this post was submitted on 23 Jun 2024
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[–] [email protected] 149 points 6 months ago (9 children)

You want some adult books that arent full of negative crap go read some Terry Pratchett. All my life these are some of the only ones that make me laugh out loud consistently while still having a great plot, characters, and just overall excellent writing in so many ways.

[–] [email protected] 63 points 6 months ago (3 children)

And when you're done you go read Douglas Adams, and not just the book with the towels.

[–] [email protected] 19 points 6 months ago

Yes! Dirk Gently series is great too.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (2 children)

I agree but the towel books are a good place to start. I also recommend the Dirk Gently series. But don't stop with fiction. At least read the meaning of liff.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Meaning_of_Liff

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[–] [email protected] 25 points 6 months ago (1 children)

I scoffed at the idea of a comedy book until I my friend lent me one of Terry's books. It was so funny, great jokes and great characters.

[–] [email protected] 26 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Good Omens (the book, by Gaiman and Pratchett) is also hilarious.

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[–] [email protected] 17 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Terry Pratchett is AMAZING.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 6 months ago

What, what? :)

[–] [email protected] 10 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (1 children)

Terry Pratchett.

I always get Pratchett and Brooks confused. Too many Terrys.

All my life these are some of the only ones that make me laugh out loud consistently while still having a great plot, characters, and just overall excellent writing in so many ways.

He does a great job of writing a series that can be read piecemeal but pays off if you go through the whole things.

I'm also a big fan of the Myth Adventure series by Robert Aspirin. It's more comedic, but has a similar vibe.

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[–] [email protected] 10 points 6 months ago

I purchased Going Postal in an airport. I ended up laughing out loud on a plane.

[–] gjoel 7 points 6 months ago (2 children)

Just don't read the biography. I just finished it, and while it's amazing it will leave you devastated.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 6 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 8 points 6 months ago

GNU Terry Pratchett

[–] [email protected] 8 points 6 months ago (3 children)

GNU PTerry. Just got both biographical books for fathers day. I entirely expect to be crushed, given how big a part of growing up his books were to me, and how devastated I was to watch his decline and eventual passing...

I've hardly been able to read his books since, which is awful.

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[–] [email protected] 7 points 6 months ago

Read his "children's" book Maurice And His Amazing Rodents and try not to sob. But also laugh, and fume, and learn.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 6 months ago (1 children)

I also highly reccomend the Myth books by Robert Aspirin.

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[–] [email protected] 5 points 6 months ago

Bought the 5-book series based on your recommendation.

[–] [email protected] 47 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Peter was not quite like other boys; but he was afraid at last. A tremour ran through him, like a shudder passing over the sea; but on the sea one shudder follows another till there are hundreds of them, and Peter felt just the one. Next moment he was standing erect on the rock again, with that smile on his face and a drum beating within him. It was saying, 'To die will be an awfully big adventure.'

Peter Pan by J.M. Barrie. Kids' books are rad.

[–] [email protected] 33 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (2 children)

I still maintain the best adaptation of that story was Hook.

Dustin Hoffman and Robin Williams absolutely Nailed their roles, shout-outs to Julia Roberts and Bob Hoskins, they also nailed their roles, but got upstaged by the former two thespians.

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[–] [email protected] 47 points 6 months ago
[–] [email protected] 30 points 6 months ago (1 children)

I'm an adult and proud that I don't read this nonsense anymore. But what is the book where there is a magic tree house ? just so that I don't read it mistakenly

[–] [email protected] 36 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (2 children)

It's literally called Magic Tree House. It's a series. The tree house is also a time machine and adventure becomes inevitable.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 6 months ago (1 children)
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[–] [email protected] 20 points 6 months ago (2 children)

You are reading the wrong adult books if that is your take away from it.

[–] [email protected] 18 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

This is the problem with so much complaining. "There aren't any good games anymore" says the people who only buy the yearly CoD and Fifa releases and don't even think about thinking about lifting a finger to find all the easily available great games being released constantly. Same with music and everything else. People just complain and somehow don't realise the only thing they do is show everyone else how dumb they are by not even trying to find the good stuff. Also the constant "I hate ads so much" idiocy and then they just ignore anyone who tells them to install an adblocker.

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[–] [email protected] 19 points 6 months ago

Someone needs to read better adult books.

[–] [email protected] 19 points 6 months ago (5 children)

I recently read Ursula K. Le Guin's Earthsea books, really interesting in that first half are kids lit and the second half were written 30 years later for a grown audience.

