Books

I have developed the habit of sharing my thoughts on all the books that I read. It serves two purposes. One, I am able to share with whoever looks at this site some books to read, or to avoid. And secondly, it allows me to spend more time with a book and reflect on them a little more than I would if I just read it and set it down.

Unfortunately, I haven’t really had the chance to share what my favorite books are, mainly because I read them before I started doing this. So, instead of going back and individually posting an entry for every book I decided to compile a list of my favorites in one post.

Here they are:

100 Years of Solitude

  
One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Quick Synopsis: One of the 20th century’s enduring works, One Hundred Years of Solitude is a widely beloved and acclaimed novel known throughout the world, and the ultimate achievement in a Nobel Prize–winning career.

The novel tells the story of the rise and fall of the mythical town of Macondo through the history of the Buendía family. It is a rich and brilliant chronicle of life and death, and the tragicomedy of humankind. In the noble, ridiculous, beautiful, and tawdry story of the Buendía family, one sees all of humanity, just as in the history, myths, growth, and decay of Macondo, one sees all of Latin America.

Quick Thoughts: Easily my favorite book of all time. it can be hard to read and is admittedly not for everybody…but the writing and events that take place in the book are what fiction was made for.

Atonement

Atonement by Ian McEwan

Synopsis: Set in 1935 England, this “New York Times” bestseller is enthralling in its depiction of childhood, love and war, England and class, making it a profound–and profoundly moving–exploration of shame and forgiveness, of atonement and the difficulty of absolution.

Quick Thoughts: If you’ve seen the movie that came out this year, you know what the story is about. It’s less about love than it is about the results of your actions. In my opinion, the style in which Ian McEwan writes fits this story perfectly.

Blue Like Jazz

Blue Like Jazz by Donald Miller

Synopsis: Donald Miller’s fresh and original voice may change the way Christians view the “status quo” faith and build a bridge to seekers who believe that organized religion doesn’t meet their spiritual needs.

Quick Thoughts: I’ve written about this book before. (Blue Like Jazz) I like to call it my instruction manual, besides the Bible of course, on how I want to live my Christian life and share my walk with others.

Mere Christianity

Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis

Synopsis: A forceful and accessible discussion of Christian belief that has become one of the most popular introductions to Christianity and one of the most popular of Lewis’s books.

Quick Thoughts: Another book on Christianity. If you’ve ever wondered about the world and why Christians believe what they do, this book would be of interest to you. It’s philosophical in it’s writing and C.S. Lewis goes fairly “deep” but it is worth the read.

Choke

Choke by Chuck Palahniuk

Synopsis: Victor Mancini, a medical-school dropout, is an antihero for our deranged times. Needing to pay elder care for his mother, Victor has devised an ingenious scam: he pretends to choke on pieces of food while dining in upscale restaurants.

Quick Thoughts: A little crazy, very disturbing (as all Palahniuk books are) but is also very entertaining and quite hilarious at times. Palahniuk is the Author of Fight Club, and this is just as disturbing and with a surprise ending as well. Definitely for adult readers only.

Into the Wild

Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer

Synopsis: In April 1992, a young man from a well-to-do family hitchhiked to Alaska and walked alone into the wilderness north of Mt. McKinley. He had given $25,000 in savings to a charity, abandoned his car and most of his possessions, burned all the cash in his wallet and invented a life for himself. Four months later, his decomposed body was found by a moose hunter. Jon Krakauer brings Chris McCandless’s uncompromising pilgrimage out of the shadows and illuminates it with meaning in this mesmerizing and heartbreaking tour de force.

Quick Thoughts: This is an amazing true story and written in a journalistic style, basically it’s a large magazine article. Exciting, and heartbreaking.

Although not in my top five or six, I’m also a big fan of these books, which I’ve read since I’ve been here:

Gilead by Marilynne Robinson
Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri

Also, before I finish, I should mention the Harry Potter books. I’ve read them and enjoyed them all, some more than once.