Popular good writers/novels

RedMolly · Oct 30, 2006

OK, so what's something you've read and enjoyed that's also appeared on the NYT bestseller lists?

Me:
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time (my confirmed non-reader of fiction husband actually spent a beautiful day inside reading this instead of going for a mountain bike ride)
A Secret History by Donna Tartt... just picked this up (and couldn't put it down 'til I was done) this weekend
Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell (one of my favorite books of all time)
The Stand (I think I first read it in elementary school, which is probably wildly inappropriate)

And on the nonfiction side of the aisle... David Sedaris can't publish anything without me snapping it up in hardcover. Neither can Richard Dawkins.

Just trying to counter the negativity here... aren't we more likely to improve our writing by finding good models and learning from them, rather than carping sour-grapishly at bad models?

PeeDee · Oct 30, 2006

We bought "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time" which sounded clever and interesting. I tried reading it, did not enjoy it even a little bit, and put it down.

my wife tried reading it, also gave up around the same time I did. There it sits, on my office floor, under eighty pages of manuscript for something-or-another.

Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell was magnificant, though, one of the best books I've read. It was so damned long, I actually took a break halfway through and read two other novels, then came back and finished it...

icerose · Oct 30, 2006

There are far too many for me to name. I have enjoyed more books than I have disliked. On the whole I have found that books that are published have been good. If they are selling well, it's for a reason.

ChaosTitan · Oct 30, 2006

Hmm...

Except for Stephen King's last couple of novels (except Cell and Lisey's Story, since I haven't read those yet), I honestly don't know if what I've read has been a NYT bestseller. That doesn't make a difference in whether or not I buy book.

I do think that While Oleander by Janet Fitch was a bestseller, though. Amazing novel. I'd love to pick up her newest novel, but alas, the subject matter doesn't interest me.

IrishScribbler · Oct 30, 2006

I believe Frank McCourt's books made NYT best-selling lists (I'll have to double-check, though), and I adored all three of them.

Shadow_Ferret · Oct 30, 2006

A lot of the authors I read appear on the NYT best seller list. Laurell K. Hamilton. Jim Butcher. Clive Cussler. Nelson DeMille. Michael Crichton.

rugcat · Oct 30, 2006

PeeDee said:
Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell was magnificant, though, one of the best books I've read.

I thought this was a terrific book, and a terrific read. I do wonder, though, what the reaction would be if you were an unknown (Susanna Clarke was a well known editor, I believe) and submitted the first five pages to one of our well beloved fantasy agents who blog?

Too much description? Where's the hook? I get no sense where this is going?

Or would they have said, wow, great writing! I would like to think the latter, but...

Julie Worth · Oct 30, 2006

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time is a good book as long as you don't actually finish it, as the author gives away the mystery at the end.

PeeDee · Oct 30, 2006

rugcat said:
I thought this was a terrific book, and a terrific read. I do wonder, though, what the reaction would be if you were an unknown (Susanna Clarke was a well known editor, I believe) and submitted the first five pages to one of our well beloved fantasy agents who blog?

Too much description? Where's the hook? I get no sense where this is going?

Or would they have said, wow, great writing! I would like to think the latter, but...

I really don't know, because although it was interesting, it kept going and going without doing more than subtly building toward the ultimate climax. I think that it would have lost a lot of people.

(Susanna Clarke was editor for The New Yorker, I believe, wasn't she? I could Google this so easily.....)

RedMolly · Oct 30, 2006

She was a cookbook editor for Simon & Schuster UK and worked on JS&MN for a decade to perfect it before trying to publish.

Maybe there's hope for my agonizing slog of a novel after all...

scarletpeaches · Oct 30, 2006

Julie Worth said:
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time is a good book as long as you don't actually finish it, as the author gives away the mystery at the end.

Uh...isn't that the point? To have a resolution?

Sesselja · Oct 30, 2006

RedMolly said:
OK, so what's something you've read and enjoyed that's also appeared on the NYT bestseller lists?

I have no idea what's been on the NYT BSL.

RedMolly said:
A Secret History by Donna Tartt... just picked this up (and couldn't put it down 'til I was done) this weekend

But I have read this one, and I loved it. It's one of my all time favourite books.

wordmonkey · Oct 30, 2006

Strange & Norrel is a curious book and I believe it's imbued with the same kind of magic which forms the background to the novel itself.

It's way too long for what it is; wanders and meanders terribly; the eponimous characters are less than endearing; the conflicts are less than gripping; the language used is akin to something you might have read 150 years or more ago; continually anti-climactic; and ultimately when you reach the end you realize that the main purpose for the book is really to set up a new universe that will, in theory spawn further books in the series. Yet it's beautiful and one of the few books that left my bathroom and made it to bed with me, where I read into the early hours of the morning.

In theory it has so much wrong with it and I was left at the end thinking I may well have read one of the the greatest books ever. Definitely wanting more.

Magic I tells ya. Magic.

Julie Worth · Oct 30, 2006

scarletpeaches said:
Uh...isn't that the point? To have a resolution?

Here the boy spends most of the book trying to find the killer of the dog. In the end, another character just tells him who did it, so all that investigating was for nothing. And until that point, the book is entirely in the strange world of this boy, and then the real world intrudes. Unfortunately, the real world is not nearly as interesting.

scarletpeaches · Oct 30, 2006

The dog thing isn't the point of the story, though. It's his personal growth, despite his autism.

Julie Worth · Oct 30, 2006

scarletpeaches said:
The dog thing isn't the point of the story, though. It's his personal growth, despite his autism.

I didn't come away thinking there was much growth, but anyway, this was cast in the form of a mystery, even though the murder victim was a dog and the self-styled detective was an autistic boy. As a reader, I was rather annoyed by the sudden "solution," almost as though the writer had lost interest and so was in a rush to wind it up.

Doctor Shifty · Oct 31, 2006

If you are not a fan of Sherlock Holmes you will miss one of the undercurrents of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime.

The title is a quote from a SH story, and the plot of Curious Incident is a skillful mirroring/reversing/reflecting of that story. If you have not enjoyed Curious Incident it probably won't make any difference to you, but if you did enjoy it, chase up the Sherlock Holmes story, Silver Blaze. Putting the two together gave me a much greater appreciation of the skill of Mark Haddon.

Kim

Rolling Thunder · Oct 31, 2006

Hmmm...I'll have to think about this one. Good thread, BTW!
(Just posting for now so the subscription keeps it in front of me.)

Popular good writers/novels

RedMolly

My beat is correct

PeeDee

Where's my tea, please...?

icerose

Lost in School Work

ChaosTitan

Around

IrishScribbler

Shadow_Ferret

Court Jester

rugcat

Lost in the Fog

Julie Worth

What? I have a title?

PeeDee

Where's my tea, please...?

RedMolly

My beat is correct

scarletpeaches

Sesselja

wordmonkey

ook

Julie Worth

What? I have a title?

scarletpeaches

Julie Worth

What? I have a title?

Doctor Shifty

Press Any Key

Rolling Thunder