Bookfriends

i'm a newbie here

2009-01-23T16:39:35Z

i read all kinds of stuff , things i have read lately have been

Twilight Saga by Stephenie Meyer
The Following by Nicholas Sparks
True Believer
The Notebook
The Wedding
Message in a Bottle
The Guardian
The Following by Danielle Steel
The Ghost
The gift
Johnny Angel
Echoes
Leap pf Faith

I read about a book a week for a good sized novel sometimes two books a week
I am reading At first sight by Nicholas Sparks right now will be finished by the end of the weekend.
My next to read pile includes The Rescue By Nicholas Sparks , And then there were none by Agatha Christie , Artimus Fowl books by Eion Colfer, Eragon by Christopher Paolini alos a few more by Danille Steel
Hope to meet up with other people to talk bout and get new ideas of good books to read

i'm a newbie here

2009-01-23T16:10:48Z

i am new here , i just started this journal . i have been reading allot more lately than i ever have. I just finished the Twilight Saga, I am reading At First Sight by Nicholas Sparks right now.

• What do you like to read? I like to read Nicholas Sparks , Danielle Steel, Harry Potter books, Twilight Saga, romance , Artimus Fowl , but i also want to read things like Jane Austen

• What kinds of books do you avoid like a bad cliche? Christan books

• How quickly and how often do you read? i am reading a book every couple days to a week

• What's in your current "To Read" pile? Agatha Christie's and then there were none , Nicholas Sparks The Rescue and Nights in Rodanthe, Artemis Fowl Artemis Fowl The Arctic Incident The Eternity Code The Opal Deception The Lost Colony
The Time Paradox all by Eoin Colfer

i read a mix of all kinds of stuff

bookfriends @ 2009-01-04T20:11:00

2009-01-05T02:03:53Z

I am a junior at a college in Tennessee with am a History major, and a philosophy minor. I'm a geek, and proud of it. I've always loved to read, and always like to keep an eye out for new finds.
What do you like to read? I read many genres of books. I enjoy classics, science fiction, philosophy, fantasy, mystery, some YA, historical, and cultural/travel. I like it when books have a dash of romance, or unrequited love, but a plot is needful. I haven't had a chance to read a whole book James Lee Burke, but I really enjoy his style from what I've read of it. I love books that have a lot of wit/dry humor in them.

A sample of my book list: Phantom of the Opera, Frankenstein, Cat's Cradle, Dracula, Pride and Prejudice, Emma, Persuasion, Les Miserables, Black Ships, The Giver, His Dark Materials, the Temeraire series, A Tale of Two Cities, Discworld, How the Irish saved Civilization, Stardust, Jonathon Strange and Mr. Norrel, American Gods, Sherlock Holmes, the Silmarillion, The Lost Tales, Good Omens, Keys to the Kingdom series, Beauty, .

Favorites: Jane Eyre, The Lord of the Rings, The Hobbit, Ella Enchanted, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, the Bible, the Dresden Files, Harry Potter, Howl's Moving Castle, Mere Christianity, The Chronicles of Narnia, The Scarlet Pimpernel, Fahrenheit 451, 1984, Sabriel, the Princess Bride, the Amulet of Samarkand, various works by Johne Donne.

• What kinds of books do you avoid like a bad cliche? There aren't too many books that I absolutely cannot stand. I'm not big on steamy romance books, biographies, self-help books (unless they actually *are* useful), or extremely twisted (in a negative/bad way) books. I'm not a big Twilight fan, but I will admit that are a few (not many) slightly interesting points to the series (that's being generous). I don't read much poetry, but I am open to it. I love Johne Donne's works. I really am open to books, so long as they are well written. I can't read the "Eragon" series. It plagiarizes far too much for my taste.
• How quickly and how often do you read? It really depends on the book, and how much free time I have. I can finish off a 300 page book in a day, but school prevents me from doing that very often.

• What's in your current "To Read" pile? I can't remember all of it.
The Dark Tower Series
Something Anne Rice. It's sad/wrong that I've never read anything by her.
Angel Masks
A Clockwork Orange
The Kite Runner
Peony in Love
Inkspell
Fingerprints of the Gods
A ton of other books I can't remember

bookfriends @ 2008-07-24T19:53:00

2008-07-24T22:53:44Z

• What do you like to read? I am Literature college graduate, so I am very fond of typical classic stuff. I read tons of T.S. Eliot, Fernando Pessoa, Whitman, James Joyce, Sylvia Plath, Virginia Woolf. I have no preferences for genres, really. I like reading poetry and prose. I hardly ever read "blockbuster literature" such as Harry Potter, Khaled Hosseini, and others of the kind. I am slightly prejudiced against feminist literature ( blame it on four long college years studying this on a daily basis... ).

• What kinds of books do you avoid like a bad cliche? Self-help books, cheesy romances, teen books, terror and/or "mystical" stories, police/thriller books.

• How quickly and how often do you read? Depends immensely on the quality of the book, my interest for it and my daily schedule and a teacher. Usually, I read quite fast.

• What's in your current "To Read" pile? "Twilight" by Stephenie Meyews and The Dark Tower series by Stephen King - friend's requests. In my personal list is Ulysses, by James Joyce ( started reading it and abandoned it a bunch of times ), couple of Brazilian books such as Sagarana, and some João Cabral de Melo Neto poetry; in Portuguese I still wanna ready Saramago's books and I wanna read some more plays by Tennessee Williams.

bookfriends @ 2008-02-17T22:21:00

2008-02-18T06:35:40Z

• What do you like to read? Hmm, well. (Authors) Lurlene McDaniel, Chris Wooding, C.S. Lewis, Anne Rice, Melody Carlson. (Genres) Romance -not the trashy kind, but stuff like Wuthering Heights-, vampire stories, cheesy teen books, and fantasy.

• What kinds of books do you avoid like a bad cliche? I don't exactly "avoid" books, but I really don't like books that are way too smutty.

• How quickly and how often do you read? That really depends on how much I like the book I'm reading, how much time I have, and how the book is written. Like Anne Rice' novels take me forever to read, because theres just so much detail and "big" words. I get overwhelmed and lost. Then theres books I can't put down and finish in 1-2 days.

