Best book ever?

Omega_Weapon

I think the best book has to be the Lord of the Rings. The depth and excellence of it is quite unsurpassable. Anyone disagree?
This should be interesting...

chernobyl

Revolutionary Self-Theory

"a beginners' manual"

Pugsley

Havent read LotR,but my fave book is currently "faith of the fallen" and the krondor series is a close 2nd.

Manach

My favourite book, I'm afraid there is choice between my favourites in different catagories.

SciFi - The Warrior's Apprentice by Lois McMasters Bujold
Fantasy - Good Omens by Gaiman & Pratchett
Fav trilogy LOTR.
General Fiction - The Man who was Thursday, Chesterton

Historical F - Master & Commader by Patrick O'Brian
Historical - Modern Times, Paul Johnson
Computers - Soul of a new Machine, Tracy Kidder
Military - Art of War in the Western World by Archer Jones
Military F - Red storm rising by Tom Clancy
Relgion - Ever lasting Man, Chesterton

Dont be at yourself

Its a tie between Lord of the Rings and Hitch-hiker's Guide To The Galaxy for me - both brilliant

yellum

I haven't been reading books long enough to come to a conclusion. I have read some entertaining books but should they be classed as best book ever ?

Surely a book that can change your whole viewpoint on life and change the way you think would take the title ?

Shinji

Bloody hard to choose. LotR is up there, as indeed is the Hitch-Hikers Guide...

But there are a few I'd add to the mix. Neal Stephenson's Snow Crash is one, for certain; one of the most intelligent and visionary cyberpunk type novels ever written.

Lord of the Flies is another - I know lots of us hate it for having to read it in school, but it really is an amazing study in the human psyche, insightful and brilliant.

Enygma

Tough one alright...
I think I'd have to say that Cryptonomicon is my favourite book of all time.
Most of Douglas Couplands books would be well up there but I'd have to go with Girlfriend in a Coma for no. 1
Hitch Hikers Guide ..... naturally.

1984 would be the one that opened my eyes and made me think about the world in a completely different way.

Da Bounca

impeccible taste shinji.

hitch hikers guide to the galaxy, along with so long and thanks for all the fish etc is top for me.
closely followed by snowcrash,
then by the forgotten realms series "The cloakmaster Cycle".

Omega_Weapon

Yes, I'm sure these are all good books, but the Lord of the Rings has to be the best. I mean, come ON, just read it and see. Anyway, I'll have to get a copy of this'Hitch-Hikers Guide to the Galaxy', it appears to be quite popular. I'm glad no-one said Harry Potter was their favourite, I really hate those books....

Excelsior

(The Bible)

Douglas Coupland- Generation X or Microserfs for me

I also agree with Manach on Chesterton, The Man Who Was Thursday and Everlasting Man are among my favourites.

I love LOTR but also adore Narnia, and speaking of Lewis I'd have to include A Preliminary Study of Miracles and The Screwtape Letters.

Maybe Animal Farm too.

Omega_Weapon

Yes, yes. Who's the author of 'The Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy.'

sceptre

Originally posted by Omega_Weapon
Yes, yes. Who's the author of 'The Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy.'

Douglas Adams RIP


Best book?
Tess of the d'Urbervilles

Close run:
Salman Rushdie's "Midnight's Children" or "Haroun and the Sea of Stories" (best kid's book ever) - tied with Antoine deSaint Exupery's "Little Prince", Anatoli Rybakov's "Children of the Arbat", John Irving's "Cider House Rules", and (not least) LOTR.

Found "Microserfs" hilarious - great book. Paul Theroux' "My Secret History" - fantastic (have "My other life" in the queue). Robert Graves' "I Claudius" (when I was 15 I thought it was the funniest book I'd ever read - it's not). And I loved Peter Straub's/Stephen King's "The Talisman" - sequel is out this month. And agree with Manach - Red Storm Rising was a great book - read it again a few weeks ago after something like a ten year gap.

T.G Catter

'learning to fly' by victoria beckham.

Omega_Weapon

Thanks for the Author's name. I also did not know he was dead.

