Sunday, July 17, 2011

Book recommendations part 1

A good book recommendation is a great gift. There are so many bad books out there. Here are some of my favorite authors and books:

Neal Stephenson is one of my favorite authors. He is revered by SF fans but is much more than that, more of a historian with a science bent. A quick read (very much SF) is Snow Crash. Cryptonomicon is an absolute masterpiece. I've not been able to get through his later very dense three-part novels. Not sure if his newest, Anathem, is good either.

Mystery/crime novels, not serious reading: anything by Michael Connelly. Start with The Poet, and you may likely want to read the rest of his books.

Voyage of the Narwhal by Andrea Barret: History of the Franklin expedition but actually interesting.

Anything by Michael Lewis (Moneyball) or Malcolm Gladwell (Outliers). They write nonfiction about things that you would normally take for granted or not think about.

I like the books that I’ve read by Cormac McCarthy: All the Pretty Horses, The Road, and No Country for Old Men (which the movie follows very closely).


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