• What's in your current "To Read" pile? "Twilight" by Stephenie Meyews, True Color series by Melody Carlson, Left Behind 6-10 by Tim Lehaye and Jerry B.Jenkins, Gossip Girl series, Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Heat, Dracula, Angels In Pink: Holly's Story by Lurlene McDaniel.

Book 7 of 2008

2008-01-16T08:25:05Z

Title: Spock's World
Author: Diane Duane
Published: 1988
Pages: 310
Rating: 5/5
Review: I'm kinda amused that I've sat up all night reading this but it was just... compelling! A brilliantly written science-fiction novel, rich in history and creation. Fantastically political and tense with excellent characters and characterisations of established characters. Detail, depth and a fascinating attempt at charting a planets early historical beginnings. Not just good Trek, but good science fiction - one I'd recommend but probably better to have at least a passing knowledge of Star Trek. Gets 5/5 in my books just for being the first book since I was in my teens that kept me up all night!

(cross posted)

bookfriends @ 2007-09-28T20:26:00

2007-09-29T02:49:42Z

• What do you like to read? Wow, umm... lots of things. I do have a particularily large love for any kind of novel that has a romance running through it, sometimes that's ALL I want to read, is books with romance in them. Mind you, when I say that sometimes I only mean a dash of romance going on, just a little tiny bit and I'm satisfied. I like memoirs, things like Agusten Burroughs, and I like kids books. Not just picture books, but sweet little innocent novels that make you feel all warm and tosty inside at the end. Sometimes unhappy endings really, really bother me, unless I think it's a justified ending. Two people dying at the end of a book might not bother me because they died together; I'm weird like that. I love fantasy novels and YA novels and sometimes older more serious novels are really what I want to read. I like Jane Austen adn other classics, yet I find that I really have to be in the mood to read a classic, otherwise it seems more like a chore than anything. I think I'd be into sci-fi if it was well written. I like Daniel Handler, Lemony Snicket (same guy, I know), Gail Carson Levine, Agusten Burroghs, Stephenie Meyer, Eion Colfer and books are along the lines of: A Thousand Little Pieces, Dry, Once Upon A Marigold, Stardust... lots of other things I can't think of at the moment. I don't think I've kept good track of all the books I've read. I like to read things over and over.

• What kinds of books do you avoid like a bad cliche? Well, I don't usually avoid much, but sometimes I can't find mystery books a little tiring. It's just not my scene. Not always, sometimes I love them and can't put them down, but I'm a bit iffy on it. Books that are REALLY dark and don't have a satisfying ending. If I know the ending is supposed to suck, I'm a little bit wary of reading the book.

• How quickly and how often do you read? Well, when I'm into a book I usually read it constantly until it's done, like I breath in the book. But, if nothing's really jumping out at me, titles wise, I can sometimes go for awhile without reading anything. Mind you, if there were things that I wanted to read it might not be the case, it's just I don't always know what to read (I have a limited selection in my library and anything I want has to be ordered in), then I kind of just laze around reading nothing. I don't think I'm a 'book in a day', person. Eclipse by Stephenie Meyer is around 630 pages and it took me... a week or a little less to read it. I was inhaling that book. So, maybe you should kind of just go from there. The Mists of Avalon took me over a month to read, because it was hard for me to digest and I kept starting and stopping over and over again. It was also really long!

• What's in your current "To Read" pile?
Some more Neil Gaiman, Kelley Armstrong, Daniel Handler, some more memoirs. Nothing specific... This is what I mean, I get into book ruts. XD

Re-introduction

2007-09-28T13:58:45Z

I'm Steph, 21 and live in London, UK.

What do you like to read?
Historical fiction is one of my passions, I really enjoy it, same with crime fiction (enjoy Henning Mankell, Patricia Cornwell, Tess Gerritsen and PD James), science fiction (fan of Asimov's robot novels), 'classics' (no particular favourite, although I dislike Austen & Bronte), poetry (don't have a favourite as such, but I like humour poems, World War poems and nonsense ones) and I'm a sucker for JK Rowling and Enid Blyton... :p

My all time favourite books are the Sherlock Holmes stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Treasure Island tops my list of favourite books and I do like anything with a nautical theme (and Clive Cusslar).

I enjoy my non-fiction too, currently mostly on Victorian sexuality for a article I'm writing, but I enjoy history (specifically World War I & II Britain, things about Bletchley Park, and Victorian history), love reading biographies (recent reads include one about Isambard Kingdom Brunel and the cyclist Marco Pantani).

PG Wodehouse is another favourite. I'm a sucker for a good ghost story too (guilty pleasure from James Herbert novels!). I also like those utopian-society-gone-wrong types (Orwell, Huxley etc...), I'm planning to start reading some current Russian literature as I'm studying the language and whilst I can't read them in Russian just yet I think it'd be a good idea to get an idea of the modern day literature coming out of Russian and former Soviet countries (current favourite is Death and the Penguin by Andrey Kurkov [Ukraine]).

To be honest, if it's in the 3 for 2 and sounds interesting then I'll probably buy it (found some of my current favourites that way - Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell by Susannah Clarke and The People's Act of Love by James Meek).

What kinds of books do you avoid like a bad cliche?
Romance, or anything with a romantic theme, anything that describes itself as 'chick lit' because inevitably it falls into the romance or romantic theme category, contains shallow annoying characters and a plot so thin you'd get a paper cut. I tend to avoid anything written by Ben Elton as he is a shocking excuse of a comic (and most of his writing is comedy). Anything supposedly written by a 'celebrity' (not including people like Stephen Fry and Will Self, but you know what I mean). Self help books are off the agenda,

Recently started to avoid the 'conspiracy' type of book (like the Da Vinci Code), not because I don't like the story but because I'm bored of them now. Also, those biographies that are about abused childhoods - they're depressing and often painful to read and whilst that's usually the point I often finish the book questioning whether everything I've just read is real.

How often do you read?
Not as often as I'd like. My occupation (work in theatre) you would think to be a great for reading, but it's very difficult to (a) read in the dark (b) refrain from making my moth complex worse (c) keep putting the book down mid-sentence. Generally I read in the bath, on the tube or sometimes in bed if I'm not too tired. I used to read an awful lot more but once you get into real life, it sucks.... I definitely read more whilst studying, even if it was books on Electrical Wiring Regulations! (*is an electrician*).

