Reading Suggestions

[Nish]

Looking for book ideas for my 16 year old son.

Some of the series he's read and liked: Rangers Apprentice, RA Salvatore (all "Drizzt books), Heros of Olympus, Song of Ice and Fire Individual books: Time Will Tell, The Giver

Hope that helps give an idea of what he likes reading.

[Trbo323]

Ender's game

If he wants to try sci-fi I have lots of others but I would start there

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[Jonnydread]

The Realm of the Elderlings by Robin Hobb. I think there are 12 (or even 15) books in the series, but they are broken up into separate trilogies and they are absolutely fantastic.

[Hobbes]

The original Dragon Lance books are solid. Dragons of Autumn Twilight, Dragons of Winter Night, and Dragons of Spring Dawning.

[EvilCreature]

Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury and Animal Farm by George Orwell are two good dystopian books a teenager could appreciate.

Siddhartha by Herman Hesse is an interesting look at South Asian philosophical ideas written from a Western perspective, making it very accessible to most readers. Not a fantasy book but an excellent story of self discovery and enlightenment. A short but powerful read.

Hah, none of these are over ~160 pages.

[EvilCreature]

Nineteen Eighty-Four is a good book but is longer and maybe more adult-oriented and/or appreciated by adults but he could give it a crack if he likes the first two dystopian books.

[Magageddon]

James A Michener, he mostly writes historical fiction, Caribbean was my favorite, The books are very long though and the font size is very small, I think it took me a month to read Caribbean.

[Brokeass_baller]

Also in the realm of dystopia, Z for Zacharia by Robert C. O'Brien is fantastic. Deals with a teenage girl in an unaffected valley surviving after a nuclear Holocaust that more or less destroyed the rest of the country. Very Cold War era type of stuff. Lots of twists for sure.

If he likes the wilderness, Hatchet by Gary Paulsen (and it's direct sequel Brian's Winter) are both great. Kid is flying in a private plane up to northern Canada to visit his dad. Pilot has a heart attack and dies, crashing into a lake. Brian is all alone and must survive. Brian's Winter deals with, obviously, having to make it through winter. There are numerous other sequels that are great, except one. Brian's Winter was written to "replace", so to speak, that one.

[Grendel]

Hera are a few off the top of my head

• Joel Rosenberg's Guardians of the Flame series - Fantasy
• Anne McCaffrey's Dragon Riders of Pern series - you would think Fantasy but actually is SciFi
• Christopher Nuttal's The Empire Corps series - Military SciFi
• Jerry Pournelle's Falkenbergs's Legion series - Military SciFi
• John Ringo's Legacy of the Aldenata series - Military SciFi
• Brandon Sanderson's Mistborn Series - Fantasy (at least to begin with )
• Taylor Anderson's - Destroyerman Series - Fantasy
• Terry Brooks - The Shannara Series - Fantasy
• David Eddings - The Belgariad Series - Fantasy
• Ursula K. Le Guin - the Earthsea Cycle - Fantasy
• Richard O'Kane - Clear the Bridge - The War Patrols of the USS Tang (WWII Submarine Richard "Dick" O'Kane was the Captain)
• Richard O'Kane - Wahoo - The Patrols of America's most Famous WWII Submarine (Historical recounting by the XO of the Wahoo)

Nish let me know what he is interested in and I can bring stuff out of my library to loan your son next time we get together to play PB. I have loads of physical books, Ebooks and Audio Books.

[dano_____]

Ender Series (The books after Enders Game) and Enders Shadow Series- Orson Scott Card
Dune Series - Frank Herbert
Lord of the Rings Series - JRR Tolkien
Seven Eves and Crytonomicon - Neal Stephenson
American Gods - Neil Gaiman
Without Remorse and Rainbow Six - Tom Clancy

[Nish]

Fool refuses to read the Lord of the Rings or Hobbit because he "already watched the movies and would know what happens"

[dano_____]

Tom Bombadil would like to have a talking with him.

[Nish]

Right. I've argued with him about this several times as I am firmly in the cam prhat says the Hobbit book is far better than the movies.

[Nish]

Thank you everyone. Grendel I may have to take you up on that.

