I love C.J. Cherryh's books, Hagatha. She has created some of the best alien races ever. I just got the newest book in her Foreigner series, Divergence. It's at the top of the pile after I finish Martin's A Dance with Dragons.

LadyKestrel, I'm behind in the Foreigner series, but I've been reading it right from day one. I might put that back on the to-read list.

Have you read Sherri Tepper's books, too? She's another favourite. Grass and Raising the Stones are among my favourite books of all time.

Slightly embarrassed here - don't think I've read any classics except under severe duress at school.

Tend to stick to good ole "thud and blunder" stuff - Reacher, Bosch, Rebus, but at the moment I'm re-reading the complete Terry Pratchett Discworld series and marvelling at all the stuff I managed to miss first time round.

Also just finished "A Deeper Blue", the biography of singer/songwriter Townes Van Zandt. Very sad to see the apparently unstoppable self-destructive trait he had, whislt still about to write such great stuff...

Nothing wrong with Bosch. I raced through the entire book series last year. I've read the Discworld series twice and I've been putting off my third go-around just so that it will seem new again.

Some great ideas here: I remember being hugely impressed by The Grapes of Wrath in my final year at school, going on to read quite a bit more by John Steinbeck, but the literature component of my French degree course reinforced the idea of reading what you like rather than what you perhaps feel that you should read as a good approach (like much else in life!). I am firmly in the thud and blunder brigade, but with quite a heavy intermittent sci-fi component, usually enjoying some humour (for instance Discworld, and Carl Hiassen).

I read the first of the Game of Thrones books and thoroughly enjoyed it but was surprised to find that the TV series did not really attract me. On the other hand, I much enjoyed A Discovery of Witches on TV, but doubt that the books will grab me!

For those who enjoy Bosch and Reacher but have not yet met John Sandford's Lucas Davenport, I (again) highly recommend trying him.

Oldbroad, I was indeed referring to the Reacher stories by Lee Child, but sadly he has handed over the mantle to his brother Andrew who is simply nowhere near the same league.

Quite a lot of David Baldacci's books also tick some of those boxes.

I have also found some quite interesting new British writers of detective fiction, in particular M W Craven writing about Washington Poe set mainly in the Lake District and Damien Boyd with D I Dixon in Somerset, also a couple of books by Allan Martin about Angus Blue set in Islay and Jura (with natural digressions into local history and of course the distilleries).

For the science fiction readers, The Sparrow by Maria Doria Russell is definitely worth a look.

I am a fast reader and have been devouring even more books since retirement, but now virtually always on the Kindle: one of the pleasures there has been digging up some older stuff which is available at little or no cost, so I now have the complete works of William Shakespeare, Rudyard Kipling, H G Wells and Edgar Wallace to dip into and the whole Dune saga by Frank Herbert to revisit.

Of course, I also have to find some time for computer gaming, crossword puzzles, sudoku and futoshiki...

Ah, I see Lex. I did notice Andrew's name on the more recent books, thinking that may be a son, but haven't gotten quite that far in the series to have read one. Thanks for the heads up that they are not so good then.

OB, I had heard that the Reacher handover would occur so I tried a couple of other books by Andrew Child: written competently enough, but I found them lacking in character development, storyline and general atmosphere/tone and the Kindle free sample of his first Reacher effort lived down to my expectations enough to make me baulk at buying it (certainly at full price).

Totally agree with the Carl Hiassen recommendation, Lex. Also very much in the same vein is the Myron Bolitar series by Harlan Coben

Has the Reacher handover happened yet, and do the new ones bear the new name? Only ask because I found the last Reacher book I read (can't recall the title, but was about a young couple being held prosoner in a motel) was deeply disappointing

For those of you who love crime fiction, I highly recommend Stuart McBride's Logan McCrae series. They're as funny as they are dark.

I have three of Tepper's books that I read ages ago, The Awakeners, Shadows End, and After Long Silence, and I like her stories very much.

An all-time favorite of mine is the Miles Vorkosigan series by Lois McMaster Bujold. Miles is one of the best heroes in SF, and the worlds and characters he interacts with are wonderfully imagined.

Others I have loved are the Sector General books by James White, Charles Sheffield's Heritage Universe series and other books, anything by Jack McDevitt, China Mieville, and Greg Bear, and, of course, the classics by Isaac Asimov and Arthur C. Clarke, just to name a few.

