Pajiba

The Brothers K by David James Duncan
Atonement by Ian McEwan
Gilead by Marilynne Robinson
Underworld by Don DeLillo
Independence Day by Richard Ford

Last 15 years?! Okay, okay, let's see...

1. Infinte Jest by David Foster Wallace
2. Disgrace by J.M. Coetzee
3. The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen
4. Mason and Dixon by Thomas Pynchon
5. Cities of the Plain by Cormac McCarthy

Here are the current favorites:

1. Good Omens, by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett
2. The Robber Bride, by Margaret Atwood
3. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, by Mark Haddon
4. House of Leaves, by Mark Z. Danielewski
5. Middlesex, by Jeffrey Eugenides

Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace

As She Climbed Across the Table by Jonathan Lethem

His Dark Materials by Phillip Pullman

And since we're limited to recent books, meaning Borges, Nabakov, etc, are precluded:

Special Topics in Calamity Physics by Maria Pessl

Lamb by Christopher Moore

Kings of Infinite Space by James Hynes
American Gods by Neil Gaiman
Good Omens by Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Fevre Dream by George R.R. Martin
Abhorsen by Garth Nix (the whole trilogy, really, but if I had to pick one)

1. Black Swan Green by David Mitchell
2. Ahab's Wife by Sena Jeter Naslund
3. Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides
4. Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood (technically it's 20 years old but, well, it's very relevant, no?)
5. Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver

Well you took my two favorites of the last fifteen years, but I'll add another three:

1. Middlesex
2. The Corrections
3. Freddy and Fredericka, by Mark Helperin
4. Saturday, Ian McEwan (haven't read Atonement, but I'm in love with Saturday)
5. A Long Way Down (actually, the only Hornby I haven't read yet, and I'd love to know what you guys think)

1. "On Beauty" - Zadie Smith
2. "Running with Scissors" - Augusten Burroughs
3. "Survivor" - Chuck Palahniuk
4. "The Beach" - Alex Garland
I can't think of a 5th contemporary book

Disregarding 15 yr. rule:
1. "The Fountainhead" - Ayn Rand
2. "Monkeywrench Gang" - Edward Abbey
3. "Franny and Zooey" - J.D. Salinger
4. "Atlas Shrugged" - Ayn Rand
5. "In Cold Blood" - Truman Capote
Runner Up: "The Bell Jar" - Sylvia Plath

[i]Anxiety of Everyday Objects[/i] by Aurelie Sheehan
[i]The Icelander[/i] by Dustin Long
[i]The Secret History[/i] by Donna Tart
[i]About a Boy[/i] by Nick Hornby
[i]Book of Joe[/i] by Jonathan Tropper

Yargh...faux pas, I just realized I put all the book titles in quotes.

Neil Gaiman
Nick Hornby

In no particular order:

The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Klay, Michael Chabon.
Middlesex, Jeffrey Eugenides.
Doomsday Book, Connie Willis.
American Gods, Neil Gaiman.
The Lovely Bones, Alice Sebold.

Kavalier and Clay - Michael Chabon
Nightwatch - Terry Prattchet
My Name is Red - Oran Pamuk
The God of Small Things - Arundhati Roy
His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman

The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay--Chabon

Assassination Vacation--Vowell

A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius--Eggers

The Kid/The Commitment--Savage

Running with Scissors--Burroughs

I know, this list is pretty ho-hum, but honestly, if I'm limiting myself to contemporary novels, I have pretty staid tastes. I read contemporary simply to be amused, with the pleasant side effect of an occasional Kavalier and Klay popping up.

In no particular order:
-Love in the Time of Cholera (not sure when it was written)
-Invisible Monsters
-The Other Boleyn Girl (I know, I know, it's a little embarassing that it's in my top 5, but it was good, get off my back)
-About A Boy
-A Heart Breaking Work of Staggering Genius

1. The Moviegoer, Walker Percy
2. Catcher in the Rye, JD Salinger
3. The Brother's K, David James Duncan
4. Jayber Crow, Wendell Berry
5. A Prayer for Owen Meany, John Irving

honorable mention: The Brothers Karamazov (Dostoevsky), Till We Have Faces (CS Lewis), Lord of the Rings Trilogy (Tolkien), and Wise Blood (Flannery O'Connor)

Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson
Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon
Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace
Fear and Loathing: On the Campaign Trail '72 by HST
The Watchmen by Alan Moore

I agree, by the way, that it would be nice to have some space for (relatively) polite and intelligent discourse on literature. Could be fun, there are some literate folk around these parts.

wow- disregard my comment- completely disregarded the directions. sorry. i'll come up with something later...

No particular order:
Geek Love by Katherine Dunn
Not in Kansas Anymore: A Curious Tale of How Magic is Transforming America by Christine Wicker
The Cheese Monkeys by Chip Kidd
Budget Travel through Space and Time by Abert Goldbarth
The Secret Society of Demolition Writers by Various Anonymous Well Known Writers

1. Wonder Boys, Michael Chabon.
2. The Virgin Suicides, Jeffrey Eugenides
3. Until I Find You, John Irving
4. White Teeth, Zadie Smith
5. The History of Love: A Novel, Nicole Krauss (though I didn't like the title, made it seem as though it was going to be fluffy, not that there is anything wrong with that.)

*I know most of these authors have other books that are more well known, but these are my favorites...maybe except the Chabon, but I figured Kavalier & Clay would be repeated enough, and Wonder Boys also great. Keep up the book reviews Dustin, I always like to hear about new and different selections, especially from a source that shares so many of my opinions on current films, tv, etc.

Keeping this to the last fifteen years is very difficult, but I'll see what I can do.

1. Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell
2. Black Swan Green by David Mitchell (In case you can't tell, I'm a huge David Mitchell fan. It would be great to see him reach a wider audience. His stuff will blow your mind, and I think it fits into the Pajiba mind-set really well.)
3. The Cabal by Ellen Gillchrist
4. The Secret History by Donna Tartt
5. Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides

1. I, Lucifer--Glen Duncan
2. Good Omens--Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
3. Crank--Ellen Hopkins (really kickass concept, aside from the story)
4. Wicked--Greg McGuire
5. Me and Emma--Elizabeth Flock (Very Bastard Out of Carolina--but there's a twist at the end that nobody saw coming)

1. The Time Traveler's Wife, by Audrey Niffenegger
2. Good Omens, by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett
3. Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West, by Gregory Maguire
4. The Lovely Bones, by Alice Sebold
5. Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers, by Mary Roach (Not a novel, but one of my favorite books. No list of my recommendations would be complete without it.)

Wow! A lot of Hornby love (I'm not complaining). I think High Fidelity will easily make everyone's list so I'm taking it as the Clooney of books here and designating it as a given.

Middlesex: Jeffrey Eugenides
(really about #7 on my list but in the interests of consensus since I don't know if any of my others will be picked up).
The Line of Beauty: Alan Hollinghurst
The Untouchable: John Banville
(if you've tried other Banvilles and given up, try this one: it's very readable)
The Time Travelers Wife: Audrey Niffenberger
That They May Face the Rising Sun: John McGahern
(also published as By The Lake in the US).

Alos props to Lauren H. for cheating iwth Franney and Zooey because it is so great.

1.) The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho
2.) The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time by Mark Haddon
3.) White Oleander by Janet Fitch
4.) Running With Scissors by Augusten Burroughs
5.) Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk

If I'd had more slots, John Irving, Philip Roth and Christopher Buckley would have made the list.

1. A Confederacy of Dunces

2. Ender's Game (yea yea)

3. His Dark Materials (trilogy but.. who cares)

4. Goodnight Mr. Tom (read it when I was young, and stayed with me)

5. Having trouble coming up with more.... and I do read quite often. I just got Kavlier and Clay which is on ever other list, so we'll see.

Only three b/c I'm a college student reading a lot of other (old) stuff, but here are three I love.

The Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugenides
Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil by John Berendt
The Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai

The one above sparked my mind

The World According to Garp.

1. Blind Assasin by Margaret Atwood
2. Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight by Alexandra Fuller
3. Still Life with Murder by PB Ryan
4. Smilla's Sense of Snow by Peter Hoeg (just made the 15 year cut-off)
5. The Golden Compass ("His Dark Materials" trilogy) by Phillip Pullman

1. The Memory of Running--Ron Mclarty
2. Einstein's Dreams--Alan Lightman
3. Kite Runner--Khaled Hosseini
4. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Klay--Michael Chabon
5. Motherless Brooklyn--Jonathon Lethem

I'm glad you put the 15 years rule up. English majors like me would otherwise run rampant. Hmmm...now I have to think.

1. Specimen Days by Michael Cunningham

2. The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri

3. Atonement by Ian McEwan (haven't finished this one yet, but I'm amazed by it!)

4. Falling Angels by Tracy Chevalier (I know, it's kind of chicky, but much more interesting than her more touted Girl with a Pearl Earring ).

5. The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver.

And cheat I must: Catcher in the Rye by JD Salinger. That book is perhaps one of the most timeless and relevent in any era.

Okay, I'm doing my list without reading the other comments, to try and remain relatively pure:

1. Black Swan Green (David Mitchell)
2. Cloud Atlas (David Mitchell) (those two are really tied for no. 1 in my book)
3. Underworld (Don DeLillo)
4. Little Children (Tom Perrota)
5. You Shall Know Our Velocity (Dave Eggers)

(I don't limit my reading to fiction written over the last fifteen years, although over the past few months I've been reading a few more recent authors and this list kind of reflects that habit. And I know two books by the same author is kind of like cheating, but I think David Mitchell is the best writer I've read in a long time and certainly the best writer of my generation...at least that I'm aware of.)

Middlesex, Jeffrey Eugenides
His Dark Materials trilogy, Philip Pullman
Bluesman, Andre Dubas III
Into the Wild, Jon Krakauer
Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal, Christopher Moore

I am not ashamed to say that I read fluff. I believe that if I am reading to escape the book better have a damn happy ending. I love it and I will proudly mention my top 5:

1. Bridget Jones Diary -Helen Fielding
2. Bridget Jones Diary: The Edge of Reason- Helen Fielding
3. Divine By Mistake-PC Cast
4. Confessions of a Shopaholic- Sophie Kinsella
5. Fairy Godmother: A Tale of the Five Hundred Kingdoms-Mercedes Lackey

I have to contribute! I don't read serious books. Evidently.

Oryx & Crake - Margaret Atwood
Sexing the Cherry - Jeanette Winterson
Geek Love - Katherine Dunn
The God of Small Things - Arundhati Roy
Uncle Tungsten - Oliver Sacks (a memoir rather than a novel, does that work for this?)

