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Book Help Needed!

franzi

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franzi

franzi

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Hello everyone!

I need your help. For our final exams we have to choose four books from an endless list. We then have to read all four and at the exam we should be able to answer questions about it. Now, I've got the list, but I don't know many of the books on it. However, I want to choose interesting books. Please have a quick look through the list and if you have read any of it, please tell me if it is any good and why or which book I should never ever choose... I would be so grateful and it's much appreciated!! Thanks a lot!

Here's my list:

- The Music of Chance (Paul Auster)

- To the Wedding (John Berger)

- The Tortilla Curtain (T.C. Boyle)

- Fahrenheit 451 (Ray Bradbury)

- Breakfast at Tiffany's (Truman Capote)

- The Magic Toyshop (Angela Carter)

- The Perks of Being a Wallflower (Michael Chbosky)

- Girl with a Pearl Earring (Tracy Chevalier)

- The Lady and the Unicorn (Dt.)

- Disgrace (J.M. Coetzee)

- The Hours (Michael Cunningham)

- The Millstone (Margaret Drabble)

- The Gathering (Anne Enright)

- The Great Gatsby (F. Scott. Fitzgerald)

- Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Café (Fannie Flagg)

- The Collector (John Fowles)

- Dr Fischer of Geneva or The Bomb Party (Graham Greene)

- The Quiet American (Graham Greene)

- The Old Man and the Sea (Ernest Hemingway)

- The Kite Runner (Khaled Hosseini)

- A Thousand Splendid Suns (Khaled Hosseini)

- Brave New World (Aldous Huxley)

- Never Let Me Go (Kazuo Ishiguro)

- The Ninth Life of Louis Drax (Liz Jensen)

- Heat and Dust (Ruth Prawer Jhabvala)

- Mister Pip (Lloyd Jones)

- Dubliners (James Joyce)

- The Black Album (Hanif Kureishi)

- To Kill a Mockingbird (Harper Lee)

- The Fifth Child (Doris Lessing)

- Ben, in the World (Dt.)

- Lamb (Bernard MacLaverty)

- Life of Pi (Yann Martel)

- The Child in Time (Ian McEwan)

- Atonement (Ian McEwan)

- On Chesil Beach (Ian McEwan)

- The Ballad of the Sad Café (Carson McCullers)

- Death of a Salesman (Arthur Miller)

- The Magician's Wife (Brian Moore)

- The Colour of Blood (Dt.)

- Lies of Silence (Dt.)

- The Bluest Eye (Toni Morrison)

- Sula (Toni Morrison)

- Cry, the Beloved Country (Alan Paton)

- Rabbit-Proof Fence (Doris Pilkington)

- The Winslow Boy (Terence Rattigan)

- The God of Small Things (Arundhati Roy)

- Educating Rita (Willy Russell)

- The Catcher in the Rye (Jerome D. Salinger)

- Equus (Peter Shaffer)

- Pygmalion (Bernard Shaw)

- The Loneliness of the Long-Distance Runner (Alan Sillitoe)

- Of Mice and Men (John Steinbeck)

- Waterland (Graham Swift)

- The Joy-Luck Club (Amy Tan)

- Felicia's Journey (William Trevor)

- The Samurai's Garden (Gail Tsukiyama)

- Slaughterhouse Five (Kurt Vonnegut)

- The Graduate (Charles Webb)

- The Bridge of San Luis Rey (Thornton Wilder)

- A Streetcar Named Desire (Tennessee Williams)

- The Day of the Triffids (John Wyndham)

- or anything by Oscar Wilde

Thanks again!!

"I like Franziska. Sounds mad as a box of frogs, but we like her." (Dev)

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KingTutsWWH

KingTutsWWH

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What a fantastic list. I've read most of these. The majority I enjoyed, but some stand out as being particularly good, and others I'd advise you to avoid.

There are also quite a few plays on this list as well as novels. You need to think about whether it would make a difference to you to answer questions on a script as opposed to text. It's interesting that many of the themes involve stories about loss of innocence, racial issues and war.

First of all my favourite book is The Catcher in the Rye. It is about a disturbed young man and I feel that although it was written some time ago it still remains pretty relevant. It is an easy read, but it ought to make you think.

The Life of Pi is a fabulous book, which contains many different levels. It is beautifully written. Don't read up too much about it online beforehand (spoilers), because you need to make up your own mind about the end. The ending is a sort of twist.

Obviously I'd recommend anything by Oscar Wilde, my signature is a quote. These are plays though. If you want comedy The Importance of being Earnest is great, or Lady Windemere's Fan. The Picture of Dorian Gray is a wonderful, pretty creepy novel. They are all written in Wilde's amazingly witty style.

