Fave book of all time.

[jag]

Mine would have to be 'Thus spoke Zarathustra' by Nietzsche. A fantastic ramble of a book that is forever an enigma.

'How tired I am of my good and my evil! It is all poverty and dirt and a miserable ease!'

[armchairanarchist]

"They throw injustice and dirt at the solitary: but, my brother, if you want to be a star, you must shine none the less brightly for them on that account!"

Been a while since I read TSZ; must dig it out again. :)

I hate calling favourites, because they differ according to my mood, but Jeff Noon's Vurt will always have a special place in my heart for many reasons.

[RedKing]

Similar to AA, faves change, but I do have a place in my heart for The Stand by Big Steve King.

[rac]

The Stand would be up there for me too- it's just so... BIG. King reaches for the stars in the sheer scale of the storytelling, and somehow he manages to grab them. The even longer extended edition is brilliant.

Also, Weaveworld by Clive Barker. A lesser writer would have made a career out of the number of new ideas Barker throws into this book.

[Deep Black]

Very difficult question

There are only a very fex books I've read more than once:
Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkin
Infinity Welcomes Careful Drivers & Better than Life - Grant Naylor

No that it makes them the best as such

Loved:
Armageddon the Musical - Robert Rankin
Consider Plebas - Mr M Banks

As they were the 1st I read by those authors...

[scooterman]

Respect to Deep. I tend to reread all my old favourites many times and seldom buy/ try anything new; I'm the same with music

[Deep Black]

I rarely feel the need to reread stuff, I often think that I'd like to but there's just so much out there to get through

[jag]

Julian Copes' 'Head-on' and 'Repossessed' are essential reading. Trainspotting is always good for a quick dabble and of course WoG.

[edash]

there's just so much out there to get through

I know the feeling. I've over 100 books here I haven't read yet.

[rac]

I know the feeling. I've over 100 books here I haven't read yet.

I'm not quite that bad, but I've quite a number on the pending pile... and with Christmas almost here, that means we can be certain a few more will be added.

[disrepdog]

I really do struggle to pick a fav book of all time. Up there are His Dark Materials, Hounds of Avalon by Mark Chadbourn (well actually all the books in all three linked trilogies) The Raven series by James Barclay, Crow Road and Matter (I need to read some more Culture books for a definitive answer on that though), The Abhorsen Trilogy by Garth Nix (the disreputable dog is one of my all time fav characters hence my user id).

And Emma by Jane Austin :o

*ducks under table to avoid hurled objects*

[RedKing]

I know the feeling. I've over 100 books here I haven't read yet.

Psst, Ed, leave the Library and go home... :D

[Deep Black]

I've got maybe 50 or so on the shelf still to read & I can't resist picking up more from charity shops /ebay etc...

[rac]

I had a quick look last night. While brushing my teeth, I could see out into the hallway, where we have bookshelves running the length of the corridor, and in the section I could see, I counted 21 books still to be read... extrapolationg this out over the entire house I guess I'm over thw 100 mark too!
Scary...

[dawnmp]

All time faves include: Feersum Endjin, Excession, Steep Approach to Garbadale - noticing a theme here?

Oh yes, and Emma, too (is there room under that table?)

[Champagne Socialist]

Recently I received just over 1200 e-books by around 40 different authors, most of which I haven't read, as a present to go along with my shiny new iPhone.

1200... all I need now is a dessert island... and solar charger.

[Deep Black]

What's that like to read on?

& welcome Dawn

[GSVdoubtfulheritage]

Faves are so hard. Can you really remember all the good 'uns read years ago? I remember really enjoying Arthur C Clarke and going on a binge until I had exhausted our library. Across the Sea of Suns.
And the Dune books, I loved the scale of Dune, especially the last one Chapterhouse Dune.
Recently have been enjoying Peter F Hamilton ( except for the end of the Nightdawn trilogy ).
Thoroughly enjoyed Protector by Larry Niven.

We do tend to pick favorites from recent reading and forget the oldies but goodies.

[armchairanarchist]

...
Recently have been enjoying Peter F Hamilton ( except for the end of the Nightdawn trilogy ).

One of the most common caveats in modern sf. He really wrote himself into a corner with that one.

[Deep Black]

Only read The Reality Dysfunction so far (& enjoyed it). I have the 2nd Nights Dawn & the 1st two Commonwelth on the Shelf too.

