Recommendations for Books, Book Series, Authors

[cosmicbobo]

Favorite books, authors, especially mysteries?
I'm a fan of a lot of the British and American Cozies or Cosies, like Hamish Macbeth, Poirot, and, of course, Holmes. Anyone have any books or series or such they would recommend?
If anyone is into major suspense/horror, over Stephen King I would recommend Peter Straub's Blue Rose Trilogy (Koko, Mystery, The Throat) and Ghost Story. Ghost Story was a book I've read a few times and the first time I averaged over 200 pages in a day.

 

[hobie1dog]

Sorry, I can't stand fiction. Well, there was the Penthouse Letters series.

 

[cosmicbobo]

I am a nut for both fiction and non fiction. My crime library grows larger daily. Lately looking into pilgrim and colonial life.

 

[anthonyrosenthal74]

I've never read many mysteries, although I've read many books that included mystery. My favorite genre to read is fantasy. I fell in love with fantasy when I was very young and never outgrew it. My favorite books would include, The Lord of The Rings books (of course), The Wheel of Time series by the late great (pipe smoking) Robert Jordan, The Shannara books by Terry Brooks, and the Mithgar books by Dennis McKiernan. That's a few of my favorites.

 

[philobeddoe]

The books of Kurt Vonnegut are cherished by me, I would recommend starting with: Sirens of Titan, Cat's Cradle, Player Piano or Slaughterhouse Five.

 

[nevadablue]

Not books, typically, but if you enjoy history and adventure, search the web for journals and notes from those who explored the Western US. Some of the best for me are the fur trappers stories. Amazing things were done with little but a black powder rifle, horse and guts.

 

[josephcross]

Fantasy Sci/fi reader as well. Well those are my preferred genres but will try to read just about anything. I would second everything Anthony mentioned as well as Steven Eriksons Malazan Book of the Fallen, or Richard Morgans Altered Carbon/ Takeshi Kovacs series.

 

[warren]

Anything by Martin Cruz Smith. I recommend starting with Gorky Park. Wanna learn something about the modern US Southwest? Start with Tony Hillerman's The Blessing Way. Any of the Nero Wolfe mysteries.

 

[cosmicbobo]

Wow, many suggestions in or around my interests.
I love the mountain men stuff and am always searching archive.org for Journal of a Trapper thing. Particularly love Bigfoot Wallace after seeing the Lonesome Dove prequel.
Read The Hobbit. Loved it, but I have the attention span of a diseased gnat, so the actual LOTR part got too long for me. I am going to try the audio books, though. Had a first edition Shannara, but I guess my forays into Fantasy are far and few between. Love the LOTR cartoons and movies. The toons were quite well done.
Read Slaughterhouse Five, but Breakfast of Champions owned my soul for some years.

Love Nero Wolfe.

Have seen movies based on Tony Hillerman and am promising self to read some of his books.

Read every Mickey Spillane up through The Erection Set and a few of his later ones. Read some more than once.

Enjoyed Zane Grey

Enjoy science as well, Think I mentioned the All About Space magazine. It's going on four years. I didn't think they would keep coming up with new stuff, but they do. I have not asked them about Skippy, though. 2.99/month for the B&N Nook version is a bargain to me.

 

[dmcmtk]

Ian Rankin's John Rebus books, set in Edinburgh, Scotland.

 

[josephcross]

Erik Larson writes some awesome books. Devil in the White City, and Thunderstruck to name a couple.

 

[phantomwolf]

I recently purchased a few Peter Straub novels(Ghost Story among them.) I too found him through King. Love Vonnegut. I recommend him to young people if they ask what is good. I think the world would be a better place if everyone read and understood his work during formative years.
Lately I have started on Shardik and the other fantasy by Richard Adams, just because it was mentioned briefly in The Dark Tower series. Before that, I read Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy; A harrowing tale. Cormac isn't my favourite novelist, but he is one of my favourite writers- You can read the same page a half-dozen times and it only gets more beautiful. Before that was The First Law Trilogy by Joe Abercrombie. Decent high fantasy series and a quick, action-packed read. Before that was a string of new Stephen King. Revival, Duma Key, Mr Mercedes, and Doctor Sleep-All masterpieces. haha And N0S4A2 by his son, Joe Hill.
After the Richard Adams, I promised my friend I'd get around to reading Dune.
Hope something mentioned catches your interest.

 

[jndyer]

anthonyrosenthal74 I also love the Wheel of Time series. Have you by chance read any of Brandon Sanderson's own series?

 

[fitzy]

Wheel of time was great and I read Mistborn series from Brandon Sanderson.
Anthony did you read Terry Brooks Magic Kingdom of Landover series?
Game of thrones books are good. I'm reading them now for the second time.

 

[lifesizehobbit]

Louis L'Amour; particularly anything from the Sackett series.

Edgar Rice Burroughs; I've enjoyed the Tarzan series (admittedly they can get contrived, but the first 5 or so are a high adventure).

Clive Cussler; "James Bond" of the ocean - the Dirk Pitt Series.

Alexandre Dumas - particularly The Count Of Monte Cristo

 

[dochudson]

Daniel Silva's Gabriel Allon Series

 

[anthonyrosenthal74]

anthonyrosenthal74 I also love the Wheel of Time series. Have you by chance read any of Brandon Sanderson's own series?

I have, most recently the Mistborn series which I would describe as an action packed super hero series based in a fantasy setting because of the way he writes the action and the magic system. It was a very fun read. I have not read any of his latest series yet, which I believe he has already released book three if I'm correct. I think his writing style is quite different from Jordan's, so I'm that much more impressed by his work on The Wheel of Time, as it seemed almost as if Jordan had indeed wrote the last books himself.

Anthony did you read Terry Brooks Magic Kingdom of Landover series?

Many years ago, before Jordan's Eye of The World if I remember correctly. I was probably in my early teens when I read those books.

 

[randelli]

The author's names escape me; but "As The Crow Flies" and "All The Light We Cannot See" are favorites of mine.

 

[matchstickman]

Jonathan Maberry. That is all you need to know

 

[tbradsim1]

Rand, Archer and Doerr.