Biography:
The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid by Bill Bryson
Conan Doyle Biography by Ronald Pearsall

Philosophy/Religion/Politics:
The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins
The Prince by Niccolo Machiavelli
A Brief History of Philosophy by Derek Johnston
The Republic by Plato
The March of Unreason by Dick Taverne
Why I am Not a Christian by Bertrand Russell
The Consolations of Philosophy by Alan de Botton * (library book)
Philosophy the Basics by Nigel Warbuton
The End of Faith by Sam Harris * (library book)
The Social Contract by Jean-Jacques Rousseau * (library book)
A Beginners guide to Reality by Jim Baggot
Britain Unwrapped: Government and Constitution Explained by Hilarie Barnett

Other:
The Cloud Spotter's Guide by Gavin Pretor-Pinney
Penguin Stopped Play by Harry Thomas
Notes from a Small Island by Bill Bryson
Marley and Me by John Grigon

Poetry:
Inferno by Dante

Fiction:
The Dice Man by Luke Rhineheart
Madame Bovary by Gustav Flaubert
The Princes Bride by William Golding
Finn Family Moomin Troll by Tove Jansson
Mr Clive and Mr Page by Neil Bartlett
Dune by Frank Herbert
Night Watch by Sarah Waters
The Algebraist by Iain M. Banks
The Idiot by F.M. Dostoevsky
Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson
A Short History of Tractors in the Ukrainian by Marina Lewycka
The Book of Lost Things by John Connolly
The Naming of the Dead by Ian Rankin

Sherlock Holmes Pastiche:
The Last Sherlock Holmes Story by Michael Dibden
The Whitechapel Horrors Edward B. Hanna
The Italian Secretary by Caleb Carr
The Singular Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Various
The Giant Rat of Sumatra by Richard L. Boyer
Sherlock Holmes and the Portsmouth Myster by Jack Coggan

Solaris by Stanislaw Lem
His Master's Voice by Stanislaw Lem
Slaughterhouse 5 by Kurt Vonnegut
We by Yevgeny Zamyatin
The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov
Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier
The Country Girls by Edna O'Brien
The Ghost by Robert Harris
Number Ten by Sue Townsend
The Public Confessions of a Middle-aged Woman (Aged 55 3/4) by Sue Townsend
The Abortionist's Daughter by Elisabeth Hyde
The Tenderness of Wolves by Stef Penney
The History of Love by Nicole Krauss
Atonement by Ian McEwan
The President's Last Love by Andrey Kurkov
The Night Watch by Sergei Lukyanenko
Everything Is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer
The Book With No Name by Anonymous
The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis
The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood
Life of Pi by Yann Martel
Animal Farm: A Fairy Story by George Orwell
Lord of the Flies by William Golding
The Great Gatsby by F.Scott Fitzgerald
Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
The Gentle Axe by R.N. Morris
When Guinea Pigs Fly by James Proimos, Andy Rheingold
Making Money by Terry Pratchett
Book of the Dead by Patricia Cornwell

bookfriends @ 2007-09-23T18:41:00

2007-09-24T00:16:01Z

I am an 18 year old college student with an undecided major and I work at Barnes and Noble.

Books I like to read
Funny books, books with plenty of suspense, science fiction, fantasy and books that take place in the south. I also like books about vampires and werewolves and supernatural stuff like that. I read mostly anything as long as it is written well and some things that aren't as long as they have a good idea behind them.

Some of my recent reads:
Wideacre - Phillipa Gregory
The Princess Bride - William Goldman
Dirty Job: A Novel - Christopher Moore
Hart's Hope - Orson Scott Card
Out - Natsuo Kirino
Forget About It - Caprice Crane

Books I avoid
There aren't many books that I avoid except for maybe self-help books and romance novels. I don't read very many non-fiction books either except for maybe the occasional biography.

How quickly do you read?
I read books pretty quickly if I like them. Otherwise I trudge through them. I can at least read one book every week and a half. Sometimes though I read one every day. it really depends on the book and what else I have going on.

How often do you read?
Very often. Usually one right after another.

What is in my "to read" pile?
Until I Find You - John Irving
Pretty Little Mistakes - Heather McElhatton
Stupid and Contagious - Caprice Crane
Pride and Predjudice - Jane Austen
The Neverending Story - Michael Ende
The Devil's Rose - Brom

bookfriends @ 2007-08-30T21:41:00

2007-08-31T02:12:45Z

What do you like to read?
I like to read just about anything I get my hands on. I'm a real glutton for classic literature and lately I've really gotten into Asian fiction as well. My favorite authors are Lynn Kurland, Clive Barker, Emmuska Orczy, Robert Bloch, and the Marquis de Sade. My favorite books are The Good Earth, Jane Eyre, The Thirteenth Tale, The Secrets of Jin-S'hei, Imajica, The Scarlet Pimpernel just to name a few.

What kinds of books do you avoid like a bad cliche?
I don't really read most things that are considered "popular". I also stay away from self-help books and most science-fiction doesn't interest me that much.

How quickly and how often do you read?
I can usually finish one book a week on average. Sometimes it's more and sometimes it's less depending upon the size of the book that I am reading, and how into it I am.

What's in your current "To Read" pile?
Geisha of Gion: The Memoir of Mineko Iwasaki
Flowers from the Moon and Other Lunacies
Myths and Legends of Japan
Widow of the South
Love Walked In
P.S. I Love You
Reign of the Favored Women
The Club Dumas
... and that's just to name a few.

intro post

2007-08-10T04:49:45Z

Hello all. My name's Courtney, I'm 22 (23 in a week). Here's a few basics about me.

• What do you like to read? One of my favorite authors is Ray Bradbury. I read a little bit of everything, but I primarily read contemporary fiction. I read a lot of Victorian literature, especially in the winter for some reason. I do read some non-fiction, as well as sci-fi, YA fiction and "classic" literature.
• What kinds of books do you avoid like a bad cliche? I don't really read any romance, and rarely do I read any chick lit.
• How quickly and how often do you read? I've been averaging a book every couple weeks, but sometimes I hit a roadblock or two. There are some books that I have to drag myself through. I keep going though--I hate giving up on a book.
• What's in your current "To Read" pile? Next on the docket is definitely Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs. I would love to have someone to read this with. I borrowed my bf's copy months ago and he's really pushing me to read it. I'd also soon like to read The Dark is Rising by Susan Cooper and The Tao of Pooh by Benjamin Hoff. I do own a ton of books I have yet to read though, so really anything on my librarything account (http://www.librarything.com/catalog/reptiliancandy) that's tagged "unread" is fair game. :)

Intro Post!