Vokes

"Wizard of Earthsea" is 1 of my favourites cos its one of the first fantasy books i remember reading. and i think it was written by a woman!

azezil

I have no idea, i'm currently reading lotr, quite enjoying it... but i have a friend who hated it!

WhiteWashMan

cor, no idea!
everyone is saying lotr, but i have to say that i think lotr, while being a great book, is a little bit too stylized for me.
too much bloody singing too.
i could never figure out if i should really try to sing the songs or not
for long winded fantasy id go for wot or tomas covenant series.

not really a sci fi fannatic, but i did love i robot by asimoz, but i enjoyed some of william gibsons stuff. but again id go for steven donaldsons gap series just for being in depth, well rounded (it would have to be as it was based on das ring die neblung, or whatever, the old norse mythology) and just really bloody entertaining.

i agree on lord of the flies, but id add in a load of other secondry school books like animal farm, in fact almost anything by orwell. really like his stuff. hemingway's old man and the sea was great if short and always reminded of it whenerver i watch castaway. very similar.

i will probably get slagged, but i absolutely love shakespear.
when its understandable. i dont go into this whole lets learn olde english stuff, but when its presented in easy reading format, its great.
or just watch the film

at the moment im readin g lotr (and have been for about 6 months)
bored of the rings (obviously a parady and about 1100 pages shorter )
server+ (er, geeky exam book!)
network+ (im on a loser here as well!)
and the girl who loved tom er, somethingorother by my favourite easy reading author, mr stephen king.
have most of his books, loved all of them.
brilliant stuff.

Loomer

Originally posted by Shinji
Neal Stephenson's Snow Crash is one, for certain; one of the most intelligent and visionary cyberpunk type novels ever written.

I really enjoyed Cryptonomicon. Must check that out.

My favourite book of all time would have to be Brave New World by Aldous Huxley. Eerily close on many future sociological and technological predictions for a novel written almost 80 years ago

Snaga

My favourite set of books were a group of sci fi novels by Dan Simmons

It was a 4 book epic,

Hyperion
The Fall of Hyperion
Endymion
The Rise of Endymion

It just covered so much and had such an amazing view of the future. The books MUST be read in order, but they kept me reading more than any other set of books Ive read.

Yossarian

Some have already been mentioned,

Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
All 4 books of the Hyperion Cantos (Hyperion, The Fall of Hyperion, Endymion, The Rise of Endymion) by Dan Simmons.
Discourses on Livy - Niccolo Machiavelli
The Player of Games - Iain M. Banks

Many good books, too little time..

phaxx

Lotr is very good, actually, um, I'm going to re-read it now. I like all of Terry Pratchett's work so far (that I have read), I liked 1984, and the appendix at the end on "The Principles of Newspeak" was definately an eye-opening few pages. I used to read Robert Jordan's The Wheel of Time series, but half way through the fifth book I realised how repetitive and slow-moving they are... I made myself finish the fifth, and stopped there. The first and second books were interesting, but after that it went downhill, in my opinion.

The Iliad and The Odyssey were damn cool books!

I've read some of the Dragonriders of Pern series by Anne McCaffrey, they're interesting, and I intend to get back into them someday.

Wwan: Shakespear is good, em, doing Macbeth in school at the moment, it's enjoyable, but I wish they'd stop making us analyze it and write about it, I just want to read the damn thing.

Vokes

Fantasy: Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula Le Guin
Military Fiction: Nimitz Class by Patrick Robinson
ScFi: War of the Worlds
Non-Fiction: Going Solo by Roald Dahl

Goodshape

the greatist book ever has to be 'Mein Kampf' by Adolf Hitler... so inspiering... that dude had it all figured out!!

