I’ve basically been ordered to pick up any fiction book and read, after a friend discovered I’ve not read anything but non-fiction for a decade.

The ones I’ve enjoyed in the past have been short, fantastical or sci-fi (think Aldous Huxley, Ian McEwan), but crucially with amazing first person descriptive prose - the kind where you’re immersed in the writing so much you’re almost there with the character.

I liked sci-fi as the world’s constraints weren’t always predictable. Hope that makes sense.

Any recommendations?

Edit: I’m going to up the ante and, as a way of motivating myself to get off my arse and actually read a proper story, promise to choose a book from the top comment, after, let’s say arbitrarily, Friday 2200 GMT.

Edit deux: Wow ok I don’t think I’ve ever had this many responses to anything I’ve posted before. You’ve given me what looks like a whole year of interesting suggestions, and importantly, good commentary around them. I’m honouring my promise to buy the top thing in just under 4 hours.

  • Rikudou_Sage@lemmings.world
    2·
    10 months ago

    The Malazan book is extremely hard to read and that comes from someone who reads daily for a few decades. I really wanted to like it, but the writing just sucks.

    • whatsgoingdom
      1·
      10 months ago

      I would not agree, I loved the fast pacing and the very visible pnp character of the books. I read the first two books in the series within a few days. Only thing I could see is the frequent jumps between different locations with a ton of characters, then again that’s just the usual way for fantasy series I guess.