What books should I read?

[Maxspeed]

HI I AM NEW TO THIS FORUM.ANY ADVICE FOR READING WILL BE APPRECIATED.

[Englishuser]

Hi maxspeed,

Welcome to the forums! It's difficult to give you any specific suggestions as I don't know what kind of texts you like. My recommendation is therefore: Read something you like, something you find interesting. For instance, you could read texts relating to some of your hobbies or interests. You could also opt for prose fiction. It's important to find another purpose for one's reading than language acquisition in itself.

Englishuser

[Prezbucky]

I'll start a list. I would start reading contemporary stuff, since it might be somewhat difficult to fully comprehend many of the classics.

I enjoy reading some/most of the works of the following popular-fiction authors:

Stephen King
Dean Koontz
Patricia Cornwell
James Patterson
Tom Clancy
Anne Rice

Search those names on the internet -- you can probably order books from their personal web sites. Or, if you're on a budget, you might be able to go to your local (or college) library and borrow a few.
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[Torsten]

I absolutely agree with Tom. The first books I read in English was a thriller called "Four Days" by John Buell, a rather unknown Canadian author. I picked that book up in store in Valletta, the capital of Malta when I was there for an English course. The course itself was not exactly what I had expected (that's probably often the case with English courses) and I felt I had to do something else to improve my English. That's when I came across John Buell. I read that book in one day and then went back to the store to buy the next one called "A lot to make up for". I remember the title because it took me a while to figure out its meaning. I think I read a third book by John Buell but I don't remember the title now.
From that moment on I would read all types of thrillers because the were easy to understand and had a gripping plot.
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[Maxspeed]

Thanks for your advices,torsten i like your story.Actually reading is an addiction,it gives you a great pleasure,it makes you think,it increases your awareness of the world events,talk more,write more,know more,respect more and finally love more.

[Snezana]

I deeply cherish my memories of three books:
for excellent style and good English: The Third Man by Graham Greene;
for hilarious story: Changing Places by David Lodge and
definitely my favourite for many, many reasons: My Family and Other Animals by Gerald Durrell.

I warmly recommend these for reading, anytime and anywhere!
Snezana

[Jamie (K)]

I have the problem that thrillers bore me to death, so they can't keep my attention. I never read them in my own language or in other languages.

When I was living overseas, I found out that there were a lot of things my language textbooks had left out. Most of the "practical" things the books included didn't have to be there, because all I had to do in everyday life was point to them and ask what they were called.

The biggest problem was that I could not talk about normal things beyond ordering meals, taking a taxi, and the other things that are in textbooks. I couldn't discuss the inside of a car and how it functioned. I didn't know how to say "internal combustion", "fuel injection", "auxiliary fuel tank", "pop the clutch", "burn rubber", "swerve", etc. I could not talk about parts of plants, biological components and processes, firefighting, farming, outer space, economic concepts like supply and demand, and a whole bunch of other things any educated person can say in his own language.

My way of solving this problem was by reading children's science and history books, until I could deal with the subjects. The best ones were in the DK Eyewitness series, because they have so many illustrations that you hardly ever need a dictionary. Today, for the same purpose, I picked up a DK Reader in Spanish about insects that eat each other. I think I've got the same book on cars in Czech, German and French, along with some on money, electricity, chemistry, ancient weapons, etc. I've read German books in investing, a French book on how babies learn to talk, and a bunch of things.

Another thing I do a lot is read things in other languages that I'm supposed to read in my own language but don't want to. For example, I get software manuals in other languages instead of English, because in English they are boring and I'll never read them. If the task is converted to language study, I have more motivation to read that material. I usually look for the manuals with a lot of pictures, because, again, I don't have to use the dictionary much.

I do read some fiction, and my favorite is novels and stories where the cultures of two different nations mix or collide. Gish Jen and Amy Tan are good authors for this kind of thing, and there are other authors who deal with people from India or Mexico encountering US culture. I also like to read novels in foreign languages when the culture is so different from my own that people in my country wouldn't even understand the stories unless you explained them. Another type of fiction I like is badly written novels from other eras where the people are behaving in ways that are unbelievable today. I've got one foreign-language novel from the early 20th century, in which a doctor has to explain the facts of life to women patients who are already married!

I have known people who like to read the English editions of novels they've already read in their own languages. Since they already know the stories, they can read them faster and build up vocabulary without a dictionary. Then they are more equipped to graduate to things they haven't read in any language.

Just some ideas.