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I'm looking for some book recommendations, and would like to hear some thoughts from the community. What is one book that you could not put down until it was finished? Not because it was short or you had an assignment due, but because you were genuinely enthralled from the beginning. I'll accept any genre, provided you give a short description and what in particular about it made it so engaging (without giving too much away, please!).

I'll start-

Piranesi by Susanna Clarke
This one is hard to explain without spoiling the entire story. It's the kind of book I recommend going in blind. The basic starting plot is that there's a guy trapped in an unending labyrinth without any memory of who he is or how he got there. The prose is interesting from the start, and the wordplay used throughout is very imaginative. It's pacing was perfect. This was one of those few books where I had to focus on not jumping forward and reading ahead because it had me on the edge of my seat the whole time. Its main genre was fantasy/mystery and delved a little into thriller at the end. It's one of my highly recommended. :)

The Haunting of Hill House buy Shirley Jackson.

Read it for Spooky Month and I've be trying to get someone else to check it out too. It's pretty much the peak of haunted house fiction and was a big inspiration for The Shining. Intense psychological horror combined with a fantastic character study, and a famous opening paragraph that gets quoted often for how well it sets the tone.

There's a thread where it was discussed a bit more, but it's not an especially long book and you cold plow through it minus any spoilers in a weekend if you didn't have much else going on.

That one's actually been at the top of my to-read list for a while! I actually remember you mentioning it and wanting to comment on it, then realizing that I... still hadn't read it. ':D I'll certainly have to check it out. The mention of an 'intense character study' gives me tingles.

Interview with the Vampire by Anne Rice.

Its' description of setting and 19th century culture is so detailed and historically accurate there's actually a fan theory that Anne herself is a vampire who lived in those times. It also brings up several interesting points about mortality, and the conflict between Lestat and Louis is engaging, yet believable and a good example of a toxic relationship. The interaction between Louis and Claudia is... well. A bit disturbing, even for me. But overall well worth the read.

I actually prefer the sequel, The Vampire Lestat. But you gotta start with the original to fully appreciate the sequel.

You want me to read about GAY VAMPIRES?! I just read The Talented Mr. Ripley, I can't handle anymore murderous European homosexuals. :(

I mean, it's still a better story than Twilight. And when I say relationship between Louis and Lestat, I don't mean romantically or homosexual. Although considering the two that Louis and Lestat actually are attracted to, I kinda wish they were just to avoid those particular arcs.

When making this list, I realized most of the stories that gripped me had the same three features:

1) Humorous & distinct first person narration
2) A very high-stakes and tense plot
3) Complex and creative worldbuilding that the plot hinges on

Namely:
- Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir. Fantastic book, consider this my chief recommendation. I read it all in a day or two. One section in the middle has the most tense sequence I have ever read in a book. The Martian (same author) is similar.
- The Harry Dresden books by Jim Butcher (the first four, at least, I haven't read the rest.) I pretty much have to finish these in one sitting.
- Eternal, I read most of the paragon branch in one sitting.
- The scholomance series by Naomi Novik.

I also tore through the foundation series by Aasimov, but I would not describe those books as gripping, they just happened to appeal to me.

Ah, I did have the thought to read Project Hail Mary because I planned on seeing the upcoming movie. I'll have to put it at the top of my list so I can read it in time. I know a friend had similar feelings about the middle. :)

Seconding Project Hail Mary and The Martian

If you like Piranesi, House of Leaves is an obvious one. 

I recently really dug Hollow by Brian Catling, fucked up historical fantasy horror novel about Hieronymous Bosch paintings coming to life 

The poor thing has been sitting on my shelf for over a year. I'm not sure why I've never gotten to it, especially considering how much I love ergodic literature (17776 ha). I'm sure the combination of general laziness and unwillingness to start a new book is to blame. :/

Hollow also sounds just about right up my alley. I'll have to add it to the list. 

 

Malk, have you read Between 2 fires?