Sorry, jumping in again to say please keep going with the book reviews. They may not be as popular as celebrity sex fantasies but I think you'll find you have a growing appreciative audience and isn't the whole point of Pajiba that we consider ourselves to the the "uncatered to" among the masses? So don't dump the book reviews just because you don't get 500 posts in the first hour. That would be akin to Christian Bale deciding not to do The Machinist because more people will go to see Batman. (Yes, Dustin, I just compared you to Christian Bale. You're now officially very fuckable).

Yay! I was waiting for this, I need more book suggestions. This is definitely the most difficult list to create, I would have so much sex with so many of my favorite books.

1. The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal: Christopher Moore
2. Case Histories: Kate Atkinson
3. High Fidelity: Nick Hornby
4. Straight Man: Richard Russo
5. A Simple Plan: Scott Smith

As per the rules, this doesn't take into account any older books, nor does it feature any non-fiction (otherwise Devil in the White City and Truth and Beauty would be on there).

I swear I did not look at Amy's list before I wrote mine down. I SWEAR!

I am glad to see the same two books pop up in the same spots from my list, however. :-)

1. Blindness by Jose Saramago
2. The Road by Cormac McCarthy
3. World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War by Max Brooks
4. Geek Love by Katherine Dunn
5. The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy

About A Boy by Nick Hornby


American Gods by Neil Gaiman


The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold


In Her Shoes by Jennifer Weiner


The Dark Tower series by Stephen King. (Cheating, I suppose, but you really have to look at the work as a whole. [Is my English major showing?])

Mine skew towards sci-fi more than literary (not that the two are mutually exclusive) ...

1. Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell
by Susanna Clarke
2. A Song of Ice and Fire Series
by George R.R. Martin
3. Girl in Hyacinth Blue
by Susan Vreeland
4. Good Omens (or American Gods)
Neil Gaiman
5. Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West
by Gregory McGuire

This was a fantastic idea; I can't wait to see how you narrow this down!

I'll agree with:

The Corrections, Jonathan Franzen
Saturday, Ian McEwan (or the first half of Atonement)

And then I'd add...

Blindness, Jose Saramago
In the Skin of a Lion, Michael Ondaatje
Sweetness in the Belly, Camilla Gibb

(High Fidelity's definitely up there too, mind you, and Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius would be as well, except I'm trying to stick to fiction.)

(And to cgg, who asked about A Long Way Down ... I've read all of the Hornby novels, and would have to rank it second from last out of the ouevre. But that's just me...)

Hmmm...my two favourite books ever are both excluded.

But let's see--
-The Kite Runner, Khaled Hosseini
-The Queen of Everything, Deb Caletti (it's technically YA, but it's very well-written YA, so it's on the list)
-My Sister's Keeper, Jodi Picoult (someone mentioned Picoult's newest novel on one of the review pages-- it's all right, but this one was her best)
-Disobediance, Naomi Alderman
-Everything is Illuminated, Jonathan Safran Foer (very weird book, and I know pretty much everyone here has probably read it, but I still needed to include it)

1. Horse Heaven - Jane Smiley
2. Widow for One Year - John Irving
3. Wicked - Gregory Maguire
4. Devil in the White City - Erik Larson
5. Strivers Row - Kevin Baker

Honorable Mention because it was published in 1980 which of course makes it ancient literature

6.The Land of Laughs - Jonathon Carroll

The Last Witchfinder by James Morrow
The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
The Kite-Runner by Khaled Hosseini
The Power of One by Bryce Courtenay
Heart Shaped Box by Joe Hill

Wow, I'm going through the list and there are so many great books mentioned...The Namesake, Time Traveller's Wife, Secret History, Assassination Vacation. Love it. Man, I wish more of my friends read often, I NEVER have anyone with whom to discuss books. My best friend and I started a book club last week just for nerdy fun, and we're starting with...Tom Sawyer. Heeee.

Fall On Your Knees by Anne-Marie McDonald
House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski
The Eyre Affair by Jasper Fforde
Small Gods by Terry Pratchett
Awake and Dreaming by Kit Pearson, the hands-down best book I've ever read that was meant for kids

1. Invisible Monster's by Chuck Palahniuk
2. Willfull Creatures by Aimee Bender
3. The Elephant Vanishes: Stories by Haruki Murakami
4. The Philosophy of Andy Warhol: From A to B and Back Again by Andy Warhol
*2 X 15 years old, but I read it twice a year and impose it on pretty much everyone I meet, and so I'm cheating and including it.
5. Life After God by Douglas Coupland

And every single year I devour The Best American Non-Required Reading anthology.

1. Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides
2. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay by Michael Chabon
3. Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town by Cory Doctorow
4. Everything is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer
5. Bel Canto by Ann Patchett

I should learn how to use HTML tags one of these days. My lack of italics is bothering the English major in me.

Shit, I forgot Lamb. OK, knock off Small Gods.

1. Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close - Jonathan Safran Foer


2. The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold


3. Special Topics in Calamity Physics - Marisha Pessl


4. Choke - Chuck Palahniuk


5. Finding Alaska - John Green

(This 15-year rule is really killing my buzz.)

High Fidelity, Nick Hornby
The Mysteries of Pittsburgh, Michael Chabon
Microserfs, Doug Coupland
Cryptonomicon, Neal Stephenson
The Road, Cormac McCarthy

"Favorite" is probably not the right word for how I feel about The Road, considering that upon finishing it, I spent two days in a weepy, suicidal depression, barely slept for the next month, and hid the book from my wife so she couldn't be damaged by it (damn you, Cormac McCarthy!).

No book has ever moved me the way The Road did, however, and that book, combined with festering post-Katrina anxiety, our presence over an earthquake faultline, and a certain U.S. President's warlike approach toward Iran, caused me to convert our basement into a warren for short- to mid-term survival, followed by taking ourselves out.

I'm surely interested in how Pajibans feel about The Road.

The Infinite Jest - David Foster Wallace

The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay - Michael Chabon

Empire Falls - Richard Russo

A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius - Dave Eggers

A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole (i think this is older than 15 years, but whatever)

In no particular order:

Running with scissors, Augusten Burroughs
Breakfest of Champions, Kurt Vonnegut
Geek Love, Katherine Dunn
The man in the high castle, Phillip K. Dick
Does Freakeconomics by Steven Levitt count? (I love that book!)

I know Devil in the White City isn't technically a novel but it read like one, so I put it on there. If I need to stay true to fiction I guess you could also include:

Winky - Clifford Chase

House of Leaves - Mark Danielewski
American Psycho - Bret Easton Ellis
Into the Wild - Jon Krakauer
Battle Royale - Koushun Takami
The Virgin Suicide - Jeffrey Eugenides

Gravity's Rainbow-Thomas Pynchon
Straight Man-Richard Russo
The Amazing Adventures Of Kavalier And Klay- Michael Chabon
Altered Carbon-Richard Morgan
Cider House Rules-John Irving

1) The Time Traveler's Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
2) A Paradigm of Earth - Candas Jane Dorsey
3) Arcadia - Tom Stoppard (technically a play, but.)
4) An Anthropologist on Mars - Oliver Sacks (technically nonfiction, but.)
5) The Telling - Ursula K. Le Guin

this was really hard, seeing as a lot of what i read is a lot older ( i had to check and make sure Arcadia was within 15 years) and/or science fiction. i should read newer stuff!

1. The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, by Haruki Murakami
2. American Psycho, by Bret Easton Ellis
3. Ghostwritten, by David Mitchell
4. Blindness, by Jode Saramago
5. Brothers Karamazov, by Dostoevsky (I know, I know, it's hardly within the past fifteen years, but I only recently discovered his stuff and I'm 19 and in love with them so you absolutely must understand. It took me a lot to leave anything by Nabokov off this list. Especially Lolita. Ahem.)

1. Fight Club by Chuck Palaniuk

2. American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis

3. Speed Queen by Stewart O'Nan

4. High Fidelity by Nick Hornby

5. Election by Tom Perotta

Hmmm. This list makes me out to be violent and/or crazy. I'm only crazy, really. :)

I love every one of you who included the His Dark Materials trilogy. It didn't quite make my list, but hot damn, I loved those books.
Now, on with my list:
1). Good Omens, Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett. Forever, my number 1.
2). Zod Wallop, William Browning Spencer. Suspenseful, funny, nerdy and heartbreaking.
3). The Perks of Being a Wallflower, Stephen Chbosky. Read it once in college and have never been able to shake it's effect on me.
4). Wicked, Gregopry Maguire. It was great well before they Broadway'd it.
5). Gertrude and Claudius, John Updike. Shakespeare nerds, take note. This book blew me away, inspired my acting thesis, and changed my perspective on Hamlet forever.

Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris
The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold
Looking for Alaska by John Green
Invisible Monsters by Chuck Palahniuk
The Curious Incident of The Dog in the Nighttime by Mark Haddon

It's a good thing Pajiba now will be able to recommend books for me to read, because I'm just a maniac when it comes to literature.

Damnit, "ITS," not "IT'S." I was an acting major, not an English major.

1. An Instance of the Fingerpost / Iain Pears
2. Washington's Crossing / David Hackett Fisher
3. A Short History of Nearly Everything / Bill
Bryson
4. The Black Book of Communism / Stephane courtois
5. Beowulf / Seamus Heaney

A somewhat Top-40ish,High School English Lit. list, but I like'em a lot:
Desolation Island by Patrick O'Brian
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens
The Voyage of the Dawn Treader by C.S. Lewis
So Long and Thanks For All the Fish by Douglas Adams

1) All the Names, Jose Saramago
2) Never Let Me Go, Kazuo Ishiguro
3) Disgrace, J.M. Coetzee
4) Paris Trout, Pete Dexter
5) The Sweet Hereafter, Russell Banks

Aw. I love the book review feature, I'm just not a frequent commenter.

1. Audrey Niffenegger, The Time Traveler's Wife
2. Patricia McKillip, Song for the Basilisk
3. Mark Z. Danielewski, The House of Leaves
4. Luis Alberto Urrea, The Hummingbird's Daughter
5. Neal Stephenson, The Baroque Cycle (technically three books, but still)

If I could include one book that's not from the last 25 years, it'd be Dorothy Sayers' Gaudy Night. It's a first-rate mystery novel and also should be a must-read for women heading into academia (and wouldn't be bad for the men, either). And considering how Niffenegger has said she based Henry and Clare on Peter Wimsey and Harriet Vane...well, it has relevance to novels written in the last 15 years.

