NationStates Jolt Archive

Hello all. I recently finished The Diamond Age and now have nothing else to read. I was hoping that the esteemed peoples of General could provide me with some worthwile suggestions. (Cyberpunk is one of my favorite genres)

It's far from cyberpunk, the prose is thick, clotted and dense, and the story is horrifically violent, but I still recommend Cormac McCarthy's Blood Meridian. He's the William Faulkner of the last twenty years, and the character Judge Holden is the most purely evil character since Shakespeare wrote Iago into Othello.

Read either 'Stalingrad' or 'Berlin' by Beevor. He writes in a novelist's narrative that makes history interesting. Both of those books are full of information and cleverly written.

Read either 'Stalingrad' or 'Berlin' by Beevor. He writes in a novelist's narrative that makes history interesting. Both of those books are full of information and cleverly written.

roughly half of harry turtledoves books are interesting. i'm just finishing Counting Up, Counting Down now, and enjoying it....

Well, if you like Neal Stephenson and haven't read it yet, I think "Snow Crash" is his best book. Really, though, Cyberpunk is a very small genre - I think there are basically three major authors: William Gibson, Neal Stephenson, and Bruce Sterling. Anything by one of them is likely to be decent, but once you've read those three authors there's not much else. Gibson's "Neuromancer" is considered by many the work that established the genre.

Many of the people I've met who liked Neal Stephenson also like Neil Gaiman who writes in a style which, as I see it, is to fantasy as cyberpunk is to scifi. If you're interested in him I would recommend reading "Neverwhere" or "American Gods", both of which are books I personally enjoyed thoroughly.

That's all the recommendations I can give just based on your insterest in cyberpunk, though if you have a broader interest in science fiction and or fantasy there's a huge amount more I could recommend. :D

You may want to read a very obscured novel called 'The Berkut' by Joseph Heywood. It's about a Russian 'spec ops' team working under the direct orders of Stalin to capture the fleeing Hitler (the corpse from the bunker was a doppelganger). It's a pretty good action thriller set in WWII!

If you can find "Naive. Super." by Erlend Loe. It's such a funny book, very enjoyable indeed.
link (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1841952516/qid=1121154023/sr=8-1/ref=pd_bbs_ur_1/104-3131859-1817518?v=glance&s=books&n=507846)

Well, if you like Neal Stephenson and haven't read it yet, I think "Snow Crash" is his best book. Really, though, Cyberpunk is a very small genre - I think there are basically three major authors: William Gibson, Neal Stephenson, and Bruce Sterling. Anything by one of them is likely to be decent, but once you've read those three authors there's not much else. Gibson's "Neuromancer" is considered by many the work that established the genre.

Many of the people I've met who liked Neal Stephenson also like Neil Gaiman who writes in a style which, as I see it, is to fantasy as cyberpunk is to scifi. If you're interested in him I would recommend reading "Neverwhere" or "American Gods", both of which are books I personally enjoyed thoroughly.

That's all the recommendations I can give just based on your insterest in cyberpunk, though if you have a broader interest in science fiction and or fantasy there's a huge amount more I could recommend. :D

(Odd... seems the forum ate my other post!)

Incidentally ive read all of Stephensons books and all of Gibsons... and Gaiman's. I'll look into Bruce Sterling but heres a list of my favorite books atm...

Favorite Books: Cryptonomicon, The Diamond Age, Neuromancer, Don Quixote, American Gods, Chocolate Jesus, Perdido Street Station, The Scar, A Brave New World, 1984, Neverwhere, and Stardust.

Jim Thompson, "The Grifters" and others
Jack O'Connell, "Box Nine"
Arthur Nersesian, "The F***-up"
China Mieville, "Perdido Street Station" (not excellent, but interesting none the less)
Jonathan Lethem, "Gun, with Occasional Music"
Neil Gaiman, "Neverwhere"
Iain Banks, "The Wasp Factory"
Dmitry Bakin, "Reasons for Living"

Most aren't cyberpunk, but several books deal with the combined influences of technology, pharmacology, and urbanisation (O'Connell, Mieville, Lethem, Banks), and the others either offer strangeness and uncomfortableness, as well as being a pleasure to read.

Jim Thompson, "The Grifters" and others
Jack O'Connell, "Box Nine"
Arthur Nersesian, "The F***-up"
China Mieville, "Perdido Street Station" (not excellent, but interesting none the less)
Jonathan Lethem, "Gun, with Occasional Music"
Neil Gaiman, "Neverwhere"
Iain Banks, "The Wasp Factory"
Dmitry Bakin, "Reasons for Living"

Most aren't cyberpunk, but several books deal with the combined influences of technology, pharmacology, and urbanisation (O'Connell, Mieville, Lethem, Banks), and the others either offer strangeness and uncomfortableness, as well as being a pleasure to read.

