Favorite Books

[Strategist's iconStrategist]

I wanted to post these on the "Books that turned you into a reader" thread but I figured a new thread would be better. Post books that you own that you really like. I took out a few books from my library and you can tell how much I like them by how beat up they are.

 

[VampireLord1024VampireLord1024's icon]

This book didn't turn me into a reader since I was already a reader before reading the book.

 

[Waffles's iconWaffles]

I don't have them with me right now, but... The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon by Stephen King (I own it in Spanish, English and audiobook format), Mazes & Monsters by Ronna Jaffe, Runaway, Wild Bird and Flipped by Wendelin van Draanen...

 

[HITMAN_99]

Trump: The Art Of The Deal (1987) : )

 

[HITMAN_99]

lol. I doubt he is literate enough to write a book.

you do know he is a semi succefull bussines man right? its okay to not like the dude personally, but i doubt very much that he is that stupid.

 

[PaleFolklore]

This man is a goddamn genius.

(Pic attached)

 

[LiberoVulpesLiberoVulpes's icon]

My all time favorite:

 

[DunkeyKong]

Mine would be Fatal Chaos series, I have to thank my uncles for giving me these kinds of comics

 

[Noon]

It’s been forever I’ll have to reread them cause my brain could only retain like 0.2% of each one lol

 

[diapered]

This book didn't turn me into a reader since I was already a reader before reading the book.

What makes you like Grapes of Wrath more than Cannery Row? Anything Steinbeck is great, but I don't think I even finished Grapes of Wrath, yet I would probably rank Cannery Row as one of my favorites of all time.

 

[HITMAN_99]

Semi is doing a lot of heavy lifting there, bud. He was born on third base and he thought he hit a triple. Many of his businesses have been failures. Go through it and learn. Real estate failures, hotel closures, ruined the USFL, you name it. He is more successful as a celebrity than a businessman. The Apprentice show is probably one of his biggest successes.

Looks like I wasn't wrong. The book is co-authored and I doubt Trump did much of the writing.

"Trump: The Art of the Deal is a 1987 book credited to Donald J. Trump and journalist Tony Schwartz.

Trump cited it as one of his proudest accomplishments and his second-favorite book after the Bible. Schwartz called writing the book his "greatest regret in life, without question," and both he and the book's publisher, Howard Kaminsky, alleged that Trump had played no role in the actual writing of the book. Trump has personally given conflicting accounts on the question of authorship."

ok lets go by parts.

1) a lot of businessman have have a failure or two and is not the end of their carrer if their are smart, your example is excelent actually, look at VinceMcMahon and the XLF that failed twice and lost him millions, and vince is still a millionare, second example is the WBF that shit failed before starting, having some failures in this business in normal.

2) yeah obviosly he didn't write it thats the job of the dude co-writing it (Tony Schwartz), take note of all he says so he can put it in a cohese matter, you know take the unecessary parts out, tied shit up, make it presentable and readeable, trump is there to give him the words, just that.

3) yeah no shit he back out, if he didn't do that he was gonna have the media on his ass, remember 2016 was a year when Trump was unnecesaryly demonized for the most trivial shit, instead of giving him some actual deserve criticism for some of his descisions.

4) i would be proud as hell too if i ever get to co-write a book that famous. : )

 

[99nereids]

Whipping Girl (Julia Serano)

Left pic is the second edition that i read, right is the newest one (3rd)
It discusses feminism & gender through the perspective of a trans women who is also a biologist. Julia Serano is a really good author and i love this book, she's able to pick apart many conservative talking points hurled at trans women in a very eloquent way, and i recommend it to anyone interested in these topics as its a fantastic academic text. It's rare to find books about trans people & their experiences that are written by trans people so this is a nice read.

Gideon The Ninth (Tamsyn Muir)

First book in the Locked Tomb trilogy, this book is set in a post-apocalyptic world run by necromancers, and centers around the story of Gideon, a lesbian who studies the blade and likes the occasional nudie mag. She's sent to a large, mostly desolate castle with the monarch that rules over her, a spiteful & dubious necromancer named Harrowhark.
This book is so good. This is the first work by this author and it gave me the inspiration to get into writing. Tamsyn's able to really immerse the reader in the world she's created in a natural way that doesn't put a pause to the unfolding plot. and the writing is so fuckign funny at times, this is the first book that made me laugh out loud reading it.

