*DAMN R6 Forum

I'm tired. Up late working on an adaption from a Harlan Coben novel for the production company I work for, and I was wondering: what's everyone's favorite authors?

A few of mine, in no order, are:

Harry Turtledove (Guns of the South, and hordes of alt history)
Kim Stanley Robinson (Red Mars, Green Mars, Blue Mars)
Frank Herbery (Dune)
Charles Dickens (duh)

Hehe, so Sci-fi eh? Not my thing, but:

Terry Pratchet(discworld)
Robin Hobb(farseer trilogy, tawny man trilogy)
Raymond Feist(a lot about Pug ;))

Good authors I can reccomend.
(That is if you are into fantasy)

Stephen King, Tom Clancy, Bill Brewster & Frank Broughton

Phillip Pullman (His Dark Materials Trillogy) is one of the best writers around. His dark materials trilogy is simply stunning, and does the amazing feat of both being addictive to adults and children alike. Its pure story telling in a awsome form.

Ursula Le Guin is another stunnin authoer. Among others such as Terry Pratchet, Annie E Proulx, Ben Okri,  Rosamery Sutcliffe, and Terry pratchet.

     Heh, now this is a topic I can sink my teeth into.

     I'm with Six on Kim Stanley Robinson and Frank Herbert. The Mars books are awe-inspiring, for the hard science as well as their scope and believability. The Dune series is hardly science fiction at all; other than being set in the distant future, there are scarcely any traditional science fiction trappings. Herbert wields dialogue masterfully. When I finish a Dune book, for weeks afterwards I have a heightened awareness of and grasp of the meanings within meanings of everything people say.

Robert A. Heinlein (Stranger in a Strange Land, The Moon is a Harsh Mistress)
John Varley (Persistence of Vision, Steel Beach, Demon, Millenium)
Isaac Asimov (walk into a library and point)
Ray Bradbury (The Machineries of Joy, I Sing the Body Electric, The Illustrated Man)
Esther Friesner (Gnome Man's Land, Harpy High, Unicorn U)
Robert L. Forward (Dragon's Egg, The Flight of the Dragonfly, Camelot 30K)
Larry Niven (Ringworld series, Known Space series, and a slew of others, all good)
Jhonen Vasquez (Johnny the Homicidal Maniac)
Terry Pratchett (Discworld series)
Neil Gaiman (Good Omens)
Mark Twain (A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, The Mysterious Stranger, Captain Stormfield's Visit to Heaven, anything else he's written)
Simon Singh (The Code Book)
Neal Stephenson (Snow Crash, Cryptonomicon, Zodiac)
J. R. R. Tolkien (as though I need to say it)
Hayao Miyazaki (Nausica? of the Valley of Wind)
Carl Sagan (Contact)
Poul Anderson (Polesotechnic League series)
Barbara Hambly (The Silent Tower, The Silicon Mage, Darwath trilogy)
Harlan Ellison (Angry Candy, many others)
Melanie Rawn (Dragon Prince trilogy, Dragon Star trilogy)
Jorge Luis Borges ("Tl?n, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius")

     That's all I can think of without going through my books to remind me of others.

Hey.....reading the list and I see you fail to mention Terry Pratchett as the co-author of good omens. And btw, did I mention Terry Pratchett in my list of great authors? Well...I would like to say that Terry Pratchett is a great writer.


:MoD: brutha......

a.k.a. BROTHER BRUTHA

     Yeah, I actually left out several co-authors, in the interest of focusing on one favorite and keeping the list as clear as possible. Also, in most cases I couldn't remember the co-author's name. : D

Good omens is sitting on my shelf and tells me it was written by Neil Gaiman and terry pratchet. And its a bloody good book ( i love the two angels!)

Dale Brown, Tom Clancy, Clive Cussler, John Grisham, Jeffrey Archer, and Robert Ludlum.

You had to be a Ludlum fan, I would have won money from that bet GS.

