Jason Bovberg

Everybody has their lists of favorite big-name books, but I thought it would be fun to share some lesser-known works that really stand out to you as excellent. Books that maybe we haven't heard of, books that should have received more of a readership. Books that you absolutely LOVE but almost no one seems to know about them.

Here are my three, to start things off:

Killing Suki Flood by Robert Leininger—A kick-ass little noir thriller with a fun voice and great characters. I wish this guy had written more, but I think this was his last book, nearly 20 years ago.

Blackburn by Bradley Denton—Another fantastic voice, this one from a boy serial killer.

Resume with Monsters by William Browning Spencer—A novel about the modern workplace crossed with the Cthulhu mythos.

So what are your favorite little-known novels?

Amator

Shantaram by Gregory David Roberts - a quasi-autobiographical novel about the most wanted man in Australia escaping from maximum security prison and running to India where he lives in the slums there and operates a free medical clinic and eventually starts to work for the Indian mob.

Jayber Crow by Wendell Berry - On the surface this novel is the story of the bachelor barber of the small town of Port William, Kentucky, but on another level, Jayber Crow is a philosophical reflection on the nature of love, God, time, and eternity.

Rex Power Colt-Robot Man

The Club Dumas- Arturo Perez Reverte: Awesome mystery for bibliophiles

The Name of the Rose- Umberto Eco: Muder mystery in midieval church abbey. Top notch writing.

Monster Hunter International- Larry Correria: (Shut up its cool) For scrubbing the brain out in between heady tomes, nothing better than some good ole pulp.

Time Warrior

Lovecraft's best book - and Lovecraft was and is everything fiction could ever aspire to be.




All Doctor Who novels are pretty impressive but this is the best they ever released.




Yes! All I need to say.


To finish off, here is a picture of my lover;

http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y20...Shoggoth-1.jpg

brainee

Interesting topic! When I first read the first post, I held off to think for a bit ... I wasn't sure if what I had in mind was obscure enough. But seeing as we've already had suggested two of the best known works of Lovecraft and Eco I'm not so concerned anymore

I don't know about limiting things to three, but browsing through my LibraryThing catalog here are some lesser known books I really like. My tastes run toward sci-fi/horror/fantasy.

Prince Ombra by Roderick Macleish - Really stuck with me when I read this as a kid (it first came out in 1982). Maybe the YA genre has beaten the idea to death these days, but back then a modern fantasy/horror with a boy hero facing an ancient evil impressed me.

The Hour of the Oxrun Dead by Charles Grant - Grant seems forgotten today in horror, but I remember his name being all over horror sections in the 80s (mostly with the tons of short story collections he edited). This is his own writing and his best, for fans of "quiet" horror.

Wildwood by John Farris - My favorite book by another horror author that I remember being all over horror sections years ago. It's about a forest in the Smokey Mountains where weird mythical creatures are appearing ... perhaps linked to the old chateau that occasionally pops in and out of existence.

danfindlay

Three Kingdoms by Luo Guanjong, Moss Roberts translation
Musashi by Eiji Yoshikawa
the complete collection of Conan the Barbarian stories by Robert E Howard

movie diva

The Virginian- Owen Wister
The Joyous Season-Patrick Dennis
A Stone For Danny Fisher- Harold Robbins * he wrote crap, but this was the gem in the crap pile.

TimeandTide

A harrowing account of the Balkans conflict. One of my all-time favorite books about war:


Funniest book I've ever read:


And all of Chang Rae-Lee's works. His books usually appear on the best seller lists and he's one of the more well known Asian American novelists, but I've yet to meet anyone who has read any of his works. Every middle aged man, regardless of race, should read Aloft. In my all-time Top 10.

Easy

+1 and free on the kindle.

Jason Bovberg

Awesome, thanks for the tip! Downloaded!

Ash Ketchum

The Illuminatus Trilogy, by Robert Anton Wilson and Robert Shea.
That's three right there. I have it both as one giant paperback and three smaller ones.

If you want to count that as one, here's two more:
Disneyland of the Gods
Our Haunted Planet
both by John Keel

kd5

I was going to choose the trilogy by Brian Lumley: Psychomech, Psychosphere, and Psychamok, but when it comes right down to it, taking into consideration all of the books in my small collection, I would have to say Lord Of The Rings by JRR Tolkien, Weaveworld by Clive Barker, and a tie between The Chronicles Of Amber by Roger Zelazny and The Dragonlance Chronicles by Margaret Weis & Tracy Hickman. -kd5-

brayzie

I have the same book, from the same publisher, but with a better cover.

johnnysd

The Stars My Destination by Alfred Bester - Famous book, but one of the all time best sci fi books every written and few have read it.

The Magicians and Mrs Quent - If you can get past the stylistic similarity to Austen, Galen Becketts book is extremely well written interesting and refreshing. Probably a love it or hate it book.

OK I have two. Other ones are too mainstream.