by Homer

 

Ulysses by James Joyce

 

The Divine Comedy by Dante

 

Pride and Prejudice and Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austin

 

David Copperfield, Great Expectations, A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens

 

Those are all great books. I've read all of them and they're very intersting. Enjoy.

[Ozhammer]

George R Stewart, Earth Abides is a good "apocolyptic" story about what really would happen. Powerful read.

[SinisterDeath]

What is there besides Fiction & Science Fiction?!?! :?

[Kivam]

Ten Philosophical Mistakes by Mortimer Adler. A great book for anyone who enjoys philosophy

[Corki]

As a Classicist, I love the majority of the Ancient Literature, especially the epic poems and plays and the other forms of poetry.

 

I am also a big Clive Cussler fan.

 

I enjoy my crime novels as well, so Ian Rankin and John Grisham.

 

But I am mainly a Sci-Fi and Fantasy reader nowadays.

[TheDiceAgain...]

I may get scoffed at for this, but I must admit that I loved both both "Angels and Demons" and "The DaVinci Code" by Dan Brown. Neither has any real basis in fact, but they are fun reads with just enough "real" stuff to plant seeds of doubt in your mind.

 

On the non-fiction side, I just finished "Guns, Germs and Steel" by Jared Diamond and am just starting his new book "Collapse".

[kutie_pie]

I have just finished reading Black Like Me by John Howard Griffin for my sociology class and really enjoyed it.

Some others that I have read are:

 

Seven Years in Tibet by Heinrich Harrer

Obasan by Joy Kogawa

The Horse Wisper and The Loop both by Nicholas Evans.

 

Kadere- I have read The Life of Pi and I really enjoyed it.

[Kadere]

yeah, Life of Pi was pretty good. My girlfriend's mom gave it to me to read, and I liked it. Kinda Robinson Corusoe without an island. I'm just trying to figure out how much of the story is fiction.

[JenniferL]

I just finished reading the print version of John Dies at the End, by David Wong. I am currently reading A World Lit Only by Fire, by William Manchester. I'm about to start a big unit on the Renaissance with my sixth grade and I need to brush up on the basics. In my bag right now is Collapse, by Jared Diamond, the dude who wrote Guns, Germs and Steel, which was just awesome. And I plan to pick up Nightlord: Sunset soonish. Its a vampire book.

[DragonSpawn]

Panzer Leader : Heinz Guderian

 

The Art of War: Sun Tzu (half finished)

 

Lost Victories:The War memoirs of Hitler's most Brilliant General : Erich von Manstein (just starting)

[phoenix]

when i'm not stuck reading crappy "classics" in AP English IV, i've been REALLY obsessed with comic books! My marvel is about the only thing that gets me through the days now. I'm really looking forward to the Marvel Civil War, which is supposed to parallel the patriot acts etc and raise ethical questions about safety and liberties. SO COOL!!

[Psycholoco]

I have greatly enjoyed the "Richard Sharpe" series by Robert Cornwell. Its about an Englishman (born of a whore) who worked/fought his way up through the ranks of the British army during the Napoleonic wars. At that time, only 5% of British officers rose from the ranks, all others bought their commissions.

[YDdraig]

Just started reading 'The beautiful Game?' can't think who wrote it. Not fiction but rather a look at how football (soccer) has sold its soul. Apparently, one of the reasons I bought it, it details Lord Justice Taylor's interests in a plastic seating company when his report reccommended all seater stadia. Which I hate so any argument against them is good for me.

 

Also re-reading 1984 and The Hitchikers Guide to the Galaxy.

 

And at various times I can be bothered Textbook on Criminal Law and other law books. But that isn't all that often, certainly not as often as I should!

[loki redfern]

Tuesdays With Morrie and Five People You Meet In Heaven by Mitch Albom

Imortality by Milan Kundera

The Diceman by Luke Rhinehart

Brave New World By Aldous Huxley

these are all great reads and they totally changed the way I thought, my favorite books -outside fantasy.

[SinisterDeath]

Umm technically brave new world is Fiction. :P

*I to just recently read it*

Also if that wasnt fiction... umm lets just say umm. yea...

I've seent he movie tuesdays with morrie.. Was a chick flick but it was required to watch it. :P

But hey, that one old guy is a good actor. =)

[Luckers]

Mostly i find im reading university set reading, so thing with absurd titles like "Masculinity, they skewed development of hetero-normativity in modern culture" which is about as interesting as it sounds.

 

But for fun i just got 1984, which my friend suggested after watching V for Vendetta. Havn't read it yet, but ive heard its good and ive been re-reading some of the books i wrote when i was about 13--mostly its funny, with a lot of wincing. Sometimes i cry. They don't count as fantasy, whatever their subject matter. More like somewhere between comedy and tragedy.

[Red States Rule!]

First Day on the Somme

 

The Price of Glory

 

The First World War

 

Dreadnought

 

Castles of Steel

 

Three Roads to the Alamo

 

Mein Kampf

 

Isandlwana

 

and at least one map of one state in the US every day

 

 

All are being read at once. Disgusting, isn't it?

 

Best military biography of all time:

Storm of Steel, by Ernst Unger

[Adanza]

I just read Jane Eyre...I'm usually not a fan of those kind of books, but it was pretty good!

[Guest Asschen-Sukar]

shadow of the wind by carlos ruiz safron one of the best books I ever read.

 

house of god by samuel shem

 

catch 22 joseph heller

 

the peoples act of love by james meek

 

reading now that new book of dan brown don't like it, boring stuff. although I really liked angels and demons. but then I though the da vince code was boring too.