[Pyrate Jim]

I might suggest the "Titan - Wizard - Demon" trilogy by John Varley.
The "Foundation" series by Isaac Asimov is great.
Anything written by Stanislaw Lem is fun.
The four book set of "King Arthur and the knights of the Round Table" by Howard Pyle give an interesting view of the old stories that are much different than hollywood portrays.

[zinger565]

Some solid YA fantasy would be the Pendragon series by D.J. MacHale
Comedic fantasy = Dungeon Crawler Carl series by Matt Dinniman

Getting into some interesting sci-fi:
The "Agent Cormac" series by Neal Asher, starts with Gridlocked (futuristic detective thriller)
Old Man's War by John Scalzi
The Lost Fleet series by Jack Campbell (fairly traditional military-sci fi)
The "Bobiverse" series by Dennis E. Taylor (short, pulpy, space sci-fi)

[Trbo323]

Ender Series (The books after Enders Game)

These suck if you ask me

Enders Shadow Series- Orson Scott Card

These are awesome if you ask me.

I know that sounds weird but pretty much all the books that have ender in them AFTER ender's game feel like Scott card just waves a magic wand to make things happen. The shadow series are much more grounded in the realm of the world that exists in ender's game.

If you guys haven't already, and you like the ender universe, go read the prequel books. The first and second formic wars. They are absolutely fantastic. Even though they have Scott cards name on them they are not actually written by him. But the guy doing them really gives the world justice to how humanity came into contact with the buggers and the wars that followed. Fantastic characters and character development

Thank you everyone. Grendel I may have to take you up on that.

Grendel has an amazing audiobook library. Audiobooks are pretty much all I listen to as a truck driver and I've been working my way through his sci-fi collection. Thanks again Grendel. Started a new series today

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[dano_____]

I would agree that these series are in the same universe, but completely different tones of books. The Ender series is far more philosophical and less action. I haven't read any of the prequels and will have to add them to my reading list.

In a different tone, the Spademan books be Adam Sternbergh are a fun read. Shorter books with a very interesting writing style. Fair warning, they must be read as the style does not lend itself well to audiobooks.

And in a far far different tone, The House of Leaves is a fun book that must be read with a physical book to really get the full effect.

[Myrkul]

I REALLY enjoyed Glen Cook's "Black Company series". It's a military high fantasy (swords, wizards, and magic) with a slightly more serious tone then most of the genre. Worth checking out.

[cellophane]

Fantasy:
The Witcher books are fantastic. The first season of the Netflix series was pretty faithful to the books, past that it starts to drift too much.
The Gunslinger series by Stephen King is great, although IMO the ending books aren't as good as the early ones.
Cirque Du Freak - the movie was meh, but the books are enjoyable.

SciFi:
Robert Heinlein - Starship Troopers is a classic, and the book is way better than the movie.
Philip K. Dick
H.G. Wells
Elizabeth Bear - I've read Karen Memory and Hammered, and am working through Scardown currently.
Kurt Vonnegut - kind of sci-fi? Good reads either way.
Aldous Huxley - Brave New World. One of my favorite books.

Other:
Tom Robbins has some fantastic books - I don't think I've ever disliked one. Fierce Invalids Home From Hot Climates is probably my favorite so far.
Daniel Quinn - Ishmael
Herman Hesse - Steppenwolf
Mark Z. Danielewski - House of Leaves. This one is an absolute mind bender. I've known a few people who stopped reading it due to this.
Thomas Pynchon - The Crying of Lot 49
Thomas More - Utopia
Yevgeny Zamyatin - We. This is what Orwell ripped off to write 1984. Both are depressing.
There are always classics such as The Red Badge of Courage, Call of the Wild, Greek Myths (The Odyssey, The Illiad, etc), Sherlock Holmes, Edgar Allan Poe, Hardy Boys / Nancy Drew, and so on.
Fyodor Dostoevsky - The Brothers Karamazov
Victor Hugo - Les Miserables. I would probably get an abridged version, it can get really wordy otherwise.

I'll also throw in a second recommendation for Siddhartha. Loved it when I read it.

All that said- I don't know what your / his tolerances are for violence & sex. Stephen King and The Witcher books have a fair amount of both, and Tom Robbins tends to have quite a bit of the latter.