Tell me about your books!

[TheBellhop]

What was the best book you have read? - 1984 by George Orwell
What was the worst book you've read? - Any civil war novel (Killer Angels, Red Badge of Courage), Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte
What book are you reading now? - Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand

 

[THE HAT]

i am such a book worm, i love love love books, got it from my mom AND dad!!

best book ever: i have two ( i am a classic lover) The Three Musketeers Alexandre Dumas
and Catcher In The Rye J.D. Salinger......ooo but what about The Great Gatsby F. Scott Fitzgerald......or how about A Tree Grows In Brooklyn Betsy Smith.....i could go on and on and on

hmmm worst book readivine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood Rebecca Wells
i am sure there are a lot more but, usually if i don't care for a book i don't finish it( i give it to page 75).

reading at the moment: Self Made Man Norah Vincent....very very good!!

 

[SunFloridaDisney]

Oh, gosh there are soooooo many.

Best book? To Kill a Mockingbird. The Old Man and the Sea. The Secret Garden. just to name a few.

Worst? The Book of Ruth.

Right now? I'm reading a new one by Margaret Atwood called the Penelopiad.

And my favorite quote from a book: "I crawled into my books and pulled the pages up over my head" Laurie R. King, A Monstrous Regiment of Women.

 

[MouseWorshipin]

Dunno about best, but my favorite is The Mayor of Casterbridge by Thomas Hardy. #2 The Bonfire of the Vanities

The worst book: The Bridges of Madison County

The book I'll never finish because it bores me: Crime and Punishment (but helps with insomnia!)

Reading Now: The Cell by Stephen King...and, of course, Crime and Punishment

 

[MouseWorshipin]

What was the worst book you've read? ..................Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte

God, I'm SO with you on that! Why does everyone think she was such a great writer????

Way, way, oh-so-very-much-waaay over-rated!

 

[Zippa D Doodah]

Best Book: The Bible (I also have been captivated by Catcher in the Rye; The Stand; and the collected works of William Wordsworth)

Worst Book: Hard to say... maybe "The Brethren" by John Grisham (If I don't like them I won't read them)

Currently reading: "In Praise of Slowness" by Carl Honore

 

[FreshTressa]

Best book - Daphne DeMaurne's Rebecca
Worst - Never finished a bad book..I always give up if I hate it.

Right now I'm reading Amy Chua's World on Fire and Robert Kaplan's the coming Anarchy.

 

[SunFloridaDisney]

Best book - Daphne DeMaurne's Rebecca

Oh, yeah, that one too!!

also anything by Barbara Kingsolver

 

[challada]

So many bests: "Where the Wild Things Are" by Sendak; "Are You There God, It's Me Margaret" by Judy Blume; "Poisonwood Bible" by Kingsolver; "My Sister's Keeper" by Picoult

Worst: hands-down all time worst was "The Corrections"! God I suffered thru that thing hoping it would get better and it never did.
Also did not like: "Bonfire of the Vanities"; "Lord of the Rings"; "Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius"

Right now: "The Song Reader", just finished "Probable Futures" by Alice Hoffman and LOVED it

 

[HaleyB]

I love books. Truth be told, I would have a hard time picking even a few favorites... but one that has had a great impact on me is The life and Adventures of Tristam Shandy by Lawernce Sterne. I loved Monk, by Lewis. Both of these books are a bit sophisticated- Tristam Shandy is making fun of a million literary and other conventions. It is a fictional autobiography that starts with the conception of the hero, who does not even appear in the book for a long while. Either laugh out loud funny or a total snore, depends in large part on your sense of humor. Monk is making fun of the Gothic novel and it is really funny if you read it knowing that. The thunderstoem happens after the kidnap scene (instead of right before it), stuff like that. So that is my disclaimer on those two favorites. Anything Plato wrote is well worth reading. Again not to everyones taste.

I like Edith Wharton, The Age of Innocence is my favorite of hers but I enjoy all her fiction, and a little of her non-fiction. Savage Beauty if you like biographys at all. It is about Edna St Vincent Malloy but it stands alone as a great read even if you have never heard of her. However if you have ever heard the phrase 'burning the candle at both ends' you have heard someone quote her

I like biographical novels and liked the A Boy Called It, My name is David, and there was another one... sad, funny, insperational. I am drawing a blank on the author.

Worst book- I dunno know, I have read some real junk. I will pretty much pick up and read any book I come across. I have lost many days and entire weeks to this habit. Some that stand out are... I guess I forget them pretty fast. I found The Red Tent a little unsettleing, but not bad, bad. Maybe one of the formula writers like Steele or Kontz. I don't really like either much. Oh wait, I know a really awful one The Old Man and the Sea I don't care if it is an American Classic. It is a snore and I could hardly make myself finish it (which means it had to be pretty bad because I finish those goofy mystery novels my MIL leaves at my house).

