Seeking book suggestions to give as a gift

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01 Jan 2009, 2:25 am

The books, that is, not the suggestions.

My husband is having a birthday in a couple of weeks and happened to mention that he needs something new to read as he's been reading the Harry Potter books over and over. Baffling, really... I thought they were good but to read them over and over? I used to do that sort of thing with books, but I have less time now and prefer to get 'round as many as I can. Anyway, he's clearly gotten too busy lately to look for other options. I've tried to get him to read Terry Pratchett but I must not be describing the books well because he never really answers, just sort of grunts and even NTs have trouble figuring out a response to that. It's going to be some years before I am likely to have one written for him, so I need some ideas.

What are some good books? Really good books. I'd prefer if they were fantasy/sci fi and not particularly filthy, and if the author had more where "that" came from. You know of course that he liked Rowling's stuff, and he has in the past enjoyed Frank Herbert, Asimov, Michael Crichton, J.R.R. Tolkein, and I'm really not sure who else... recently, anyway. I mean, he read Piers Anthony, but I know that I'm sick of the guy and my husband gave up on him before I did, so there you go. And he read Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy but not beyond book 1, so scratch Douglas Adams off the list.

And if there is a particularly good Discworld book, let me know. I can read it, at least. :wink:

Thank ye all who have help to offer.

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kalantir
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01 Jan 2009, 5:41 am

Sword of Truth series by Terry Goodkind is my all time favorite. 11 books, between 600-980 pages each... All very good, although lots of people didnt like numbers 3-5... but i dunno. Its pure fantasy, takes place in its own world.

for sci-fi fantasy, theres the Incarnations of Immortality series by Piers Anthony. I believe its like 8 books, each about 300 pages or so? Very good mix of fantasy and sci-fi. Or the Apprentice Adept series by the same author(although it got lame after the first 3 imo. But it was only supposed to be a trilogy at first anyways)

Also, theres the Myth series by Robert Asperin. Each of them is a fairly light read(less then 300 pages each) but theres quite a few and theyre all pretty good fantasy novels. I would take the time to explain all of them, but google explains better then I do. Theres currently a tv series running about Sword of Truth called Legend of the Seeker if youve heard of it.(sucks compared to books, but still)

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sacrip
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01 Jan 2009, 10:05 am

Ender's Game, by Orson Scott Card, is an excellent sci-fi book. The sequels aren't AS good, but they hold their own, by and large. Snow Crash, by Neal Stephenson (Sp?) is an enjoyable, if long read. It's not strictly sci-fi/fantasy, but The Amazing Adventures of Cavalier and Clay by Michael Chabon is a good story that any genre fan should appreciate. If he likes military sci-fi, The Forever War, by Joe Haldeman, is an excellent novel. That should hold you for a while.

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Fogman
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01 Jan 2009, 10:23 am

Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars series is good, accurate SF. Philip Jose Farmer's Riverworld series is good as well.

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01 Jan 2009, 11:40 am

C.S. Lewis' Space Trilogy- Out of the Silent Planet, Perelandra, and That Hideous Strength- I woke up today thinking about a re-read of these (happy New Year! I like to spend it reading and writing).

What about Asimov's Foundation series?

If he likes short stories, you could get him a subscription to F&SF magazine too.

irishwhistle
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03 Jan 2009, 12:41 am

Thanks. I'll start checking these out, and even if he doesn't like them, I get to read them. Works for me.

computerlove
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03 Jan 2009, 7:54 pm

Julio Cortazar's cronopios book, I love it, short stories, many are one page long trippy.
Michael Ende's Momo, one of my favest book.

from Amazon, about Cronopios:

Quote:

Review
Anyone who doesn't read Cortazar is doomed. Not to read him is a serious invisible disease which in time can have terrible consequences. Something similar to a man who has never tasted peaches. He would quietly become sadder . . . and, probably, little by little, he would lose his hair. -- Pablo Neruda

Product Description
Long out of print and now reissued in paperback, Cronopios and Famas is one of the best-loved books by Julio Cortzar, perhaps the greatest of Latin American novelists (author of Hopscotch and The Blow-Up and Other Stories). "The Instruction Manual," the first chapter, is an absurd assortment of tasks and items dissected in an instruction-manual format. "Unusual Occupations," the second chapter, describes the obsessions and predilections of the narrator's family, including the lodging of a tiger-just one tiger- "for the sole purpose of seeing the mechanism at work in all its complexity." Finally, the "Cronopios and Famas" section delightfully characterizes, in the words of Carlos Fuentes, "those enemies of pomposity, academic rigor mortis and cardboard celebrity-a band of literary Marx Brothers." As the Saturday Review remarked: "Each page of Cronopios and Famas sparkles with vivid satire that goes to the heart of human character and, in the best pieces, to the essence of the human condition."

if you know spanish get it in spanish.

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paganita
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04 Jan 2009, 5:55 am

how bout cities of the red night by Williams S Burroughs it has several different stories going on at once in different styles and settings its very dirty and perverse but overall a good read from what i remember

carturo222
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04 Jan 2009, 8:31 am

Two words: Singularity Sky.

computerlove
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04 Jan 2009, 12:00 pm

@iriswhistle: Has your husband read all of the Foundation books?

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irishwhistle
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05 Jan 2009, 9:01 pm

He read the first, and funnily enough, he just went out and bought the next two. So my search is a bit less urgent now, but I at least hope to find one or two good reads. At least he did go get something so that he can put the Rowling down. I enjoyed them, but I can't believe a steady diet of Harry Potter is good for the brain.

Still wish I could get him to try Terry Pratchett. He could use a laugh.

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