 

[HITMAN_99]

1) No, that isn't true, not many businessmen can afford that many failures. Donald got by through bailouts and scams and having a large pool of money. Vince McMahon was incredibly successful at everything he did and built himself up from practically nothing. The XFL and the World Bodybuilding Federation stand out as rare missteps in a lot of huge successes.

2) Well I said he wasn't literate enough to write a book by himself and I wasn't wrong. Saying a bunch of stuff and having another dude write it doesn't contradict anything I said.

3) Trump was demonized appropriately for all the shitty things he did and continues to do. I don't give a shit what you think, but it is important to speak truth in times like these because uninformed people will be swayed by the lies of MAGA idiots such as yourself.

damn im sorry to hear that, hey im gonna give you my advice,i know you don't want it, its over, Trump won by a landslide.
that should be a worring waking call to your side that something when wrong, maybe look why people are voting him in such big numbers, how is he promising shit and actually delivering, being that angry is not helpfull. : )

 

[HITMAN_99]

take it back to twitter bro this is a thread about books on a gaming forum.

yeah its over anyways, is like talking to a brick wall.

 

[MegaHiro91]

I very rarely read, I just don't have time for it with all my other hobbies, though I wanna make more time for it. That said, a couple years I finished Myst: The Book of Atrus, which I gobbled up because it's a prequel to one of my favorite games of all time, and last year, because I love the movie, I decided I owed it to myself to read the The Secret Garden.

To those who don't know, it's about spoiled young orphan girl who is taken in by her distant uncle, and initially wants nothing to do with anyone in his mansion, but quickly warming up to the kindhearted chambermaid becomes the key for her to slowly open up to everyone else. Going from spoiled and slightly unlikable, to unspoiled and super likable.
Since there is nothing to do inside the prestigeus house she ventures out into the gardens where she also meets the kind gartener and hears a rumor about a secret garden that hasn't been opening for 10 years. Curiousity sets in, and she makes it her mission to find it and restore it, since she has a fondness for nature and gardening in general.

What I love about the book, is how Burnett manages to describe the world Mary Lennox inhabits from a child's perspective, which makes the wonders of nature seem even more fantastical. I am normally one who wants action i.e I want the story to get a move on, but with the Secret Garden I don't mind the slow pace at all because the meticulous description of nature and wildlife IS the story.

I especially love how she describes that being used to everyone around her doing everything for her back in India, Mary is described as weak and pale. But then, as she peruses the gardens, fighting the harsh autumn winds and getting some much needed fresh air, she starts gaining strength and color in her cheecks, which in turn helps her mood as well.
I love the description of her meeting with the animal charmer Dickon, whom she finds so interesting that she wonders if he's a fairy whom she is afraid will vanish if she looks away. And my favorite passage has got to be where the two are alone in the gardens and she summons the courage to ask if he likes her. Not romantically, but seeing how up till this point she has never had any close friends and therefore never really cared if others cared about her, it's a big leap in her character development to check in on whether this peculiar boy likes her or not.

For anyone interested but maybe don't have the time to read the book, I recommend the 1975 BBC series which can be watched on YouTube.

 

[Strategist's iconStrategist]

I very rarely read, I just don't have time for it with all my other hobbies, though I wanna make more time for it. That said, a couple years I finished Myst: The Book of Atrus, which I gobbled up because it's a prequel to one of my favorite games of all time, and last year, because I love the movie, I decided I owed it to myself to read the The Secret Garden.

To those who don't know, it's about spoiled young orphan girl who is taken in by her distant uncle, and initially wants nothing to do with anyone in his mansion, but quickly warming up to the kindhearted chambermaid becomes the key for her to slowly open up to everyone else. Going from spoiled and slightly unlikable, to unspoiled and super likable.
Since there is nothing to do inside the prestigeus house she ventures out into the gardens where she also meets the kind gartener and hears a rumor about a secret garden that hasn't been opening for 10 years. Curiousity sets in, and she makes it her mission to find it and restore it, since she has a fondness for nature and gardening in general.