2007-08-09T17:52:26Z

Well hi there! This is such a fantastic idea for a comm!

My name is Megan, I'm 19. I'll shortly be attending college to study Anthropology and German! I've been reading since I was 4 (or maybe younger). Books are a passion and always will be. I spent 3 years in high school volunteering at the library, and then worked in one for a year after I graduated.

• What do you like to read?

Where to start?? I guess I'll just do this in lists, I'm good at lists. :)

I like 'hardcore' fantasy (dragons, knights, the whole shebang), humorous fantasy, fairy-tale retellings, PIRATE stories and nautical tales, Star Wars books, other sci-fi and sci-fi/fantasy mixes (like steampunk), some historical fiction, non-fiction on topics of interest to me: pirates, Scotland and its history, and travel, and funny but deep books on Christianity and topics of Christian faith. I do read a lot of YA, and I'm interested in reading more classics - but just ones that interest me; I don't want to read books just to say I have.

Favorite Authors
Robert Louis Stevenson
Philip Pullman
Tanith Lee
Brian Jacques
Louisa M. Alcott
Orson Scott Card
J.K. Rowling
Terry Pratchett
Donald Miller
Joshua Harris
James P. Blaylock
Kenneth Oppel
Tim Powers
L. A. Meyer

Favorite Books - Top 10 12-ish
1. The Bible
2. Little Women by Louisa M. Alcott
3. Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card
4. The Last of the Really Great Whangdoodles by Julie Andrews Edwards
5. Summer of my German Soldier by Bette Greene
6. Harry Potter 1-7 by J.K. Rowling
7. His Dark Materials Series by Philip Pullman
8. Ella Enchanted by Gail Carson Levine
9. The Anubis Gates by Tim Powers
10.The Elfin Ship and The Disappearing Dwarf by James P. Blaylock
11.Searching for God Knows What by Donald Miller
12.Kidnapped and Catriona by Robert Louis Stevenson

• What kinds of books do you avoid like a bad cliche?

Any books shelved in the romance section of a library. Books written by celebrities...actually biographies in general (with a few exceptions). Horror. 'Chick lit' and smutty YA novels in similar veins... I did read a lot of the Princess Diaries series before realizing that I hated them. So, books like that. I don't like anything with a lot of foul language or macabre scenes. Dracula is about as creepy as I get, and that's almost a little too much. I'm generally not big on vampires, or mysteries (unless it's Sherlock Holmes or something similar). Popular fiction unless it looks really good. I don't like stuff that's really 'out there' or depressing.
I definitely prefer books that are plot driven and have a decent amount of dialogue. I don't enjoy Hemingway or similar writers. I also don't like Steinbeck.

• How quickly and how often do you read?

Depends on the book, but usually any book (if I'm into it) I can finish in under 2 weeks - 1 if I'm not busy. Stuff like Harry Potter I can read in under 24 hours.
And I'm almost always reading something. Right now I think I'm working on 4 or 5 books, lol. I definitely need to cut back on internet and TV time, though, and make more time for reading.

What's on your to-read list?

Oh Lord, my master book list is almost 5 pages long and I know I've got more to add. Check out my personal LJ; it's my book blog...
In general, I'd like to read every Star Wars book I haven't already read! Also more Tolkien, Pratchett, Gaiman, Blaylock... I'd like to read more books by my favorite authors. Obviously.
Some titles that I hope to read real soon are The Last Coin and The Paper Grail by James Blaylock, Little Men by Alcott, Under the Black Flag by David Cordingly, The Blue Sword by Robin McKinley, and I've got a book of Stevenson's short stories and on of Blaylock's short stories to read as well.
For more, my goodreads profile: http://www.goodreads.com/user/show/102929, but it's still incomplete!!

bookfriends @ 2007-08-08T12:08:00

2007-08-08T10:34:35Z

Hi, I am Kirsten from The Netherlands, in september I'm going to study Arthistory.

• What do you like to read? I'm absolutely obsessed with Haruki Murakami. Other favorites Roland Topor, Willem Frederik Hermans (Dutch writer), Douglas Coupland, feminist literature such as Cunt from Inga Muscio, but also little precious works as Le petit prince and The Giving Tree belong to my favorites.
Other favorites are: Nadja by Andre Breton, Alice in Wonderland, House of Leaves by Danielwski, Crime and Punishment by Dostojevski, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon, Charles Bukowski, Vladimir Nabokov, Oscar Wilde, Anais Nin, the Harry Potter series, Sylvia Plath, Henry Miller.
I mostly like books that have normal people getting into extraordinary situations.

• What kinds of books do you avoid like a bad cliche?
Chicklit, books by Heleen van Rooyen (obnoxious dutch writer), books about another couple getting into a sexual adventure on Ibiza, bascially that means I avoid most Dutch popular books.

• How quickly and how often do you read? I read fast. Basically if a book is enchanting I will stop everything just to finish it. And when I finish it I feel a strange sense of sadness that I'm not in that world anymore. But still I can't stop slowing down. I'm just sucked in, I turn pages without realizing.
Let's say, Haruki Murakami's Wind Up Bird Chronical took me two days (not reading the full day), which is around 700 pages I believe.

• What's in your current "To Read" pile? Murakami - Wild Sheep Chase, The Unbearable Lightness of Being - Milan Kundera, Faust - Goethe, Nada; a novel - Carmen Laforet, If Nobody Speaks of Remarkable Things - Jon McGregor, Lullaby and Fight Club - Chuck Palahniuk, Women - Bukowksi, Geek Love - Katherine Dunn, The Consumer - M. Gira, The Neverending Story - Michael Ende, Demian - Hermann Hesse.

If anyone has any recommendations for books that are alike to Haruki Murakami's work, please tell me :)

bookfriends @ 2007-08-08T10:32:00

2007-08-08T09:54:11Z

Hi, I`m JJ, 29 ; Dutch ex-philosophy student, now doing a Ph.D. in Education in the UK.