Fan of many mentioned like Clancy, Heiniein, and Herbert.  Also a big fan of the Sharp's series by Bernard Cromwell (good if you are into the Napoleoniac wars at all).  Joel Roesnburg's "Not for Glory" and "Hero" for some futuristic military stuff (if you are an anti-semite, don't bother reading him).  Stephen Coonts has a couple follow ups to flight of the intruder that were pretty good.  Yes, I read Ludlum too, and his first books were very good.

I forgot one, don't know if you'll count this as its more playright than aughter but... if there are any Shakespear fans out there (if not why not!) and you havn't heard of Tom Stoppard then go and find a copy of "rosencrantz and guildenstien are dead" - The alternative version to Hamlet... Its is simply brilliant - and the film version ain't half bad as well!

(the bits with the discoveries... physics, gravity, the burger etc.lol!)

Yep, I'm a big fan of Shakespear's plays.

I'm also a big fan of Dumas.  The Count of Monte Cristo is a great book.  And like most great books, if you think the seeing the movie was even close, you have no grip on reality.  :D

Speaking of classics, if you haven't read Twain, I also suggest him.  He was a great storyteller.

Michael Crichton (Congo, Jurassic Parc, The lost world, Timeline, ...)
J.R.R. Tolkien (Lords of the rings, Silmarillion, ...)

The count of Monte Cristo.... cor. yes definatly. I can happily say i have never seen the film, however i did see a pretty fantastic TV feature series which i must say was very well done.

I'd have to disagree with J.R.R Tolkien.. People might shout at me but i don't think the book is actually that well written - i love the idea and the concepts of the story, but so mcuh of it can be found in other material, and actually the way Tolkien writes can be so bloody longwinded and frustrating.. I've found a lot of people just pick this now becasue of the film (not saying you did sent) and regarding the Trillogy of films i think it is another matter - the story telling is so much better and the films are simply fantastic! (although i would debate the quality of the ending!)

For Tolkien, what makes him great is that yes, with all that detail he laid the groundwork for most other works in the genre.  He pretty much invented the genre.

Face it, books like the Shanara series are nothing but copies of the Lord of the Rings.  And most authors will say that he was part of their inspiration.

And after all that, yeah, he's a great author, but I don't enjoy reading him as much as most.  He reminded me of Moby Dick or even Ivanhoe, two great stories, but overwritten for my personal taste.

Tom Clancy - Hunt for Red October, Clear and Present Danger, The Bear and the  Dragon, Without Remorse

Clive Cussler - Atlantis Found,  Valhala Rising

Phillip Pullman - His Dark Materials Trilogy (The Golden Compass, The Subtle Knife, The Amber Spyglass)

J.R.R Tolkien - The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings Trilogy

Jon Krakauer - Into Thin Air

I know there are more authors I just can't think of them so ill post again later when i remember.

     Heh, I've tried reading Lord of the Rings about ten times over my life, and I never enjoyed it the least little bit until this most recent attempt. This time, I'm enjoying the style of speech he gives his characters and his mode of description. It's a bit of work to read, but I do like reading people actually using the language, which modern speech patterns do not.

     Mark Twain and Harlan Ellison are my heroes. They are both highly intelligent and overflowing with sarcasm and cynicism. There was a collection of Twain's stories that he instructed his executor to publish posthumously, but the executor considered them so inflammatory that he went against Twain's wishes. The stories were finally published in the late 1970s(!) in an anthology titled "Letters from the Earth". It's easily my favorite of his writings, and worth a look if you're not a militant right-wing conservative religious zealot.

a.k.a GhostSniper

     Yes, thank you, O master of subtle wit.

Tom Clancy- First book of his I read was, obviously, Rainbow Six. Then I went on to the opcenter series, then Without Remorse, then NetForce series, then Red storm rising, then debt of honor. Overall fav author.

Clancy, Grisham, King, and Sparknotes... I, uh... mean... Shakespear...  :o

 ;)

... Um i believe the "His Dark Materials" was actually the follwoign:

1. Northen Lights
2. The Subtle Knife
3. The Amber Spyglass

Not sure where the golden compass came from? is this one of his other books ive not heard off?

