200 replies to this topic

[Mike]

Are Hubbard's books good? No.

[Christian U]

Huh, that's a lot of L. Ron Hubbard books there. Are they actually meant to be any good? (I've no interest in reading them, just asking out of curiosity).

Nah, not in the least. Though personally, I've only read Battlefield Earth, which was very mediocre sci-fi.

[brucegray666]

That's what I figured. whenever I've read any comments abuot him I've yet to see anything along the line of "Regardless what you think of Scientology his books were pretty good."

[Nicholas Taggart]

The fact that the overlapping books between the two lists are The Lord of the Rings and To Kill a Mockingbird is interesting.


The top ten as voted by the Modern Library's board rather than general voters is

• ULYSSES by James Joyce
• THE GREAT GATSBY by F. Scott Fitzgerald
• A PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST AS A YOUNG MAN by James Joyce
• LOLITA by Vladimir Nabokov
• BRAVE NEW WORLD by Aldous Huxley
• THE SOUND AND THE FURY by William Faulkner
• CATCH-22 by Joseph Heller
• DARKNESS AT NOON by Arthur Koestler
• SONS AND LOVERS by D.H. Lawrence
• THE GRAPES OF WRATH by John Steinbeck

Huh, that's a lot of L. Ron Hubbard books there. Are they actually meant to be any good? (I've no interest in reading them, just asking out of curiosity).

They are not well regarded as books outside of the Scientology community. They are about the same level of badness as Ayn Rand's books.

[Paul F]

Nah, not in the least. Though personally, I've only read Battlefield Earth, which was very mediocre sci-fi.

It's also the favourite book of Mitt Romney.

On the Modern Library list, I've never even heard of "Darkness at Noon." Is it good?

[Nicholas Taggart]

I'm surprised to see it so high on the list because I don't feel like it is all that famous (in the English speaking world any way) but it is a great book. It is about the 1938 Great Purge in the Soviet Union.

[Christian U]

The fact that the overlapping books between the two lists are The Lord of the Rings and To Kill a Mockingbird is interesting.


The top ten as voted by the Modern Library's board rather than general voters is

• ULYSSES by James Joyce
  
• THE GREAT GATSBY by F. Scott Fitzgerald
  
• A PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST AS A YOUNG MAN by James Joyce
  
• LOLITA by Vladimir Nabokov
  
• BRAVE NEW WORLD by Aldous Huxley
  
• THE SOUND AND THE FURY by William Faulkner
  
• CATCH-22 by Joseph Heller
  
• DARKNESS AT NOON by Arthur Koestler
  
• SONS AND LOVERS by D.H. Lawrence
  
• THE GRAPES OF WRATH by John Steinbeck

Two Joyces? Seems a bit over the top, considering that any list like this will sorely miss a lot of books that should be among the top ten. This isn't a bad list; mine would be quite different though.


Martin - Darkness at Noon is the only one of these I haven't at least read some of. Damn.

[Nicholas Taggart]

I am relucant to admit I have never read anything by William Faulkner.



I just read Netherland by Joseph O'Neill. I thought it was good, often extremely good, but I do think people have overhyped it to me quite a bit.

Now I am reading Any Human Heart by William Boyd and The Marriage Plot by Jeffrey Eugenides.

[Christian U]

I am relucant to admit I have never read anything by William Faulkner.

I always recommend As I Lay Dying, it's a very tight and concise, nasty, brilliant little novel. The story of a family's journey to bury the mother, told by all family members in alternating voices. A quick, terrific, impressive read.

Edited by Christian U, 11 August 2012 - 01:04 PM.

[Robert B]

I always recommend As I Lay Dying, it's a very tight and concise, nasty, brilliant little novel. The story of a family's journey to bury the mother, told by all family members in alternating voices. A quick, terrific, impressive read.

It's a lot more enjoyable and accessible than The Sound and the Fury.

[Nicholas Taggart]

I always recommend As I Lay Dying, it's a very tight and concise, nasty, brilliant little novel. The story of a family's journey to bury the mother, told by all family members in alternating voices. A quick, terrific, impressive read.

I have to say that my biggest reason for not reading anything by him yet is that I am a bit of a wimp about reading stuff where horrific things happen to people. Of course, if it is a great work I end up liking it a lot anyway, it is really just something that stops me finishing a lot of not so good books and stops me starting a lot of probably great books. Like any time I feel like tackling some Faulkner I take a look at what the book is about and think... maybe not today.


What makes this worse is that I really enjoy the subgenre of Southern gothic a lot. I am a big fan of Carson McCullers, Tennessee Williams, Truman Capote, and a bunch of the other big ones.

[Rory Abel]

Finished Ready Player One. Why were people making a big deal about this book? Is 80s nostalgia really that huge a draw these days? The plot is ok but the writing is just awful. All tell and no show with tons of cliches and stilted dialogue.

