What are your favourite books of all time? [View all]
Despite my love for good writing it's a sad truth that I have read a pitifully small amount in my life to date. Having said that I have made sure to touch on a few of the classics and have amassed a short list of beloved books over the years. Here's my list, what's yours?
100 Years of Solitude
Gabriel García Márquez
-This book blew my mind and left be stunned for days. I fear going back to reread lest it should let my memory of it down.
Under the Volcano
Malcolm Lowry
-Lowry's devastating account of the decent of a man into alcoholic oblivion. Such stunning writing! My father urged me to read this and now it's one of my favs.
Moby Dick
Herman Melville
-What can I say that hasn't been said about this already? That chapter, "The whiteness of the whale" !!
The Grapes of Wrath
John Steinbeck
-I find some of the rest of Steinbeck to be too sentimental but how can you not fall in love with this masterpiece?
The Heart of Darkness
Joseph Conrad
-My grade 12 English teacher actually gave this to me and another student as a project because he could see I was reading beyond my grade level. I need to get back to it as I don't remember a lot of it. But I remember enough to secure it's place here.
Middlesex
Jeffrey Eugenides
-I've yet to read anyone that manages to write with such care and love for their own characters. Such a romantic and heart breaking read!
Faces in the Water
Janet Frame
-A university English prof got me hooked on Janet Frame. A more unique stylistic writer you will not find. Such creativity with words and phrases I have yet to see equaled (though like I said I've read pitifully little). This book recounts the authors years of mistaken institutionalization in the New Zealand of the 60s.
As you can see I have a love for great style. Story and even characters and plot are less important to me than a style that blows me away.
Can anyone recommend any authors for me based on the above?
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