[Nix]

I like anything written by Stephen King, Michael Crichton, Palahniuk, in particular

Survivor - Chuck Palahniuk
The Man Who Was Thursday - G.K. Chesterson
The Andromeda Strain - read it in 6th grade!
Chatter - Patrick Radden Keefe
Digital Fortress - Dan Brown
1984 - Orwell
Brave New World - Huxley
Confessions of a Street Addict - Jim Cramer

I, unlike most readers, didn't really like The Davinci Code series of books Dan Brown wrote.  I liked just about any other book he's written though. And no, it's not because of "religous heresy" or anything, It's just that I couldn't get into them.

[NGTM-1R]

Huh. Unlike most of you they're nonfiction; nobody said anything about it having to be a novel.

Hitler's Spies by David Kahn; an in-depth examination of German military intelligence in WWII, 'bout 543 pages not counting biblography, notes, and index in the edtion I have. It looks larger then that though.
The Codebreakers by David Kahn; history of cryptanalysis. Big scary freakin' book, but interesting stuff. If you read it you should probably get Seizing the Engima too, since it fills in a gap resulting from The Codebreakers having been published before additional information came to light.

And an honorable mention for the fiction category via Dale Brown's Storming Heaven, simply because he made fun of himself. A news commentator bursts out with the line "This isn't a Dale Brown novel!"

[Vagabond]

Nineteen Eighty four.
Battle Royale.
Jurassic Park.
Hunt for the Red October

[Mongoose]

Lord of the Rings.
Then Chronicles of Narnia.
Then Hitchhiker's Guide.

All that needs to be said.

[Grug]

- Dune series (old and new)
- LOTR
- Scarecrow series (really, anything by Matthew Riley)
- World War 2.1, and World War 2.2
- River God (and a few others by the same guy)
- Spartan by Vasalino Massilini or something (? o.O) (Can't remember his name but he has quite a few excellent books)
- Hitchhiker's Guide

I even have read most of these:
- Harry Potter
- Animorphs

[CP5670]

(aside from the garbage they assign in college literature classes)

O RLY?

YA RLY.

I did this ethnic identity literature class last semester because it satisfied some stupid general requirements I needed, but the books were the most boring, retarded crap I've ever read in my life, and there were seven of them too. I just stopped reading them altogether halfway through the course and relied on class discussions to learn anything relevant to the tests and essays.

[Ford Prefect]

Well I don't know what texts you read, so I can't argue that point. But I highly doubt that a GenEd literature course on ethnic identity was college literary discourse at its best. I mean, the canon of English literature is massive.

[Rictor]

Oh God, I can only imagine what a college class on "ethnic identity" would look like. Damn dirty hippies.

[Ford Prefect]

I used to have that attitude toward issues of race and ethnicity, but I took a course on the philosophy of racial formation this semester, and it really gave me a lot more respect for that area of study.

[Rictor]

It's not that, it's just that I think many such subjects are likely to be used to teach diversity and gender politics and other such crap you wouldn't wish on your enemies. I completely support people having a thorough knowledge of the humanities, but that's something which I think is best done individually. If people don't want to learn about social issues, forcing them to sit in a class isn't going to change that. And if they are interested, they'll do the learning on their own, which is the best way to do it IMHO.

[Kie99]

Nineteen Eighty-Four
War of the Worlds

[Ford Prefect]

I don't think diversity and gender politics are inherently crap-- I think that a lot of people make them crap with feel-good bull****. And the fact that this course completely changed my opinion of racial issues is evidence that people don't have to learn about this stuff on their own (I didn't know it was a course on race until I showed up). Moreover, racial and gender inequality are institutional problems, and while self-motivated learning may remedy a certain amount of individual prejudice, it takes real discourse to make people realize that racism and sexism permeate more than just interpersonal relations. They have become political constructs, but have been largely written off-- even by much of the philosophical community-- as peripheral. You can't expect people to realize this on their own. I sure as hell wouldn't have.

[Polpolion]

Beserker
HP
Hitchikers guide to the galaxy

[futureshock]

Diamond Age
Quicksilver / Barocque Cycle
Cryptonomicon
Thieves World Anthology
Stand on Zanzibar
Magician
Gateway
The Stars My Destination
The Black Angel