.....no, only joking .... LotR and Hitch Hikers Guide... cant argue with that.... but then, I'm sure there are plenty of amazing books out there that I am yet to even lay eyes on!

havok*

LOTR was good, i could'nd really say i thought it was amasing (i'm not really into fantasy books tho)

Anyways, All of Ian M. Banks Si-fi works are brillent, Player of games being the best of them.

but the best book of ever read was A.A.Attanasio's "Centuries"
Fantastic peice of work. (also Si-fi)

Cheez

yea play of games rules
but best book ever = one flew over the cookoos nest by ken kesey fukin excellent

GoneShootin

best book =

The Bible

you heathens !!!

nore

I dunno...
I've only been looking at this site for the past few weeks. Since it was mentioned in the Irish Times and won some award or something. I was wary to begin with when I saw that there were whole forums devoted to "games", role-playing etc. And in general I found a lot of the exhanges quite childish etc. and people couldn't even be bothered to spell properly.
But when I saw a posting in the forum "Literature" under the heading "the best book ever?" and read the initiator suggest "The Lord of the Rings", well... "The Lord of the Rings" is a FANTASY. It's somewhere for you geek-boys to go because you can't deal with the REAL WORLD. It is NOT LITERATURE.

In principle this site is a good idea. However, it seems the sad reality is that it his frequented entirely by geek-boys which is maybe inevitable because it was probably developed by geek-boys exchanging cards and childish insults. It's a pity more real people don't come on here. The f*ckin' Lord of the Rings!!

bonkey

Originally posted by Gone Shootin
best book =

The Bible

I dunno.

I can never find a copy of it filed under fiction or fantasy whenever I go looking. If they cant even categorise it correctly, how can it be that good?

jc - off to the pub with me

Da Bounca

is the bible a book?


there was an argument about that before if someone wants to go digging and revive it

Dr. Loon

Originally posted by nore
I dunno...
I've only been looking at this site for the past few weeks. Since it was mentioned in the Irish Times and won some award or something. I was wary to begin with when I saw that there were whole forums devoted to "games", role-playing etc. And in general I found a lot of the exhanges quite childish etc. and people couldn't even be bothered to spell properly.
But when I saw a posting in the forum "Literature" under the heading "the best book ever?" and read the initiator suggest "The Lord of the Rings", well... "The Lord of the Rings" is a FANTASY. It's somewhere for you geek-boys to go because you can't deal with the REAL WORLD. It is NOT LITERATURE.

In principle this site is a good idea. However, it seems the sad reality is that it his frequented entirely by geek-boys which is maybe inevitable because it was probably developed by geek-boys exchanging cards and childish insults. It's a pity more real people don't come on here. The f*ckin' Lord of the Rings!!

Arséhole.

I'm a real person. Whether a book is fantasy or fiction or biography or whatever... it's all literature. Obviously someone of your intelligence can't comprehend that. Yeah, that's right... you are a fool.

What... then is literature in your opinion? In my opinion The Bible is fantasy! Fiction... whatever you want to call it. That's my view. I reserve the right to hold that, and if needs be debate that. The boards are designed for people to express "their" opinions on whatever topic they wish to, not to slag off people's opinions.

Therefore, it appears to me that you don't understand the principle of this idea. So shut the fúck up with your ill informed shíte. If you were to post a valid opinion here, you'd understand the idea of discussion and debate. At the moment... you can't even rack your brains enough to come out with anything intelligent whatsoever, but to slag people. You're a fúcking twat


Question to mods - Why isn't this fool gone yet?

Excelsior

Originally posted by nore
I dunno...
I've only been looking at this site for the past few weeks. Since it was mentioned in the Irish Times and won some award or something. I was wary to begin with when I saw that there were whole forums devoted to "games", role-playing etc. And in general I found a lot of the exhanges quite childish etc. and people couldn't even be bothered to spell properly.
But when I saw a posting in the forum "Literature" under the heading "the best book ever?" and read the initiator suggest "The Lord of the Rings", well... "The Lord of the Rings" is a FANTASY. It's somewhere for you geek-boys to go because you can't deal with the REAL WORLD. It is NOT LITERATURE.

In principle this site is a good idea. However, it seems the sad reality is that it his frequented entirely by geek-boys which is maybe inevitable because it was probably developed by geek-boys exchanging cards and childish insults. It's a pity more real people don't come on here. The f*ckin' Lord of the Rings!!

Can you give me an example of a piece of literature (by your own definition) that would not be to some extent fantastical?
Don't give me any of that claptrap first year english students spout out about Emile Zola and his scientific novels. Yes, realistic beyond compare.