1. Everything is Illuminated - Jonathan Safran Foer

2. The Book of Illusions - Paul Auster

3. Bones of the Moon - Jonathan Carroll

4. Kavelier & Clay - Chabon (FINALLY just reading it and kicking myself for not reading it sooner!)

5. Neverwhere - Neil Gaiman

I could list 20...Atwood-The Blind Assassin, Pullman-Golden Compass or Amber Spyglass, Parkhurst-Dogs of Babel, John Twelve Hawks-The Traveler...and on and on.

(Thanks redkitten for also including one of my fav authors Jonathan Carroll!!)

1. Cold Mountain by Charles Frazier
2. Waiting by Ha Jin
3. World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War by Max Brooks
4. The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion
5. The Tender Bar by J.R. Moehringer

Small Gods by Terry Pratchett
Bone by Jeff Smith
World War Z by Max Brooks
Things My Girlfriend And I Have Argued About by Mil McMillan
About A Boy by Nick Hornby

Missmle: I LOVE Aimee Bender, I just finished reading her collection of short stories The Girl in the Flammable Skirt. Really imaginative stuff, they seemed to evoke themes usually seen in the realm of magical realism. I read it on the trolley on the way to work, I kept imagining what the person next to me would think if they caught a peek of any of the text. :)

Cryptonomicon - Neal Stephenson

Le Ton Beau de Marot: In Praise of the Music of Language - Douglas Hofstadter

Any of the Patrick O'Brian series, but if I had to pick one: The Mauritius Command (O'Brian newbies are alerted that they must be read in order...)

Dave Barry Is Not Making This Up! (Shut up! And honestly, it takes a lot of smarts to be that consistently funny...)

And though not perhaps a "favorite," an enjoyable recent read:
Motherless Brooklyn - Jonathan Lethem

In no order...
1. The Devil and Miss Prymm - Paulo Coelho
2. The Time-Traveller's Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
3. The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
4. Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West - Gregory McGuire
5. Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
So glad to see most of mine on other lists. It seems good literature IS recognized in this world. Hope there are some on the final list I haven't read.

PS, I lurve 'What Pajiba is Reading.' Most of my friends are illiterate hacks, and it's so hard to get a good book recommendation these days.

Memoir from Antproof Case, Mark Helprin
Soldier of the Great War, Mark Helprin
Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, Susanna Clarke
The Corrections, Jonathan Franzen
Cryptonomicon, Neal Stephenson

I loves me Mr. Helprin.

what an utterly fabulous afternoon comment diversion!
i have to mention that i am an avid book junkie and everytime i go on my break at work i always have a book with me, and for that, most of my co-workers make fun of me while they prefer to waste away precious time by text messaging. what has society come to when people find it more acceptable to make fun of others for enriching their minds instead of spending countless hours on mindless activies.

anyways:

1. Into The Wild - Jon Krakauer
2. The Orchid Thief - Susan Orlean
3. Slouching Towards Nirvana - Charles Bukowski
4. The Captain's Verses - Pablo Neruda
5. Fifth Business - Robertson Davies

Honorable Mentions:
1. Under The Banner of Heaven - Jon Krakauer
2. No Logo - Naomi Klein
3. The Hours - Michael Cunningham

*sigh* I was excited about this list until I read that the books must be less than 15 years old and "novels," which I interpret to mean fiction. Since I am a history major, this means I've got nothing to show.

Nothing. I can't think of one fiction book written since 1992 that I have read, let alone a list of favorites. Damn.

(If I was not constrained by eiter rule, my list would read:

Into the Wild - Jon Krakauer
The Old Man and the Sea - Ernest Hemingway
The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald
Das Parfum - Patrick Suskind
Ordinary Men - Christopher Browning)

Okay - I already gave my top five, but had to put my support behind The Time Traveller's Wife, Geek Love (does it meet the 15 year requirement? I'm not entirely sure when it was written), and anything by Douglas Coupland or Tom Perotta. Are top tens allowed?

And I agree with missmie re: The Best American Non-Required Reading. I read it every year.

1) High Fidelity, Nick Hornby.
2) Middlesex, Jeffrey Eugenides.
3) Naked, David Sedaris.
4) The Crimson Petal and the White, Michael Faber.
5) The Virgin Suicides, Jeffrey Eugenides.

i obviously disregarded the last 15 years rule, but i don't care.

Damn, forgot "The Time Traveler's Wife"--a bonus for me since it's so cool to read about my own city in a novel.

De-lurking. I LOVE this idea. Can't wait.
So, in no particular order:

"Oryx & Crake" - Margaret Atwood

"Not Wanted on the Voyage" - Timothy Findley

"The Poisonwood Bible" - Barbara Kingsolver

"Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell" - Susanna Clarke

"A Fine Balance" - Rohinton Mistry

Great diversion:
1. The Blind Assassin, Margaret Atwood
2. Middlesex, Jeffrey Eugenides
3. Wicked, Gregory Maguire
4. His Dark Materials, Philip Pullman (if I have to choose just one, I'll go with Amber Spyglass)
5. The Human Stain, Philip Roth

Ooops. Looks like I can't read directions very well: apologies for the non-novels.

Erase Hofstadter and Barry, insert William Gibson's Pattern Recognition, any other Stephenson, say, Snow Crash, or the Clooney of Novels (as someone aptly said above), High Fidelity.

Perhaps a future Comment Diversion should be devoted to non-fiction, essays, and humorists?

I'm going out on a limb here obviously but I'm gonna say
Kavalier and Klay... bear with me here
Good Omens... outrageous I know
Invisible Monsters...madness!
A Long Way Down...Nick Hornby? no way!

Sorry to be unoriginal, but at least I feel at home here.

My final is Villa Incognito by Tom Robbins, but only because Jitterbug Perfume and Still Life with Woodpecker fall outside the 15 year mark.

A Song of Ice and Fire (in its incomplete state) George R.R. Martin


The Long Dark Tea Time of the Soul Douglas Adams


Ficciones Jorge Luis Borges


Remains of the Day Kazuo Ishiguro


The Long Goodbye Raymond Chandler

socalledonlycousins:

I am one-third of the way through The Road. My husband's away on a trip and I refuse to read any more until he gets back, since I consider my recent horrifying nightmares to be directly linked to what I've so far read of the book.

I've got a thing for post-apocalyptic lit & film, which is generally sci-fi fluff, but The Road is clearly a masterpiece & utterly real.

Great diversion:
1. The Blind Assassin, Margaret Atwood
2. Middlesex, Jeffrey Eugenides
3. Wicked, Gregory Maguire
4. His Dark Materials, Philip Pullman (if I have to choose just one, I'll go with Amber Spyglass)
5. The Human Stain, Philip Roth

1. The Brothers K, David James Duncan
2. Jayber Crow, Wendell Berry
3. You Shall Know Our Velocity, Dave Eggers
4. Everything is Illuminated, Jonathan Sfron Foer
5. Life After God, Douglas Coupland

1. The People of Paper, Salvador Plascenia
2. Atonement, Ian MacEwan
3. Perfect Circle, Sean Stewart
4. Trash Sex Magic, Jennifer Stevenson
5. Cloud Atlas, Scott Mitchell

In no particular order:
The Road by Cormac McCarthy
The Known World by Edward P. Jones
Blindness by Jose Saramago
Suite Francaise by Irene Nemirovsky
The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Klay by Michael Chabon

1- Girlfriend in a Coma, Douglas Copeland
2- The Pornographer's Poem, Michael Turner
3- Everything is Illuminated- Jonathan Safran Foer
4- All the novels of Siri Hustvedt: The Blindfold, What I Loved, The Enchantment of Lily Dahl
5- Blindness- Jose Saramago ***

So these are mine, but I also acknowledge The Corrections, The Eugenides books, the Sedaris, Burroughs, and Chabon's deserve to be up here, they're just not my favorites.

world according to garp - john irving,
the history of love - nicole krause,
fortress of solitude - jonathan lethem,
crossing california - adam langer,
extremely loud and incredibly close - jonathan safran foer

Oh man, only new stuff?! I guess I will have to disregard my obsession with Dawn Powell.

Okay, no particular order:

1. Atonement by Ian McEwan
2. The Hours by Michael Cunningham (It really helps if you read this right after Mrs. Dalloway, which is what I did. I would also accept Specimen Days, even if I didn't like it quite as much.)
3. Alias Grace by Margaret Atwood
4. Microserfs by Douglas Coupland
5. Shopgirl by Steve Martin

1, 2, and 3: The Border Trilogy, by Cormac McCarthy (specifically The Crossing, as it was my favorite)

4: On Beauty, by Zadie Smith

5: The Virgin Suicides, by Jeffrey Eugenides (just to be different)

@Julie -
Give Kelly Link a try, a little darker than Aimee Bender, but just as (if not more) magical.

Oryx and Crake Margaret Atwood

Fight Club Chuck Palahniuk

The Ground Beneath Her Feet Salman Rushdie

The Road Cormac McCarthy

A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius Dave Eggers

I'm surprised by the lack of Salman Rushdie love so far! Midnight's Children and Satanic Verses are better but break the rule.

1. The Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood
2. The Big Over Easy by Jasper Fforde
3. The Green Mile (best as a serial)
4. White Teeth by Zadie Smith
5. Middlesex

"crossing california - adam langer"

M-I forgot about this book, great pick!

Ok, I need to stop commenting and start my list. I've been debating reading Cloud Atlas for a while, I may have to pick that up from the library this week.

1. Lullibies for Little Criminals---Heather O'Neill
2. Time's Arrow---Martin Amis
3. High Fidelity---Nick Hornby
4. Everything is Illuminated---Jonathan Safran Foer
5. American Psycho---Brett Easton Ellis

1. Bel Canto-Ann Patchett
2. The Historian-Elizabeth Kostova
3. The Lovely Bones-Alice Sebold
4. The History of Love-Nicole Krauss
5. Middlesex- Jeffrey Eugenides

1. The Kite Runner, Khaled Hosseini

2. Wicked, Gregory Maguire

3. Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister, Gregory Maguire (I must confess that I like this better than Wicked.)

4. The Handmaid's Tale, Margaret Atwood

5. The Color Purple, Alice Walker (Okay, it's not within time constraints, but I adore this book...)

cripes, i've almost completely ceased reading fiction for some reason or another, but--books!--i've gotta weigh in. dunno if these all make the 15 year criterion, but:

invisible cities (italo calvino)
hard boiled wonderland and the end of the world (haruki murakami)
infinite jest (DFW)
the blind assassin (lord, i love me some margaret atwood)
the secret history (donna tartt)

and i *know* it doesn't make the chronological cutoff, but don delillo's white noise deserves a mention.