How could I have forgotten to mention these? Miles Vorkosigan is one of my all-time favourite fictional characters.

While working toward an master's degree, I took seminars covering Jane Austin, Shakespeare, Chaucer, as well as one in African American literature. Those courses cover and require the student to read 7 to 10 books. When I was done with my college work, decided to join a book of the month club. Took one look at the list and when each book needed to be read, and it was the same as looking at course requirements, minus the essays. Still feel that way.

I like reading books that are part of a series; makes the story last longer. One was the 'Left Behind' series. I found the made-for-TV movie about the first book interesting, so ended up reading thru the whole series, about 10 books. Though I don't agree with it, did find the interpretation interesting.

One of my daughters introduced me to Sheri Tepper and in particular Grass, but I also enjoyed an earlier book of hers which is a good horror story, Blood Heritage.

As far as I know there has only been one Reacher book by Andrew Child, the Sentinel.

I loved the TV series Justified mentioned earlier, and also recommend most of Elmore Leonard's books: always an interesting study in less than black and white characters or situations, so you never know who is going to triumph, and often there are converging story lines which only connect late in the story. I think of Pulp Fiction as being typical Elmore Leonard storytelling although as far as I am aware he did not have a direct hand in that one of Tarantino's films (I know that both parties recognised their congruence of approach).

I will be trying out several of the authors mentioned in this thread which are new to me, especially the SF.

The Raylan Givens books (Justified) don't really feel familiar to those who watched the series until the third novel, which is really where the TV show starts.

I'm glad you've found some good suggestions. These threads always give me some new authors to read.

A great favourite of mine is The Count of Monte Cristo.

I first read it in my teens and my tiny local library of the time had to order it in for me because it came in three separate volumes.

After being totally fascinated by it all I just HAD to have my own copy - and I've read that copy so many times since !!

And I reckon I've watched every film and television series of it that was ever made too !! The best being one made by the BBC a very long time ago.

But none of them has ever been able to tell the absolutely complete story with it being such a long and complicated one.

Mad, I have an unabridged copy of The Count of Monte Cristo (Penguin Classics - 1276 pages!) and I am ashamed to say that it is still sitting here patiently waiting to be read, along with quite a few others. I really need to read it!

My parents were great believers in the old Classics comic books, with the yellow border at the top left of the cover. They were very good, albeit brief, somehow compressing the whole story into a few pages. I'm sorry to say that the comic version is the only version of this book I've read. I suspect that's also true of a host of other older classics. I remember having quite a few of those comics. They did get me into reading more recent authors like Dickens, though.

A library used to be a good place to find an "original" version of a book without having to pay an arm and a leg but nowadays (as long as you don't want a "first edition") they are more easy to come by. You just need to do a little searching

He has a stand alone that is in the same universe as his First Law trilogy that is my favorite Abercrombie work. It is titled Best Served Cold and it stays with you long after you have finished the book.

You know, that book is probably on my Kindle, or I might have even bought the actual book. I do remember buying it at some point and I don't remember reading it. I'm done with my current series now, so it's a good time to go fishing through my books.

If anyone is looking for some rather silly light (but macabre) relief in the crime genre, Anne Frasier is worth a try - her Elise Sandberg series gives an interesting view of Savannah!

For a more serious crime read Loreth Anne White can be quite good, but beware her roots in Mills and Boon...and some of Danielle Girard: my wife Linda and I both particularly enjoyed her Dr Schwartzman series.

LadyKestrel, since you mentioned the Vorkosigan Saga, I decided to work my way through it again. It must have been ten years since I've read it, and it's still as good as I remember.

There are a couple of newer additions to the series that you might not have read, Hagatha.

I'll have a look for those. I did read a couple of books, or perhaps they were novellas, that continued the story after Miles was married, but that was years ago..

I just finished George R. R. Martin's A Dance with Dragons, the 5th book in his A Song of Ice and Fire series, and now I have to wait until The Winds of Winter comes out. Martin's characters are now embedded in my psyche, and I can't wait to find out what happens to them.

For a change of pace, I've just started Divergence, the newest book in C. J. Cherryh's Foreigner series. So far it's !