 

[FreshTressa]

Oh, yeah, that one too!!

also anything by Barbara Kingsolver

Yup...loved those too.....I'm not with you on the Margaret Atwood though. Too out there for me!

 

[barkley]

best-"in cold blood" or "to kill a mockingbird". both i read then immediatly re-read (such phenominaly well written works). another one i realy enjoyed was "one L" by scott turow (tells what the first year of law school is like under the "socratic method" of teaching).

worst-anything by f. scott fitzgerald, or john stienbeck (i have tried a couple of both and found them tedious).

currently (when i get it back from my mom)-"capote" (how they managed to make a screenplay from such a detailed book is amazing to me).

there are some books that i enjoy re-reading every few years "we the jury" (excellent in-depth study of the juan corona mass murder case) "child of satan/child of god" (susan adkins biography of her involvement in the manson murders). i'm now enjoying rereading some of the books of my childhood as dd discovers them (all the beverly cleary, laura ingalls wilder, and a new set "junie b. jones").

 

[Kay7979]

I just wanted to say that everyone should read Atlas Shrugged. Also, the book she wrote before that, The Fountainhead. Both are very long, but they make you take a good hard look at society and its a real wake-up call.

 

[Fifinella]

So many books to choose from...so little posting time

Best: Catch-22 by Joseph Heller. Changed my life. Followed closely by Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird. Honorable mentions: Lewis' Chronicles of Narnia, Tolkien's Middle-Earth saga, Watership Down by Richard Adams, Vonnegut's Breakfast of Champions.

Worst: Sadly, too many to recall now. I loathe all of Stephen King's work. I was incredibly disappointed in Thomas Harris' follow-up to Silence of the Lambs, Hannibal--I found it to be utter drivel.

Reading now: The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt by Edmund Morris, and In the Company of the Courtesan by Sarah Dunant.

Favorite literary quote: "Go in peace! I will not say: do not weep; for not all tears are an evil." --Gandalf's farewell from The Return of the King)

Favorite literary guilty pleasure: American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis (and I am sure that means something about me that I may not want to think about! Yikes.)

 

[Dana49]

Best Book - "The Killer Angels" by Michael Shaara
Even if you aren't really interested in the Battle Of Gettysburg, it's still a great read. I've read it twice in fact, and will probably read it again.

Least Favorite Book - "The Last Season: A Team In Search of Its Soul" by Phil Jackson
I believed the hype and now that he's back w/ the Lakers, I feel so used.

Reading Now - "Ireland - A Novel" by Frank Delaney
A very long book, but a great read. I've learned several things about Ireland that I never knew. This book is worth the time.

Guilty Pleasure - Anything by Nicholas Sparks.
His books are always a great read. I'm a Grandpa who enjoys a great love story.

 

[Marseeya]

This is a hard question to answer!

Best: Lord of the Rings trilogy, Diana Gabaldon Outlander series, Steven R. Donaldson's Thomas Covenant series, King's The Stand (there's a whole thread devoted to that one!).

Worst: Can't remember who wrote it, but it's called Demons. It was so bad I couldn't even get past the first chapter. The writing was SO inflated and overblown.

Reading now: Salman Rushdie's Haroun and the Sea of Stories which is turning out to be a great book.

As you can tell from my best list, I'm very much into fantasy. I'm also into contemporary lit. I do like classics, but they're not the books I pick up again and again.

 

[LindsayDunn228]

Best book: The Prince of Tides by Pat Conroy, Heaven by V.C. Andrews (actually the whole series)

Worst book: Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte

What I'm reading now: The Stand by Stephen King. I recently watched the mini-series and have a lot of unanswered questions, so now I'm reading the book

 

[Just2554]

Best books: My all time favorite book is Little Women by Louisa May Alcott. I also love Pride & Prejudice, Shogun, A Farewell to Arms, & Gone With the Wind.

Worst book: As much as I love both Steinback and Hemingway, I hated The Grapes of Wrath and The Old Man and the Sea. And I know it is one of THE definitive American novels, but after 3 readings, I still just don't like The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.

Guilty pleasures: Nicholas Sparks books. I know they're sappy and not the most fantastic literature out there, but I've loved every one of them.

Reading now: The Color Purple by Alice Walker

 

[Kitty 34]

Best Book.......Thorn Birds or Small Sacrifices

Worse Book......In Cold Blood (Still have nightmares)

Book I'm reading now.....Hoot along with my 7th grade classes.

 

[rhanditresmom]

Best Book: Well, I love to read so there are many that I love:

To Kill a Mockingbird
Of Mice and Men
Seabiscuit (I adored this book)

Worst Book:
I just quit if I can't get into it, but I hated "Silas Marner"

Book I'm Reading now:

Advanced Review of Speech-Language Pathology

I'm studying for comps!