I think you'd really love that one! I haven't read Hollow, but if you enjoy historical grimdark fantasy horror, Between 2 fires is absolutely awesome. It's about this disgraced knight who lost his holdings because his wife's lover usurped his title, and he goes on this quest with this prophetic little girl who's like possessed by an angel or something. She's trying to get to Avignon because she wants to see the Pope. While this journey is going on, it's the Black Death, and so there's a bunch of gnarly scenes, and there's also demons roaming Earth. They go on this journey, and I won't spoil what happens but it's pretty awesome. If you haven't read it , check it out when you get a chance!

Yeah, that's been on my list a while. My girlfriend also recommended I check it out, so it seems that one will be next. 

House of Leaves is definitely a book I COULD put down, though. Great read, but that middle section is not exactly a page-turner.

Seconding this, excellent book

That sounds really cool! Adding it to the list!

I shall add it to my list! 

Lonesome Dove!

It's an epic western surrounding 2 retired rangers who take their cattle outfit from Texas to Montana along with their hired hands.

What makes it so good is the depth of characterization, and just the way that Larry McMurtry writes his characters with so much empathy and humanity. We get to see the characters' inner struggles, and even some of the most minor characters have really interesting traits that you can't help but really like.

Gus and Call are obviously the characters the narrative revolves around, but McMurtry manages to not do his side characters dirty.

I feel like Lonesome Dove is an epic in every sense of the word because of the scale of the journey the characters go on, and the hardships they experience. People die, and sometimes a bit too quickly for my liking.

And there's inner struggles like Call's being divided between sticking to his image as the stoic honorable man who keeps his word and does the difficult things, and being a fundamentally flawed human being who is dishonest about something that's so important, it trumps almost everything else. And Gus, a man who tries to live in the moment, find joy and pleasure in every day, but who's haunted by his past and wants to go back to Nebraska to reunite with an old love.

And this is all happening during snake attacks, Indian raids, heavy storms and basically any kind of Oregon Trail mishap you can think of.

I just fell in love with the world and I couldn't stop reading once I picked it up. The beginning is rough, but I still enjoyed it, and once you go on the first raid to Mexico with Jake Spoon, and eventually leave Lonesome Dove for good, the story picks up significantly

I've never read a western before... 

this shall be my first! :D

I have a lot of book recommendations, so I'll try to organize them as best I can.

Note: The Physical vs Audio Books sections are purely based on how I found them. There are probably audiobooks of the physical books, and vice versa. I'll bold one or two in each section that I liked the most.

 

1. Fantasy
   1. Physical Books
      1. Thud! by Terry Pratchett
      2. The Inheritance Cycle (I have almost all of Christopher Paolini's books)
      3. The Bone comic books (I have all of these in one book, and read them in two days)
      4. The Rift War Saga
      5. The Kingkiller series (Really wish the third book was released) 
      6. Robinson Crusoe (Not certain if this is considered Fantasy, but I don't think it's Sci-Fi either)
      7. The entire Mistborn series. (I listened to them all first, but I'm now going through the physical versions.)
   2. Audiobooks
      1. The Cradle series (With twelve books, it's a long series. I think there are some physical copies of them out there somewhere.)
      2. Beware of Chicken (Great slice-of-life series, currently on the fourth book.)
      3. The Wandering Inn (Another Great slice-of-life series)
      4. Heretical Fishing (Slice-of-life, again. Somewhat similar to Beware of Chicken) 
      5. Reborn as a Demonic Tree (Despite how boring it might sound, it's surprisingly good. It's kinda like a Slice-of-life book, but sometimes it isn't.)
2. Sci-Fi
   1. Physical Books
      1. The entire Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series (I also have the entire thing in one massive volume)
      2. Scythe (Only read the first book so far, but I'm getting the second one here soon. Also not certain of the genre of this one, but Sci-Fi feels closer than Fantasy)
      3. The Martian (One of the more "realistic" Sci-Fi series)
   2. Audiobooks
      1. The Bobaverse series (They're a great sci-fi series that is slightly "realistic," though less so than The Martian. Imho, Heaven's River is the best of them all. The ones afterwards are good, but feel lacking compared to it.)
      2. Project Hail Mary

I might add more in later. Look at what you've done to me! I've wasted a solid half an hour adding in 2 5 6 more books by now! I knew I should have stayed away from this thread!

Total Books: 17

Alright, I think I'm going to tear myself away from here for now. Feel free to comment on this; I'll just create a new comment if I want to add more, lol.

