Author Recommendation Poll

[queerbychoice]

I have too many authors I want to read books by, and I want you people to help me prioritize them. All of the following are authors I've never read any books by, but have been planning to try reading books by. Some of them write fiction and some of them write nonfiction.

[Poll #495135]

(And if you haven't read any books by any of them, don't worry - neither have I!)

Comments

[exterra.livejournal.com]

phew, thank goodness for your last line... i was beginning to feel totally illiterate! i've only read a few of those authors.

jhumpa lahiri is definitely worth reading, but i find her a bit overrated. i'll be curious to hear which you end up reading/liking.

[frankepi.livejournal.com]

i've read books by a few of those authors (Nadine Gordimer, Jonathan Swift, etc.) and others i keep MEANING to read (Philip Gourevitch leapt back to the top of my list after i saw the Hotel Rwanda there's no one on the list with whom i feel familiar enough to recommend or discourage.

lots of Vietname war stuff? what triggered that?

i've been wanting to find a Vietnamese or Vietnamese-American novel Thanh and i can read together. if you come across anything great (but not super-intimidating; he's generally a recreational reader) let me know.

[queerbychoice.livejournal.com]

"lots of Vietnam war stuff? what triggered that?"

No idea, unless it's just the fact that gamesiplay is obsessed with war literature from all wars, and I take her recommendations to heart.

"i've been wanting to find a Vietnamese or Vietnamese-American novel Thanh and i can read together. if you come across anything great (but not super-intimidating; he's generally a recreational reader) let me know.

You know, off the top of my head, I can't think of a single Vietnamese author I've read. It must be one of those languages that nobody is bothering (or daring?) to translate into English. Except that doesn't explain why I also can't think of a single Vietnamese-American author I've read, either. Hmm. Now that you've made me aware of this alarming gap in my well-read-ness, I'll have to try hard to find some books to correct it with.

There's a new LJ community recently founded though, called po_co, which is devoted to postcolonial literature. It would be a perfect place to ask, except that it would be more perfect if the community weren't quite so new and small still.

[ardhra]

Maybe advertise it in communities like culture_studies, de_ex, civilenergetics, debunkingwhite, globalfeminisms, sex_and_race, socialsciences, or sociologists?

Also, try asam or asian_american for suggestions on Vietnamese-American novels. That is, if Google and Amazon.com don't reveal anything interesting.

[gamesiplay.livejournal.com]

*grins* Well, I'm flattered. Timothy Findley's The Wars is an interesting WWI novel that was passed on to me by the_acrobat, by the way, if you're ever interested. It reminded me a bit of Barker's Regeneration trilogy, I suppose because it dealt with sexuality in a way that few war novels do satisfactorily.

As for Vietnamese authors, I've only read Novel Without a Name and Bao Ninh's The Sorrow of War--neither of which bowled me over, but both of which were worth reading, I thought.

There are a couple of authors on your list I've read and not felt strongly about either way: in particular, Anita Shreve and John Osborne. (I assume you mean Osborne the English playwright.) But I don't know exactly how your tastes match up against mine, so I can't be sure how you'd like them.

[pure-agnostic.livejournal.com]

I strongly recommend "The Things They Carried" by Tim O'Brien. One of the best anti-war books I've read. I've often loaned out my copy to Conscientious Objector friends of mine. Of all the books and films on the Vietnam war, this one felt the most personal to me.

*flaunts icon*

[gamesiplay.livejournal.com]

I agree. I think Tim O'Brien is the best of almost any bunch of war writers you could assemble--especially because he is one of the best pure writers I think I've ever read. If I Die in a Combat Zone is also fantastic.

[heron61.livejournal.com]

I'm amused that Renault (who is excellent) is one of only four authors on all of these lists that I've even heard of, and one of only three (the others being Swift, who is good and worth reading, but who I do not "highly recommend") and Solzhenitsyn, who I have strong ethical objections to.

[queerbychoice.livejournal.com]

What are your ethical objections to Solzhenitsyn? If I'm going to have them too, I'll definitely want to deprioritize reading him.

[heron61.livejournal.com]

None from his fiction, but I've read essays by him where he came across as an exceedingly pro-violence pro-armed resistance fanatic wrt the Soviet Union. While I can completely understand his objections to the USSR, there was a glorification of violence in these essays (which I read many years ago) that I found unpleasant.

[disi.livejournal.com]

i loved kite runner by Khaled Hosseini and i think you'd like it too.

[ardhra]

Robert Aldrich? Is that the Robert Aldrich who writes history books, and lectures in history? Because, if so, I had him as a lecturer for Economic History in my first year of Uni. I haven't read much of his work, but he was frighteningly thorough in his lectures.

[queerbychoice.livejournal.com]

Yes, it is - I'm interested in his book Colonialism and Homosexuality.

[theobscure.livejournal.com]

Ah, I read too quickly and didn't even notice that Elie Wiesel was on the list, too. I highly, highly recommend them.

[queerbychoice.livejournal.com]

You can always change your poll answers by clicking on the [Fill Out Poll] link at the top of the poll results page.

[plesant-rose.livejournal.com]

You don't actually know me but i am a friend of insipidity and i was intrigued by the survey. avoid "The kite runner" by khaled hossaini at all costs! it was the worst book i read this year. it was like reading a soap opera, except that it took place in afghanistan.

[queerbychoice.livejournal.com]

For comaprison purposes, can you tell me who some of your favorite authors are? Because some of the people recommending Hossaini to me are people whose taste in books I generally trust.

[plesant-rose.livejournal.com]

some of my favorite authors include charles bukowski, shirley jackson, thisbe nissen, zadie smith, jonathan lethem, david sedaris, phoebe gloeckner and jack kerouac.

[lm.livejournal.com]

I will highly recommend Renaults The King Must Die, but I'm not sure about her other works. I have The Mask of Apollo and have never read it, and at the moment can't remember whether it's because I started reading it and got bored, or I just haven't gotten around to it.

Also, even though I haven't read Audrey Niffenegger, I'm planning on it, because condotta, whose opinion on books often parallels mine, if terribly in love with The Time-Traveller's Wife.