Hunter S Thomson (Fear & loathing, Hells Angels, Songs of the doomed)
Chuck Palahuniuk (Lullaby, Invisible monsters, Fight Club)
Stephen Fry  (UK) (The stars tennisballs, Making History, The Hippopotamus)
Sue Townsend (UK) (the complete Adrian Mole series)

True bliss comes in pages (the more the merrier)

J.R.R. Tolkien - LOTR 123, hobbit (gotta love the language, unlike any kind of english one might encounter in daily life)
Alastair Reynolds - Redemption Ark, Absolution Gap (quite long-winded, but that suits me)
Tom Clancy - from the hunt for red october to op-center, every single one
Stephen King - too many, but Salem's lot and Nightmares & Dreamscapes among others
Roald Dahl - such innocent books as "the BFG" but also "switch bitch"
Clive Barker - The Great And Secret Show

misc:
John Grisham
Dean Koontz
Thea Beckman (dutch, you dont know her)
Ronald Giphart (dutch, you dont know him)
might edit post to add more

Ahh yes, Dahl... and the BFG... a personal favorite ;)

Vladimir Nabokov (Pnin, Lolita, Pale Fire)
Fyodor Dostoevsky (Crime and Punishment, The Brothers Karazmov)
Ayn Rand (Atlas Shrugged, The Fountainhead)
Milan Kundera (The Unbearable Lightness of Being, Slowness)
Oscar Wilde (The Picture of Dorian Gray)
Colin Higgins (Harold and Maude)
Italo Calvino (The Baron in the Trees)

and oodles more, im sure. it's so hard to think of these things on the spot  :)

Camus, Dostoevsky, Irving, Updike, Foster Wallace, Pynchon

AAAAAH HOW THE FUCK DID I FORGET CAMUS?!!

the plague & the stranger are two of my most favorite books.

oh tasty how i love thee

<3

so when are you coming to visit Grinnell cookeh?

I am a huge fan of Micheal Chriton. For those of you who dont know he wrote ;jurrasic park..sphere..rising sun..and more recently timeline.. and those were just his books that were made into movies.

He really grabs you when reading. good stuff.

as soon as i come back to america. promise.  ;D

Alastair Reynolds is a must for sci-fi lovers! He is a new author, but his books will be called classics very soon. They are just that great. If you haven't yet, go and read "Revelation Space" so you can say "I read Reynolds when he was still underground" :P :P :P

Damn, was going to go out and saw this thread and had to put my $far too many's worth here.

From reading Loth's list it looks like we have similar tastes....

You could use his list and add:

Gregory Benford - COSM
Greg Bear - Slant, Darwin's Radio, Distress, Eon, Anvil of the Stars
Larry Bond - Vortex, Moonseed
Peter Hamilton - Reality Dysfunction and the other two in that series, Fallen Dragon (excellent) and I liked the concept of Nano Flower and Mindstar Rising
Iain M Banks - Use of Weapons, Against a Dark Background, The Business
David Brin - most of his stuff
Patric Robinson - HMS Unseen, Kilo Class (a good alternative to Clancy)
Phillip K Dick - Do Androids Dream of Electirc Sheep?, A Scanner Darkly, Now Wait For Last Year
Douglas Adams - The first 3 books of Hitchikers series
Julian May - the Plocene and Milieu series
Greg Egan - Quarantine, Axiomatic, Permutation City, Diaspora, He is a great new author with some interesting new concepts
Adam Roberts - Salt
Orson Scott Card - the Ender series

From times past:
Michael Morecock - Everything he wrote Particularly the Eternal Champion Series
Piers Anthony - Loved his stuff when I read it
Anne McCaffery
Stephen Donnaldson

My comment about books is that you know you have too many when you need to move house to house them. (Around 2000 and still adding)

<edit>

In my hurry I forgot the following:

Tad Williams
Dale Brown
Stephen Coonts

A good read for something different is John Steakley - Armor

And how could I forget Sun Tsu - The Ancient Art of War (but you have to get a good translation)
((a good online translation can be found at http://www.newstrolls.com/news/dev/kilner/sun_tsu/gilesbare/Outer.html)

     D'oh, I totally forgot Brin, Dick, Adams, and Card (sounds like a legal firm). Thanks for the reminder, Dingo. : D