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u/angelkatomuah [132/75] 1d ago
we've got a lot of overlap. i read the sequel to Memory Called Empire, and although it was fine, I didn't think it was needed. Might want to try Luster by Raven Leilani, These Memories Do Not Belong To Us by Yiming Ma, Stoner by John Williams, and maybe a Toni Morrison
edit: I noticed you already have it and liked it. I dont think I have anything similar. but have you read any Stephen Grahan Jones?
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u/Alexblbl 2d ago
You might like some Indian fiction. A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry and A Suitable Boy by Vikram Seth are two of my favorites.
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u/Bmarmich 3d ago
Similar tastes and you’re making me feel better about DNF’ing Gilead earlier this year.
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u/LouWong 3d ago
If it was any longer I wouldn’t have finished, so boring and didn’t feel interested in any of the characters
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u/Bmarmich 3d ago
You might try Donna Tart’s The Little Friend…. Probably the least accessible of her 3, the story builds much more slowly. But to me the payoff was incredible. It was my first read of the year and still probably my favorite
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u/L-J-Styrsacre 3d ago
I would recommend you read Norwegian Wood by Murakami and The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
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u/IsaBella-trix 3d ago
I'm sorry but you can't tell me that the secret history is better than the goldfinch
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u/Valuable-Credit6167 4d ago
Great list, Stoner is one of my favourite books and I think from what your list looks like here you might love Butchers Crossing also by Williams.
Especially if you really liked Lonesome Dove.
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u/Nervous_Research_450 4d ago
Strongly agree in Lonesome Dove and ATPH being masterpieces, and in Babel being trash. Disagree with Cloud Atlas being bad though.
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u/Rare_Poetry_301 4d ago
I feel like we have the same taste! I just finished All The Pretty Horses and really enjoyed reading, well listening to it! lol The Sympathizer was an interesting read as well!
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u/rosemarylavender 4d ago
Similar tastes, but I loved Beautyland!! Funny bc I also hated Gilead & it was the same friend who recommended both. Proof that even aligned taste can diverge at times.
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u/rosemarylavender 4d ago
As for your next read, I’m currently reading A Visit from the Goon Squad & enjoying it. Other past favorites include: This is Happiness by Niall Williams & The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien.
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u/Brucewayne1818 4d ago
Have you read Into Thin Air by Krakauer? I think you'd really enjoy it seeing how high you rated Endurance.
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u/Itsneverjustajoke 4d ago
Curious about One Day Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This. I can't imagine you reading it if you didn't already, at least somewhat, agree with the premise, so was it the prose?
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u/easygoingbarber 4d ago
Our tastes are so similar. In the distance and north woods were my top books last year.
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u/TwoHungryBlackbirdss 4d ago
I love your tastes, we are very similar so I'm stealing a few of these for my own TBR!
Seeing my all-time favorite (Cloud Atlas) so low is heartbreaking, though. Ever delve into Russian classics? I think you'd like the Master & Margarita
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u/atipton72 4d ago
I would love to see your opinion on some of the popular books on social media like Dungeon Crawler Carl and Red Rising.
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u/LouWong 4d ago
I read red rising and generally liked it but didn’t feel like I needed to read the series. DCC I actually tried and DNF. I just couldn’t get into the litRPG format…maybe should have done it as an audio book but that’s just not the type of thing I want to be reading
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u/atipton72 4d ago
I'm not into LitRPG at all but the audio version of the book is what sucked me in.
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u/LouWong 4d ago
Yeah maybe I’ll give that a shot. I’m team podcast > audio book cause for whatever reason I have a hard time processing audio books but I think DCC would be a good one.
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u/rolandofgilead41089 4d ago
Finish The Border Trilogy; The Crossing and Cities of the Plain from McCarthy.
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u/CapriciousSon [83/52] 4d ago
I see The Crossing on there under Elite. Agreed on the need to finish the trilogy though. That ending, oof...
