Recommend Me A Book/Author?

[StevenF]

I'm not one for reading books - I always found something else to do with my time. But recently I got a notion for a good book and picked up Chris Ryan's Strike Back. I've just finished reading it and really enjoyed it. I thought the plot was a bit predictable and there was a lot of repetition used, but I still enjoyed reading it.

So... it's time for another one. I think thinking of going for another Chris Ryan book - The One That Got Away, any thoughts on this?
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[Ol]

obvious as it sounds, i read the long way down and actually enjoyed it more than watching the DVD !
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[ms51ves3]

[pa_broon74]

IN that vein.

I don't rate Chris Ryan, his plots and stories aren't very well crafted. Andy McNab's books are much better, although they are written in a tedious fashion (to much detail on military procedure.) The stories and action are good though and the endings aren't saccharine sweet.

In this area (spy/action type books) the best I've read are Adam Hall's Quiller books. They're written a bit weirdly, but once you get used to his style; cracking good reads. The main character is closer to the film version of Jason Bourne than the character in the Jason Bourne books were. You'll also learn how to kill a person in several different imaginative, yet very simple ways.

I read a shit-load of books (all genres) and Quiller is the 'toughest' character I know.

Harlan Coben books are good and the old guard authors like Gerald Seymour, Freddie Forsyth, Alistair McLean (some of my favourite books by him, Fear is the Key or When Eight Bells Toll.) If you read Fear is the Key for example, you'll see what a lightweight in terms of plot Chris Ryan really is.

Stephen King, is another favourite for his prose alone. Even if you don't like horror or scifi, his story telling is really good, one of the best. You can learn some great turns of phrase, (like "Why don't you put an egg in your shoe and beat it!" from The Dark Half.) His story telling is easy and chatty.

He also wrote among others The Green Mile, Running Man, The Shining, It and The Shawshank Redemption to give you an idea of his output.


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Didn't catch anything.

[santa668]

John Ringo - Ghost

Smacks you between the eyes and makes you go what teh fu..?

Nick

[sebastianw]

Try anything by Lee Child - good quality 'loner comes ty town and gets involved in trouble' type books

[neatbik]

Frederick Forsyth. Only recently read one of his books and really enjoyed it.

I've also just read Ted Simons 'Jupiters Travels' - amazing

[mistergixer]

[WildGoose]

forward operating base, 2nd in command, general purpose machine gun, vector (direction + magnitude, so probably a distance in a particular direction), sangar is a temporary bunker type thing, casualty evacuation.

There is normally a glossary, there was in his non fiction books, though I agree it is pretty tedious.

In response to the original post, "the one that got away" is his real life account of the bravo two zero mission from the first iraq war. Been heavily criticised for being basically a load of bollocks.

Both Mcnab and Ryan have been caught out over embellishing their real life exploits, they both in my opinion think far too highly of themselves, and it makes for irritating reading. I haven't touched their fiction for this reason, but read both B20 accounts, and mcnab's "immediate action" which covers the rest of his military crap.

Got Peter Radcliffes eye of the storm on the shelf at the moment, it is considered better than both the above.

No interest in modern military fiction tbh, though do enjoy Tom Clancy. Rainbow six and red storm rising are well worth the effort but only if you like the technical details.
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[dooley]

kent anderson - sympathy for the devil
raymond carver - where i'm calling from

[mistergixer]

[Dr. DaveJPS]

for a more historical military novel go for Flashman by George McDonald Frazer
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"intelligent inattention is preferable to unintelligent tinkering"
www.davejps.com

[10 pence Short]

Apache - Ed Macy.

Awesome book about Apache helicopters and their missions in Afghanistan.

Terence Strong is the SBS version of McNab/Ryan,Just a bit more watery!
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I haven't had a cont all day, drinkstable.

[Pernig]

I like Tom Clancy's older stuff. Not been able to get into the newer stuff I've tried to read.

