Listen Fat, President Trump makes me want to be a better man.
Naysayers may laugh, but it's how I feel in my heart.
He makes me want to work harder. Learn more. Become stronger. Expand my talents. Think Big. Fight. Not waste my time. Never give up. Become great and leave a legacy.
I got to thinking, during this time of quarantine when many of us have extra time, rather than fritter it away, like doing Meth with male hookers in hotel rooms, reach out to my caterpillars here on .win to tap into this infinite well of knowledge for things we can be doing to MAGA by Making Ourselves Great Again, because after all, what is America? It's not the magic dirt. It's us.
Suggestions for personal, spiritual, family, health, career, education, leisure, and any others are welcome. We may never become as great as Donald Trump, few ever have or will, but let us die trying.
This Tender Land, William Kent Krueger. Best book I've read this year.
Bernard Cornwell, The Archer's Tale. I've read all of his, but this was probably my favorite series. It was called Harlequin in the UK, I think.
Dan Simmons, Hyperion. Like Snow Crash, it's a sci fi classic. It didn't start a genre, but similar to Gibson and Ian m. Banks, I think it's prescient. Also, did you know that Elon Musk likes to name his space craft and recovery vehicles in the manner of Bank's Culture ships.
Much of Martin Cruz Smith's stuff is beautifully written. I wrote about ten thousand words on something one day, then read a bit of Polar Star that night and wanted to cry because his writing seemed so effortless.
An off the wall suggestion for you is Lawrence Block. When The Sacred Ginmill Closes, A Walk Among the Tombstones, all of the early Scudder books are gritty and real, and his Bernie Rodenbarr books are fun and light cozy mysteries in the style of Christie but more fun and less murder.
Enjoy, I'm going to check out Gogol and Diana Wynne Jones from you list, as I haven't read them.
i love these reccs, all of these are getting hunted down and read, hyperion first. yuuuuge TY!!
My pleasure. Hyperion is one of my top three favorite Sci Fi books. Along with Speaker For the Dead and Peter F. Hamilton's Reality Dysfunction. I'm kind of into sentient ships.
i don't mind them... for me, I am looking for good style and command of the written word. I appreciate simplicity and pared down, because it takes a lot more skill than bloviating like Ayn Rand. I like when the humor comes through the way the author intended it to. Which is why Snow Crash is possibly the greatest book ever. There is NO humor in the actual narrative text, but the scenes are hilarious. Nice juxtaposition. I also go for long absorbing sophisticated text, but not for its own sake which is why Rand, Anne Rice, and Charles Dickens annoy me. I think Bronte and Ralph Waldo Emmerson are good examples of wordy stuff that's still fun to read. There has to be some meat on the bones, you know.
This is what's so great about Russian authors, its a long, meandering, immersive tale, but just like a movie, no scene or interaction is without essential meaning somehow. Its pared down, but not so much that it rushes you along. Theyre so good at that, its amazing. When you read them, you are not rushing through, or slogging through.
That tends to be why I lean toward sci fi, its nearly all meat, and its just a matter of pacing. thats why I thought LOTR was just good but not great... the pacing was not to my liking. Also, I know he did his darndest to be descriptive, but it wasn't his forte. If Anne Rice had written his descriptive passages, it would have been a masterpiece on a whole other level.
I particularly enjoy good vampire novels, and good cyberpunk.