What I love about the book, is how Burnett manages to describe the world Mary Lennox inhabits from a child's perspective, which makes the wonders of nature seem even more fantastical. I am normally one who wants action i.e I want the story to get a move on, but with the Secret Garden I don't mind the slow pace at all because the meticulous description of nature and wildlife IS the story.

I especially love how she describes that being used to everyone around her doing everything for her back in India, Mary is described as weak and pale. But then, as she peruses the gardens, fighting the harsh autumn winds and getting some much needed fresh air, she starts gaining strength and color in her cheecks, which in turn helps her mood as well.
I love the description of her meeting with the animal charmer Dickon, whom she finds so interesting that she wonders if he's a fairy whom she is afraid will vanish if she looks away. And my favorite passage has got to be where the two are alone in the gardens and she summons the courage to ask if he likes her. Not romantically, but seeing how up till this point she has never had any close friends and therefore never really cared if others cared about her, it's a big leap in her character development to check in on whether this peculiar boy likes her or not.

For anyone interested but maybe don't have the time to read the book, I recommend the 1975 BBC series which can be watched on YouTube.

View attachment 24174

I think I saw a movie adaptation of this a long time ago.

 

[Octopus]

I can't get any photos of them right now, but I'll list off the ones I particularly like/own physically;
-a complete H.P Lovecraft omnibus, includes all his stories published under his name (so excludes all his ghostwritten work) and his extensive letters and correspondence. It also looks very nice, has a really nice (fake) silver embossed style cover of Cthulhu's face.
-Disaster Artist by Greg Sestero, about the making of The Room. Was a great read honestly, and had more in it than just the insanity of Tommy Wiseau and was more personal than I was expecting.
-Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut, one of my favourite books of all time easily.
-a biography/art book of Alex Ross, shows off all his amazing paintings and some of his really early work that I think hadn't been seen until the book if I recall.
-a few video game art books, got a bunch of street fighter and MGS ones.
-various philosophy books, the usual Nietzsche and Kant mainly.
-quite a few old Marvel comics 'how-to-draw' books back when I was drawing, I'm not sure how many I have left actually I may have gotten rid of almost all of them; I'll have to check. I also had an equal amount of various shitty 2000s how-to-draw manga books that I've definitely gotten rid of.

That's all I can remember off the top of my head, when I get the chance to I'll try and get pictures and see what else I have kicking around, used to be a big reader so I have a decent stockpile.

 

[Strategist's iconStrategist]

I can't get any photos of them right now, but I'll list off the ones I particularly like/own physically;
-a complete H.P Lovecraft omnibus, includes all his stories published under his name (so excludes all his ghostwritten work) and his extensive letters and correspondence. It also looks very nice, has a really nice (fake) silver embossed style cover of Cthulhu's face.
-Disaster Artist by Greg Sestero, about the making of The Room. Was a great read honestly, and had more in it than just the insanity of Tommy Wiseau and was more personal than I was expecting.
-Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut, one of my favourite books of all time easily.
-a biography/art book of Alex Ross, shows off all his amazing paintings and some of his really early work that I think hadn't been seen until the book if I recall.
-a few video game art books, got a bunch of street fighter and MGS ones.
-various philosophy books, the usual Nietzsche and Kant mainly.
-quite a few old Marvel comics 'how-to-draw' books back when I was drawing, I'm not sure how many I have left actually I may have gotten rid of almost all of them; I'll have to check. I also had an equal amount of various shitty 2000s how-to-draw manga books that I've definitely gotten rid of.

That's all I can remember off the top of my head, when I get the chance to I'll try and get pictures and see what else I have kicking around, used to be a big reader so I have a decent stockpile.

