Fiction

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Reformed Thomist

Reformed Thomist

Puritan Board Sophomore
What floats your boat? What are you reading?

I'm not a big fiction reader at all, but I likes what I likes. Favorite authors: Edgar Allan Poe, M.R. James, Ray Bradbury (esp. his early pulp sci-fi/horror short stories), Robert Aickman, Stephen King, Russell Banks, and others.
 
Reformed Thomist said:
What floats your boat? What are you reading?

I'm not a big fiction reader at all, but I likes what I likes. Favorite authors: Edgar Allan Poe, M.R. James, Ray Bradbury (esp. his early pulp sci-fi/horror short stories), Robert Aickman, Stephen King, Russell Banks, and others.
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I used to avoid fiction generally ... But now my love for it has been increasing.

I challenge all theological wonks to start introducing some fiction into their reading, it will make them better theologians!

Floats my boat: Wodehouse, Many of the Russian Authors (Dostoyevski, Bulgakov, Chekhov), Twain, Arthur Conan Doyle, Bunyan (of course)

Currently Reading: Heinlein (sci fi), Hemmingway (Islands of the Stream)
 
Reformed Thomist said:
What floats your boat? What are you reading?

I'm not a big fiction reader at all, but I likes what I likes. Favorite authors: Edgar Allan Poe, M.R. James, Ray Bradbury (esp. his early pulp sci-fi/horror short stories), Robert Aickman, Stephen King, Russell Banks, and others.
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It appears that we have very similar tastes! I enjoy Poe, M.R. James, H.P. Lovecraft, Charles Robert Maturin, Matthew Lewis, a select few of Nathaniel Hawthorne's short fiction, and pretty much any supernatural horror fiction that is in good taste.
 
The Wheel of Time series by Robert Jordan is one of the greatest works of fiction when it comes to the fantasy genera. People claim that it is comparable to the Lord of the Rings.
 
JoyFullMom said:
Currently reading Tolstoy's "Anna Karenina"
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Great book. Nabokov is my favorite. I've also been reading Cormac McCarthy lately. Good stuff, especially The Road and Blood Meridian.

I also love Proust. In Search of Lost Time takes effort but it is well worth it. Proust will change your life (j/k). Read the new translation.
 
christabella_warren said:
Reformed Thomist said:
What floats your boat? What are you reading?

I'm not a big fiction reader at all, but I likes what I likes. Favorite authors: Edgar Allan Poe, M.R. James, Ray Bradbury (esp. his early pulp sci-fi/horror short stories), Robert Aickman, Stephen King, Russell Banks, and others.
Click to expand...

It appears that we have very similar tastes! I enjoy Poe, M.R. James, H.P. Lovecraft, Charles Robert Maturin, Matthew Lewis, a select few of Nathaniel Hawthorne's short fiction, and pretty much any supernatural horror fiction that is in good taste.
Click to expand...

Have you read any Aickman? He's Jamesian (M.R., that is) in a lot of ways, but goes for the throat a bit more (psychologically). His stories "Larger Than Oneself" (1966) and "The Swords" (1969), both collected in the classic horror anthology The Dark Descent (David G. Hartwell, Ed.; Tor Books, 1997) among other anthos, simply blow me away. Disturbing and terrifying (in the best sense of the words), thought-provoking, and brilliant.
 
I think that many people on this board would appreciate the work of Orson Scott Card, especially Ender's Game and Speaker for the Dead. SftD even mentions Calvinists!
 
I like to read Fantasy and Sci Fi.

Here are some good titles or series in that genre.

Hyperion by Dan Simmons
The Legend of Drizzt series R.A Salvatore
The Sword of Truth series by Terry Goodkind
The Farseer Trilogy by Robin Hobb
The Sword of Shannara by Terry Brooks
A game of thrones by George RR Martin
Legend by David Gemmel

I also like to read Historical Fiction.

Here are some good ones in that genre.

Sarum, London, The Forest, and The Princes of Ireland by Edward Rutherford
James Michner and Bernard Cornwell are some other good authors.
 
A question... is there anything actually worth reading in all those jam-packed fiction sections that I basically ignore in Christian bookstores?
 
Reformed Thomist said:
A question... is there anything actually worth reading in all those jam-packed fiction sections that I basically ignore in Christian bookstores?
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Good quetion. I've often wondered that myself but I'm afraid to try because I'll probably get about 200 pages in and find out that the underlying worldview is Arminian or pentacostal or word of faith or dispensational or something like that, so I haven't ever tried one.
 
DD2009 said:
Reformed Thomist said:
A question... is there anything actually worth reading in all those jam-packed fiction sections that I basically ignore in Christian bookstores?
Click to expand...

