11
votes
Please help me pick my next book to read!
Hello fellow readers! I am finally close to finishing the book I am reading (maybe 2 weeks away or so - I am kind of a slow reader). That book is 1Q84 by Haruki Murakami. However, I am already getting excited about the next book and I have a few on my "to read" list. I have read nothing by any of these authors, so I am going in blind, based only on some browsing and very basic non-spoiler reviews. Please, no spoilers. I thought it might be fun to post this here and see if your thoughts can help me prioritize my "to read" list and pick the next book I'll read. I think I am leaning towards "The Tunnel" or "The Seventh Function of Language", but anything on the list will be very fresh to me.
| Title | Author |
|---|---|
| Life: A User's Manual | Georges Perec, David Bellos |
| Lives Other Than My Own | Emmanuel Carrère, Linda Coverdale |
| The Door | Magda Szabo, Len Rix +1 |
| The Melancholy of Resistance | László Krasznahorkai |
| The Seventh Function of Language | Laurent Binet |
| The Tunnel | Ernesto Sabato |
| The Pillars of the Earth | Ken Follett |
Putting The Seventh Function of Language on my list. I very much enjoy work that deals with neurolinguistic hacking or the power of language. Examples being Snowcrash by Neal Stephenson and Lexicon by Max Barry.
What a weird coincidence. I literally bought a copy of Life: A User's Manual last week!
I read ebooks nearly exclusively, so I've been trying to branch out by reading books that either can't be read as ebooks or are simply better as physical books.
I spent some time digging around the internet for recommendations for titles that aren't House of Leaves because, yeah, I ALREADY KNOW (great book though).
This title popped up somewhere, it sounded interesting, and I bought it on a lark.
Then it arrived and I realized it's HUGE -- classic case of not realizing the actual size of something you order until it gets there.
Anyway, if I had to vote I would give an entirely selfish one for Life, if only because it would be great for you to read it before me and let me know if it's worth the significant investment I now realize it requires. XD
I haven't read Life, but I have read a couple others by Carrère and they were great! One was a biography-ish of Philip K Dick, and the other was The Mustache. The latter is fairly short, and available for free on archive.org, but there's also this video if you'd rather go that route: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=2CJowTpZTiw
I'd say read and then watch with The Mustache, but either will probably help you decide if you're up for Life. (Lemme know how Life is if you read it, and how urgently it should be added to my TBR list)
I've read two of these, here are some thoughts:
The Melancholy of Resistance is an extreme book. The characters are opposing, the story is dark, the narration is wandering and surreal, and the sentences are long. It's heavy, but beautiful. The promise made by the title is fulfilled.
The Pillars of the Earth is very fun. It's a good choice for escapism, some architectural musings, and an unconventional coming of age story. Unfortunately, it does feel a lot longer than it is deep. Still a nice time set in the trappings of mainstream historical fiction, for better and worse.
Hope that helps!
My vote is László Krasznahorkai's 'The Melancholy of Resistance'. He just won the Nobel prize, because of this I am choosing to read Satantango (because I already have it) as my next book. I have never personally read any of his work but I would expect 'The Melancholy of Resistance' to be difficult and dark, perfect for the dark winter months. I would take Ken Follett off your list completely, it is not worth your time.
What did you think of IQ84? I have read a few Murakami books (The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, Sputnik Sweetheart, Hard-boiled Wonderland, and Kafka on the Shore) and enjoyed all of them. I have not read IQ84 and have heard very mixed reviews. Have you read any other books by Murakami and how did they compare to IQ84?