Without Remorse would be a good place to start. It's about a guy who goes postal over some pimps and crack dealers after they murder his girlfriend. Probably my favourite of his as it's focused on policemen and criminals rather than government officials and spies etc.
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[neatbik]

Oh yeah, 'without remorse' is a stonking read

[GhostRider]

So.....does anyone read anything not related to the military?!? (Aside from that 'without remorse' suggestion).

I'll throw this one in there - Physics of the Impossible - Michio Kaku.

Takes everything from time travel, laser guns, death stars, teleportation, force fields, invisibility etc etc and explains the physics required to achieve all of these, how plausible they are with an estimated timeline as to when they will come about, and does it in a way that is understandable for people who don't grasp the finer details of string theory and quantum physics so well (like me).

Currently reading Chaos by James Gleick, about Chaos Theory (Butterfly effect etc), but am only just on the first chapter so can't comment on it much at the moment.

GhostRider
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[Paulington]

Mark Z. Danielewski - House of Leaves

Luke Rhinehart - The Dice Man.
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[Dr. DaveJPS]

[Itchy]

Douglas Coupland?

Generation X was good, Girlfriend in a Coma, and Hey Nostradamus are good, the rest steadily go down hill from there.


Bret Eason Ellis's American Psycho isn't bad it is fairly disjointed though and jumps around.

Chuck Palinuaik Invisible Monsters is weird I mean what other novel contains this bit:

"When a man f**** you up the butt without a rubber. He shoots his load, and then plants his mouth on your anus and sucks out his own warm sperm, plus whatever lubricant and faeces are present.

That's fletching. It may or may not, include kissing you to pass the sperm and fecal matter into your mouth." -Invisible Monsters by Chuck Palahniuk.


Longitude by Dava Sobell is an interesting read about George Harrison.

Nick Middleton's Going to extremes is a good series on extreme climates.
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[neatbik]

I have read a couple of books by Simon Scarrow - Centurion and The Gladiator.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Centurion-Roman-Legion-Simon-Scarrow/dp/0755327764

I enjoyed them, and i'll read a few more

[pa_broon74]

Mmm.

Feltching, yummy. Not really.

I'll read anything, I read David Mitchell's Cloud Atlas which I was expecting to be hard going but it was an amazingly far reaching book, one of the best I've read. I also read The Wind Up Bird Chronicle (Haruki Murakami) it was a WTF type of book. I'm still not sure what happened, probably need to read it again.

On Tom Clancy, the older books are good (Clear & Present Danger etc) The Sum of all Fears is a cracking read, really detailed. A whole chapter devoted to the 1000th of second it takes for a nuclear bomb to go off. I got fed up with them though as they went all uber-american, you know the kind of thing; the US can do no wrong and saves the world every day type shtick? Meh.

Lee Child's Jack Reacher books are a bit like this, also, I can't stand it when everything in the book (characters and equipment) are all perfect, everything is 'just so' and 'in the right place' all of the time. The worst author for that is Dan Brown, the only decent book he wrote was The Da Vinci code and only because of the central plot idea. The rest of it is bilge of the first order.

For example, the main character who was only able to hold his breath for so long while hiding in a fountain (as I recall) because he fell down a well as a child. Aye right then, fuck off.

Stephen Fry described it as pure arse-gravy, I tend to agree. Stephen Fry writes some good books by the way. The one on my desk at the moment is The Hippopotamus. Its about a 14 year old boy (from a rich background) who thinks he can cure all ills by basically shagging them. At one stage, one of the families' horses developes colic... Well you get the idea, its told in great detail as only someone like Stephen Fry could.. Its a funny book and pulls no punches. I also read Moab is my Washpot which is his biography upto age 18ish; its a really good read too.

Anyway, I could go on.


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Didn't catch anything.

[GhostRider]

[pa_broon74]

[jimspeed]

i am quite liking the Jack Higgins books at the mo for a bit of quiet time reading, they are usually easy enough to read and keep up with over a few nights.
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[nowhere.elysium]

Charles Stross, the Atrocity Archives.
British civil service, cthulhu mythos, and satanic omelettes. It's a bit geeky, but Stross is an awesome author.
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