I've never been much into horror, so I haven't read HP Lovecraft. My older sister really liked Stephen King and I read some of his stuff (not fully). I liked more of his non-horror stuff like The Stand than his straight horror novels, although there was a collection of horror short stories that stuck with me. My sister gifted me Pet Cemetery, since we used to watch Stephen King movies together at an incredibly inappropriate age for me. Still need to get to it.

Funny that you mention Slaughterhouse Five. I got a copy of it recently, since its one of those books that gets mixed in with the satirical/philosophical/existentialist books I love to read. Since my favorite Canadian mollusk thinks highly of it, I'll have to move it up my list.

- Kingdom Come is one of my favorite graphic novels. A good friend of mine let me read his copy and the story and artwork has stuck with me. Alex Ross is the pinnacle of artistry, comic book, or otherwise. He's an incredible talent and I'm at awe at every one of his works.

- Love reading about philosophy. Unfortunately, I didn't keep my undergrad philosophy books, I can only find depressing existentialist novels.

 

[Octopus]

I've never been much into horror, so I haven't read HP Lovecraft

That's fair, and he's definitely a hard read on top of that. A lot of archaic language, really dense passages and overly wordy (but amazing) descriptive sentences; his longest single sentence in a story was something like 12 lines of text or something crazy like that, I can't remember exactly the length but it was in The Whisperer in Darkness which is probably in my top 3 of favourites. He's horror by definition of course, but I think someone who's not into horror can still get into him as it's more about the writing itself than the genre, at least to me.

Funny that you mention Slaughterhouse Five. I got a copy of it recently, since its one of those books that gets mixed in with the satirical/philosophical/existentialist books I love to read. Since my favorite Canadian mollusk thinks highly of it, I'll have to move it up my list.

If that's your jam, it's easily one of the greatest in the genre man. Poignant and surreal all at once.

Love reading about philosophy.

I had a phase around high school where I got into philosophy and poetry, I was a meme. I was into really only existentialism but I also read a little Buddhism and stuff like that; really liked the Wisdom of No Escape by Pema Chodron (can't get the proper accent text on his name there), I think I actually own an actual copy of that too.

Kingdom Come is one of my favorite graphic novels. A good friend of mine let me read his copy and the story and artwork has stuck with me. Alex Ross is the pinnacle of artistry, comic book, or otherwise. He's an incredible talent and I'm at awe at every one of his works.

I haven't read Kingdom Come yet but it's on my list, and Alex Ross is an absolute legend. I really like his smaller one-off stories he did with various writers, they're all in the book I have.

 

[ATenderLad]

Picking favorites is....probably not that hard, actually, it's just a -Me- problem. Here's some of the more recent ones I can think of though.

There's The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler, a cornerstone of hardboiled detective books. It's more pulp than mystery, the various threads don't come together like an Agatha Christie novel. That said, Chandler turns a phrase like nobody's business, and between him and Dashiell Hammett you have the origin of a lot of the slang and style of speech in film noir movies of post-war Hollywood.

There's some articles by a cephalopod that got me thinking to re-read my only real foray into D&D-adjacent fiction, Dragonlance. A boy on the bus gave me the book, he'd read it and didn't care much for it, and figured I would appreciate it. (He was right!) It's apparently a combination of three novels, though the cover had already been all but torn off when I got it.

Okay it must be this one, Dragonlance Chronicles by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman. I found a copy sold on Ebay and the spine matches my mutilated book. (The pages are all still in good shape, thankfully.) Anyways, I didn't read much fantasy growing up - neither of my parents were into it - so this was a bit of a revelation for me. I'll admit, as an adult it's a lot easier to see the derivative bits - Tolkien especially - but the characters are a delight, with the red wizard Raistlin Majere being a real standout.

 

[LiberoVulpesLiberoVulpes's icon]

For horror, i prefer anthologies, i have a Lovecraft Anthology, and A Gothic Horror Anthology, both pretty good.

Philosophy, i have read far too much, Greeks, Romans, French, German, Russian, Hispanic, Chinese, etc. etc. I'd say Heidegger (Being and Time) and Aurelius (Meditations) would be the ones i like most.

 

[Strategist's iconStrategist]

Picking favorites is....probably not that hard, actually, it's just a -Me- problem. Here's some of the more recent ones I can think of though.