What do you like to read?
I mostly read biographies and history, and crime fiction, esp. the hard-boiled genre (too much of that around now). I have rediscovered my penchant for weighty theology. (Currently swotting up on biblical hermeneutics and reading Eamonn Duffy's massive and magistral 'The Stripping of the Altars') As my Ph.D. thesis is on Literary Education I read a lot of F.R. Leavis and Geoffry Bantock , something I enjoyed doing more when I wasn`t doing it for a living :(
As far as fiction is concerned I`m head over heels with Salman Rushdie and am convinced the Satanic Verses is the novel of the twentieth century, even without all the bearded brouhaha from Qom. With regards to Dutch literature I`m a strictly W.F.Hermans man myself, although I tolerate Hugo Claus.
Life has never been the same after reading Dostoyevsky's 'Crime and Punishment'.

What kinds of books do you avoid like a bad cliche?

Pretentious bilge (Something exceedingly popular in Dutch literature, make it look 'deep' by empty aesthetisizing and futile reflections on reflections on etc: Yes, Harry Mulisch, Margriet de Moor (never forgave her 'De Verdronkene'), that means you) ; Courtroom thrillers, anything with blurbs which say 'groundbreaking' or 'riveting read'.

How quickly and how often do you read?

I read for fun an profit, I think I manage a book a week.

What's in your current "To Read" pile?

Half a dozen Terry Pratchetts and at least eight more volumes of Copleston

bookfriends @ 2007-08-07T21:41:00

2007-08-08T02:04:34Z

Name: Mary

Age: 19

What do you like to read?: I guess I read mainly fiction, but I love a good memoir every once in a while.--- A few of my favorite writers are Joseph Heller, J.D. Salinger, Chuck Palahniuk, Ram Dass, Aldous Huxley, Ernest Hemingway, Terence McKenna, so on and so forth.---- I am a very open minded person.----I love controversial things----I like the mundane, where nothing really happens but you can really feel the character, like he or she is an actual living being.---- I love things that are f**cked up...something that makes me do a double take. ----I am definitely up for trying out new things.

What kind of books do you avoid?: I could never say what I really try to avoid, because I can like books in genres that I try to avoid and it won't matter to me; but with that having been said, I suppose I try to avoid traditional, run of the mill murder mysteries; cheesy romance novels, typical teenage romance, and most biographies.

How quickly do you read?: I think it really just depends on what I am reading. If I am super interested I can read a book in a night, depending on how long it is. I am in college, so I have a pretty hefty work load, and that is about to consume mostly all of my time, which is why I would love to have a book buddy, so that I can keep myself reading things other than textbooks.

How often do you read?: I read every day, but like I said before, college takes up a lot of time.

What's in your current "to read" pile?: It is a work in progress. I will update soon.

bookfriends @ 2007-08-07T00:45:00

2007-08-07T05:45:24Z

Hey all! Good to see how much this community has caught on. I'm really glad to be helping with it.:)
Anyway, my name is Kalina Dolejsi, and I'm a twenty year old Communications and Literature double major.

I love older books, anything from before the 20th century. I also enjoy modern books, especially anything historical or fantasy, though recently I've been trying to branch out into more categories (with books such as "Blink", "Running with Scissors", "A Long Way Home", etc.)

My favorite books are anything anything ANYTHING by Terry Pratchett ("Good Omens" and "The Color of Magic" are my top two picks, but the man is genius, genius I tell you!), "The Other Boleyn Girl" by Phillipa Gregory, "Pride and Prejudice", "Emma", and "Mansfield Park" by Jane Austen, "Great Expectations" by Charles Dickens, "Anne of the Island" by L.M. Montgomery, "Madame Bovary", "Hypocrite in a Pouffy White Dress", "Running with Scissors" by Augusten Borroughs, "Troubling a Star" by Madeleine L'engle, "Blink", "the Tao of Pooh", "Jane Eyre", and "Phantom of the Opera".

I have more I know, I just can't think of them at the moment. I am open to reading anything and everything (and that is my goal!) I especially want to find a book buddy that can introduce me to more current literature, especially anything that has to do with current events/politics/science. These are the three subjects I know the least about, and I really want to improve my knowledge.:)

what I hate: Anything written by celebrities (big shock there, I know;)), and I have to admit that books with Oprah's seal of approval make me a little hesitant...also, I don't read romance or chic-lit.

Want to read:
"The Namesake" by Jhumpa Lhairi
anything by Dostovesky (anyone have any recs? Everything by him looks so good!)
"The Book-seller of Kabul"
"the Curious Lives of Human Cadavers"
"the Portrait of Dorian Gray"

I can't wait to meet others on this application! I hope I find a buddy.:)

Anyone looking for a fantasy and Brit Lit dork?

2007-08-07T04:38:15Z

Name: Lauren, 20-year old student

What do you like to read? I'm mostly a fantasy junkie, but I sprinkle in a lot of other stuff too. I like 19th century serialized and sensation novels (Dumas, etc). I'm an English major, so I spend alot of time reading "classics" or whatever you'd like to call it. I prefer British literature, from the early Christian stuff up through the Victorian era. I don't read much non-fiction/biographies for pleasure, unless 1) I'm particularly interested in the subject matter or 2) the author is a really captivating and entertaining writer.

What do you hate? Hate's an awfully strong word to talk about a book D= My dislikes include stupid romance, a good deal of American lit (it's like I was born on the wrong side of the pond...), bad crime/thriller novels. A real pet peeve are authors that manage to get published without the ability to write. Plotting and charicterization are key components to any book, but when the language itself is terrible, I get angry over being stuck reading bad writing just because I want to know what happens.

How often do you read? It fluctuates. Reading is my first love, but sometimes I have affairs with my video games or guitar and read less (but a reading buddy would keep me motivated! =D). Obviously, it's harder to read as much during school, but given the right book(s), I can make time (in other words, sleep very little). I read the entire Wheel of Time series over the course of one semester (including the 11th book and the prequel =P). It's hard to put a number of pages or amount of time per day/week/month because I usually read by the chapter. I like reading 2-3 books at once, and put in a real effort to read 1-2 "chapters" every day, if not more (this is probably part of why I like serialized novels so much). I figure, hey, that's where the author wants me to stop, so may as well.

What's in your current "To Read" pile?
I found Bibliophil recently, and have wasted hours catalogging my reading endeavors that I'd rather just link you to a filter of my to read books from my library instead of listing them out. This is a work in progress, so you can expect that to grow.

