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Old 10-30-2006, 05:19 AM   #1
TadW
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The 100 Best Novels
Not necessarily my personal favorites, but RandomHouse has a list of their and their readers' top 100 Best Novels.

http://www.randomhouse.com/modernlib...estnovels.html

Excerpt...

The board's top 5:
1. ULYSSES by James Joyce
2. THE GREAT GATSBY by F. Scott Fitzgerald
3. A PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST AS A YOUNG MAN by James Joyce
4. LOLITA by Vladimir Nabokov
5. BRAVE NEW WORLD by Aldous Huxley

The readers' top 5:
1. ATLAS SHRUGGED by Ayn Rand
2. THE FOUNTAINHEAD by Ayn Rand
3. BATTLEFIELD EARTH by L. Ron Hubbard
4. THE LORD OF THE RINGS by J.R.R. Tolkien
5. TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD by Harper Lee
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Old 10-30-2006, 09:24 AM   #2
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Quote:
Originally Posted by TadW
Not necessarily my personal favorites, but RandomHouse has a list of their and their readers' top 100 Best Novels.

http://www.randomhouse.com/modernlib...estnovels.html

Excerpt...

The board's top 5:
1. ULYSSES by James Joyce
2. THE GREAT GATSBY by F. Scott Fitzgerald
3. A PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST AS A YOUNG MAN by James Joyce
4. LOLITA by Vladimir Nabokov
5. BRAVE NEW WORLD by Aldous Huxley

The readers' top 5:
1. ATLAS SHRUGGED by Ayn Rand
2. THE FOUNTAINHEAD by Ayn Rand
3. BATTLEFIELD EARTH by L. Ron Hubbard
4. THE LORD OF THE RINGS by J.R.R. Tolkien
5. TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD by Harper Lee
Random House's list which is parallel to the other one is also impressive.
Even if some of the books are doubtful to be there, these two lists represent years of great entertainment.
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Old 10-30-2006, 11:23 AM   #3
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Man, there must have been some serious vote stuffing going on over there on the reader's choice list. Four Ayn Rand books in the top 10? 3 Hubbard books? This is another result that shows you online re-voteable polls are not accurate.

Of course the "experts" list reads like your typical high school/college english book list, not exactly your typical bedtime reading for the average person.
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Old 10-30-2006, 12:02 PM   #4
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Leaping Gnome
Man, there must have been some serious vote stuffing going on over there on the reader's choice list. Four Ayn Rand books in the top 10? 3 Hubbard books? This is another result that shows you online re-voteable polls are not accurate.
I would deal it with great care to read novels by Lafayette Ronald Hubbard [founder of Scientology].
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Old 11-29-2006, 01:15 AM   #5
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Leaping Gnome
Man, there must have been some serious vote stuffing going on over there on the reader's choice list. Four Ayn Rand books in the top 10? 3 Hubbard books? This is another result that shows you online re-voteable polls are not accurate.

Of course the "experts" list reads like your typical high school/college english book list, not exactly your typical bedtime reading for the average person.

Definitely vote stuffing. As has already been said; L. Ron's book is pushed by Scientology. Rand's followers border on cult status as well... but I actually don't mind some of the philosophy in those books... I really wouldn't say Rand's philosophy repeated in a mediocre story qualifies for much intellectual or pleasure reading.
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Old 11-29-2006, 12:22 PM   #6
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I don't remember any particular philosophy being pushed in B.F.E. -- you were talking about Rand's books, sorry.

I think it's interesting that being dead doesn't impair Hubbard's ability to write & publish new work. Oh, right, he's just "gone on to the next planet."
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Old 04-22-2008, 06:28 PM   #7
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All this recent talk about Hubbard (everywhere, not here in particular) has made up my mind to read his science fiction novel called "dia"something.
Other than that, I like "top X" lists. Oftentimes there are items in them that might have escaped my attention.
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Old 04-22-2008, 08:03 PM   #8
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ayekappy View Post
... Rand's followers border on cult status as well... but I actually don't mind some of the philosophy in those books... I really wouldn't say Rand's philosophy repeated in a mediocre story qualifies for much intellectual or pleasure reading.
Now cult that out, I enjoyed Ayn Rand books. Having read the Hubbard books (before I had even heard of Scientology) I found them to be very poor representatives of SciFi.

Harper Lee's To Kill A Mockingbird is a true classic.
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Old 04-23-2008, 10:16 AM   #9
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Not on the top 10 lists but a great book in my estimation is Sinclair Lewis' It Can't Happen Here. I remember reading it in the 1960s and then along came Richard Nixon and Watergate and I remember thinking that Lewis must have some link to the future (the book was written in the late 1930s) because the book was like a portent of Nixon.
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Old 04-23-2008, 10:22 AM   #10
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Originally Posted by Leaping Gnome View Post
Of course the "experts" list reads like your typical high school/college english book list, not exactly your typical bedtime reading for the average person.
Apart from 'Ulysses', I thought the board list was more readable than the readers' one.
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Old 04-24-2008, 06:17 PM   #11
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Ulysses has spent the past year in my guest bathroom. I have no desire to finish it and my guests apparently don't either. The pages look barely used.
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Old 04-24-2008, 07:40 PM   #12
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Quote:
Originally Posted by TadW View Post
Not necessarily my personal favorites, but RandomHouse has a list of their and their readers' top 100 Best Novels.

http://www.randomhouse.com/modernlib...estnovels.html

Excerpt...

The board's top 5:
1. ULYSSES by James Joyce
2. THE GREAT GATSBY by F. Scott Fitzgerald
3. A PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST AS A YOUNG MAN by James Joyce
4. LOLITA by Vladimir Nabokov
5. BRAVE NEW WORLD by Aldous Huxley

The readers' top 5:
1. ATLAS SHRUGGED by Ayn Rand
2. THE FOUNTAINHEAD by Ayn Rand
3. BATTLEFIELD EARTH by L. Ron Hubbard
4. THE LORD OF THE RINGS by J.R.R. Tolkien
5. TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD by Harper Lee
The reader's top 3 in that list are total crap. But the 4 & 5 are very good.
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Old 04-24-2008, 09:00 PM   #13
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Ulysses has spent the past year in my guest bathroom. I have no desire to finish it and my guests apparently don't either. The pages look barely used.
Ulysses was the most boring book I've ever (tried) to read. It's a fraud. (I can't even understand how can it be considered so good even for scholar purposes).

This listing, though... not universal enough for me. Where's Hugo, Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, Kafka, Cervantes,...?
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Old 04-25-2008, 04:53 AM   #14
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This listing, though... not universal enough for me. Where's Hugo, Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, Kafka, Cervantes,...?
English only readers (like me ) can only read their works in translation - I'm never clear how much my enjoyment is due to the quality of the source, or the quality of the translation.

It's hard to provide an objective assessment if you can't read in the original language; but the English translations of 'War and Peace' and 'Three Musketeers' I've read are both worthy of inclusion in a Best Novels list.
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Old 04-25-2008, 07:30 AM   #15
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hmm.I'd like to list the King in yellow on top places,but I have no idea if I can classify that as a Novel.
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