Originally posted by billie

learn hebrew and read the Old Testament (TaNaKh) you will be amazed how much it was intentionally manipulated & changed into what is now the "english" OT.

iv actuall read the bible, quran (in arabic) and the torah (close translation given to me by some jewish dude :p)

they are all extremly intresting an ubelivebly close to each other. it amazes me sometimes that those three relegions hate each other when they are 95% the same.

Originally posted by billie

learn hebrew and read the Old Testament (TaNaKh) you will be amazed how much it was intentionally manipulated & changed into what is now the "english" OT.

God help me for responding to what seems like an obvious trolling.

The guy's looking for entertaining sci-fi or fantasy fiction to read. No, despite whatever your take on religions are, religious texts do not count.

Also, duh. Of course it has been changed. Also, you can't read most of the Old Testament in its original form. The Hebrew peoples spent a long time with only an oral tradition (no writings), until probably somewhere around 300-500 BC. The events they refer to were told and retold many times prior to that. So there's no way of even saying if even the oldest written copies of the Talmud/Torah realisitically reflect the original tellings.

My favorite Jack Kerouac book is proabably Desolation Angels. He is my favorite author.

I like fantasy, horror and science fiction.   But I'll recommend a damm good 'mainstream' book.    The Road by Cormac McCarthy (Think I got the last name wrong).    Its about a father and his young son trying to survive in a post apopolyptic* world.  Its very  bleak but its very good.  It won the pulitizer prize a couple of years ago.   Also being made into a movie coming out later this year.  

Its almost a zombie book without zombies if that makes any sense. 

Originally posted by terrant

A few recommendations:

 

This Alien Shore by C.S. Friedman: A brilliant and very original sci-fi story about a girl on the run from practically everyone because of the secrets in her head.

The Atrocity Archives by Charles Stross: OK. Imagine this: HP Lovecraft, Ian Fleming, and Bill Gates have a 3-way love child. That's what this feels like.

 Necroscope by Brian Lumley: Kinda the same idea as the above story. Only with vampires.

Everything and anything written by Robert Heinlein. Everything.

The Black Company by Glen Cook. Fantasy with a dark, military-minded edge to it.

 

I got the Atrocity Archives on my book shelf.   Haven't read it yet.   So many books and I'm not a voracious reader.   Sigh.

  Still going to heavily insist on American Gods by Neil Gaiman. I finished it the other day, and it's a pretty damn good read.

Has anyone read Neuromancer by William Gibson?  It was like reading anything by James Joyce - unreadable. It was like oil and water or something - cyberpunk and me just do not mix well at all.

Originally posted by declaredemer

Has anyone read Neuromancer by William Gibson?  It was like reading anything by James Joyce - unreadable. It was like oil and water or something - cyberpunk and me just do not mix well at all.

I have not, but i remember a friend having similer fealing about that book.

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Originally posted by SgtFrog

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Originally posted by declaredemer

Has anyone read Neuromancer by William Gibson?  It was like reading anything by James Joyce - unreadable. It was like oil and water or something - cyberpunk and me just do not mix well at all.

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I have not, but i remember a friend having similer fealing about that book.

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i love Neuromancer but i rarely recommend it as it is not so approachable. But if you want an unreadable Gibson novel then grabe "the difference engine" which he wrote with Bruce Sterling. I really wish i had never actually read that book.

If you want an approachable cyberpunk book pick up "Snow Crash" by Niel Stevenson

I am not sure if this was already said, but right now I am reading "The Dark Tower" serie from Stephen King and I must say I am really enjoying it !

Currently awaiting a copy of The Man In The High Castle by Philip K Dick.

If you want some good scifi and/or fantasy books, go to a used bookstore and look for anything by Daw -- the publisher -- that has a yellow cover, these books are from around the late '60s into the '70s when Daw would publish just about anyone, and there are some great stories.