Good quetion. I've often wondered that myself but I'm afraid to try because I'll probably get about 200 pages in and find out that the underlying worldview is Arminian or pentacostal or word of faith or dispensational or something like that, so I haven't ever tried one.
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That's basically why I have avoided them myself: a strong suspicion of weak/bad underlying theology, pretty much across the board.
 
Andres said:
why read fiction? I will just wait for the movie
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Movies are limited in terms of time (or length) and budget of the producers. Whereas, fiction, especially when the writer is really good, is only limited by the imagination of the reader.
 
Reformed Thomist said:
What floats your boat? What are you reading?

I'm not a big fiction reader at all, but I likes what I likes. Favorite authors: Edgar Allan Poe, M.R. James, Ray Bradbury (esp. his early pulp sci-fi/horror short stories), Robert Aickman, Stephen King, Russell Banks, and others.
Click to expand...
I like the older authors I reckon. I like mysteries and my favorite is Agatha Christie's Hercule Poirot, I like The Saint books things like that. I also get as varied as like Ted Dekker's books too

-----Added 11/21/2009 at 10:08:57 EST-----

Reformed Thomist said:
A question... is there anything actually worth reading in all those jam-packed fiction sections that I basically ignore in Christian bookstores?
Click to expand...
Sometimes, I found some good stuff.
 
JoyFullMom said:
Andres said:
why read fiction? I will just wait for the movie
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The book is always better!!!
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if this is really true, then I guess I need to read No Country for Old Men by McCarthy because the movie was just about perfect. I am excited to see The Road with Viggo Mortensen because I have heard the novel was awesome. A few years back when I found out Scorcese's next film would be Shutter Island, I checked the book out from the library because I was excited to get into the story. I only got through a third of the book.
 
Chippy said:
The Wheel of Time series by Robert Jordan is one of the greatest works of fiction when it comes to the fantasy genera. People claim that it is comparable to the Lord of the Rings.
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I thought that as well, until I got past book 5, then 6, then 7, then 8, then 9...

I just stopped after that. It seemed like Jordan lost focus and just kept prolonging everything. It became very repetative and sappy.

I may try rereading the series again, now that the new book is out and the last two should be here soon.


I also tried reading the Game Of Thrones books. I get too emotionally involved when I read, so after the first book, I had to give it up. The treachery in the story is too much for me. haha :)
Oh well.

For favorite fiction, I guess my favorite authors are JRR Tolkien and Agatha Christie.
 
Dostoyevsky
Harry Potter
Black by Ted Dekker was entertaining, I want to read the others in the series
Currently working my way through Narnia since I never got to as a kid
 
I have always enjoyed anything Graham Greene has written. His "Power and the Glory" being one of the most memorable. Also anything by Conan Doyle, not just his Sherlock Holmes stories.

Frederick Forsyth, Jack Higgins, Ian Rankin, Road Dahl are other favoured authors whilst Alexander McColl Smith has produced a number of delightful stories.
 
I agree...

Pilgrim72 said:
Chippy said:
The Wheel of Time series by Robert Jordan is one of the greatest works of fiction when it comes to the fantasy genera. People claim that it is comparable to the Lord of the Rings.
Click to expand...

I thought that as well, until I got past book 5, then 6, then 7, then 8, then 9...

I just stopped after that. It seemed like Jordan lost focus and just kept prolonging everything. It became very repetative and sappy.

I may try rereading the series again, now that the new book is out and the last two should be here soon.


I also tried reading the Game Of Thrones books. I get too emotionally involved when I read, so after the first book, I had to give it up. The treachery in the story is too much for me. haha :)
Oh well.

For favorite fiction, I guess my favorite authors are JRR Tolkien and Agatha Christie.
Click to expand...

You are not kidding about the Jordan series, loved it in the beginning, then blew it off around book 6 or 7.
 
Ah, so nice to feel at home with other readers :). I also love scifi/fantasy, and historical fiction, alternative history, and most of the classics. I love Tolkien, Lewis, and Jordan, and Stephen Lawhead, Orson Scott Card's Ender series, some of Heinlein, and Herbert, and Niven and Pournelle. The Russians (Tolstoy and Dostoevsky) are also favorites, and Milton, and Quo Vadis, and Moby Dick and the Iliad/Odyssey/Aeneid (okay those were definitely an acquired taste, but I love them now).
 
I'm amazed how many people like and enjoy M R James.
Seems like masochism to me. I read them all, years ago on the urging of someone close, but I always wished I hadn't. It took me ages to get the lingering aftertaste out of my mind. I will admit they're very well written, which is why they stick with you, but where's the moral, where's the edification,... what's to like?
 
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