Wednesday, May 20, 2009

Garrett chats about Books

Since getting the Kindle...I have been tearing through books like never before (and that's saying something) And that has put me in a mood to lay out my impressions of my favorite authors (these are all pop fiction authors...not highbrow lit)

Stephen King: The master of the storyteller....incredible imagination...if anyone has not I suggest you pick up, Carrie, The Shining, The Stand, It, The Dead Zone...just for starters..he is still going strong having recently completed his magnus opus "Dark Tower" series...Kings book are big and long...you never get cheated

Dean Koontz: Also very good but has slipped in the last ten years as he is obsessed with his "odd thomas" character....formulaic...in every book there is always an autistic hero..and a magic dog.

Michael Crichton: I still can't believe he is gone...nobody could teach and entertain like crichton did......it's such a part of our culture now we forget just how perfect a story "Jurassic Park" was..

Nelson Demille: Fun, Fun author, great first person storyteller...makes you feel like you are on a fun journey in his stories

Tom Clancy: When he put out a new Jack Ryan book it was an event! huge thousand page political and military thrillers...he helped create a genre...sadly he doesn't put anything of note out anymore.

Michael Connelly: I picked up "The Black Echo" and immediately stopped everything and read all his books in order...Connelly is like that, you have to keep reading...and you love the world of Harry Bosch. When I met Connelly I said to him, " I can't help looking for Harry's house everytime I drive down the 101 and look up into the hills"

Lee Child: On par with Connelly, I could not stop once I picked up the first "Jack Reacher" novel...I am reading his 15th book right now, this is my break time to do this. Great character, great world.

Vince Flynn: Slightly less fun to read then Child or Connelly, but very entertaining books starring CIA hero "Mitch Rapp" (Why won't the suits just let him torture terrorists?)

Greg Iles: Probably my favorite combination of an author with a beautiful command of language, a great ability for suspense and character development...Greg Iles books are all incredible.

James Michener: Hawaii, Alaska, Chesapeake, The Source, The Covenant, Centennial, The drifters....etc etc.....A sweeping epic storyteller he takes a certain piece of geography and tells the entire history of it and it is fascinating and entertaining each time.

James Patterson: The master author for those who have short attention spans...each one of his books (he now has people write them for him) are divided up into about 130 4 page chapters......He is the opposite of Greg Iles in that he has no gift for language...but he is entertaining I must admit...(sometimes you're in the mood for a guilty pleasure)

Dennis Lehane: His Kenzie/Genarro mystery series is fantastic...from there he switched to standalones like "mystic river" and "shutter island" both phenomonal books. Lehane has also written for "The Wire" arguably the best television drama ever made.


So tell me folks....what kinds of books do you read...or do you read at all? Grabbaggar wants to know!

4 comments:

Sailing Vessel Serenity NOW said...

Yikes, I would have thought that you would have had quite a few people talking about books that they have read. Being that there are so many reader's in the family and what not. I, for one am not one of them but thought this would be a great topic to post on. Hats off to all the reader's. Love ya, Susan

Bible Thumpin' Mike in Utah said...

Mr Riley, always the avid reader.
What do I like to read. I still have that Dodgers Encyclopedia I got from you in Chico that is fun to flip through.
I hate fiction and science fiction. I like a good baseball biography anytime. "The Boys of Summer" by Roger Kahn, I believe was good.
I also like the books of the bible of course.
I am currently reading "The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership" and "The 21 Most Powerful Minutes in a Leaders Day" by John c Maxwell. These were recommended by a friend.
Also I have been reading "America in Crimson Red" by Robert Bellar.
I also enjoy "Lectures to My Students" by Charles Spurgeon.
Also "Martyrs Mirror AKA Blood Theatre" by a German guy whose name escapes me.
Most of all I love to read Garret's Grab Bag.

Paula said...

You are a reading machine, Garrett!! You have always been a great reader.

Books that I have been reading lately? It seems like I prefer biographies and books about different cultures and also anything inspirational.

I've read "Three cups of Tea"...the story of one man's success in starting schools in Pakistan, "Eat, Pray and Love"..journal about travels to Italy, India and Indonesia...."If you had one Month to Live"...how would you live it? "Because they Hate"...story of the militant uprising in Lebanon", "Dangerous Surrender" by Kay Warren..about the AIDS epedemic, "What is the What"..the story of the Lost Boys of Sudan and their trek to a refugee camp in Kenya. I loved this last book so much, that I read three others on the subject!
I also love books about health or nutrition and travel books.
My favorite book of all time is God's love letter to me and my compass for life...the Bible.

Love, Mom

Bible Thumpin' Mike in Utah said...

I hate reading, really absolutely hate it. I also hate science, oh yeah and math.

But i have a book on science I just cannot put down. "Fixing My Gaze" by Susan Barry.

It is the story of my life, told by somebody who went through it 20 years before me. And my 6 yr old is enduring it now. Crossed eyes at birth, failed surgery at a young age, no 3-D vision (really sucked when Jaws 3 came out), no depth perception, no idea what things look like not on a flat surface.
Susan had vision therapy at 50 yrs old and gained all the visual senses of binocular, stereo, 3D vision provide.
My daughter starts therapy next week. I will follow myself. When I can see what you all see, the first thing i am doing is hitting the batting cages somewhere, anywhere. What is it like to see the ball sphere drawing closer to you? Really pick up the spin and not just guess where it will cross the plate.
I cannot wait until it snows again here. To see 3D snow flakes falling around you rather than thousands of white specs falling as if along a sheet of glass!
Travel to the coast to see ocean waves, or even stinkin seaguls flying past.
If you are in to neurobiology, pick up a copy of this book.