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u/Curtis_Geist 4d ago
Hard agree with most of these, minus As I Lay Dying. Vuong also belongs at the bottom of the barrel with Kuang.
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u/LouWong 4d ago
It may just not have been the right time for me to read as I lay dying. The character switching was just too much for me.
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u/Itsneverjustajoke 4d ago
I love As I lay dying, but I read it for high school English class, so I wonder if the daily discussion on things like character switching, etc. helped it flow.
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u/Curtis_Geist 4d ago
That’s more than fair. You’re under no obligation to love the classics, and just because I disagree, it doesn’t make you wrong.
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u/Cambradley201 4d ago
Surprised you weren't a fan of As I Lay Dying as someone who seems to like Cormac McCarthy.
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u/squatland_yard 4d ago
Wellness is on my TBR. Have you read the nix by Nathan Hill? I loved it
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u/SokkaHaikuBot 4d ago
Sokka-Haiku by squatland_yard:
Wellness is on my
TBR. Have you read the nix by
Nathan Hill? I loved it
Remember that one time Sokka accidentally used an extra syllable in that Haiku Battle in Ba Sing Se? That was a Sokka Haiku and you just made one.
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u/RandomRavenclaw87 4d ago
Land by O’Farrel
The Amazing Adventures of Cavalier and Klay
Real Americans by Kong
Free Food for Millionaires
The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravetz
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u/Lopsided_Pain4744 4d ago
Love to see All The Pretty Horses getting some love. Curious as to why you didn’t do so well with Kafka on the Shore?
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u/Sloth_Flower [3690/5000] 4d ago
We are like book opposites.
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u/LouWong 4d ago
Haha say more, what are your faves?
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u/Sloth_Flower [3690/5000] 4d ago edited 4d ago
As I lay dying is one of my all time favorite books. Same with Cloud Atlas and the Unbearable Lightness of Being.
Disliked/Overrated Goldfinch, Secret History, Pretty Horses, True Grit, and Thousand Suns, All the Light we cannot see. Never Let me go is by far my least favorite Ishiguro.
I would downgrade Kafka by the shore, Unbroken, Station eleven and a little life to just so bad.
I liked Lonesome Dove and Stoner but they failed their objectives in the cultural consciousness.
I liked Endurance but wouldn't consider it a masterpiece. I went on a explorer/mountaineer kick for awhile. Like self help, I feel like these either hit you personally or sound like every other one. Denalis Howl was not as well written but hit me much harder.
I agree on East of Eden, Demon Copperfield, Gentleman in Moscow, Name of the Wind, On Earth, and Dark Matter
We have different tastes on the types of books we choose. I don't particularly care for war books, westerns, or melodramas. I prefer scifi, horror, or gothic lit. I like my books sarcastic and funny over serious and sappy. Dreamlike and understated rather than straight forward and descriptive.
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u/BubblyVision 4d ago
The Sympathizer was such a ride. I wasn’t sure how I felt until it started to tie up in the end, then I was just astonished. Doesn’t hurt that I was in Vietnam at the time and encountering pictures of Uncle Ho at every turn.
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u/Exact-Two204 4d ago
I’m planning to buy Endurance. What’s your review?
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u/LouWong 4d ago
Masterpiece. Absolutely gripped by the story and it’s also an amazing portrait of leadership.
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u/ProfaneWords 4d ago
What didn't you like about One Day Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This? I was a bit apprehensive going into the book, concerned that it could easily end up reading like a scolding with no actual teeth, but I was presently surprised.
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u/LouWong 4d ago
Tbf it’s not that I didn’t like it - and I think calling it overhyped isn’t the right way to describe it. I think I was just expecting it to be a bit better given all the awards. I found the personal anecdotes and commentary very interesting, but I was expecting to be “wowed” and it just didn’t land for me. Still think it’s a very important and accessible book.
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u/HellMuttz [31/20+20] 4d ago
Ugh I have North Woods checked out and was just deciding not to read it so I can get to other things 😭 is it that good?