I am very confused at Robinson Crusoe being discussed as "fantasy" or "sci fi", is this some kind of weird, completely different thing that used the same name and not the actual Robinson Crusoe?

I have no clue what genre it belongs to, and I didn't want to create an entire section just for it and possibly one other book, so I just put it in the one that fit it best, lol.

Lol okay. If a book written in 1719 that is set in the real world and contains no magic whatsoever counts as fantasy to you, then what doesn't I guess.

(I am actually glad to see you reading something good that doesn't contain wizards or space ships though.)

Well, I've now created a new section for it (& Scythe), and added even more books as well. I should probably stop adding to the list, but I keep on thinking of books that I liked but didn't add, lol.

I think you might end up really liking Gulliver's Travels too, which was written around the same time and actually does contain "realistic" fantasy societies. The protagonist is this very pragmatic "normal guy" who meets a society of tiny fairy-sized people, then giants, then a society dominated by enlightened talking horses. Basically written when the ocean was still the wondrous frontier that could contain any amount of weird shit for sailors to find, that later was the kind of thinking moved to outer space.

Oh yeah, I remember reading that! My family actually watched the movie (or was it a series?) based on it not too long ago.

Time to add another book to the list!

I have a lot of book recommendations, so I'll try to organize them as best I can.

 

(Note: The Physical vs Audio Books sections are purely based on how I found them. There are probably audiobooks of the physical books, and vice versa. I'll bold one or two in each section that I liked the most.)

(2nd Note: The three main sections are bassed off of feels. If you have a gripe with it, please comment under the old list and I'll consider moving it, or even creating an entierly new section.)

 

1. Fantasy
   1. Physical Books
      1. Thud! by Terry Pratchett
      2. The Inheritance Cycle (I have almost all of Christopher Paolini's books)
      3. The Bone comic books (I have all of these in one book, and read them in two days)
      4. The Rift War Saga
      5. The Kingkiller series (Really wish the third book was released) 
      6. The entire Mistborn series. (I listened to them all first, but I'm now going through the physical versions.)
   2. Audiobooks
      1. The Cradle series (With twelve books, it's a long series. I think there are some physical copies of them out there somewhere.)
      2. Beware of Chicken (Great slice-of-life series, currently on the fourth book.)
      3. The Wandering Inn (Another Great slice-of-life series)
      4. Heretical Fishing (Slice-of-life, again. Somewhat similar to Beware of Chicken) 
      5. Reborn as a Demonic Tree (Despite how boring it might sound, it's surprisingly good. It's kinda like a Slice-of-life book, but sometimes it isn't.)
2. Sci-Fi
   1. Physical Books
      1. The entire Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series (I also have the entire thing in one massive volume)
      2. The Martian (One of the more "realistic" Sci-Fi series)
   2. Audiobooks
      1. The Bobaverse series (They're a great sci-fi series that is slightly "realistic," though less so than The Martian. Imho, Heaven's River is the best of them all. The ones afterwards are good, but feel lacking compared to it.)
      2. Project Hail Mary
3. Books with genres that don't really fit into either of the previous categories:
   1. Robinson Crusoe (The main reason this section is even here)
   2. Scythe (Only read the first book so far, but I'm getting the second one here soon.)
   3. Immune: A Journey into the Mysterious System that Keeps You Alive. (Written by Philipp Dettmer, the creator of Kurzgesagt: In A Nutshell. I've read this thing at least four times. (Maybe even more, lol.) )
   4. The Seven Habits of Highly Productive Teens
   5. The Dictionary (Yes, I really did read the entire dictionary once; I was bored, okay?)
   6. The Thesaurus. (Yes, it was the same day as the dictionary. Yes, I was extremely bored. Yes, I'm a nerd/geek.)
   7. Gulliver's Travels

Look at what you've done to me! I've wasted who knows how long adding in 2 5 6 7 10 11 more books by now! I knew I should have stayed away from this thread!

Total Books: 22 (For now...)

Please don't comment on this! I want to be able to update this without adding a new text wall to this thread each time.

Kingkiller series is mid and I am very confident that if Doors of Stone is ever released, it will be a flaccid wet chode of a book. The books were somewhat entertaining but massively overhyped. Rothfuss spent way too much time jerking off on his gay little magic system for my taste

Okay, this has to be addressed.