I'd love a reading buddy who wants to tackle some big meaty literature together (the sort of stuff you want to read but go, "it's so dense, I'll read it some other time..." and never do). Or someone who has read alot of 20th century lit, and might be able to bring me back to the present (I'm really in a comfort zone reading older literature...).

bookfriends @ 2007-08-06T15:24:00

2007-08-06T19:46:40Z

I'm Rachel, and I seem to be coming in on the older end at a whopping 26.

• What do you like to read?
I tend to read a lot of the classics, and the "great" literary works. I really like books with compelling narrative, and I tend to enjoy memoirs as an exemplum of narrative craft. Generally speaking, I want depth and soul to my reading (or, in the case of non-fiction, something truly revelatory or insightful). I rarely put books aside if I'm not enjoying them, but I tend to be harsh in my critiques.

• What kinds of books do you avoid like a bad cliche?
I have an innate fear of the Bestsellers list, as most of those books tend to let me down (*ahem* The Lovely Bones). And I refuse to read the last Harry Potter on principle. (Of course, I read through everyone's reviews, because I had to know how it ended.) So I guess I like a good story, but it's got to be well written for me to truly enjoy it. The more "literary" the better, generally.

• How quickly and how often do you read?
How fast I read really depends on what I'm slogging through at the moment -- George Eliot's Middlemarch, for example, took me a lot longer than Cormac McCarthy's The Road. I can read a book in a day if I have time to devote to reading, but mostly I average about a book or two a week. Less, if it's a wrist-breaker of a text.

• What's in your current "To Read" pile?
Within the next few hours I'll be starting on Beowulf (Seamus Heaney translation), and after that I've got Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, then Piers Plowman, Sir Orfeo, and a handful of other medieval literature. After that, I'll move on to the Renaissance. Oh... and I have two Gabriel García Marquéz books to read through soon (they're en route in the mail).

• Caveat
If it isn't already apparent from this post and the parts of my journal that are public, I'm a PhD student in Medieval Literature. I'm currently studying toward my comprehensive exams, which means I'm giving myself sort of a crash course in the history of English literature. I'll probably be reading mostly "classics" (not classical literature!) over the next few weeks/months. Of course, I'd be happy to pair/team up with someone who just likes to read at the same pace or is similarly picky, or with someone who is studying literature too. Actually, I'd be really interested to read with someone who is reading more world literature, since as far as my doctoral work goes I'm limited to works written originally in English. (GRRR.)

bookfriends @ 2007-08-06T09:43:00

2007-08-06T14:16:36Z

Name: Katey

• What do you like to read? I'm a fan of the classics, though, admittedly, I haven't read many of them. I particularly like Regency era fiction, as well as some fantasy (Such as Tolkien and Marion Zimmer Bradley) and some science fiction (think Bradbury, Vonnegut, H.G. Wells, etc.). I like books that make you think, but I also like mostly plot-driven books (think 1800's pulp fiction: the Scarlet Pimpernel, The Count of Monte Cristo, etc.). I am not at all adverse to the Greek and Roman classics, neither am I adverse to Shakespeare. I like biographies, and I like non-fiction if it is written more as a story than as a textbook. As for authors, my favorite books right now are: Flowers for Algernon, Harry Potter, Jane Eyre, The Time Machine, The Tao of Pooh, I Capture the Castle, Fifth Business, The Chronicles of Narnia, Fahrenheit 451, The Hobbit, White Fang (and Jack London in general), A Little Princess, any of the Sherlock Holmes short stories, The Cider House Rules (Irving in general) and last but most certainly not least, I love almost anything by Poe. Oh, and I like children's fiction very much, so you might see a few of those on my list.

• What kinds of books do you avoid like a bad cliche? I dislike most pulp fiction. I did, however, like "Snow Flower & the Secret Fan" very much, which I guess is under the classification of "popular fiction". I don't like any of the gossip girl novels and tend to avoid chick lit like the plague unless it was written in the Victorian era. Austen and Bronte I both like, but that's about as far into chick lit as I'll go. Most fantasy novels other than a select few like Tolkien, Rowling, Neil Gaiman, and Marion Zimmer Bradley I dislike very much. It all seems like a rehash of the same ideas after awhile. Basically, if I'm going to read something that is entirely about the plot, it better be pretty good and most of the time I like it if the books I read have a bit of depth to them, without being indecipherable.

• How quickly and how often do you read? I'm terribly slow. It usually takes me between a week to three weeks to finish a book, but during the summer I can often finish things a bit faster. I like to read a lot though, and while sometimes I take a break and won't read for awhile usually when I finish a book it makes me want to go pick up another.

• What's in your current "To Read" pile?

Oookay, so, here's the pile, in no particular order:

The Lord of the Rings (all of them) - J.R.R. Tolkien
The Secret Garden -Frances Hodgson Burnett
The Merchant of Venice - William Shakespeare
Macbeth - William Shakespeare
The Aeneid - Virgil
The Iliad - Homer
Little Women - Louisa May Alcott
A Tale of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
East of Eden - John Steinbeck (I love Steinbeck and this is one of his I haven't read)
Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
Candide - Voltaire
The Abhorsen Trilogy - Garth Nix
The Sun Also Rises - Ernest Hemingway
The Good Earth - Pearl S. Buck
Watership Down - Richard Adams
Dracula - Bram Stoker
A Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood
Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov (I've already started this, and I'm loving it so far)
A Game of Thrones - George R.R. Martin
Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
Middlesex - Jeffrey Eugenides
1984 - George Orwell
Pride & Predjudice - Jane Austen (I know, such blasphemy that I haven't read it)
A Room with a View - E.M. Forster
The Heart is a Lonely Hunter - Carson McCullers
All the Pretty Horses - Cormac McCarthy
Pilgrim at Tinker Creek - Annie Dillard
Walden - Henry David Thoreau
Being There - Jerzey Kosinski
Anthem - Ayn Rand
The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thakeray
To the Lighthouse - Virginia Woolf
Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal
The Tao Te Ching - Lao Tzu (as translated by Ursula K. Le Guin)
The Left Hand of Darkness - Ursula K. Le Guin
Good Omens - Neil Gaiman
Stardust - Neil Gaiman
The Picture of Dorian Gray - Oscar Wilde
The Importance of Being Earnest - Oscar Wilde
Lady Windermere's Fan - Oscar Wilde
Titus Groan - Mervyn Peake
Robert Kennedy and His Times - Arthur M. Schlesinger
Make Gentle the Life of the World - Robert F. Kennedy, John F. Kennedy
Look Homeward, Angel - Thomas Wolfe
Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons

Just a note: There's a lot that hasn't been included on this list so if there's something else you'd really like to read chances are I'm up for it, especially if it's a classic. I'm up for most anything.

bookfriends @ 2007-08-06T20:54:00

2007-08-06T10:56:45Z

Name – emma

What do you like to read? I really enjoy dark stories, with twists and turns. I can handle a love story as long as its not cheesy with extra cheese. I love to read true stories. Memoirs, autobiographies. And I adore short stories. ( I once found this book that had different story on every page, each story had to be 50 words or less) I really enjoy reading books written by people in music. I love music and reading so it seemed the easy choice. Historical books are interesting aswell.