[Deep Black]

I know the feeling. I've over 100 books here I haven't read yet.
Just had a count up on the shelves & I've got 96 unread books to get through
:eek:

[Chiaroscuro]

Just had a count up on the shelves & I've got 96 unread books to get through
:eek:

Busy weekend ahead, then. ;)

I've got quite few unread ones too. A friend said to me recently sometimes a book that's been sitting on the shelf for ages just seems to put itself forward, almost as if they've got a right time to be read. :)

[edash]

I've ones here that have been waiting to be read for over 5 years. I really should try and clear some of them, but then new ones come along which I want to read even more.

[ROU Read After Burning]

A couple of favourites of mine would be 'The Third Policeman' by Flann O'Brien and 'Suttree' by Cormac McCarthy.

'The Road' by McCarthy's excellent too, I nearly didn't want to read right to the end having read his other work...

[Champagne Socialist]

What's that like to read on?

& welcome Dawn

screens a bit smaller than ideal, but otherwise it's quite comfortable.

light grey text on black screen is nice.

[Deep Black]

Cool, would love to get one some day


'The Third Policeman' by Flann O'Brien
Awsome novel. Have you read his others?
"At Swim Two Birds" is pretty insane.

If you like Flann O'Brien have you ever tried Robert Rankin?

[198505]

Mine would be Star Warts by Patrick Tilley, it's about a guy that walks up one morning in Catford London and ends the day dining at a taverna on another world, in fact one in a ring around twin suns called Bill and Ben (their names are longer than that and mean the bright one on the left, and the other bright one in Atlantian) and his adventures there.

Other than that I'd had to say the Moist Von Lipwig books by Terry Pratchett and Against a Dark Background

[ROU Read After Burning]

Awsome novel. Have you read his others?
"At Swim Two Birds" is pretty insane.

If you like Flann O'Brien have you ever tried Robert Rankin?

Yes, love 'At Swim Two Birds' as well, I found it slightly tough reading at times though.

Funny enough a work colleague's after lending me 'Armageddon - The Musical', I'll dip into it after polishing off 'A Confederacy of Dunces' by John Kennedy O'Toole - good book too if you haven't come across it.

[Deep Black]

Funnily enough Armageddon - The Musical was the 1st RR novel I read too, still one of my favorites. I've now read all 30 of his novels. Along with Mr Banks, Robert in one of my top authours.

Random fact: Apparently Robert & Iain once had an argument

[sofa]

Too hard to pick favs, Against a Dark Background, Wasp factory stick out by mr Banks.
Orcs by Stan Nicholls was fun. The Night Watch trilogy by Sergei Lukyanenko, anything by Terry Pratchett. Oh Lordy just too many.. Ask me next week and it'll be a different list.

I will say that the best biography is Unforgivable Blackness the rise and fall of jack Johnston, by Geoffrey C. Ward.

[Hilarity Unit]

Very difficult this one mainly because (stand by for astonishing revelation) books aren't like films or music. You can't just view/listen to them again and again, especially as when you have 96 unread books on your self.

I've re-read most of TMH's M books plus a handful others, but I have yet to read a book 3 times. So you have either to choose from the handful of books you have read more than once or rely on first impression. And one thing re-reads have taught me is that first impressions (wrt books) aren't that reliable.

For instance I read most of John le Carré's books following the showing of BBC's Tinker Taylor Soldier Spy series in the early 80s. The best of the lot was The Honourable Schoolboy and I rated it as one of the best books I had read up till then (well I was in my early 20s at the time). About 5 year ago I read The Russia House and was appalled by how badly written it was.

So, best fave all time book - sorry it will have to be a list: Excession, Use Of Weapons, Player Of Games, Waterland (Graham Swift), The Child In Time (Ian McEwan).

[Hagbard Celine]

Would you be surprised if I said The Illuminatus Trilogy?
But hey, that book is a trip and I love tripping.

[RedKing]

I've read and re-read lots of books more than 3 times - some of the things I read as a youngster, The Weirdstone of Brisingamen, Earthsea Trilogy, Foundation Trilogy etc., have been read a dozen or more times, easily.

I have read the Sprawl stories of William Gibson (Neuromancer / Count Zero / Mona Lisa Overdrive) a lot too, as I used them for a lot of RPG'ing stuff. Dune was a book that was read and re-read a lot, but it's been a long time since I picked it up. Perhaps it's time again...