You seem to read a lot of fantasy, UD, and you seem to have specifically set out to list your favorite fantasy here.

How is it then, that the Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings trilogy is nowhere on her e? Was this a grevious, terrible mistake, or shall I just proceed with losing all respect for any opinion you have on anything? Because this seems pretty glaring when you just went and listed the dictionary as one of your favorite books of all time that you just "could not put down."

No more list updates for you, you need to be locked up.

1. This is not meant to be a comprehinsive list
2. I put the dictionary down multiple times, I just returned to it multiple times due to having nothing better to do.
3. Petros already locked it, lol.

You might enjoy 1% Lifesteal or Dungeon Crawler Carl.

I did listen to almost all of Dungeon Crawler Carl, but I stopped after a while. I'm not entirely certain why, tbh, but I've got plenty of other series I'm reading and listening to.

But if you had to pick one of these... what would it be?

Obviously the dictionary, it's a riveting page turner from start to finish, keeps you on the edge of your seat.

Listing the dictionary has got to be one of the most try hard things I've seen posted in a while.  Either that or UD is literally the most boring person on the planet 

I think he just lost sight of the actual request in his zeal to list everything he ever read.

Yeah, that's pretty much what happened; Sorry, lol

The Riftwar Saga, with the Kingkiller Chronicle right behind it. It's one of the best series I've read so far!

Pachinko!

It's the story of 3 generations of Koreans who fled Korea and lived in Japan because of WW2 and living conditions in Korea were untenable because Japan recently annexed Korea and things were not good in Korea.

There's this family who operates a lodge. They make money by taking in boarders, but then the daughter gets pregnant out of wedlock, a kind priest who lodges there decides to marry her to give the baby a name and a better chance at life, and they move to Japan.

Then the story follows this girl, her sons, her grandson, as they all try to make it in a country that's discriminatory towards them. The reason why the book is called Pachinko is because of a Japanese pinball kind of game that's popular in gambling parlors. Because of societal discrimination, operating a pachinko parlor was seen as low-class and criminal, and Koreans were seen in a negative light because many times Koreans get involved in the business, and there was already a societal discrimination around Koreans. So it became sort of a negative stereotype. But Pachinko also plays a positive role in the family's story and shows up several times to save them.

It's a really good book, and it doesn't really get boring. I really enjoyed traveling alongside all the characters and seeing their lives.

I feel like I might be overposting on this thread, so I'll drop 2 more recs and then stop.

1. The Hellbound Heart by Clive Barker.

Apparently there's been a super popular movie based on this book called Hellraiser with like 9 sequels or something really crazy. It's constantly getting remade, so there may be a new one out at some point. If you've seen the original movie before, then you know the story, but I hadn't heard of Hellraiser until I finished Hellbound Heart. Pinhead is not named in this book, and the Cenobites themselves play more of a background manipulative role. But the hooks in their flesh and all that are accurate.

Unlike Lonesome Dove and Pachinko, this book is more mature, with way more gore and explicit sexual content so I would caution younger readers away from this book.

This book is basically about this dude named Frank who gets bored of life on Earth and is seeking some kind of new and previously unheard of pleasure. He gets this puzzle box called the Lemarchand Box that can unlock some kind of mystical race of supernatural beings called the Cenobites. Apparently they can take you this different realm and offer you your heart's desire.

Except, it turns out that the Cenobites, a race of powerful, sadistic, and unearthly beings, do not have Frank's best interest at heart. Shocker. Who could have seen that coming?

So they end up imprisoning him and torturing him to harvest his suffering, which they feed on. They also imprison him directly behind the wall of the house he lived in while trying to crack the Lemarchand box, so he can see his room but can't go there because he's trapped behind the wall in like this other dimension or realm or something, I don't know, it doesn't really specify. But he's there and not there at the same time.

His brother, Roy and Roy's wife Julia move in to the house, and Roy has this accident where he cuts his hand on a chisel and bleeds in the same room that Frank was spirited away from. This is important because in this other realm, Frank lost his corporeal form entirely, so the only way he can get his body back is with blood. And the only reason he's able to do that is because of another even more gross thing that happened that basically allows him to maintain some semblance of a foothold on Earth, and then the blood feeds him enough so he can become a sort of nervous system attached to an eye type specter.