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u/DeadSquirrel272 4d ago
As with all books it depends on what you have a taste for at the time. Personally, I read Northwoods last year and it became one of my favorites. It’s a little bit of darkness, a little sadness, and a bit of hopefulness. Personally it felt like it filled me with a sense of heredity and a feeling that all things contain a soul of those who came there before.
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u/--typing-- 4d ago
Oh hey, I didn't realize Interior, Chinatown was a book. I watched the show a while ago and thought it was pretty good, though I think I remember being disappointed with the ending. Why didn't you like the book?
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u/rastab1023 4d ago
I recommend Cold Mountain by Charles Frazier.
It takes place during the US Civil War and follows a man who deserts from the Confederate Army to journey back home (almost entirely on foot) to a love interest he met shortly before going off to war. It's a very layered story about survival, the relationship between people and the land, and the human cost of war. It's one that really stuck with me.
Train Dreams by Denis Johnson might also interest you.
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u/Sad___Snail 5d ago
The Goldfinch, 🤢
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u/ultrafunner 4d ago
I saw it on there - so I'll recommend my favorite Donna Tartt book, The LIttle Friend
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u/Thop207375 5d ago
Here’s some random recommendations you might try looking at
Man Hunt by Swanson, We Die Alone by Howarth, Surely you’re joking My Feynman, Ubik by Dick, the Talented Mr Ripley by Highsmith, Killers of the Flower Moon by Grann, City of Thieves by Benioff, Shadow Divers by Kurson, In cold blood by Capote, and A short stay in hell by Beck.
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u/Harry-Stonkz 5d ago
Just finished The Bee Sting and I was so captivated by it. It continued to impress me from start to finish.
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u/j_palazzolo 5d ago
If you liked The River of Doubt, then you need to read Destiny of the Republic. Millard is masterful at presenting these unique moments in American history.
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u/No-Fee4904 [37/52] 5d ago
We have similar taste (I also count TSH and The Bee Sting as masterpieces, and find R.F. Kuang to be mid at best) so I'm using your tierlist to find my next read 😂
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u/JB_Wallbridge 5d ago
Have you read any Ursala Le Guin or Octavia Butler? Looks like our tastes overlap quite and a bit and they're two of my favorites.
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u/Odd_Schedule2672 5d ago
All the Pretty Horses is an absolute 5-star masterpiece. McCarthy’s best in my opinion.
Might as well rock the remaining 2 books in The Border Trilogy if you liked that one
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u/LouWong 5d ago
I’ve read the crossing (loved it, it was just below masterpiece for me), been taking a little time between them but starting cities of the plain now.
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u/grigoritheoctopus 5d ago
Have you read "Blood Meridian"? It's a lot but the writing is incredible.
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u/LouWong 5d ago
I did, I read it in college like 15 years ago and loved it but yeah it was a lotttt. Really enjoyed the border trilogy and suttree recently.
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u/grigoritheoctopus 5d ago
Yeah, those are great books, too. Suttree is something else and there is just this elegiac somberness about the Border Books that speaks to your soul. Love Mac's depictions of the natural world.
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u/LouWong 5d ago
Check out “in the distance” by Hernan Diaz. I just finished it and it was excellent. Kinda like a blend of McCarthy and north woods (also a great book).
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u/grigoritheoctopus 5d ago
Oh, that's another favorite of mine, for sure. "North Woods" was great, too. You've got a lot of books on this list that I really like, too, and some (like the Tartt books) that I am more inclined to read after seeing them grouped highly with many of my favorites.
A few other books I've really enjoyed from the past few years that you might like: "You Dreamed of Empires" by Enrigue, "Dispatches" by Herr, "Mason & Dixon" by Pynchon, "Libra" by Delillo, and "When We Cease to Understand the World" by Labatut.
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u/Mysterious-Emotion44 5d ago
In the Name of the Wind is literally up my alley. It has everything I love about fantasy in it and yet I disliked it so much.
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