When in the beginning of this semester i was asked about my favourite novel, I couldn't remember which one is the best, and I still can not do it. For me, it was always very hard to choose favourite book, film, painting, etc. I enjoy reading books of different authors, and I can't state that one is the best and the others are worse. In my opinion, to choose who is better - Ray Bradbury or Gabriel Garcia Marquez - is a nonsense. All the writers are different and many of them have their particular charm. So I'll write about a couple of novels here.
1). Erich Maria Remarque's Spark of Life. All Remarque's books have the same sad and tragical style, but this novel is the only one that seems not to bear a resemblance to the others at all. It doesn't tell us about
love, which is very strange for Remarque's books. The story is very dark and cruel - this novel tells us about fascist concentration camp. Main hero even does not have a name, only a number - 409th.
2). Ken Kesey's One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest - well-known book, one of the greatest novels of the XX century, it has many social critics which masked by insane hero's delirium. The story also is perfect from the psycological point of view.
3). Ken Kesey's Sometimes a Great Notion - less known in Russia, this book is harder to understand then the previous one. Furthermore, in my opinion it is more profound. The plot is about strange and sometimes unpleasant relationships inside one family.
4). Gabriel Garcia Marquez' 100 Years of Solitude - this book doesn't need an introduction: I think everybody knows this novel. Probably, Marquez' best book, it shows us perfectly his favourite genre of magic realism.
5). Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse Five - it's impossible for me to explain the style of a book. It shows us some parts of a war from an unusual point of view of an American who came under the bombs which were dropped on Drezden by American Army. This time, in Drezden there were no German soldiers at all - only Americans and thousands of innocent civilians.
This list should be much longer. It may include the novels of such writers as Ray Bradbury and Roger Zelazny, Terry Pratchett and Duglas Adams, Anthonny Burges and Jerzy Kosinski, Douglas Coupland and Jack Kerouac, Richard Bach and Akutogawa Ryunosuke, Johann fon Goethe and Miguel de Cervantes, etc. etc. etc. ...
1). Erich Maria Remarque's Spark of Life. All Remarque's books have the same sad and tragical style, but this novel is the only one that seems not to bear a resemblance to the others at all. It doesn't tell us about
love, which is very strange for Remarque's books. The story is very dark and cruel - this novel tells us about fascist concentration camp. Main hero even does not have a name, only a number - 409th.
2). Ken Kesey's One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest - well-known book, one of the greatest novels of the XX century, it has many social critics which masked by insane hero's delirium. The story also is perfect from the psycological point of view.
3). Ken Kesey's Sometimes a Great Notion - less known in Russia, this book is harder to understand then the previous one. Furthermore, in my opinion it is more profound. The plot is about strange and sometimes unpleasant relationships inside one family.
4). Gabriel Garcia Marquez' 100 Years of Solitude - this book doesn't need an introduction: I think everybody knows this novel. Probably, Marquez' best book, it shows us perfectly his favourite genre of magic realism.
5). Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse Five - it's impossible for me to explain the style of a book. It shows us some parts of a war from an unusual point of view of an American who came under the bombs which were dropped on Drezden by American Army. This time, in Drezden there were no German soldiers at all - only Americans and thousands of innocent civilians.
This list should be much longer. It may include the novels of such writers as Ray Bradbury and Roger Zelazny, Terry Pratchett and Duglas Adams, Anthonny Burges and Jerzy Kosinski, Douglas Coupland and Jack Kerouac, Richard Bach and Akutogawa Ryunosuke, Johann fon Goethe and Miguel de Cervantes, etc. etc. etc. ...
Great list! I've only read #2 from your top five, but I know that I really should at least read "Slaughterhouse Five." From your runner up list, I really like Douglas Adams and Douglas Coupland. I've read most of their books. I've also read at least one book by Bradbury, Pratchett, and Kerouac. All good stuff!
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