"Why Girls Are Weird" by Pamela Ribon
"Death Rat" by Mike Nelson (I'm a geek, I know)
"Going Postal" by Terry Pratchett

Other than that, the majority of books I have been reading and collecting are political commentary and narrative history stuff, because I completed a history degree not too long ago.

I'm really interested to see how this is going to go. I love getting book recommendations.

I disagree with only allowing books published within the last 15 years. I mean, Good Omens was published in 1990, but it's showing up on quite a few lists (not mine, unfortunately, though I do love it). I don't primarily categorize books in terms of time period, and there was no age limit on our top five most bangable, so I choose to not follow the rules.

Off the top of my head:

Hornby - About a Boy
Miriam Towes - A Complicated Kindness
Douglas Coupland - Generation X
Matthew Good - At Last There is Nothing Left to Say (not really a novel, a collection of manifestos... but shhh, it's dear to my heart)
Mark Haddon - The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time

Is anyone else jotting down notes of future books to check out? Hah, because I sure am.

Frankly, its difficult to stick to the last 15 years, but in no particular order:

1. American Psycho, Ellis
2. JPod, Coupland
3. The Witch of Cologne, Tobsha Learner
4. The Rum Diary, Hunter S. Thompson
5. A Short History of Nearly Everything, Bill Bryson

Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, Michael Chabon
Assassination Vacation, Sarah Vowell
A Long Way Down, Nick Hornby
Kitchen Confidential, Anthony Bourdain
If Chins Could Kill: Confessions of A B-Movie Actor, Bruce Campbell

I just scrolled right down as not to be influenced by other posts:

Skinny Legs and All - Tom Robbins (hands down, favorite book EVER. I've read it about 10 times and still turn to it when I need something comforting)

Jitterbug Perfume - Tom Robbins (yeah, so I like TR. So shoot me.)

You Must Remember This - Joyce Carol Oates (This one haunted me long after I read it. She gets me every time.)

Fortress of Solitude - Jonathan Letham. (This one blew me away. First of his I ever read, still one of my faves.)

The Passion - Jeanette Winterson (she is a master with words. This one will make you want to run off to Venice)

Runner Up - The Known World by Edward P. Jones.

* I was a bad Pajibian and didn't read the 15 yr. rule before posting. Woops!

I've just recently discovered this site and am really enjoying it. I'd absolutely love for you to do a book review! Here are some of my favorites. Some of these were been written before the 15-year mark, but absolutely none should exceed 25 years.

1)"Kiss of the Spiderwoman"-Manuel Puig. (Okay okay so this is out of the time frame, but it's absolutely brilliant and few people have ever read the book. At most they've only seen the film.)

2) "Love in the Time of Cholera"-Gabriel Garcia Marquez

3) "Midnight's Children"-Salman Rushdie

4) "Poisonwood Bible"-Barbara Kingsolver

5) "Middlesex"-Jeffery Eugenides. (You mentioned it already, but I really would love to see a review of this.)

Other honorable mentions

1) "Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers"-Mary Roach

2) "Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim"-David Sedaris

3) "The Kid" and/or "The Commitment"-Dan Savage

Hey Dustin, any way that, in addition to the inevtable top ten Pajiba books entry, we could get a list of every book mentioned in this diversion? Maybe a link to your excel spreadhseet or something? I am prety passionate about movies and all, but books are my crack cocaine. I know I have read a LOT of the books on this list, but the idea that I am missing some important ones is making me completely twitch. Please give us the whole shebang! If nothing elsemaybe us Pajibians could start a book swap or something.

Yeah that's an idea, any Philadelphians want to start a Pajiba book club? I'm serious here.

Fiction:

1. Underworld by Don DeLillo
2. A Long, Long Way by Sebastian Barry
3. Leviathan by Paul Auster
4. Glamorama by Bret Easton Ellis
5. The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami

Honorable mentions: Lord of the Barnyard by Tristan Egolf (may he rest in peace),A Girl in Landscape by Jonathan Lethem, The Restraint of Beasts by Magnus Mills, and anything written by Cormac McCarthy or Don DeLillo

Non-fiction:

1. I Was Vermeer by Frank Wynne
2. Cassavetes on Cassavetes by Ray Carney
3. In a Sunburned COuntry by Bill Bryson
4. Assassination Vacation by Sarah Vowell
5. Savage Art by Robert Polito

Honorable Mentions: Blood on the Moon by Edward Steers, Rave On by Philip Norman, We Wish to Inform You That Tomorrow We Will Be Killed with Our Families by Philip Gourevitch, and Which Lie Did I Tell? byu William Goldman.

1. Black Swan Green, David Mitchell

2. All the Names, Jose Saramago

3. (I saw someone included graphic novels, so) Box Office Poison, Alex Robinson

4. Wonderboys, Chabon

5. Cloud Atlas, David Mitchell

Writing this, I realized how little current fiction I've been reading lately. By the way, am I the only one that couldn't stand the last 200 pages of the Corrections?

Blessed are the Cheesemakers - Sara-Kate Lynch

A Dirty Job - Christopher Moore (It ranks equally with Blood Sucking Fiends (a love story) and You Suck (a love story) also by Moore)

The Time Traveler's Wife, by Audrey Niffenegger

Bel Canto - Ann Pratchett

The Eyre Affair - Jasper Fforde (the first in a series of books for book nerds. I love it)

Pajiba, it hurts me to only list 5! Runners up: The Tender Bar - J.R. Moehringer; A Long Way Down - Nick Hornby; In Her Shoes - Jennifer Weiner (the book didn't suck like the movie); Foolscap - Michael Malone

the 15 year rule makes this hard, but in no particular order:
1. Never let me go - kazuo ishiguro (I was'nt completely in love with this book as I was reading it, but can't seem to stop thinking about it after reading it)
2. Atonement - Ian McEwan
3. True history of the siege of lisbon - jose saramago (I liked it better than blindness, but that seems to be a more popular choice for other posters)
4. Secret history - donna tartt (a great beach read/fine literature mix)
5. Thread of grace - mary doria russell

I have so much trouble finding new things to read and these lists will be great. I have to pick out the book for my book club and now I have some good choices!

The fifteen-year limit cuts out a lot of my favorite books, but here goes:

Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, by Susanna Clarke
Double Duce, by Aaron Cometbus (this is sort of a Bay Area local kind of book, but I'm going to leve it on anyway)
Neverwhere, by Neil Gaiman
Good Omens, by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett
Snow Crash, by Neal Stephenson

(Honorable mention: Stephenson's Diamond Age and Walker Percy's The Moviegoer.)

His Dark Materials
Rats Saw God by Rob Thomas
Lisey's Story by Stephen King
Running in Heels by Anna Maxted
The Mysteries of Pittsburgh by Michael Chabon

and seriously... no list of novels is complete without Watership Down even though it's totally breaking the rules.

Jumping back in again to acknowledge the two people who selected Jasper Fforde, a true reader's author.
Also James B., love you for putting Heaney's Beowolf on the list. There should be another comment diversion for poetry (only not just the last 15 years).

Middlesex is a GREAT book.
Also, anything by Roddy Doyle.
And can we add Raymond Carver? Please?

All time favorites:
Of Mice and Men
Tom Jones

And I still believe Diane Lane should be on the sexiest list!!!

"2. The Hours by Michael Cunningham (It really helps if you read this right after Mrs. Dalloway, which is what I did. I would also accept Specimen Days, even if I didn't like it quite as much.)"

I'm 180-degrees away from you on this. Cunningham is an aggressively awful writer. Reading it after Mrs Dalloway only shows up his artless prose. It's bad enough he includes large chunks of MD in The Hours.

That novel -- even thinking about it -- makes me want to take a very long Silkwood shower.

OOPS. Thanks for pointing out that my beloved Good Omens breaks the 15 yr. rule. You'd never know it from reading it - it's so contemporary-feeling

OK, replace it with Steve Martin's The Pleasure of My Company, which is especially delicious if you listen to him read it, himself, on the book-on-tape (which I normally hate, but this one is MARVELOUS).

Goddamnit. Forgot to close my tag.

oranges are not the only fruit - jeanette winterson
a fine balance - rohinton mistry (this is like being hit by a bloody bus)
beloved - toni morrison
poisonwood bible - barbara kingsolver (don't read this one in public - i was sobbing on the greyhound)
memoirs of a geisha - arthur golden.

The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay by Michael Chabon;
Buddha's Little Finger by Victor Pelevin;
The Moor's Last Sigh by Salman Rushdie;
The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri;
The Wind-up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami

Joselyn:

Sorry to hear about the nightmares -- I had a similar experience, where I would be half-asleep and anxiously worrying as if I were in the book. I love post-apocalyptic material in cinema and literature, especially "28 Days Later" and the like. But "The Road" is a different animal from those works of entertainment. It is a superb piece of literature, beautifully written and profoundly conceived. And fucking scary.

I've read some, but not all of the comments & am definitely now adding some books to my "must read" list. I'm sort of ignoring the 15 year rule...sorry.

Good Omens
Ender's Game
The first few books in the Dark Towers series by Stephen King. If I had to pick just one, I'd go with the first - The Gunslinger.
The Abarat Series by Clive Barker. They're meant for tweens, but I just love reading them. Although, if he doesn't finish the trilogy soon, I might find him and kill him.
The Stephanie Plum series by Janet Evanovich. I know. I know. And, while the last few books haven't been anywhere near as good, the first...5 maybe just made me laugh and laugh and laugh. It may not be high quality, but it's certainly entertaining.

And, if The Gunslinger is just too old (1982), I'd replace it with His Dark Materials.

Also, I saw Chabon's name mentioned a lot. The only thing of his I've ever read is Summerland, which was very enjoyable, especially if you like baseball.

Theresa-I live and work in Philly, and I am all about the book club :)

I have to concur with The Kite Runner and The Eyre Affair.

Also, this is Amazon's description of Double Duce:
"
What Kerouac was to the Beat generation, Aaron Cometbus is to the punk scene in Berkeley, California. In this first novel, his slacker kids ponder life's mundane questions with the seriousness of ancient philosophers: how to get by on no money, where to scam free photocopies, and the finer points of food filching. Through a haze of beer and Top Ramen, they engage in endless debates about the nature of punk rock rage."

It's less a novel and more a series of vignettes about his life in the punk squats of Berkeley and Oakland...but that's still a pretty good description.

