Mine is Devil House by John Darnielle. Wowwww.

  • WideEyedStupid@lemmy.world
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    3 months ago

    I mostly read series, and my favorite is Malazan Book of the Fallen by Steven Erikson. The Silo series by Hugh Howey a close second.

    I’m not really someone who reads many standalone books, because I love getting lost in epic/long stories (for this same reason I barely ever watch movies and stick with series in stead), and I hate how by the time I’m really getting into a book, suddenly it’s over… But hmm, for a standalone book I’d have to go with The Book Thief by Zusak (which btw, never seen the movie, maybe I should sometimes).

  • Volkditty@lemmy.world
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    3 months ago

    My Teacher Flunked the Planet, by Bruce Coville.

    The final book in the My Teacher is an Alien series, it follows a group of 6th graders who are tasked to explore the best and worst of humanity in order to help defend our right to exist to an intergalactic council of aliens that fears us. It deals with some pretty heavy fucking themes that have stuck with me since I first read it at the age of 10.

    “Forty thousand,” said Duncan. His eyes were closed, as if he were reading from a page inside his head.

    “What?” asked Susan.

    “Forty thousand,” he repeated. “That’s how many kids die every day from things that could be changed if we, all of us, the people of Earth, decided they should be.”

    I took in a sharp breath; forty thousand people was more than twice the population of Kennituck Falls.

    “Forty thousand a day,” continued Duncan relentlessly. “That’s a quarter of a million a week. Over a million a month. Nearly fifteen million a year. They die from not having vaccines that cost less than a dollar apiece. They die from dirty wells and lack of food. They die from the fact that people don’t care, at least, not enough to change it.”

    Duncan sat frozen, as if in a trance. Tears leaked from beneath his lowered eyelids, cutting paths through the dust of the camp that still covered his cheeks. His voice was like the voice of God, listing our sins.

    “Last year, fourteen million children died because we earthlings decided to spend our money elsewhere. It happened the year before, too. And we’re going to let it happen again this year.”

    Suddenly he opened his eyes and looked right at me. “Peter, I learned a lot in the last few weeks. I read more than you can imagine.I have millions of facts in my head that I’m trying to put together. I don’t know what it all means, but I know the numbers. I know one day’s worth of the money our world spends on guns and bombs and soldiers could save fifty million children over the next ten years.”

    As Duncan spoke I had a vision, a fantasy, that the people of Earth - not the leaders, not the governments, just the people - were suddenly able to speak with one voice. And they said, “Enough. We don’t want it to be this way anymore. Make it right!

    But we couldn’t speak with one voice. For some reason we were no better than mute in the face of a disaster we all wanted to pretend wasn’t happening.

    I was sick with shame and anger. And I knew that I would never be the same after that night.

    I had been witness to a crime.

    Now I would have to testify to what I had seen. Because to keep silent would also be a crime.

  • GladiusB@lemmy.world
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    3 months ago

    Snow Crash - Niel Stephenson

    Choke - Chuck Palahnuik

    Timeline - Michael Chricton

    It’s hard to pick which one I like the best.

  • VanHalbgott@lemmus.org
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    3 months ago

    I read lots of books over the years.

    The last book series I read was All Quiet On The Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque.

    Bought the series on my Nook eReader.

    Currently, I read the Alphabet series by Sue Grafton, a local mystery novel author.

  • Capitao_Duarte@lemmy.eco.br
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    3 months ago

    For me it has to be Berserk. Not an actual book, I know, but it has the best story I’ve ever consumed, it being books, movies, games, you name it. Berserk takes the crown

  • Cyth@lemmy.world
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    3 months ago

    Red Sister by Mark Lawrence. A series described inaccurately, but amusingly, as about “lesbian murder nuns”.

    “It is important, when killing a nun, to ensure that you bring an army of sufficient size. For Sister Thorn of the Sweet Mercy Convent Lano Tacsis brought two hundred men.”

    “No child truly believes they will be hanged. Even on the gallows platform with the rope scratching at their wrists and the shadow of the noose upon their face they know that someone will step forward, a mother, a father returned from some long absence, a king dispensing justice … someone. Few children have lived long enough to understand the world into which they were born. Perhaps few adults have either, but they at least have learned some bitter lessons.”

  • moitoi@feddit.de
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    3 months ago

    Empire of Normality, Neurodiversity and capitalism by Robert Chapman

    It’s about the normalization of the human centered on eugenic and how it serves the capitalism to the detrimental of the neurodiversity and the neurodivergents.

  • Mr_Blott@lemmy.world
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    3 months ago

    I dislike classical literature and these threads are usually littered with pretentious answers 😂

    Give me a trashy thriller any day. The Breach by Patrick Lee is one of the best sci-fi thrillers I’ve ever read

  • Corr@lemm.ee
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    3 months ago

    My favourite book is hands down the scorpio races by maggie stiefvater. I’ve read that book so many times I’ve lost count now

    • NineMileTower@lemmy.world
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      3 months ago

      This book is easily the best story about the paradigms of life and loss. Exceptional book. I recommend it to people who have lost someone.

  • ℕ𝕖𝕞𝕠@midwest.social
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    3 months ago

    Galactic Pot-Healer by Philip K. Dick.

    I tried to write a plot summary and couldn’t do it justice. So instead I’ll talk about themes:

    • individuality vs. subsumption

    • theology

    • the nature of love and sexual attraction

    • art restoration

    • making a wrong choice intentionally just to prove you’re capable of making choices

    It’s very funny, and has a sassy robot, which we all love.

    My favorite quote:

    A man is an angel that has become deranged, Joe Fernwright thought. Once they – all of them – had been genuine angels, and at that time they had had a choice between good and evil, so it was easy, easy being an angel. And then something happened. Something went wrong or broke down or failed. And they had become faced with the necessity of choosing not good or evil but the lesser of two evils, and so that had unhinged them and now each was a man.

    • Corr@lemm.ee
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      3 months ago

      Very cool excerpt. Made me think of the witcher quote about lesser evil:

      Evil is Evil. Lesser, greater, middling… Makes no difference. The degree is arbitary. The definition’s blurred. If I’m to choose between one evil and another… I’d rather not choose at all.