20 Books I Would Recommend Reading, 5 Books I Wouldn't, and 50 from my Reading List
Ah, spring! Nice enough to get outside for reading on the porch, a hammock, or what-have-you. Time for another Books List post!
My likes/loves: These are books that entertained me, moved me, taught me things, made me think, inspired me, and that I would heartily recommend. They are not ranked – they are merely in the order in which I read them.
Stolen Lives: 20 Years in a Desert Jail – Malika Oufkir
Affluenza – John de Graaf, David Wann, Thomas Naylor
YOU: The Owner's Manual – Dr. Mark Roizen and Dr. Mehmet Oz
Shotgun Alley – Andrew Klavan
Damnation Street – Andrew Klavan
The Da Vinci Code – Dan Brown
The Consumers' Guide to Effective Environmental Choices- Michael Brower and Warren Leon
The Clan of the Cave Bear – Jean Auel
The Kite Runner – Khaled Hosseini
Widdershins – Charles de Lint
Anansi Boys – Neil Gaiman
Phobias and How to Overcome Them – Gardner and Bell
The Dress Lodger – Sheri Holman
Howard's End – E.M. Forster
London Bridges – James Patterson
Beach Road – James Patterson and Peter de Jonge
Judge and Jury – James Patterson
Someplace to Be Flying – Charles de Lint
Right, Wrong, and Risky – Mark Davidson
Forests of the Heart – Charles de Lint
My meh/yuck list: Did not find these appealing for any number of reasons – some were boring; some had an interesting subject but did not do it justice; some were flat-out terrible. All simply left me cold in some way. Although I am likely to read multiple books by authors I like (you will see a lot of Dean Koontz, Jonathan Kellerman, Margaret Atwood, Charles de Lint and Toni Morrison), I do not excuse those authors when they write a book I didn't like, so they might just show up here, as well.
Everything Bad is Good for You – Steven Johnson
Cell – Stephen King
Lisey's Story – Stephen King
Silent Partner – Stephen Frey
The Deep End of the Ocean – Jacquelyn Mitchard
My Reading List: these are books I haven't read yet, so I don't have a reaction for you. However, I could semi-recommend them, based on the reasons they made it onto my list:
They were on one of those “100 Greatest Books” lists;
They are other books written by authors I really enjoy; or
I read a review, and it sounded like something I'd like.
#1 can be a bit hit-or-miss; #2 is almost (but not always) foolproof for me (but maybe not for you), and #3 usually works out pretty well, as it's a combination of the first two. As always, your results may vary, but consider them suggestions. These may tend to come in chunks of stuff by author (apologies).
Evil – Lance Morrow
Moon Pies and Movie Stars – Amy Wallen
The Untouchable – John Banville
Killing Time – Linda Howard
Hypocrite in a Pouffy White Dress – Susan Jane Gilman
Sick Puppy – Carl Hiaasen
The Painted Veil – W. Somerset Maugham
Wicked: The Life and Times of The Wicked Witch of the West - Gregory Maquire
Never Have Your Dog Stuffed – Alan Alda
The Devil of Nanking – Mo Hayder
Gods in Alabama – Joshilyn Jackson
Early Bird – Rodney Rothman
A Long Way Down – Nick Hornby
Soapsuds – Finola Hughes and Digby Diehl
You Shall Know Our Velocity – Dave Eggers
The Adventures of Augie March – Saul Bellow
American Pastoral – Philip Roth
Apointment in Samarra – John O'Hara
Loving – Henry Green
Lucky Jim – Kingsley Amis
Money – Martin Amis
The Assistant – Bernard Malamud
At Swim-Two-Birds – Flann O'Brien
The Berlin Stories – Christopher Isherwood
The Big Sleep – Raymond Chandler
The Blind Assassin – Margaret Atwood
Blood Meridian – Cormac McCarthy
The Bridge of San Luis Rey – Thornton Wilder
The Movie Goer – Walker Percy
Never Let Me Go – Kazuo Ishiguro
The Painted Bird – Jerzy Kosinski
A House for Mr. Biswas – V.S. Naipaul
I, Claudius – Robert Graves
Infinite Jest – David Foster Wallace
Ubik – Philip K. Dick
Undre the Net – Iris Murdoch
Under the Volcano – Malcolm Lowry
Watchmen – Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons
White Noise – Dan DeLillo
White Teeth – Zadie Smith
Wide Sargasso Sea – Jean Rhys
Call It Sleep – Henry Roth
Pale Fire – Vladimir Nabokov
Play It as It Lays – Joan Didion
A Passage to India – E.M. Forster
Portnoy's Complaint – Philip Roth
The Confessions of Nat Turner – William Styron
The Corrections – Jonathan Frantzen
The Crying of Lot 49 – Thomas Pynchon
A Dance to the Music of Time – Anthony Powell
That's all for now; hope you find these lists useful as you think about things you might like to read.
In case you missed the prior lists, here and the handy links:
https://bucketofuseful.blogspot.com/2020/03/the-books-list-part-one.html
https://bucketofuseful.blogspot.com/2020/04/the-books-list-part-two.html
https://bucketofuseful.blogspot.com/2020/05/the-books-list-part-three.html
https://bucketofuseful.blogspot.com/2020/05/the-books-list-part-four.html
https://bucketofuseful.blogspot.com/2020/09/the-books-list-part-five.html
https://bucketofuseful.blogspot.com/2020/11/the-books-list-part-six.html