Breakfast at Tiffany's is a really good book. Like The Catcher in the Rye about the loss of innocence. It is very stylishly written. Funnily enough its writer Truman Capote was the inspiration for the protagonist Dill in To Kill a Mocking Bird, as he was friendly with Harper Lee as a child. TKAMB is another excellent, interesting read. It deals with racial inequality in the States in the past. BAT gives you the excuse to watch the wonderful film with Audrey Hepburn in too.

Hemmingway, Ishiguro and Joyce are a bit heavy going. McEwan is a top writer, but his topics are generally rather depressing. Equus would totally freak you out.

There are other good 'uns on the list, but you only asked for 4, and I think I've given you more, Hope this helps. Enjoy reading.:)

'To disagree with three-fourths of the British public is one of the first requisites of sanity'.

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Viv

Viv

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What a fantastic list. I've read most of these. .:)

:|

I would choose:

1. Fried Green Tomatoes - the movie of that is f* magnificent, btw

2. Death of A Salesman - very powerful and sad - I remember that from English classes at school.

3. To Kill A Mockingbird.

4. The Loneliness of The Long Distance Runner.

Or you could set the books ablaze, make an early bonfire - write about that..... - I actually find this list instantly frightening - how dare they issue that length of a list.

Delta Machine, Depeche Mode - buy NOW !!

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rosie_posii

rosie_posii

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I haven't read many of these, but my parents have so here's my list:

1. To Kill A Mockingbird

2. Life Of Pi (apparently that's an amazing book, but my mum won't let me read it...)

3. A Thousand Splendid Suns

4. The Great Gatsby (I have read this one, and it's really good)

Hope this helps, what course are you doing this for?

The sheep is not a creature of the air.

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franzi

franzi

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Thank you so much everyone! Also, thanks a lot for replying so quickly! You're the best :) xx

As the whole selection is on a first come - first serve basis, I think I now stand a good chance to get the books I chose.

I'll probably go with:

- Breakfast at Tiffany's

- To Kill a Mockingbird (also recommended by my parents btw... :D)

- Life of Pi

- Of Mice and Men

Thanks again for your help and for all your work writing these posts! ;)

"I like Franziska. Sounds mad as a box of frogs, but we like her." (Dev)

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franzi

franzi

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Hope this helps, what course are you doing this for?

It's for my English course. That's why I asked on here, I thought English speaking people could help me better than the small descriptions we got on our list... ;)

"I like Franziska. Sounds mad as a box of frogs, but we like her." (Dev)

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franzi

franzi

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Or you could set the books ablaze, make an early bonfire - write about that..... - I actually find this list instantly frightening - how dare they issue that length of a list.

Not sure if my English teacher would like that... :D

I'm actually quite happy that the list is so long. As I don't know the majority of all the books, I don't really mind the length. Plus, I get a bigger variety of books to choose from...

Good luck, franzi, btw. Forgot to say that earlier. #mondays

Thanks :)

"I like Franziska. Sounds mad as a box of frogs, but we like her." (Dev)

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franzi

franzi

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We had to study Of Mice and Men at school in English last year; it's quite a good story. It's got a lot to do with the relationships between the different characters, power and the attitudes of the time towards women. It's all very interesting.
Wow, I did Of Mice And Men some... what, 13 years ago now. Enjoyed going more indepth into that one and there is also a rather good movie version with John Malkovich and Gary Sinise that we watched in class at the time.

We had a short discussion about it at school, but didn't go any further. That's why it's on the list, we haven't read it properly.

"I like Franziska. Sounds mad as a box of frogs, but we like her." (Dev)

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franzi

franzi

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There are other good 'uns on the list, but you only asked for 4, and I think I've given you more, Hope this helps. Enjoy reading.:)

Thank you for your really loooong post! It helped a lot. It's much better information than I got from our teacher. I would probably have chosen boring or too difficult books... Thanks :)

"I like Franziska. Sounds mad as a box of frogs, but we like her." (Dev)

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TheEpicPlum

TheEpicPlum

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Because I'm childish, I like the sound of the tomato-y one (the author). Read Never Let Me Go amd that was AWESOME (but the film was crap) and Of Mice and Men. Have To Kill A Mocking Bird on audio in my iPod. I only read half of your list, because I got bored.

GOOD LUCK (und viel Glück!)

OMASM. Radio presenters are like fruit. Matt is my kumquat and Scott is blatantly my orange.

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