Julia finds him, decides that she likes Frank better than his brother, her husband, and then the duo set out on a morally bankrupt, incredibly evil journey to get Frank a body back of some kind.

I couldn't put this one down because it's short for one and creepy to the point where it sort of fixed my attention. It's 150 pages, and there's not a lot of fluff. The pacing is fast, and things get set into motion rather rapidly, and the imagery is really visceral and gross, so it's kind of hard to put it down. There's a lot of twists and turns, and there's this really cool gambit where another character also hatches an interesting ploy to get revenge, and I thought that was pretty cool.

2. Devdas by Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay

This book is suitable for a younger audience, and it's also really short. I think it's even shorter than "The Hellhound Heart".

It's basically this Shakespearan story set in 1900s Bengal. it's a super popular novel to make a film out of in India, and that's how I originally heard of it, since it's basically filmed in almost every Indian language, with all kinds of takes over the years. So it's kind of like the Indian Romeo and Juliet since it's also a tragic love story, but there are a few differences.

Okay so the narrative revolves around this zamindar(landlord) named Devdas who lives in a small village. As a kid, he and this girl named Parvati(Paro) were in love with each other, best friends as kids, and then they slowly start falling in love as kids. So they're basically childhood sweethearts.

Devdas is in a higher social class than Paro and a lot richer so that puts a damper on their relationship. Devdas leaves their village to study in the big metropolitan city of Calcutta. Then when he comes back, he and Paro fall in love.

But when Paro's mom goes to Devdas's mom with a marriage proposal(both families have been really close with each other for years, but there's also this lurking understanding of social class differences in the back of their minds), Devdas's mother gives a sort of noncommittal answer.

Paro realizes that Devdas may not be able to marry her, so she goes to his house at the dead of night, but then Devdas, who's a bit emotionally immature, leaves and goes to Calcutta. Paro then gets married, then Devdas coincidentally finally decides he likes her. But she's already married so he gets drunk and fucks up the rest of his life.

That's sort of the spark notes version, but you should read the whole thing, this summary doesn't do the story justice. I couldn't put this one down because for one, it's short, two it's really haunting and sad. I read this one right after Hellbound Heart, and it's sort of a palette cleanser, because even though it's tragic, the characters here are more wholesome. I really liked the prose, it's simple and straightforward, and I enjoyed the way the story develops, and how there always seemed to be a silver lining in sight. If only one action proceeded with a different outcome, then maybe things would have been different. It's like watching a train wreck that can be stopped at any time but the train driver refuses to act. There's something so captivating at seeing this guy who at any time could choose better but doesn't, and with every page you hope for him to do better and yet he just keeps fucking up. But he does try and he tries to fight his alcohol addiction. I also really loved the progressive themes in this novel and the way that Sarat showcases characters like Paro and Chandramukhi. It's a quick read and one that's pretty absorbing, and I definitely couldn't put this one down until I was done. It was better than the movie, which is surprising because I really loved the 2002 film adaptation, but the novel is just so imaginative and quietly understated in ways that I felt the movie could have adopted as well.

The book that recently got me back into reading after a long hiatus was The Tainted Cup by Robert Jackson Bennett. It's a murder mystery in a weird fantasy setting. I got it for a local book club a few weeks in advance, figuring it would take me that long to get through it. I finished it in a day and a half. I'm honestly not sure what made it so engaging. It's well-written, the characters are interesting, the mystery is mysterious... but yeah, beyond all that it's just one of those books that keeps you turning pages.

Fuck you, asshole! I just read Piranesi and really loved it. This is not a good feeling

May I suggest the Book of Mormon next?