I love re-reading books. There seems to be a list of books that I reread every year. I have read every book in my bookcase at least once.

• What kinds of books do you avoid like a bad cliche? I keep away from shows that have been made into books ( the only exception was buffy). Like i said before - cheesy love stories. Anything by Paris Hilton, any self help books because I have to find out for my self. Anything else is pretty much fair game.

• How quickly and how often do you read.

i read every morning and afternoon on the train home. And I have be known to read a little during lunch break. There will be periods where I wont read at all but they have been few and far inbetween

• What's in your current "To Read" pile?

eldest - christopher paolini

The phantom of the opera – Gaston Leroux

Buffy – seven crows – John Vornholt

The safe house – Nicci French

Blindsighted – Karin Slaughter

The Uninvited – John Farris

A long way down – Nick Hornby

bookfriends @ 2007-08-06T11:52:00

2007-08-06T10:00:01Z

Hi, I'm Andrea, 22, from Germany.

What do you like to read??
I try to read according to principle of variety meaning lots of different genres, times and nationalities. I really have a thing for poetry (I'm totally enarmored with the Latin-americans right now) so I also like to read poetic and well written fiction. Thereby, I prefer novels to short-stories though I love all the short works of Angela Carter and Dorothy Parker. Besides them my favourite authors would include Salman Rushdie, Hermann Hesse, Michael Ondaatje, Margaret Atwood, Mikhail Bulgakov, Gabriel García Marquéz and Jorge Luiz Borges.
I also like to read a little fantasy once in a while but only if it is well written. My favourites here would be The Lord of the Rings, His Dark Materials and Anne Rice's Vampire Chronicles. Sometimes I also get an appetite for children's literature and I really love Alice in Wonderland, The Wizard of Oz, Peter Pan and the classical fairy tales as collected by the Brothers Grimm or Peirrault.
I also like non-fiction. Philosophy is always good. I prefer the Germans and the French here. And I really love biographies if they're well researched and un-prejudiced.

What do you hate??
Everything that is cheesy, over-constructed or full of clichés. Genre-wise I normally don't read romances (though I make an exception for Jane Austen whom I adore), historic fiction (prefer non-fiction here), crime writing (just not my cup of tea though the exception is James Ellroy who's just to good a writer to ignore) and chick lit (for aforementioned reasons).

How often do you read??
I am a pretty avid and fast reader. I can normally read a book in three days though that always depends on the style, depth of topic and the genre. Stuff like Harry Potter is even managable over a weekend :P My pace also depends on my working schedule during a term I can not manage so much private reading because I have to work thrpugh lots of books for my courses.

What's in your current "To Read" pile??

That's the stuff I wanna manage until october when university starts again:
Novels:

Lavinia Greenlaw: Mary George of Allnorthover

Lavinia Greenlaw: An Irresponsible Age

Nicole Krauss: The History of Love

Julian Barnes: A History of the World in 10 1/2 Chapters

Jonathan Safran Foer: Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close (because I loved Everything Is Illuminated so much)

Charles Frazier: Cold Mountain

Angela Carter: Wise Girls

Marisha Pessl: Special Topics in Calamity Physics

Short Stories:

Stefan Zweig: The Best Stories

Hermann Hesse: The Best Stories

Poetry:

Richard Siken: Crush

Non-Fiction:

Ernesto 'Che' Guevara: The Motorcycle Diaries
Heinrich Broeler and Horst Königsstein: The Family Mann
Miles: Hippie
Dietmar Rothermund: Mahatma Gandhi. A political biography
E.M. Cioran: Dawning of the mind
David Frisby: Fragments of Modernity

</div>

Salutations!

2007-08-06T05:17:54Z

What's in your current "To Read" pile?
Er... *goes to look* (this is sort of a yearly reading list... it gets added to quite regularly and I'm listing most of it because I'm always looking for recommendation's in a similar vein to what I'm currently reading :) :))

Non Fiction:
The Cloud Spotter's Guide by Gavin Pretor-Pinney
The Man Who Knew too Much: Alan Turing and the Invention of the Computer by David Leavit
Compass: A Story of Exploration and Innovation by Alan Gurney
Le Tour: History of the Tour de France by Geoffrey Wheatcroft
Vulcan 607 by Rowland White
Black Earth: Russia After the Fall by Andrew Meier
Penguin Stopped Play by Harry Thomas
The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins
The Worm in the Bud by Ronald Pearsall
Conan Doyle: Detective by Peter Costello
Conan Doyle Biography by Ronald Pearsall
Necropolis: London and It's Dead by Catherine Arnold
Silent Night: The Remarkable Christmas Truce 1914 by Stanley Weintraub
The Kenneth Williams Diaries

Fiction:
Imperium by Robert Harris
The Dice Man by Luke Rhineheart
Madame Bovary by Gustav Flaubert
The Princes Bride by William Golding
The Greatest Gift by Danny Leigh (half way through this, loosing interest unfortunately he's a friend of my co-worker so I can't give up just yet!)
Finn Family Moomin Troll by Tove Jansson
Mr Clive and Mr Page by Neil Bartlett
Dune by Frank Herbert
Night Watch by Sarah Waters
The Algebraist by Iain M. Banks
The Idiot by F.M. Dostoevsky

Sherlock Holmes Pastiche:
The Last Sherlock Holmes Story by Michael Dibden
The Whitechapel Horrors Edward B. Hanna
The Italian Secretary by Caleb Carr
The Singular Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Various
The Giant Rat of Sumatra by Richard L. Boyer
Sherlock Holmes and the Portsmouth Myster by Jack Coggan

Olá!