[Christian U]

I have to say that my biggest reason for not reading anything by him yet is that I am a bit of a wimp about reading stuff where horrific things happen to people. Of course, if it is a great work I end up liking it a lot anyway, it is really just something that stops me finishing a lot of not so good books and stops me starting a lot of probably great books. Like any time I feel like tackling some Faulkner I take a look at what the book is about and think... maybe not today.


What makes this worse is that I really enjoy the subgenre of Southern gothic a lot. I am a big fan of Carson McCullers, Tennessee Williams, Truman Capote, and a bunch of the other big ones.

Heh. Yeah, there's definitely a lot of terrible stuff happening to people. It's not the kind of book where that really impacts you, though - it's more of a farce than a tragedy, really.

[Arjan Dirkse]

The fact that the overlapping books between the two lists are The Lord of the Rings and To Kill a Mockingbird is interesting.


The top ten as voted by the Modern Library's board rather than general voters is

• ULYSSES by James Joyce
  
• THE GREAT GATSBY by F. Scott Fitzgerald
  
• A PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST AS A YOUNG MAN by James Joyce
  
• LOLITA by Vladimir Nabokov
  
• BRAVE NEW WORLD by Aldous Huxley
  
• THE SOUND AND THE FURY by William Faulkner
  
• CATCH-22 by Joseph Heller
  
• DARKNESS AT NOON by Arthur Koestler
  
• SONS AND LOVERS by D.H. Lawrence
  
• THE GRAPES OF WRATH by John Steinbeck

Do the people in Modern Library's board only read English language literature?

They're good books but it's a very biased list.

edit: Ah never mind, I checked out their website and it's indeed only English literature.

I am relucant to admit I have never read anything by William Faulkner.

Light in August is quite accessible.

Edited by Arjan Dirkse, 11 August 2012 - 06:17 PM.

[Martin Smith]

I started reading American Psycho last night. Got a bit over 100 pages in by this afternoon and had to give up. It's so tortuously dull. It's like a novelisation of an Argos catalogue. The stream of consciousness narration really grates pretty quickly, especially the filmic elements ("smash cut" etc) which thankfully disappear quite quickly. There isn't a single likeable character, which normally doesn't bother me, but there isn't even an interestingly unlikeable one. It's just a bunch of yuppie gits high-fiving. That Bateman only sees people as sex-objects and walking clothes-hangers is mildly interesting and perhaps combined with the secret murdering elements could have carried a short story, but for a novel it just gets tiring. The violent and sexual elements aren't interesting and didn't carry me through the rest of the intimate details of his work-out routines and clothes fetish.

[Miqque Loveland]

Was this Hubbard stuff about my comment about Writers of the Future? WotF is a yearly contest. The winners are selected by a panel of writer-teachers. It's named after Hubbard, but that's the only connection. Think of it as a big sci-fi mag of the 1950's.

I'm reading Ringworld again. It was one of Larry's Niven's happy works, like Dream Park.

[Mark Peyton]

I read Battlefield Earth when I was a kid and still trying to forget how crap it was.

Just finishing The Atrocity Archives by Charles Stross and very much enjoyed it. Now got to decide what I'm going to read as my first ebook.

[Nicholas Taggart]

Was this Hubbard stuff about my comment about Writers of the Future? WotF is a yearly contest. The winners are selected by a panel of writer-teachers. It's named after Hubbard, but that's the only connection. Think of it as a big sci-fi mag of the 1950's.

Hubbard came up because I made this post in response to a conversation about a list of the best young adult novels

There are a bunch of good and great books on that list.


Modern Library did a reader vote for the best 100 novels which was presumably voted for by adults. This was the top ten

• ATLAS SHRUGGED by Ayn Rand
• THE FOUNTAINHEAD by Ayn Rand
• BATTLEFIELD EARTH by L. Ron Hubbard
• THE LORD OF THE RINGS by J.R.R. Tolkien
• TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD by Harper Lee
• 1984 by George Orwell
• ANTHEM by Ayn Rand
• WE THE LIVING by Ayn Rand
• MISSION EARTH by L. Ron Hubbard
• FEAR by L. Ron Hubbard

I'd much rather read the kids top ten despite it containing a number of books I am not a fan of.

[Christian U]

Read "The Borrower" by Rebecca Makkai (a random buy off the current books table at Waterstone's). It's a book about a kid kidnapping their librarian, and while it was a very nice novel with some great moments, it wasn't as good as it might have been. Fair enough though, it's a debut novel, after all.

Edited by Christian U, 12 August 2012 - 07:31 AM.

[Mike]

Christian, if you're going to grab random books whilst you're here, grab Hawthorn & Child by Keith Ridgway.