Well I wasn't wanting to post a huge list since I'm trying to be a little selective here. But I've read a lot of historical fiction and fiction by historical people, and a few really stood out to me over the years. I know Suranna isn't just asking for "books you liked", so I'll be trying to stick to some I remember feeling a need to just burn right through, that also stayed with me a long time or inspired multiple rereads.(though these are granted, aimed more at some of the kids reading than Suranna)

The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck - This is a tale of a family in pre-WWII China, starting with a farmer meeting his new bride for a very unglamorous wedding day and following all the ups and downs of village life, struggles with poverty and famine that are later built up to wealth and corruption. It's the first of a generational trilogy about the family, but usually regarded as the best. The author was the daughter of missionaries and grew up in China, so the book was pretty unique for its realism at a time when China was usually written about like a kind of stylized fantasy land.

The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver - Set in the Congo in the late 50s around the time it declared independence (the author lived there during that period, her parents were health workers), this is a about a very out of place missionary family, a wife and four daughters dominated by an overbearing Southern Baptist who really isn't there about spreading the faith so much as pushing his brand of civilization on the people they're living with like an angry toddler trying to jam a square peg into a round whole. It follows the girls over several years up until leaving the country after a tragedy occurs, and explores the impact this life makes on them all.

Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe - Written by a Nigerian author in the 50s, this opened the gates for the unique idea of African literature written by actual Africans. It follows a man who is one of the leaders of his community leading up to the transition period of British colonialism and really delves deeply into village life and the depths of tradition. The protagonist is also a very flawed character in his own right do this doubles as a pretty fascinating character study. He spends a lot of tine beating his wives and kids, obsessed with reputation and "manliness" as a reaction to his own father's weakness and life spent in debt. And this rigidity and inability to adapt is a part of his downfall and ends up driving his own son away when he can't handle the boy's conversion to Christianity or the other outside influences in the village.

Moby-Dick by Herman Melville - yeah, it's the one about the whale. But more than that it's just this gloriously sprawling and delightfully weird textual maze, going off on bizarre and increasingly lengthy tangents and exploring some very memorable characters. I always felt like this one is a little lacking in actual plot momentum, but it truly is about the journey, and will teach you a lot about 19th century whale ships as a bonus. (This one actually doesn't follow the "burned right through" category as I was working a ton and had other things going on with having to take care of my grandpa, but I kept getting drawn back to it after every time I had to put it aside, it was haunting me.

A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith - It's hard to explain why this one was so caprivating to me, it just follows the very ordinary life of a girl growing up in the early 20th century. But it always leaves an impression that's very triumphant and wholesome and uplifting, one of those books I've reread several times just because it makes me happy.

David Copperfield by Charles Dickens - One of the first "serious" Dickens book I read (not counting A Christmas Carol, that was kind of its own thing) was Oliver Twist, which was kind of a slog for me because of the suspension-of-disbelief straining total innocence and oblivious nature of Oliver himself. But David Copperfield was where it really all clicked for me. It's supposed to be semi-autobiographical in nature and was the favorite of Dickens himself. The protagonist's father dies after he's born, and a few years later while he's sent away on a visit his mother marries a man that's harsh and controlling, him and his sister turning things upside down in the household. The kid is sent to a boarding school and then later forced to work in a factory. Later ending up with an aunt he'd never known who is really just a delightful character and turns his whole life around, leading up to the second part of the book with him navigating adulthood. And of course since this is a Dickens book there are tons of other characters and memorable villains; this one is the origin of the sleazy and very punchable Uriah Heep.

Kim by Rudyard Kipling - I've always loved Kipling's short stories, and this was a book of his I for some reason only read a few years ago and always wished I hadn't waited so long to get to it. Kipling always seemed infatuated with the idea of cultural blending, like he's mostly writing from the British perspective of course because that's what he knew, but his more admireable knew how to adapt and learn when far from home, while the ones getting poked fun at were often the arrogant and unyielding overly British oafs.

So the novel Kim is like an exploration of the ultimate cultural chameleon. His farther was an Irishman who left him orphaned in India at the age of 3, and he's spent his childhood on the streets, just sort of barely looked after by dad's drug dealer girlfriend, speaking the local languages more fluently than his own and dodging the missionaries who would've taken him away.

He ends up by chance as a guide to this very innocent and out of place Tibetan holy man, and a lot of the novel is their travels on the old man's quest and just the things they encounter with the bewildering size and diversity of India. There's a lot of reflection on religion here too because of course once again it's India, you've got Buddhism and Hinduism and Muslims and missionaries of both the Protestant and Catholic varieties.