Best of both worlds! Though I did find the kids books way more fun.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Yeah, you get to book 4 and you're like "Is everything ok, Ursula?

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[–] [email protected] 16 points 6 months ago (2 children)

High school English classes kind of beat the habit of reading out of me. I mean first of all there was this sense of new = not valid; To Kill A Mockingbird was the newest work of literature I studied in high school, written in the 60's about the 30's, everything else was 19th century or older. The Canterbury Tales, Shakespeare, Poe, the goddamn Bronte's.

I stopped going to book stores. I stopped going to the library. Adult reading is like rubbing wood chips in your eyes. It's dry and awful.

My grandmother handed me a book. A paperback novel called Utopia by Lincoln Child. It's a kind of whodunit mystery thriller set in a futuristic theme park, and the main character has a teenage daughter who has an mp3 player. And that caught me off guard. Because I was a teenager with an mp3 player. This book was new. It was written by someone who was still alive, about characters who were my age and my generation. And the book was kinda okay.

I miss my gramma.

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[–] [email protected] 15 points 6 months ago

This is why I read genre fiction rather than literary fiction. Sure, you and your book club can look down on me but until you're reading a book that isn't a variation on a theme of "unsuccessful professional moves back to coastal small town to look after their mother who has dementia", yous can all get to fuck.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 6 months ago

I read mostly three things: fanfics mostly on My Little Pony, literature for degree and scientific papers(mostly unrelated to degree).

[–] [email protected] 14 points 6 months ago

Stop shaming people about reading kids' books.

The kids can have those books back when you're done and not one minute sooner.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 6 months ago (15 children)

Sounds like someone is shaming people who like adult books, rather.

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[–] [email protected] 12 points 6 months ago (5 children)

I like the take that science fiction and fantasy is just a better form of fiction because you could take literally any fiction story about a mopey 30 year old who has to take care of their sick parent and a science fiction story has the potential to write an equally compelling story except this time there's a killer robot on the loose or they're on Mars or something.

All good stories are human stories, even science fiction. There's nothing inherently better about setting your story in the "real world".

[–] [email protected] 5 points 6 months ago

"Human stories" are depressing and boring as fuck. I've already dealt enough with people dying of illnesses and being in shitty relationships and all that bullshit in my own life. I don't need to be reminded of it by reading or watching a dramatized version. Put that shit in a metaphor the characters can solve their problems by blowing up.

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[–] [email protected] 12 points 6 months ago (1 children)

This is basically the “everybody secretly likes pop music” reverse snobbery angle. It’s so difficult to imagine that other people have different tastes from you.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

it's not saying everybody likes kids books. it's just saying you shouldn't shame people who do.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 6 months ago (1 children)

You want a sad book? Mr. Frumble, from that same worm driving an apple book, is a tragic character. In a single day the poor guy has tragedy after tragedy, probably costing him millions, and making him hated by his entire community. There's no relief. There's no mercy. His life is chaos.

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[–] [email protected] 11 points 6 months ago (5 children)

If you're into magic treehouses in your books, you can ease the transition from kids books to adult books by going via the Fantasy genre.

Granted, there will be more swords involved than in a kids book...

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[–] [email protected] 8 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Wasn’t Animal Farm marketed and widely believed to be a “kids” book??

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[–] [email protected] 8 points 6 months ago

I love reading all sorts of books, and I think most people do too. Those who judge others for what they read are just a loud minority.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 6 months ago

I’m never ashamed of what books I read, especially since they are on a kindle and no one ever looks at the title. Besides, you’re just as likely to find LOTR, Dune, Foundations, pretty much anything from Dumas, among others on my kindle. If i’m reading books that are well written, have a decent plot and make me never want to put the book down, then who the fuck cares that I’m reading hunger games, harry potter or the golden compass… not any friend i’d want to keep.

Its the same with movies, though i find those less compelling overall. But damn if i’m not going to go see any new finding nemo or minions movie.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 6 months ago (1 children)
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[–] [email protected] 6 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (2 children)

Alice in Sunderland. Wonderful "adult" comic novel. Seriously the thing is between 200-400 pages. Neil Gaiman illustrated it, and Bryan Talbot wrote it.

I learned more about British history, as an American, from that book, than I did in my university level history classes.

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[–] [email protected] 5 points 6 months ago

This is me every time I recommend Bone by Jeff Smith. It's a kid-friendly book but I'll be damned if it isn't a lovely 1000+ page adventure anyone can enjoy

[–] [email protected] 5 points 6 months ago (1 children)
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