The fact of the matter is that you demonstrate your own ignorance by talking to us, LOTR fans like this.
LOTR has long been top of opinion charts composed by writers, critics and most importantly the people on the street.
I urge you to open them up again and immerse yourself in that stream of description that is so lush and thorough. Drop yourself into a series of books that transcend fantasy (which, you should be aware is not an insult) and moves into the most treasured of all genres, MYTH.

Now, go back to your arts course buddies, come back to me with some foolish argument about style, and myself, Bard, Manach, anyone of us, will blow you out of the water. You arrogant and rude man; for shame.

Bard

Originally posted by Excelsior

Now, go back to your arts course buddies, come back to me with some foolish argument about style, and myself, Bard, Manach, anyone of us, will blow you out of the water. You arrogant and rude man; for shame.

Well said, that man!... and if I wasn't dying with hay-fever right now I'd dive right in with the rest of ye and berate the guy for the sheer idiocy he has displayed here.

Lord of the Rings "FANTASY and not LITERATURE" indeed!!! pshaw!!! :rolleyes: -... what a maroon!

'heh'

bonkey

Originally posted by nore
"The Lord of the Rings" is a FANTASY. It's somewhere for you geek-boys to go because you can't deal with the REAL WORLD. It is NOT LITERATURE.

Troll troll troll troll troll troll troll troll....

Oh go on then....I'll bite as well....its a slow evening.

Can you show me what part of any accepted definition of literature precludes fantasy.

I'll settle for any definition of literature which supplies grounds to exclude Lord Of the Rings on any credible basis - not just that its fantasy.

Go on. You know you can. You tar all "us geek-boys" with the same brush, which is pretty damning, so prove your superiority. Show us our miserable failings.

Oh - and while youre at it, after giving us the definition of literature which precludes LOTR, and explaining why this is the case, perhaps you could also offer to us a work which meets your definition of literature and which is worthy of the title "best book ever".

Personally, I wouldnt put LOTR as the best book ever. Its excellent in many regards, and was considered (I believe) "Book of the Century" by many, but ever covers an awful long time, and disregarding the works of the previous centuries seems a bit shortsighted to me.

And before anyone asks...I'm still trying to think what I would class as the best.

jc

Gordon

Celestine Prophecy by James Redfield

A glowing book.

Dr. Loon

Originally posted by Gordon
Celestine Prophecy by James Redfield

A glowing book.

Wow...I read that book ages ago. It's very good actuall. Wouldn't be my favourite of all time...

Gerry

I'd also have to be predictable and say Lord of the Rings and Catch 22. Lord of the Rings, because I've never read anything else so evocative, that draws you in so much. Catch 22 because of its unique sense of humour, and because my sides hurt after reading it. I have read both of those books at least a dozen times, and will probably do so again.

Typedef

1984 - George Orwell
Consider Phleabas - Iain M Banks

Before age 12
IT - Stephen King

iisollie

My favourite .
Perfume by Patrick Suskind
very unusual and very well written

Terran

I started this thread ages ago! I gave up on it! I'm Omega_Weapon, at least, I was.

Someone close this Thread, please.

And the Bible sucks.

Xterminator

It's nearl impossible to say this 1 book .. but
I'd go for Ian M Banks ...' Consider Phleabas ' as the best novel I've read. All his books are so readable.

I love LOTR, and it sets the standard by which I measure books.
It had its flaws too though.

Speaial mention for Julian May's books too. They were pretty good. Oh yes and The Clan of the Cave Bear .. cant remember the author was a good series.

X

Chubby

I have to agree with the above post and say the best book ever is the bible. It's one of the oldest work of fiction still being read and have changed countless lives. No other book could claim to have help shaped today's western society or caused so much misery

vk1

Couldn't chose between:

The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
Collected Short Stories of Philip K. Dick (5 volumes)
House Of Leaves - Mark Danielewski
Glamorama - Bet Easton Ellis

vk1

Oh yes absolutely. the bible.

Simply for the sheer idiocy, crap writing and utter wrongness of it, it is the best book ever written. No seriously. Forget the glaring inaccuracies, unfulfilled prophesies of apocalypse, the catastophic and crippling effect it has had on the developement of human civilisation. Forget the misery it still heaps on certain members of society (homosexuals, women, atheists) .Yes buy it. Buy it now.

Because clearly it is so great.