I Always Enjoy a Good Book. I Always Have a Book I Just Finished ...

I just finished "The Help," which was recommended on Mamapedia. I think it's only out in hardback. What a fun, satisfying read. I was laughing out loud and clapping my hands at the climax and denouement of the novel.

historical novels and crime/mystery novels are my favorites.
Read some of Owen Parry's Able Jones series, and you can get a good dose of both all rolled into one. :)
(Shadows of Glory; Call Each River Jordan; Honor's Kingdom; et al)

I also love all the Michael Connelly novels.
Or you could go with Jeff Shaara's war novels: The Glorious Cause; The Rising Tide; To The Last Man; The Steel Wave. I really enjoyed all of these.

If you want a longer read (something that takes more than 3 or 4 days to get through)... you could try "The Terror". I read that over Xmas 2 winters ago. It is about 1,000 pages, and is a historical fictional account of the lost ship the HMS Terror on its search for the Northwest Passage. Yahoo recently had a news story about a similar ship that was lost about the same time (the 1800's) that has just recently been located/found.

Or, if you like long reads, Ken Follet's "The Pillars of the Earth" and its sequel "World Without End" were both very good.

But one of my truly, all time favorites is: "A Prayer For Owen Meany" by John Irving. Every person I've ever recommended it to, has also fallen in love with it.

How to choose? Ah, I love reading, too! My favorite book ever is Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen. Although lately, I tend to read "page turner" books. I think of them as brain candy. My job is stressful, so I read dumb books to unwind. Romance, thriller, whatever's handy. I read a bunch of the Lee Childs books recently (his Jack Reacher series). Those were entertaining!

Some other books I've read recently and enjoyed are:
Water for Elephants
The Glass Castle
Running With Scissors
The Kite Runner
Bounce: Mozart, Federer, Picasso and the Science of Success

I'm looking forward to the other responses!

I like Anita Shreve, Jodi Piccoult.

I like romance novels. I guess you could call me a hopeless romantic, but I just love them! My favorite book? Well, I have a couple. (: Francine Rivers is one of my favorite authors, but Julie Lessman is right up there with her.

My favorite book would probably be Redeeming Love by Francine Rivers. Then it would be the Daughters of Boston series by Julie Lessman... and after that the Mark of the Lion series by Francine Rivers...

All are AWESOME books!!!

i like twisted russian classics, think doestoevsy and kafka, usually i read non fiction educational stuff like cook books, home repair, health related, etc., right now because of the insistence of the ladies on here im reading "the proper care and feeding of husbands"

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I loved the Sookie Stackhouse stories (True Blood) and Twilight. I also love Christoher Moore books. They are all very vampire and demons and stuff.
As for authours that write about their lives, Laurie Notaro and Jen Lancaster are hilarious. karyn Bosnak is also great (only 2 books out and 2nd book "20 times a lady" is being made into a movie right now).
You should join Goodreads.com great way to find lots of new books to read.

i love historical romance....a "smut" series by Mary Gillgannon i love...i also love redeeming love by francine rivers. I also like her series that has Voice in the Wind, Echo in the Wind, Sure as the Dawn. I also love Linda Chaikin's Heart of India series. I am also addicted to the twilight saga. :)

I don't have a favorite book (singular), but all my favorites get read about every other year or so (a short list of about 40 books). I think the *most* number of times I've read a story that way is coming up on #14, but every book in my house I've read at least a couple times. I read about 150pgs an hour so -unless they're text books- it's not really that obscene. In fact, it's the only way to save on the budget is to have books that are good enough to be reread over and over. (Libraries are no good... they never have ALL the books in a series so I end up buying more. I don't have ROOM for more. Sigh... And I lost a couple thousand books in a flood. Just don't have the cash to replace them, and the flood was the "wrong" kind to be insured.). Any book I can't reread, I give away.

I enjoy every genre BUT horror (maybe some day), and I read via tone. If I don't like the author's voice I don't read it... no matter how acclaimed the book.

Most of my favorite authors are sci-fi... I suspect because the effort it takes to create an entire working world gives them a depth that present day fiction doesn't usually have, or historical authors (similar reasoning, I have to THINK more to be in a different time than my own, and the author has to get it right enough to be believable). Here're some of my favorite authors... I'm sure to forget several somebodies... so take it as a 'off the top of my head' list rather than a true one :)

- Anne McCaffrey (SF)
- Robert Heinlein (SF)
- Harry Harrison (SF)
- Douglas Adams (SF/humor)
- David Eddings (fantasy)
- Charlaine Harris (vampire fun)
- Stephanie Meyer (more vampire fun)
- Rex Stout (mystery)
- Elizabeth Peters (historical mystery)
- Jean M Auel (historical fiction)
- Rudyard Kipling (poems and stories)
- Jane Austen (fiction)
- Dave Barry (humor)

And... oh... tons more. But I have a little guy here trying to convince me to shut the laptop, and I am about to capitulate. LOL...

I love paranormal romance. Try a series called The Endurers by Rose Wynters. Her newest release is Curvaceous Condemnation. It's an awesome read!

I really like Wally Lamb, John Irving and Margarette Atwood. For 'lighter' reading I've read Christopher Moore, who's very funny, those rotten Sookie Stackhouse books that I didn't want to read but ended up getting hooked on (damn), GM Ford has written some funny crime novels... Ah... Lets see, for non fiction I've read Stumbling on Happiness, all of Mary Roach's books except her new one (FUNNY), The Seven Daughters of Eve and Adam's Curse (about genetics) by Brian Sikes, Birth Day by Mark Sloan MD (totally awesome).
I could go on and on and on...

I love Holocaust stories (or hate them rather, but can't stop...), Dean Koontz, The "child called it" trilogy, and alot of the classics like "Of mice and Men", The lion the witch and the wardrobe, etc. The book I have read the most though was "The eyes of the dragon" by Stephen King. Looooove that book!