Theresa - a Philly 'burbs-based Pajiba reader myself...count me in.

Ummm...just one Tower in that Dark Tower series.

Smello - I found Summerland to be Chabon's weakest. Kavalier and Clay is arguably his masterpiece, but I'd recommend any of his novels.

Last 15 years? Y'all suck. These are maybe not my favorite books ever, but certainly some of the more intiguing books of the last 15 years.

1. The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield
2. The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold
3. The Tale of Murasaki by Liz Dalby (Genji shout-out!)
4. Life of Pi by Yann Martel
5. Pilgrim at Tinker Creek by Annie Dillard--neither a novel nor from the last 15 years, but way too damn good to ignore.

Perhaps Pajiba could devote an entire column for each book, making it more similar to the movie reviews?
I would prefer to have one extensive review of a book I know I might potentially read, than a list of quick commentary on a handful of books I may or may not have been interested in when clicking on the header.
And, really, if we have room for an entire review of each 'Dukes of Hazard'-type movie, I think we can afford one for each individual book.

OK, I am old. 1990 was more than 15 years ago, ouch.

Rant - Chuck Palaniuk

Survivor - Chuck Palaniuk I would also threw Fight Club or Invisible Monster on here, or Choke or Lullabye for that matter

American Gods - Neil Gaimen

The Color Magic - Terry Pratchett

TimeQuake - Kurt Vonnegut - i think this is his only novel that fits the 15 year period

1. Long Way Down by Nick Hornby
2. Schroedinger's Ball by Adam Felber
3. Closing Time by Joseph Heller
4. Love Monkey by Kyle Smith
5. Children of Men by PD James

The Tesseract, Alex Garland
Lullaby, Chuck Palahniuk
The Blind Assassin, Margaret Atwood
The Virgin Suicides, Jeffrey Eugenides
The English Patient, Michael Ondaatje

Oh, James S.--you kick ass for putting Beowulf down. I so should have done that!

Until I Find You by John Irving
The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold
We Need to Talk About Kevin by Lionel Shriver (not entirely sure that's w/i the 15 year limit)
Wicked... by Gregory Maguire
I Know This Much is True/She's Come Undone by Wally Lamb

Pajiba book reviews make my toes curl..and speaking of curling toes, I nominate: Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood, Atonement by Ian McEwan, White Oleander, Sin Killer by Larry McMurtry and Sacrifice by the inimitable Andrew Vachss. Honorable mention, and have I really not seen it come up yet?-Life of Pi. Geek Love would definitely be on here, but I want to respect the 15 year parameter-parameters can be fn!

Marmotte, Bryan Perro

well i don't recall reading another book (worth mentioning) written after 1995.

AIR - Geoff Ryman
SNOW - Orhan Pamuk
SYRUP - Maxx Barry
LIFE AFTER GOD - Douglas Coupland
WIND-UP BIRD CHRONICLE - Haruki Murakami

Actually de-lurking for the first time... I have to break the rules with most of my selections, but they're my favorites, and books that at any time I can pick up and re-read...

Catch 22, Joseph Heller (hands down the best book ever)

A Prayer for Owen Meany, John Irving

The Age of Innocence, Edith Wharton

A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, Dave Eggers

The Stand, Stephen King

In no particular order:

High Fidelity - Nick Hornby
My Legendary Girlfriend - Mike Gayle
The Eyre Affair - Jasper Fforde
The Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas - Hunter S Thompson

D'oh! How could I forget Saramago and Ishiguro? Although for me it would be "The Gospel According to Jesus Christ" (Saramago-though if you've got a thin skin about Christian orthodoxy, stay the hell away from this book) and "The Remains of the Day."

Hey, so only one (maybe two) books on my list looks like contenders for Honorable Pajiba Mention, so I wanted to quickly plug the others for the people scanning this list for library recommendations. You will not regret reading these books. (This list is a repeat of the one I posted upthread.)

1. Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood
(Glad to see there are enough Atwood fans to keep her in the running -- this is a great intro to her work: part love story, part sci-fi (an isolated part, duly segregated to its own story-within-a-story-within-a-story -- and f*ing brilliant, btw), part mystery, and, as always with Atwood, part tragedy.)

2. Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight by Alexandra Fuller
(Technically auto-biography, but reads like a novel -- with truly engaging characters and entertaining stories throughout. The author recalls her childhood growing up white and poor on a farm in South Africa during the apartheid. Surprisingly funny and relatable.)

3. Still Life with Murder by PB Ryan
(If you like mysteries, read this book. Just: read this book. You will thank me.)

4. Smilla's Sense of Snow by Peter Hoeg (just made the 15 year cut-off)
(A beautiful, sparse, emotionally cold, intellectually deep, mathematically transcendent novel with one of the best female protagonists I have ever come across in this genre -- which is some combination of mystery/suspense, adventure, and Intro to Physics.)

5. The Golden Compass ("His Dark Materials" trilogy) by Phillip Pullman
('Nuff said.)

1. A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius - Dave Eggers
2. Wicked - Greggory Maguire
3. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay - Michael Chabon
4. American Gods - Neil Gaiman
5. The DaVinci Code - Dan Brown

HAHAHAHAH, sorry, not really...

5. A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole

oh and can i just say i have a girl boner for all of you who mentioned sarah vowell? fantastic

Confederacy of Dunces is too old isn't it? Dammit. Well then I'm going to go with...

5. Too Say Nothing of the Dog - Connie Willis
I don't think that one's been mentioned yet.

I would like to say that I love the Pajiba book column and want to see it continue. I'm in the middle of Lamb, as well as the Fables series, and recently finished The Mysteries of Pittsburgh all because of the suggestions. Don't leave me hanging folks!

The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy
Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer
Chocolat by Joanne Harris
Einstein's Dreams by Alan Lightman
The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger

Take it for what it is. I think it's pretty obvious that my taste doesn't fall in line with that of the average Pajiban, but in no particular order:

Wicked - Gregory McGuire

The Rum Diary - Hunter S. Thompson

Wolves of the Calla - Stephen King

Hello Darling, Are You Working - Rupert Everett

A Crown of Swords - Robert Jordan

This weird list doesn't begin to be descriptive enough, but the 15 years thing is really killing me.

1. His Dark Materials - Phillip Pullman (If I had to pick just one out of the trilogy, I would go with The Amber Spyglass. It's not my personal favorite of the three, but it has, perhaps, the most potential for Pajibesque discussion.)
2. White Teeth - Zadie Smith
3. The God of Small Things - Arundhati Roy
4. The Hours - Michael Cunningham
5. Wicked - Gregory Maguire (Just for the sake of consensus...I couldn't really think of a fifth, and this book was actually interesting until the unapologetic cheese of the Broadway musical tainted it for me.)

love the murakami love!
1. haruki murakami the wind-up bird chronicle
2. haruki murakami hard-boiled wonderland or the end of the world
3. patrick süskind the perfume
4. philip roth i married a communist
4. caleb carr the alienist

Under the 15-year rule, I can only think of one: The Master by Colm Toibin.

1. The Blue Flower by Penelope Fitzgerald.
2. Freddy's Book by John Gardner.
3. The Old Devils by Kingsley Amis.
4. Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy.
5. Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry.

Most or all of these are older than 15 years, but not older than 30, which I hope is close enough.

jill c.: you certainly may say so; a number of us (I'm looking at you, Armando) have boy-boners for Sarah Vowell ...

1. The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami
2. Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides
3. Cold Mountain by Charles Frazier
4. The Human Stain by Philip Roth
5. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon

The 15-year rule knocks almost all of mine off; why do we always have to keep it modern? So many things about the modern world suck.

And fifteen years ago was only 1992, which is not only unfathomable, but also mildly depressing.

The Kite Runner, Khaled Hosseini
What's the Matter with Kansas, Thomas Frank
White Oleander, Janet Fitch
She's Come Undone, Wally Lamb
I Know this Much is True, Wally Lamb (at 17 years old, it's positively antique; sorry.)

Also: everything John Irving.

The Blind Assassin - Margaret Atwood

Until I Find You - John Irving

The Time-Traveller's Wife - Audrey Niffenegger

A Gathering Light(UK title)/A Northern Light(US title) - Jennifer Donnelly

Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrel - Susanna Clarke

His Dark Materials, Phillip Pullman
Reading Lolita in Tehran, Azar Nafisi
Petropolis, Anya Ulnich
The Perks of Being a Wallflower, Stephen Chbosky
Absurdistan, Shteyngart

Good Omens - Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett
Altered Carbon - Richard K. Morgan
Six Bad Things - Charlie Huston
The Stand - Stephen King
Mystic River - Dennis Lehane

The Museum of Unconditional Surrender - Dubravka Ugresic
High Fidelity - Nick Hornby
The Fortress of Solitude - Lethem
The Adventures of Kavelier and Klay - Chabon
An Abundance of Katherines - John Green

The Romantic - Barbara Gowdy
Lady Chatterley's Lover - DH Lawrence
The Loved and the Lost - Morley Callaghan
Success - Martin Amis
Mysteries of Pittsburgh - Michael Chabon

ack! cross off Absurdistan, and add Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke to my list. How could I forget?!

Prisoner of Trebekistan-Bob Harris
Lamb-Christopher Moore
You Shall Know Our Velocity-Dave Eggers
Wicked-Gregory Maguire
Timequake-Vonnegut (the only Vonnegut that fits the time limit, but also my favorite)

So many of my favorites already mentioned, so I'll go with a few new (unless I missed them) entries to see if they entice anyone:

1) The Plot Against America by Philip Roth
2) Tortilla Curtain by T.C. Boyle
3) Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Murakami
4) Father and Son by Larry Brown
5) Life of Pi by Yann Martel

Wow. This is incredibly hard. In no particular order:

1.) His Dark Materials (easily the best fantasy out there)

2.)Brief Interviews With Hideous Men- David Foster Wallace (best collection of short stories, I've read)

3.) The Lies of Locke Lamora- Scott Lynch (action packed, though sensitve, I've never sympathized with a thief more than I did when I read this.)

4.) The Linnet Bird-( A girlier pick, put how can you resist a WELL WRITTEN story of a Victorian prostitute)

5.) Dress Your Family in Courdurory and Denim- david Sedaris. (So, its not fiction, but it reads like it.)