Ive already read Perdido Street Station and Neverwhere but ill be sure to check out the others. The Bas Lag books are the only fantasy books I actually like. I guess liking the world they are written in helps, eh?

Perhaps you should try this:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/5/5e/Ac.meinkampf.jpg

ROFL!!!!

Perhaps you should try this:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/5/5e/Ac.meinkampf.jpg

ROFL!!!!

have you read it? I hear it's written terribly bad.

have you read it? I hear it's written terribly bad.

I have. Its not exactly literary gold but its not exactly toilet paper either. Like it or not Hitler was a very eloquent man.

have you read it? I hear it's written terribly bad.

I heard it's full of racist bullsh*t, with sentences stretching beying the length of a page! I'm sort of interested in reading it, since I'm intrigued by Hitler.

Trainspotting by Irvine Welsh. If you can get past the Scottish accents in the book, which is hard to understand at times, you'll love it; especially this one chapter.. I can't remember it too well but I do know it's one of the best chapters I've read of any book.

I heard it's full of racist bullsh*t.

It is but that can be expected. Although the views espoused are not that far from center for the time period that the book was written in. In the 30's white superiority was a given in all western nations. But if you're interested in Hitler I would definately pick up a copy of it if not for anything else than trying to gain a deeper insight into his mind.

I heard it's full of racist bullsh*t, with sentences stretching beying the length of a page! I'm sort of interested in reading it, since I'm intrigued by Hitler.

well that would hardly surprise me.

(Odd... seems the forum ate my other post!)

Incidentally ive read all of Stephensons books and all of Gibsons... and Gaiman's. I'll look into Bruce Sterling but heres a list of my favorite books atm...

Favorite Books: Cryptonomicon, The Diamond Age, Neuromancer, Don Quixote, American Gods, Chocolate Jesus, Perdido Street Station, The Scar, A Brave New World, 1984, Neverwhere, and Stardust.
Heh. Looks like I'm going to have to be more creative in my recommendations - you've already read everything I listed! So I'm going to give it another go!

"The Last Unicorn" by Peter S. Beagle and "The Princess Bride" by William Goldman are both books you might enjoy. They both are, in a way, children's books, but I think someone of any age could enjoy them. The same person who recommended "Neverwhere" to me recommended these.

Completely out of left field I'm going to recommend "War and Peace" by Tolstoy and The Lattimore translation of the Iliad by Homer since they're two of my favorite books and you seem to like similar books to me (Don Quixote is one of my favorite books for the same reasons those two are). Only read these if you enjoy the slow pacing of epic works.

As a last recommendation, "A Game of Thrones" by George R.R. Martin is the beginning of an excelent fantasy series if that interests you.

Anyway, those are the books that for whatever reason come to mind given the favorites you listed - I hope you find one that you enjoy!

It is but that can be expected. Although the views espoused are not that far from center for the time period that the book was written in. In the 30's white superiority was a given in all western nations. But if you're interested in Hitler I would definately pick up a copy of it if not for anything else than trying to gain a deeper insight into his mind.

You're probably right, everything has to be put into the right perspective. It's not like the nazis were the only racists around at the time. Or what would today be considered racists, anyway. Hitler's mind must've been seriously screwed up, though.

edit:are we stealing this thread a bit?

Jim Thompson, "The Grifters" and others
Jack O'Connell, "Box Nine"
Arthur Nersesian, "The F***-up"
China Mieville, "Perdido Street Station" (not excellent, but interesting none the less)
Jonathan Lethem, "Gun, with Occasional Music"
Neil Gaiman, "Neverwhere"
Iain Banks, "The Wasp Factory"
Dmitry Bakin, "Reasons for Living"

Most aren't cyberpunk, but several books deal with the combined influences of technology, pharmacology, and urbanisation (O'Connell, Mieville, Lethem, Banks), and the others either offer strangeness and uncomfortableness, as well as being a pleasure to read.
I'd like to put in a good word for Iain Banks - in particular for his science fiction works published under the name Iain M. Banks. He creates a very interesting future, and the approach he takes to artificial intelligence and virtual reality is very similar to that in some cyberpunk authors.

I've never read any of his non sci-fi (published without the M) but maybe I'll go out and read "the Wasp Factory" now. :D

edit:are we stealing this thread a bit?

(not really, its my thread anyways)


You're probably right, everything has to be put into the right perspective. It's not like the nazis were the only racists around at the time. Or what would today be considered racists, anyway. Hitler's mind must've been seriously screwed up, though.

If you look at any prominent authors from the 30's its pretty easy to spot white supremicist undertones in their work. (H.P. Lovecraft and Robert E. Howard to name a few.) But of course it seems Hitler took this and ran with it so to speak. Its always been my view that Hitler was crazy (possibly from the vast ammounts of drugs he comsumed), but that his staff (Goebels, Himmler, etc.) were perfectly sane and 100% evil. (Not to say Hitler wasnt evil either but there was the drugs...)