2007-08-06T01:46:21Z

Hello, I'm Marcela, 21 and Brazilian. Love the idea for this community. :D

What do you like to read? A little bit of everything, really. If it seems good then I'll read it. I'm a big fan of the Classics and I'm trying to read more 20th century lit. There is so many authors that I'm only familiar by name and I'm trying to change that. I'm also trying to read more Latin American authors since every one I tried is absolutely fantastic. Jorge Luis Borges has become one of my sacred cows...
I also like fantasy/sci-fi books - something I found out quite recently and I'm trying to read more short stories, but it's so hard to find recommendations. Oh, and I decided this week that I need to read more plays and, especially, poetry books. I'm taking a class on English/American 20th century poetry and I'm familiar with every poet we're studying, but I don't think I read a single book by them. And that's sad. ;)

What do you hate? I don't like self-help books. Especially those who pretend they're novels, like Paulo Coelho's books. And I never read a Harlequin novel, but I don't think it's something that I'd enjoy. Best-sellers also bug me a bit. Not because I want to be an intellectual, but because I have the worst luck with them. The last few I read were a waste of time.

How often do you read? Hmm, depends, really. I always try to read more than one book at a time and I give myself a number of pages that I have to read every day so that I won't spend 4 months reading a single book. Around 50 pages a day, I think. 15 on book A, 20 on book B, etc... But sometimes classes and assigned readings get on the way and I spend days without reading anything. Or finish a 600 pages book in 15 hours.

What's in your current "To Read" pile?
- Stardust, Neil Gaiman.
- The Ode Less Traveled, Stephen Fry.
- Crime and Punishment, Dostoevsky.
- Ficciones, Jorge Luis Borges.
- Sherlock Holmes - The Complete Novels and Stories, Arthur Conan Doyle.
- Near the Wild Heart, Clarice Lispector.
- The Waste Land, T.S. Eliot.
- If on a winter's night a traveler, Italo Calvino.
- A bunch of plays by Tom Stoppard.
- The Cinnamon Peeler, Michael Ondaatje.

It'll still take me a couple of weeks to start on the list, since I just started a couple of books and I have to read 2 more for classes: Travels in My Homeland by Almeida Garrett and and Cousin Basílio by Eça de Queiroz. Still, nothing says I can't start another book, right? ;) So if anyone wants to read any of these books or something like the stuff I wrote on the "what I like" part feel free to contact me.

bookfriends @ 2007-08-05T20:09:00

2007-08-06T01:32:10Z

Name: Tracy, 16 years old

What do you like to read? I definitely read more modern contemporary fiction and novels. I've also read a few memoirs and I have a few biographies on my TBR list. I work in a bookstore, so we receive free ARC's (Advanced Reader Copy's). That's my main focus. I had a stack of 11 that I needed to get serious about, and have knocked out two, and am on my third. I don't really do non-fiction, except for a few: Devil in the White City, Crashing Through and a few others.

What do you hate?
- Romances
- Chick lit
- Political Books
- Cheap YA stuff (ie, clique, gossip girl, etc), I don't really do YA, but every once in a while I will pick an YA ARC.

How often do you read? I'm feeling a little slow after reading HP 5-7, and only managed to get three in between then and now, so I think I'm experiencing just some slowness. Over the school year, I manage 4 a month. Throughout the year, I'm aiming for the first time, 50. Which I believe is in my grasp. I'm on #33 right now. I would like to achieve 60, and I think I could because I'm just kind of slacking right now. Choosing the computer or TV over reading.

What's in your current "To Read" pile?
ARC's :
The Scandal of the Season by Sophie Gee - out now
The Great Man by Kate Christensen - August 14th
Bounce by Natasha Friend - September
Tomorrow by Graham Swift - September
Away by Amy Bloom - September
Her Last Death by Susanna Sonnenberg - January '08
The Missing Girl by Norma Fox Mazer - Februrary 5th '08
Chanda's War by Allan Stratton - March 11th '08

regular titles
Paint it Black by Janet Fitch
Evening by Susan Minot
The Hours by Michael Cunningham
The Kite Runner by Khahled Hosseini

bookfriends @ 2007-08-05T20:05:00

2007-08-06T01:06:04Z

Hi! I think that this is a fantastic idea. I have been longing to have real conversations about literature.

Maureen, Age 21, college student (english major)

What do you like to read? Authors, favorite books, genres, etc. Give us a holistic view of what you might pick up in the bookstore. I have a wide range. I love the classics, particularly classics from other national canons. I also love contemporary literature by authors of other cultures. I do read works connected with fantasy, often with echoes of fairytales and myths but not exactly novelization of them (ex: The Ground Beneath her feet, by Rushdie). I like texts that deal with philosophical, political, and religious ideas. Experimental is good. My favorite authors include woolf, dostoevsky, kafka, kundera, eco, rushdie, gaiman. I am also a big fan of nonfiction works.

What kinds of books do you avoid like a bad cliche? Anything that would be placed in the Romance, Mystery, or Suspense Genres. (But not books that contain these elements). Stuff with cutesy covers or too "beach read". I dislike cheap sentiment. I do have an instinctive aversion to Oprah's Book Club and the Best Sellers list, but this is with plenty of exceptions.

How quickly and how often do you read? I often finish a novel a day. This will probably change once school starts back up at the end of august.

What's in your current "To Read" pile?
These are the books I have at hand (I won't have access to others until August 15th)

Sappho's Leap - Erica Jong
The Mysterious Flame of Queen Loana - Umberto Eco
Einstein's Dreams - Alan Lightman
Tamsin - Peter S. Beagle
The Nonexistent Knight and The Cloven Viscount - Italo Calvino
The Stranger - Albert Camus
Brief Encounters with with Che Guevara - Ben Fountain
Rainbow's End - Lauren St. John
Cat's Cradle - Kurt Vonnegut
Winter's Tales - Isak Dinesen
The English Patient - Michael Ondaatje
The Magic Toyshop - Angela Carter

Others on deck
Tale of Genji - shikibu
The Woman in White - collins
The Satanic Verses - rushdie
The Count of Monte Cristo - dumas

Amazon wishlist
Barnes & Noble Wishlist