1. Shopgirl, by Steve Martin
2. World War Z, by Max Brooks
3. The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fist-Fight in Heaven, by Sherman Alexie
4. A Year at the Movies, by Kevin Murphy
5. The Lovely Bones, by Alice Sebold

Honorable mentions:
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time, by Mark Haddon
Mystic River, by Dennis Lehane

Other books in my top 10 rudely disqualified due to age:
All Quiet on the Western Front, by Erich Maria Remarque
2001: A Space Odyssey, by Arthur C. Clarke
Slaughterhouse-Five, by Kurt Vonnegut

Sweet Jesus this is kind of hard... Aside from #1, these are in no particular order.

1. The Hours by Michael Cunningham. It's simply an astonishingly well-written novel that's infinitely profound.
2. The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold. I'm not a rabid fan of the novel, but I did enjoy it quite a bit and I'm looking forward beyond words to see how Peter Jackson is going to pull off heaven in the film adaptation.
3. The View From Saturday by EL Konigsburg (I think that's her name). I'm sure no one else will put this and it's not even really in the realm of review because it's a children's book, but this is probably the most exquisite piece of fiction I've ever read. For some reason, it's just perfection in terms of character details and narrative drive.
4. The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen. I think Franzen's a really great writer and while the novel is dauntingly dense, it's dense in a way that's interesting, not just dense for the sake of being dense. If that makes sense.
5. The only Margaret Atwood I've read that qualifies for the time period is The Robber Bride and while I thought the novel was good, it wasn't great. The Handmaid's Tale is brilliant, but falls outside the time frame. So just add a vote to whatever Atwood novel's in the lead after the tally. :-)

Love these comment diversions, guys!

OK, I'm going to cheat. Take away my vote for View from Saturday and give it to The Poisonwood Bible. What a great book.

Sorry... sorry! Take my Atwood vote away and give it Snow Crash. Now there's science fiction done right.

She's Come Undone-Wally Lamb. I've read this a hundred times.
White Oleander-Janet Fitch
About a Boy-Nick Hornby
Me Talk Pretty One Day-David Sedaris
Atonement-Ian McEwan

Eugenides's "Middlesex"
Franzen's "The Corrections"
Robinson's "Gilead"
Oates's "We Were the Mulvaneys" (made-for-television movie/Oprah status be damned - I'm a HUGE Oates fan and I think this is among her absolute best work)
Roth's "The Plot Against America" or "American Pastoral"

Honorable Mentions: Lamb's "She's Come Undone", Lent's "Lost Nation", Smith's "White Teeth",

Not sure if ALL of these fall within 15 years, but I'll give it a shot because I don't feel like looking them all up.

1) Checker and the Deraillers - Lionel Shriver

AWESOME book with good 80's music references.
Seriously, this book killed me when I first
read it.

2) Female of the Species - Lionel Shriver

Another great by Ms. Shriver

3) They Call Me Mad Dog - Erika Lopez

Funny, funny, funny. Includes her own drawings

4) E - Matthew Beaumont

Epistolary novel written in emails that go
back and forth in a British ad agency.

5) You made a no Harry Potter rule, that was
mean. Harry Potter is one of those things
that I didn't WANT to like, but couldn't help
becoming obsessed anyway.

"What's Eating Gilbert Grape" Peter Hedges
"The Lovely Bones" Alice Sebold
"The Cases That Haunt Us" John Douglas & Mark Olshaker
"An Underground Education" Richard Zacks
"A Density of Souls" Christopher Rice.
Almost every book in Mr. Stephen King's repertoire.

1. The Eyre Affair - Jasper Fforde
2. The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
3. 1906 - James Dalessandro
4. Ireland - Frank Delaney
5. Ursula, Under - Ingrid Hill

and, it is over 30 years old but, I must include The Princess Bride by William Goldman

Lamb- Christopher Moore (I'm not bothering with the whole title...)
Curious Incident of the Dog In the Nighttime- Mark Haddon
Golden Compass (or the trilogy as a whole) - Philip Pullman
Wicked- Gregory Maguire
Bel Canto - Ann Patchett

Runner-up: The Little Prince- Antoine St. Exupery

Oh yum -- my tastes may be lowbrow -- but can't put down....

1. The Short History of a Prince -- Jane Hamilton

2. The Girl's Guide to Hunting and Fishing - Melissa Banks

3. The Poisonwood Bible - Barbara Kingsolver

4. Dry - Augusten Burroughs

5. The Story of My Life - Jay McInery

5b. The Time Traveler's Wife - A. Niffenegger (had to read for book club -- had no IDEA would love it so much! -- surely the movie will butcher it...:( )

Beloved- Toni Morrison
Brothers K- David James Duncan
Geek Love- Katherine Dunn
Immortality- Milan Kundera
Gospel- Wilton Barnhardt

No order:

The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay - Michael Chabon
Trainspotting - Irvine Welsh
A Star Called Henry - Roddy Doyle
The Life of Pi - Yann Martel
The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle - Haruki Murakami

Ideally, I'd like to include Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World instead The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle but, hey, I'm playing by the rules. I think that Murakami lost his way a little with the latter.

5c (sorry)
The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold (read in one night)

Middlesex- Jeffrey Eugenides
Me Talk Pretty One Day- David Sedaris
Life of Pi- Yann Martel
Eleven Minutes- Paul Coehlo
Poisonwood Bible- Barbara Kingsolver

I'm an English major and all my choices are so mainstream I'm almost embarassed. But who cares? They're all incredible books.

Thirteenth Tale - Diane Setterfield

The Book Thief - Markus Zusak

Beloved - Toni Morrison

The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini

A Million Little Pieces - James Frey..We are talking fiction, right? Not because I particularly liked the book but let's talk about it for what it is.

I just have to add one thing, because its the best damn memoir out there and oh so pajiba-ish...

A Girl Named Zippy- Haven Kimmel.
Anyone care to agree?

The Poisonwood Bible - Barbara Kingsolver
The Red Tent - Anita Diamant
The Eyre Affair - Jasper Fforde
White Teeth - Zadie Smith
His Dark Materials - Phillip Pullman

Dustin, I love you for doing this. Also, I'm impressed at how many of my favourites are popular with the Pajiba crowd!

1. Closing Time, Joseph Heller (but ONLY because Catch-22, the greatest book of all time, didn't make the damned 15-year cut)
2. Fluke, or I Know Why the Winged Whale Sings, Christopher Moore (though Lamb's also an excellent book...hell, I could make an all-Moore list, but will refrain for variety's sake)
3. Middlesex, Jeffrey Eugenides
4. Long Way Down, Nick Hornby
5. Good In Bed, Jennifer Weiner (surprisingly substantial chick-lit)

Argh, a difficult list, but I'm OK with it. Can't wait to see Pajiba's ten sexiest books!

no order:

-- Birds of America: Lorrie Moore
-- Three Month Fever: Gary Indiana
-- From the Teeth of Angels: Jonathan Carroll
-- Guide: Dennis Cooper
-- Music for Torching: A.M. Homes

Yay! I can't wait to see the top ten compilation! Maybe you'll be extra gracious and give us a top twenty. Here's my $0.02 worth, in no particular order:

1. Hunting in Harlem - Mat Johnson

2. The Dark Tower V: Wolves of the Calla - Stephen King

3. Hitchhikker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams

4. Paul Bowles - The Sheltering Sky

5. Self Help for the Bleak - Rich Hall

You've already drummed up enthusiam for Pajiba book reviews/discussions in this household folks! Please do. Last 15 years is tricky for me, being a Georgian (era not country) lit student but I think I can make it

1. On Beauty - Zadie Smith
2. Snobs - Julian Fellows
3. Morpho Eugenia - AS Byatt
4. Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
5. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Hadon

1. The Time Traveler's Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
2. White Oleander - Janet Fitch
3. The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
4. The Brothers K - David James Duncan
5. The Boy Detective Fails - Joe Meno

• Ender's Game - Orson Scott Card
• Marooned in Realtime - Vernor Vinge
• After Dachau - Daniel Quinn
• His Dark Materials - Phillip Pullman
• Jennifer Government - Max Barry

Card, well, I know he's "the man" and whatnot, but I've only recently begun the Ender series, and frankly I'm enamored at the moment.

Vernor Vinge. Marooned in Realtime is the most compelling of his to me in its mix of hard sci-fi and a really great detective story. I like all his work, but this is the one I hand out. Also check out Rainbow's End.

Daniel Quinn. I read Ishmael. I liked it. It makes you think about things on a fundamental level most people aren't normally apt to do. After Dachau does exactly that again, with Quinn carrying a conceit to the furthest extent of consideration. Excellent reading.

I'm also on the Pullman train. These are fantastic books. I'm going to be very upset if they ruin this movie opportunity.

Max Barry. He's an interesting character, but this book is fantastic. A really interesting look at corporate culture taken to the extreme.

I have no idea how to decide what my favorite books of the last 15 years are. This list is five books I'd love to hear anyone's thoughts on that I read recently enough to still be interested in discussing them.

Oh my god! I'm so excited you finally chose to include books - I'm such a geeky English teacher. This is so incredibly hard, since (most) of my all-time favorite novels are older than 15 years, but here are the ones I've really enjoyed in the past few years:

1. Interpreter of Maladies, Jhumpa Lahiri
2. The Kite Runner, Khalid Hosseini
3. The Lovely Bones, Alice Sebold
4. The Time Traveler's Wife, Audrey Niffinegger
5. The Historian, Elizabeth Kostova

I know there are many, many more, but these are the ones that popped up in my mind first...

This 15 year rule is rough. Let's see...

1. On Writing - Stephen King (he sounds so normal in his autobiography)
2. A Yellow Raft in Blue Water - Michael Dorris
3. The Things They Carried - Tim O'Brien
4. The Nuclear Age - Tim O'Brien (he's amazing)

Ummm...I can't think of any other ones that I loved that were very recent. All time favorites:
Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
Gone With the Wind- Margaret Mitchell (Believe me when I tell you it's better than you might think)

Though I think it's extremely limiting to exclude older books (I prefer the tried and true, what can I say?), here are my modern favorites...

1. The Robber Bride by Margaret Atwood (in fact, almost anything by Atwood.)
2. Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke
3. Stardust by Neil Gaiman (in fact, almost anything by Gaiman)
4. both of the Bridget Jones books (I know, I know, but that Bridget Jones-Colin Firth interview in the second novel gets me giggling just thinking about it. They are charming books, all chick lit classifications aside.)
5. About a Boy by Nick Hornby

Apologies for being so parenthetical.