The book is not overly long and keeps a fast pace without sacrificing all that depth, and at some point the story morphs into a spy novel with intrigue between the British and Russians and Kim carrying messages on his travels with the old man. Just a very satisfying and fun story all around, and Kim is a hilariously fun character who gets away with the most brazen shit due to his ability to blend in and take on various roles.

The Call of the Wild by Jack London - so this is technically kid's books, but of course written at a time when kids were smarter. I had this really teacher in the 5th grade and this was one he read us, and he said it was the book that had hooked him on reading as a kid too.

The main character is a dog named Buck (he does not talk). He's kidnapped from an idyllic home in Califirnia and shipped north due to the high demand for sled dogs in the Alaskan gold rush. Like a lot of the author's stories (he lived through some pretty incredible adventures himself) this really goes into the brutality of nature and mankind, and is just a great adventure story too.

Basically, if you haven't read this book and also White Fang, then fuck you, you're not a real American. (The waves of furry wolf children the site used to be inflicted with that had never even heard of these used to amaze and infuriate me.)

White Fang btw is a similar story that goes in reverse, a dog-wolf hybrid from Alaska that through a series of adventures ends up with a comfy retirement in California. But doesn't seem to ever be read in schools anymore, possibly because of the drunk dog-beating Indian (feather not dot) that owns him a good part of the story.

Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain - I think Wizzy might be along to talk more about this one soon, but it's another "fuck you FAKE AMERICANS who have never read this" novel.

Little Women by Louisa May Alcott - this is the ultimate heartwarming comfort food of literature. It's another one that draws from many of the real experiences of the author and is broken up into these little slice of life tales of four sisters growing up poor in New England in the Civil War era while their father was away. And there are other books following the lives of the girls into adulthood and then later the orphanage for boys that the main one runs.

In addition to the books I also really love the author, I've read collections of her letters to her family and other biographicsl things, she had a very hard but exceptional life. Her impoverished childhood was not because of her father being away in the Civil War like in the book; he was more of a traveling and perpetually penniless Transcendentalist philosopher. Which meant she got to grow up rubbing elbows with Henry David Thoreau and Ralph Waldo Emerson, and others in that community, and her parents being hardcore Abolitionists as well with her mother doing a lot of social work.

Unfortunately of course none of that shit paid the bills. Louisa May had her health destroyed working as a Civil War nurse, then went on despite a lot of chronic pain and repeated episodes of crippling illness to single handedly raise her family out of poverty and become world famous through her writing. So all of you should read her stuff, it's just that good and she went through a lot to get it out there.

I should just mention as I wrap up this post that "fiction by historical people" is really just some of the best stuff out there if you like historical things at all. Someone from a century ago writing a semi-autobiographical story about regular people in a time remembered from their childhood is going to invest it with so much depth and detail and realistic characterization that some random non-grass touching autist today writing about the same time period just isn't ever going to touch, and even worse they'll be trying to sensationalize it for zoomer attention spans.

People of the past also had a habit of writing beautiful and extensively detailed letters to each other catching family and friends up on their lives, it's the kind of casual literary skill that will make you weep to see it in this broken Twitter-pilled AI plumbing disaster wasteland of 2026, and so many of these letters from anyone even mildly influential have been collected together for easy reading if you just seek them out.

Anyway, I may add more later when I'm not as pissed, but I'll drop one here for now: The Castle by Kafka It's not finished. It just ends in the middle of a line, which I think adds to its charm immensely. It's a story about a man who is trying to do some surveying work for a castle and (predictably) gets entangled in the bureaucratic mess that he needs to go through to get into the castle. You're probably better off reading The Trial, but I liked this one better.

Also, I've read three rather noided nonfiction books recently for anyone who wants to become a schizophrenic. Eye of the Chickenhawk, Aberration in the Heartland of the Real: The Secret Lives of Timothy McVeigh, and The Fort Bragg Cartel. 

These are serious nonfiction but have a toe in the world of conspiracy. That's important, because if you're not at least a bit of a conspiracy theorist now you're a lunatic. 

I have The Fort Bragg Cartel on my list for when I am feeling up for it, thanks to you. I will have to look into these others.