First of all, good point about Lynch, although I'd probably remember him quicker if he actually got his act together and wrote the next one.

Second: holy shit, there's someone else who's actually heard of The Book of All Hours? I was beginning to think I was the only one... (aside from my girlfriend...)

Edit: just realised that I didn't include anything by Brandon Sanderson in my list. The Mistborn trilogy and The Way of Kings are his best books (that I've read; I'm about to start The Alloy of Law), but I'd say anything he's written is probably worth a read.

 

It's really not a self insert, the books are written as "real life accounts" and he uses his own name as a "fake name". The shit that happens to the protagontist, I doubt the author wishes upon himself. It's definitely a Young Adult series with alot of the characteristics, but it's still my favorite for what it means to me.

 

I recall his other series, The Demonata, being pretty cool too. Though the latest one I read was book 5, and it's finished at 10 books now.

 

Hard to choose, but if I had to say it would probably be Neal Stephenson's Baroque Cycle. It starts off slow as shit, but dear lord it becomes epic and the payoff is huge.

 

Good stories and good writing:

The Hobbit (If you've read Tolkien's famous works some of his short stories are very entertaining, such as Farmer Giles of Hamm, as are a few of the stories in the Silmarillion/Unfinished Tales, they're just more dense)
Battle Royale
Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
The Stranger (More Camus)
Steven King's darker forays (The Stand, the Shining, the Dark Tower series)
The first 5-10 Dune books
The Princess Bride
Steinbeck's translation of the Arthurian tales
Franny and Zooey
High Fidelity
Jurassic Park/Lost World
All of the Chronicles of Thomas Covenant
Beowulf (My favorite translation is Seamus Heany's though this is a widely disputed argument - most Beowulf translations you can find are decent)


Good/addicting stories with some rather bad writing at points:

Jim Butcher's Codex Alera series
Ready Player One (If you saw/loved the movie Fanboys, this should be at the top)
Vampire D saga
Odd Thomas series
Vampire Earth series
The Inheritance quadrilogy
Lamb


EDIT: There's more I have to recommend but without a genre/type of writer it's hard to pinpoint what you'd actually find interesting. These are all pretty varied and most people don't have to be a fan of the specific genre to enjoy reading, minus a few of the fantasy picks.

 

The Heroes by Joe Abercombie and A song Of Ice And Fire Series by Martin are my favorites. The First Law and Best Served Cold by Joe Abercombie are good too though not in the same league as the Heroes.

 

Thank you very much to everyone who has responded so far.

 

Robin Hobb - the assassin trilogy, (and slightly less recommended, but still awesome tawny man trilogy). Never have I cried like such a baby, nor been so completely enthralled by a story. Seriously skipped three days of classes, barely ate or slept. Haha, that makes me sound crazy, and maybe they won't have the same effect on you, but really good books nonetheless.

 

I'll go with The Chronicles of Amber by Roger Zelazny.
The other series that might come close to that is Lord of the Rings, especially The Hobbit, or There and Back Again.

 

the book thief - Marcus Zusak

 

Haha, I got these the other day, but they were kinda far down on my reading list.
Thanks to you, I'm gonna read them when I finish my current book (spellwright by blake charlton, someone reccomended it to me in another topic ages ago and I'm just now getting around to it)

Clearly I have to finish a series like that before classes start up again.

 

Started the Farseer books a little while ago, still not far in but the writing is such a step up from Spellwright that it's really noticeable. Spellwright wasn't bad by any means, but so far Assassin's Apprentice is so good it just blows it out of the water.

Again, thanks very much for all the recommendations. I just wanted to let you guys know I appreciate it.

 

Kingkiller Chronicles, especially The Name of the Wind.
Lord of the Rings Trilogy
The Hobbit
The Count of Monte Cristo
I rather enjoy the Mickey Haller series as well.

 

Mistborn Trilogy by Brandon Sanderson, to this day one of my favorite rereads is the first in the series.

And following Taure's example I would say that the best book/trilogy I ever read and felt completely drawn in to it and thought I would never read a better book from that point on was the Bartimaeus Trilogy. Great story.

Honorable Mention goes to The Black Company books, a massive story of epic proportions and all of Paul S Kemp's Erevis Cale novels and short stories because of the fantastic characters and setting (though the setting is not of Kemp's own creation.)

 

Favorite Series. Wheel of Time. Just so much epic in there. Still plan on rereading every last word when the last book comes around.

Favorite author? L.E. Modesitt Jr. of the Recluse Saga. Not the greatest of series, but I do love his style of writing. Also, he pulled a soul-bond quite believably, twice.

EDIT:

Also a damn good series. The first, I think, five books from Corwin's POV. The rest just blow.

 

Harry Turtledove does a really awesome alternate history series.

LINK. I fucking love these books.

 

I second someone's recommendation of The Earthsea Cycle, as well as the well-loved (but often disputed) A Song of Ice and Fire series.

In terms of Sci-fi squeeeeeeness, I would have to recommend Exultant by Steven Baxter for its brilliant (if preachy at times) depiction of mankind 20,000 years in the future, embroiled in a war with an alien race, and the implications that faster than light travel and paradoxical experiences have on human society.

 

Looked up a brief summary, and this looks like the sort of thing I'd love. But I saw it mentioned that it's part of a series that is part of a larger series. What book do I start with?

If the earliest ones aren't so good, tell me where I can jump in without missing too much stuff.

 

Tbh it doesn't really matter. I read Exultant first as a standalone, tried a couple of others but the atmosphere was radically different.

Exultant just takes place so much further in the future than in the other books, so it's best to just treat it as a standalone story in the same universe than anything. For my money though, I'd start with Exultant.