I’ve basically been ordered to pick up any fiction book and read, after a friend discovered I’ve not read anything but non-fiction for a decade.

The ones I’ve enjoyed in the past have been short, fantastical or sci-fi (think Aldous Huxley, Ian McEwan), but crucially with amazing first person descriptive prose - the kind where you’re immersed in the writing so much you’re almost there with the character.

I liked sci-fi as the world’s constraints weren’t always predictable. Hope that makes sense.

Any recommendations?

Edit: I’m going to up the ante and, as a way of motivating myself to get off my arse and actually read a proper story, promise to choose a book from the top comment, after, let’s say arbitrarily, Friday 2200 GMT.

Edit deux: Wow ok I don’t think I’ve ever had this many responses to anything I’ve posted before. You’ve given me what looks like a whole year of interesting suggestions, and importantly, good commentary around them. I’m honouring my promise to buy the top thing in just under 4 hours.

  • Quintus
    4·
    8 months ago

    I made a comment somewhere else a few days ago so I’ll just copy paste.

    Les Misérables is easily the best book I’ve ever read in my entire life. A few years ago I read a shorthened version of it and even then I was fascinated by it. I finished reading the full text two months ago and oh my fucking god this book is the best thing ever written.

    I’m Turkish so I read the Turkish translation (will read the full text in English and French when I learn it) and on the back of it, it says something along these lines:

    “… Les Misérables is the third and the most majestic collumn of the author’s novel trilogy that tells of the society…”

    And I completely agree with that. This book is simply timeless. The characters, situations, unjustice, inequalities, all the suffering in it could be applied to any society. This book is real.

    The messages that it sends are solutions to topics that seemingly anybody with a functioning brain should be capable of thinking and realizing. And yet, these solutions are ignored and refused because of greed, revenge, bloodlust and most important of all, ignorance.

    The main character of the book, Jean Valjean is the embodiment of redemption. His entire arc teaches us how to treat criminals. Some countries today are taking these lessons and applying them. The lessons being; treat them as human, rehabilitate them. The result? They actually do heal and return to society as normal human beings.

    And yet you see people against this practice. Those kinds of people are blinded by bloodlust and revenge. They are the same kind of people that were racist, sexist and much more back in the day. The arguments that these people bring don’t hold up either. The most common one I see (at least from my perspective) is this:

    “You wouldn’t react this way if they hurt one of your loved ones!”

    The fact that these people don’t know anything about me aside, this argument is pointless as it implies that I would be blind to fact and logic when I’m in pain. And while that is true, me being angry over an apple falling onto my head won’t make gravity any less real. In other words, so what?

    The biggest victims of this mentality are pedofiles. Not the ones that do engage in action. But rather the ones that don’t harm anybody are aware of their issue. For instance, if a non-engaging pedo went to a therapist and told them of their issue, what would the therapist do? Call the police of course. And what would that do? Their life would be pretty screwed from that point forward. Assuming they are the non-engaging type, of course. I don’t believe this to be the correct attitude towards these kind of cases.

    I would also like to dive into other topics that the book covers (and perhaps extend on this one) but it would be way too long for a comment. Thank you anyone reading this far. I would like to hear your opinions on the matter and discuss even!>>