Figured I'd start a thread on books you've recently read and thought someone else should read.
Be here now, Gita, The psychedelic experience, One flew over the cuckoo's nest, and terence mckenna archaic revival

Sometimes A Great Notion by Kesey, Naked Lunch by William Burroughs, On The Road by Kerouac. Those aren't recent. That would be Life by Keith Richards. But everybody should read these books IMHO.

I've been wanting to get my hands on "sometimes a great notion"..is it real good? the cuckoo's nest was great...animal farm is good

I like Notion better than Cukoo's Nest but it's a much harder read. The perspective changes every few paragraphs so you end up following the narrative through the eyes of successive characters speaking in the first person. Hard to get used to. The first time I tried to read it I only got to page 90 The second time I just kept pushing and around page 100 I got used to the style and then it just turned into a great story.

Equinox wrote:


Yeah, that's Kesey's style. Even Cuckoo's nest, but to a lesser extent. Some of his stuff is really out there, and you almost
have to read it all before you start to get a sense of the larger picture.

The First Third by Neal Cassidy,
As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner,
A Good Man Is Hard To Find by Flannery O'Conner,
One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez, to name just a few...

also Deliverance by James Dickey ( My English professor at U.S.C.)

What did you think of James Dickey? My mother used to teach English at Bryn Mawr. She met Dickey when he came there for a reading. Said he got drunk and tried to chase some of her students. I enjoyed Deliverance. Much better than the movie. Also liked his poem about the stewardess getting sucked out of the airplane.

Another greaat Kesey book is Demon Box. Some excellent shorter pieces.

Sailor's Song was another great Kesey Novel
I also like Clive Barker stuff like The Great and Secret Show and Weaveworld

Sailor Song is a lot of fun.
I've read some Clive Barker but for fantasy I really love Stephen King. About a quarter of what he puts out is pretty great literature. And most of the rest is very entertaining.