Hmmmm... Only five? Okay.
"Others" - James Herbert.
"High Fidelity" - Nick Hornby
"The World According To Garp" - John Irving
"The First Casualty" - Ben Elton
"Still Life With Woodpecker" - Tom Robbins

1. The Time Traveler's Wife, by Audrey Niffenegger
2. Lamb, by Christopher Moore
3. The Loser's Club, by Richard Perez
4. His Dark Materials, by Phillip Pullman
5.Me Talk Pretty One Day, by David Sedaris

Norwegian Wood - Haruki Murakami
Life After God - Douglas Coupland
The New York Trilogy - Paul Auster
Time's Arrow - Martin Amis
Heartbreak Tango (out of PRINT, BITCHES!) - Manuel Puig

Sorry about breaking the 15 year rule but "Garp" is a book that I've purchased and given to a LOT of people that I love.

Someone up there said something about memoirs...Pajiba leaders - maybe a separate comment diversion??

A Girl Named Zippy -- I liked, but not as much as Too Close to the Falls - Catherine ? or The Glass Castle - Jeanette Wall? or Running With Scissors - (or anything by Augusten Burroughs) or David Sedaris - Me Talk Pretty One Day....

I love it when you're laughing and nearly (!) weeping while reading and it's someone's actual life. Or one hopes so, anyway (thanks for the additional reason for cynicism JAMES FREY).

'Cloud Atlas'
'Black Swan Green'

Both by David Mitchell. I love him. They are equally spell-binding, and completely different from one another, so they both have to be mentioned.

'Bless Me, Ultima' by Rudolfo Anaya. I haven't seen it on here yet. One of the most beautiful novels I've read, ever, a bit of magical realism, but not overboard, and written the way a coming-of-age tale should be, with humor and sensitivity but not saccharine in the least. Please, please read it, Pajiba boys! You'll love it, I promise!

'Life of Pi.' Shut up. I really loved it.

And my absolute favorite of all time: 'The Dictionary of the Khazars,' by Milorad Pavic. Seriously. I have the epigraph tattooed on my back (no joke), that's how much I love it. A little postmodern 'conceit' to it, as ya'll would say, but it works. It's what Umberto Eco could be if you didn't need a damned PhD in history to read it.

I guess I can throw in another one, but there aren't any more novels that I feel as passionate about as those.

If we're allowing non-fiction, 'Vita: Life in a Zone of Social Abandonment' by Joao Biehl is one of the most affecting pieces I've read to date, part ethnography, part biography, part detective story, supplemented with lovely still photographs of the narrative's subjects.

I guess I really enjoyed reading both 'The Lovely Bones' and 'Bel Canto,' so you could add a half a tally to one or another of those.

Gimme a P! Gimme a B! Gimme an R! Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaay, Pajiba book reviews! (who doesn't love PBR?)

All I've read this year are books for uni, so this is actually a pleasure to think about books that I enjoy.

1. The Time Travellers Wife (Audrey Niffeneger)- never have I feared a film adaptation of a book so much.

2. My Sister's Keeper (Jodi Picoult)- Picoult's books are pretty formulaic but I bawled like a baby at this one.

3. The Handmaids tale (Margaret Atwood)- I looooved this book so much, pretty much everything she's done is great but this is the one that stuck with me.

4. His Dark Materials trilogy (Philip Pullman)-
As much as I'm looking forward to the next Potter book, Pullman's proposed addition to this series where Lyra is older (He talked about it on Richard and Judy!)is probably the book I'd rather read.

5.The lost art of keeping secrets (Eva Price)- a book where nothing much really happens but it's just delicious.

Honourable mentions must go to Watchmen, because I just read it, anything by Marian Keyes because I love her and A Room with a view because it's my favourite book ever.

Hmmm...screw the time constraints, I sez.

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep - Phillip K. Dick.

Perdido Street Statio - China Mieville.

The Shining and IT - Steven King

All of the Harry Potter books. (A very good, quick read. If you haven't yet, give em a go. I have no doubt that anyone on this site could finish all 6 of those books in a week.)

Anything by Haruki Murakami. Seriously, I saw him mentioned on here once, and I highly recommend people try his stuff. Great obscure pop culture refrences, excellent imagery, strange stories. Start with Norwegian Wood, and go from there. A brilliant under the radar author.

in no particular order:

"The Red Tent"- Anita Diamant
"Remains of the Day"- Kazuo Ishiguro
"High Fidelity"- Hornby, obviously a must
"Interpreter of Maladies"- Jumpha Lahiri
"On Beauty"- Zadie Smith

1. Good Omens - Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett
2. Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal - Christopher Moore
3. World War Z - Max Brooks
4. The Golden Compass/The Subtle Knife/The Amber Spyglass (His Dark Materials Trillogy) - Phillip Pullman
5. The Beach - Alex Garland

Runners up: Being Dead, by Jim Crace, and America: The Book, by The Daily Show.

Oh man, I tried to add mine without looking at everyone else's, and then I realized I left out Phillip Roth's The Plot Against America. Damnit!

I cannot abide by the 15 year rule...so I will make up for it by attesting to the fact that all 5 of these books are ones I have purchased copies of for others, and any time I see one of these titles in a used book store, I buy it (no joke, I had 4 copies of #1 on my shelves for years).

1 ~ Song of Solomon, Toni Morrison
2 ~ Geek Love, Katherine Dunn
3 ~ Cloud Atlas, David Mitchell
4 ~ Peace Like a River, Leif Enger
5 ~ History of Love, NIcole Krauss

In no particular order:

Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk
The Diamond Age by Neal Stephenson
The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood
A Supposedly Funny Thing I'll Never Do Again by David Foster Wallace
Assassination Vacation by Sarah Vowell

I realize I may have stretched the definition of "novel" on the last two, but I had to do it b/c I was precluded from including most (and the best) Vonnegut . . . There's only so much restriction a person can take.

Honorable mention to
Outlander by Diana Gabaldon
Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro

ok there is no way i could pick five favourite books so i'm going to go with the last five books i read that i liked and encourage others to read:

1. Shantaram- Gregory David Roberts (ok technically not fiction but the line is pretty blurred in this book!)
2. The Book Thief- Markus Zuzak
3. Life of Pi- Yann Martel
4. The Kite Runner- Khaled Hosseni
5. The Shadow of the Wind- Carlos Ruiz Zafon

And this is probably going to be really unpopular but i really don't get the nick hornby love. I find him quite a lazy writer- formulaic. dick-lit really. okay don't shoot me.

In no particular order:

Atonement, Ian McEwan.
The Blind Assassin, Margaret Atwood.
Everything is Illuminated, Jonthan Safran Foer.
The Mysteries of Pittsburgh, Michael Chabon.
Martin Dressler, Steven Millhauser.

At least that's what IIIII think.

1) In the Skin of a Lion - Michael Ondaatje
2) A Complicated Kindness - Miriam Toews
3) Anil's Ghost - Michael Ondaaje (what can I say, I love the man)
4) Pilgrim - Timothy Findley
5) Alias Grace - Margaret Atwood

Can you tell I'm Canadian? ;)

It seems like a few people are feeling some sort of literary guilt when it comes to the inclusion of anything that's been read by too many people. So, The Life of Pi happens to have a gold sticker on the front, announcing to the world that the author won the Booker Prize. It's not a badge of shame.

If it moves you, who cares whether it's a popular book? Shout it from the rooftops! Tell the world or, at the very least, Pajiba.

The only reason I haven't included the latest adventures from The Saddle Club is that, well, I couldn't choose between the deconstructionism of Horse Capades and the utterly poignant Saddlebags.

Big shout out to those of you who picked Invisible Monsters for Palahniuk -- It was hard for me to choose between it and Fight Club, and I went with the more well-known choice. (And what's up with his latest stuff? Sorry, but not nearly as good -- time travel? Ancient voodoo whatever? C'mon.)

I had to write again to put in ANOTHER Honorable Mention for A Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket. Those are so entertaining and witty. Great for kids as well as adults.

1. "Choke" by Chuck Palahniuk
2. "American Psycho" by Bret Easton Ellis
3. "Maus" by Art Spiegelman
4. "The God of Small Things" by Arundhati Roy
5. "She's Come Undone" by Wally Lamb

-High Fidelity, Nick Hornby
-Little Children, Tom Perotta
-Running with Scissors, Augusten Burroughs (though I have to say, I'm a total geek for all his books, same with the above two men, too)
-A Density of Souls, Christopher Rice (I've lost track how many times I've read this)
-The Kid, Dan Savage (Or any of his books.)

Honorable Mention: Without You, Anthony Rapp (Because I'm not sure if non-fiction was allowed, though I did see 'A Heartbreaking Work..' up there, which I also loved.)

....I just realized one of my picks -was- non-fiction.

Brainfart.

But I'm thrilled to see that someone else loved 'Wolves of the Calla'. It was one of my favorite books in the Dark Tower series.

Invisible Monsters by Chuck Palahniuk
Peace Like a River by Leif Enger
Perdido Street Station by China Meiville
We All Fall Down by Robert Cormier
Watchmen by Alan Moore/Dave Gibbons

Gold stars for the book review idea, that would rock! But - ack, I can't even come close to picking...it was a lovely excuse to procrastinate on my thesis though, thanks!

In no particular order, a really geeky list:
* A song of Ice & Fire (series) - George R.R. Martin
* Perdido Street Station - China Mieville
* Anything by Terry Pratchett or Neil Gaiman that fits in this time period
* The Eyre Affair (series) - Jasper Fforde
* The Last Days of Summer - Steve Kluger

Now I just know I will kick myself for leaving something off. The rest I think you guys pretty well covered: High Fidelity, Life of Pi, Fluke, White Oleander, Snow Crash, Cryptonomicon, Kavalier & Clay... love this diversion!

1) History of Love-Nicole Krauss (Mrs. Foer! Check it out kids!).
2) Pesthouse-Jim Crace (Like The Road only better as I HATE McCarthy).
3) Never Let Me Go-Kazuo Ishiguro (I simply love this man and this book).
4) You Don't Love Me Yet-Lethem (First Lethem I've read. . .tremendous).
5) Bel Canto-Patchett (I really cannot speak highly enough of this book.

In the interest of full disclosure, I run a bookstore and these are actually the last five books I have read that I love. I eat, breathe, pray books and there are just too many to examine.

Good think I paid attention to the 15 years stipulation or I would have been flying my English major flag big time with a bunch of Modern Brit lit.

1. Written on the Body-Jeanette Winterson (Which may be older than 15 years, but who cares. It rocks.)
2. We Need to Talk About Kevin-Lionel Shriver
3. Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norell-Susanna Clarke
4. World War Z-Max Brooks (Good to see some other nods to Mr. Brooks so I don't feel like I total freak.)
5. The Glass Castle by Jeanette Walls (I couldn't put this memoir down. Running With Scissors is hysterical but Jeanette spins a more engaging tale of an f'ed up family.)