View attachment 24254There's The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler, a cornerstone of hardboiled detective books. It's more pulp than mystery, the various threads don't come together like an Agatha Christie novel. That said, Chandler turns a phrase like nobody's business, and between him and Dashiell Hammett you have the origin of a lot of the slang and style of speech in film noir movies of post-war Hollywood.

There's some articles by a cephalopod that got me thinking to re-read my only real foray into D&D-adjacent fiction, Dragonlance. A boy on the bus gave me the book, he'd read it and didn't care much for it, and figured I would appreciate it. (He was right!) It's apparently a combination of three novels, though the cover had already been all but torn off when I got it.

View attachment 24250Okay it must be this one, Dragonlance Chronicles by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman. I found a copy sold on Ebay and the spine matches my mutilated book. (The pages are all still in good shape, thankfully.) Anyways, I didn't read much fantasy growing up - neither of my parents were into it - so this was a bit of a revelation for me. I'll admit, as an adult it's a lot easier to see the derivative bits - Tolkien especially - but the characters are a delight, with the red wizard Raistlin Majere being a real standout.

Noir is not a genre I have read much of, but I enjoy it in film or video game form. Another genre to explore for me.


Unfortunately, Dragonlance was before the time I got into D&D (1995 or so), but the new hotshot D&D writer was R.A. Salvatore. Drizzt, Wulfgar, Bruenor Battlehammer, Catti-Brie and Regis are my crew. I loved the Icewind Dale series. I loved how it delved into subject matter that was a bit out of the norm for fantasy such as overt racism/discrimination. Don't have it anymore, though.

I also read the Hobbit as a kid and it was pretty good, but I tried to read the Similiarion (I asked for Lord of the Rings in my local bookstore in the 90s and that is what they could find) and I don't recommend it.

 

[Octopus]

The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler

I've dabbled in the classic pulp noir, I really should read more. I hear Chandler's name thrown around a lot so I will probably start there, and maybe even with that book; I've been meaning to get into regular audible listening again since I have like 16 credits stockpiled at this point.

Dragonlance

Hell yeah. Never read any of the novels, but the modules also done by the Hickman's are classics. I think it started as a 1st ed AD&D setting, and it may have been ported to second AD&D; I do know that there was a lot of Dragonlance stuff in 3.5 though.

 

[ATenderLad]

@Strategist I feel so awkward not having read R.A. Salvatore at all, I've gotten so much adjacent crap from Baldur's Gate and various older games that it seems like a no-brainer.

@Octopus I can see how the setting would make for a fun adventure module, Dragonlance basically starts with a diverse party meeting up at a tavern and setting out on a quest. You have different classes, races, skill sets, and everyone gets to contribute in some way with what their good at. There was also a comic book that I had the first six issues of...shit, actually that's all I have to say about it, I can't remember where they are and it's been too long since I read them.

@Uhhhthebothofyou Pulp noir is pretty fun! Chandler in particular has such amazing descriptions of people, with his detective Phillip Marlowe really seeing to the melancholy heart of the people around him. (He's arguably a little too sad, a knight out-of-time, obsessed with a chivalry the then-modern world would never abide.)

 

[Strategist's iconStrategist]

@Strategist I feel so awkward not having read R.A. Salvatore at all, I've gotten so much adjacent crap from Baldur's Gate and various older games that it seems like a no-brainer.

The Drizzt cameos in Baldur's Gate games are kind of weak fanservice. I guess Baldur's Gate 2 captures some of the Drow culture dynamic since you get to visit the Underdark. But the game that captures the Salvatore vibe the best is the SSI PC game called Menzoberranzan, because it is partially based on one of his novels "The Legacy" (which I haven't read, maybe I should correct that). That one recounts Drizzt's whole backstory growing up in the Underdark and the cruel nature of the Drow culture.

The Icewind Dale games (the lesser famous cousins of the Baldur's Gate series) also cover some adjactent material to R.A.'s novels, such as the barbarian cultures of the north of the sword coast and the ten towns area.