The Marx Family Saga - Juan Goytisolo
Number Nine Dream - David Mitchell
Life and Times of Michael K - J.M. Coetzee
Gilead - Marilynne Robinson
Vineland - Thomas Pynchon

Older than 15 years, Catcher in the Rye, Steppenwolf by Herman Hesse and Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie.

I can't believe someone mentioned Goodnight Mr. Tom! I stole that book from my primary school library I loved it so much - I'm sure I've read it at least 20 times.

I also did love Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro... perhaps I'd replace Number 9 Dream... it's a tough one!

Julie and Jason, great! Okay it's a thing! Email me at theresabbeiner@verizon.net and let's talk scheduling and our first book!

Dustin, would you mind advertising the Philly-Pajiba book club a bit further?

Philly-Pajiba book SWAP club I meant to say, though if you guys want to sit around in a bar or starbucks and talk about a book we've read I'm down with that too! Oh this is so cool.

I think I could join the book clubs of many of the above readers.

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, by Mark Haddon
Lost, by Gregory Maguire
Me Talk Pretty One Day, by David Sedaris
Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, by Jonathan Safran Foer
Stiff, Mary Roach
Confederates in the Attic, by Tony Horwitz

Whoops, that's 6. Oh well. I'm not deleting any.

Anne-Oh my GOD yes, The Princess Bride is such a fantastic book.

And I have to concur wuth all those who listed Vowell and Sedaris-I didn't add them since they're non-fiction, but definitely two of my favorite authors of all time. Assassination Vacation was like porn for me: a sarcastic history lesson. Tremendous.

The Time Travellers Wife, by Audrey Niffenegger;

His Dark Materials trilogy, by Phillip Pullman;

The Obernewtyn chronicles, by Isobelle Carmody;

The Book Thief, by Marcus Zusak;

Plus, I totally would have included Harry Potter in my list if that was allowed: Dustin, I think you should make special mention of it in your list and give it some discussion - I would Love Pajiba's view on Potter.

Hee, Theresa, I just saw that you responded-I'd be down with meeting up if you guys wanted, I don't think any book club/swap is complete without alcohol or coffee :)

And I said I wouldn't post any more comments (I believe this is 5 or 6). Ha. You mention books, you may as well hand me speed.

try as i might to avoid overlap, i'm afraid with my late arrival, there's just too many great reads already mentioned. but here's my two cents, for whatever that a thousand lire might buy you...

1) if nobody speaks of remarkable things - jon mcgregor

2) a dirty job - christopher moore

3) case histories - kate atkinson

4) king dork - frank portman

5) a prayer for owen meany - john irving (though technically a couple ticks past the 15 year mark)

and as a random aside, try as i might, i could not love the corrections (heck, i could barely get through it...)

Nothing new here:

The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay by Michael Chabon


The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini


Middlesex by Jeffery Eugenides


The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time by Mark Haddon


An Abundance of Katherines by John Green

Ugh, last 15 years...that cuts off Grendel, doesn't it? See, all my favorites are too old :(

Ookay.

1. Night Watch Terry Pratchett (Glad to see Vimesy getting some love further up on the comments)
2. Invisible Monsters Chuck Palahniuk
3. Naked David Sedaris
4. The Stand Stephen King (Come on, Nick Andros owns all.)
5. Good Omens Pratchett and Gaiman

You can pretty much add the entirety of Pratchett's Discworld series to that (except Equal Rites, that one just annoyed the snot out of me), but particular mention goes to Monsterous Regiment. You just can't beat Maladict.)

1. "Homage to Catalonia" by George Orwell
Did you know Orwell fought in the Spanish Civil War? Neither did I.

2. "Nicholas and Alexandra" by Robert K. Massie
An outstanding account of the last Tsar of Russia.

3. "A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court" by Mark Twain

4. "Naked Pictures of Famous People" by Jon Stewart
This book is hilarious, I think I read it in an afternoon last summer.

5. "the Satanic Verses" by Salman Rushdie
This is the book I would most likely see adapted to a film. It was deemed so controversial at the time of its publication that the Iranian government issued a fatwa calling for Rushdie's death. This novel deals with the complexities of being a Muslim in the modern world, and provided it was done correctly, would make a hell of a film, particularly the opening hijacking scene and the decent into surrealism.

I appear to have gained a ")". Bloody typomonster.

Written on the Body, Jeanette Winterson

Fear Itself, Walter Mosely

The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency, Alexander McCall Smith

The Eyre Affair, Jasper Fforde

The Red Tent, Anita Diamont

John Henry Days - Colson Whitehead,
Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World - Murakami,
Survivor - Palahniuk,
On Love - Alain de Botton,
Blindness - Saramago

WORLD WAR Z by Max Brooks
HEY RUBE by Hunter S. Thompson
FIGHT CLUB by Chuck Palahniuk
...This is so pathetic. I love to read but I can't think of any goddamn books! I think perhaps I need to read something more modern.
Hmph.
HITCHHIKER'S GUIDE TO THE GALAXY by Douglas Adams ...Does that fall in the time frame?
RING by Koji Suzuki. Haha. Honestly. I have nothing of worth to add to this list, apparently.

HMPH.
I vote 5 times for World War Z then.
That book gave me nightmares. I was so ready to kick zombie ass after his first offering (Zombie Survival Guide) but after reading WWZ I lost my fool mind. :(

1. The Road - Cormac McCarthy
2. Children's Hospital - Chris Adrian

Ehh, these are the only two that immediately stand out as being truly excellent.

How Like A God - Brenda W. Clough

Crime and Punishment - Dostoyevsky

No-No Boy - John Okada

American Gods - Neil Gaimon

Picnic, Lightning - Billy Collins

Fifteen years makes it hard. Really, really hard just by looking at my shelf...

The Omega Scroll but Adrian d'Hage (great political aspect if you ignore the religious side of it, which was okay if they stop comparing all religious books to that book that I will not refer to because I hate it that much).

Popcorn by Ben Elton (or any Ben Elton)

World War Z by Max Brooks

American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis (admit it, he's a great writer, even if gruesome)

Ugh, this is really tough. All my favourites are about 50 years old. How about ripping into Stephen King just for the hell of it?

High Fidelity by Nick Hornby
Seven Types of Ambiguity by Elliot Perlman
The Tender Bar by JR Moehringer
Shopgirl by Steve Martin
A River Runs Through It by Norman MacLean

Man, Top Five lists are a bitch! And as I just finished reading and watching High Fidelity (yeah, again! and again!) I've been wandering about composing them in my head all the time now. Thank god you put in the ~15 years clause.
Anyway, I'm totally cheating here but:

Fiction:
1. The Blind Assassin - Margaret Atwood
2. The Virgin Suicides - Jeffrey Eugenides
3. The Secret History - Donna Tartt
4. Little Children - Tom Perrotta
5. The Walking Dead - Robert Kirkman et al (although obviously not finished)

Non Fiction
1. Letter To A Christian Nation - Sam Harris
2. Blood Must Bear Your Name - Sue Walker
3. Nickel And Dimed - Barbara Ehrenreich
4. Eats, Shoots And Leaves - Lynne Truss
5. Jarhead - Anthony Swofford

Except I know I'm gonna want to change this as soon as I hit post!

Man, Top Five lists are a bitch! And as I just finished reading and watching High Fidelity (yeah, again! and again!) I've been wandering about composing them in my head all the time now. Thank god you put in the ~15 years clause.
Anyway, I'm totally cheating here but:

Fiction:
1. The Blind Assassin - Margaret Atwood
2. The Virgin Suicides - Jeffrey Eugenides
3. The Secret History - Donna Tartt
4. Little Children - Tom Perrotta
5. The Walking Dead - Robert Kirkman et al (although obviously not finished)

Non Fiction
1. Letter To A Christian Nation - Sam Harris
2. Blood Must Bear Your Name - Sue Walker
3. Nickel And Dimed - Barbara Ehrenreich
4. Eats, Shoots And Leaves - Lynne Truss
5. Jarhead - Anthony Swofford

Except I know I'm gonna want to change this as soon as I hit post!

Ok fuck it, here goes.

I mostly read non-fiction and I appear to be the only person who love's Pajiba and absolutely hates Nick Hornby but here is my list:

1. Geek Love
2. Good Omens
3. Time Traveler's Wife
4. Time's Arrow
5. Hollywood (which is closer to 20 yrs old but I just love it so much that I had to put it on here.)

My runner up goes to anything written by Christopher Pike. He was totally the thinking man's RL Stein.

Aaand, I'm back. Because as was just pointed out by friend, I always claim American Gods as one of the best novels ever written blah blah so I guess I have to knock out Little Children and replace it with my beloved Neil Gaiman.

Although looking over the list, I'm not pointing out anything new there.

So, Pajiba book club anyone? Do any of you live in New Orleans or nearby? Hell, I'd be up for keeping it cyber, even. I'm starved for something like this!

yay! gee- i thought i was the only one actively NOT on the hornby bandwagon.

Yay!

1. The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera
2. Ignorence (also by Kundera)
3. The Devil Tree by Jerzy Kosinski
4. Catcher in the Rye- J.D. Salinger
5. A Clockwork Orange- Anthony Burgess

My favorite book of all time is "cather and the rye," which sadly wasn't released in the last fifteen years. Anyway, in lieu of "favorite" here are the last five books that I really enjoyed reading:

1). extremely loud and incredibly close- by jonathan safran foer.
2). the boy detective fails by joe meno
3). hard-boiled wonderland and the end of the world- by haruki murakami.
4). naked by david sedaris (I know...and I listen to NPR too).
5). king dork by frank portman.

Anything by Terry Pratchett or Ian Rankin for me. I have started reading the discworld series again from the start and those books still stand up as being absolutely hilarious and spot on in respect to the strange behaviours that we humans get up to.

This is hard, but here goes:

1. The Way the Crow Flies, Ann-Marie McDonald
2.I Know This Much is True, Wally Lamb
3. House of Sand and Fog, Andre Dubus
4. My Dream of You, Nuala O'Faolain
5. The Lecturer's Tale, James Hynde

Also love: Drop City, T.C. Boyle; Empire Falls, Richard Russo; Fingersmith, Sara Waters; Plainsong, Kent Haruf; We Were the Mulvaneys, Joyce Carol Oates; The Fig Eater, Jodi Shields; Mystic River, Dennis Lehane; The Shipping News, Annie Proulx; The Time Traveler's Wife, Audrey Ni