Jonathan Ames -My Not so Secret Life
George Saunders- Pastoralia
Ingo Schultz -33 moments of happiness

all of these are short stories that can be digested in smaller or larger chunks depending on how much time you have. They are all amazingly well written and slightly psychedelic/unpleasant but will make you incredibly happy that there are these beautiful, talented freaks living amazing lives or just imagining them. Great bike riding companions.

Not even going to try and compete with the fiction lists that people are throwing up, but for non-fiction travel/world history writing you can't go wrong with either

anything by Ryszard Kapuscinski - the man is informed and engaging. Big recs for the "Shah of Shahs" (about the final days of the Shah of Iran) and "The Emperor" (about Ethiopea and Haile Salassie).
The 42nd Parallel by John Dos Passo

And if you want to know how your bike works and like strong opinons then you can't go wrong in picking up a copy of "How to Rock and Roll: A City Rider's Repair Manual" by Sam Tracy. Definitely a good book to read before tackling ParkTools.com or a 'proper' bike repair manual.

He's definitely got the SS/FG spirit in those pages and its much more like chatting to your local lbs mechanic.

The Fool's Progress - Ed Abbey

Anything by Ed Abbey

i forgot Deep River by Shusaku Endo. six tourists take a trip to Varanasi, India, and their lives all come together and are profoundly affected by the Ganges river.

i also want to echo Jhumpa Lahiri, and Jonathan Franzen.

Just read that and Loved it!

I would also second/add:

Murakami (any of his)
Infinite Jest
Illuminati Trilogy
atlas shrugged/fountainhead
mists of avalon
unberto eco
anythign herman hesse

Rational Mysticism is also a really interesting compare/contrast of modern spirituality in the sense of trying to find a common thread between religions, new age tendancies, etc,

Oh yeah - and Harry potter ;)

That is a very funny book. The book-on-tape version is great for long drives.

I just have to say that Lacan was about the worst thing I read in college. It got to the point where I would groan, put my head down, and stare vacantly anytime anyone mentioned Lacan. Sorry to anyone who likes Lacan, but he really makes no sense and, to me, doesn't say anything important.

Love this thread. I think everyone who actually read Infinte Jest has posted here.

Thought of another one since my list was so guy heavy:

Sarah Vowell, NPR host and voice of Violet Increadible, "Take the Canoli" (for the title if nothing else) and Partly Cloudy Patriot. Very funny and smart short memoirs. Also want to read her new one "Assination Vacation" when it comes out in paperback. Also beware on the David Sedaris front, Me Talk Pretty One Day is really funny but some of his other stuff crosses the line from funny to whiny and annoying which is thinner than you might imagine.

yes! esp proust

Yes!! i just took a class called picturing conflict. we studied war photo journalism. I have access to several articles and images online all the way from the Crimean war (1st war photographed) up to current times. Hit me up if you would like a link/password etc for the online reserves for my school.

***********************************

Kate ****ing Chopin "The Awakening" Feminisit classic. beatiufiul novela. Read it.

Charles Brockden Brown "Wieland" Mysterious gothic novel.

Lyndall Gordon "T.S. Eliot An imperfect life" Bio on Eliot. I always thought he was arrogant, pompous and thumbing his nose with his constant allusions until i read this book. he's still pompous but it's an interesting read. the man was tortured and these themes show up in his poetry and prose. Helps grasp the experience that is Eliot.

Proust "Swann's Way"

Harriet Jacobs "Incidents in the life of a slave girl"

Harper "Iola Leroy"

I can think of two great books off the bat "Jarhead"-Anthony Swofford and "Dr. Excitements Elixir of Longevity" -William Patrick Ryan. Right now I just picked up "Bee Season" and I should really go read it instead of messing about here.

I saw "Infinite Jest" by David Foster Wallace earlier and totally second that. If you don't have the month or four to devote to it, you should start with "A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again." It's a collection of his essays, very funny and easier to digest.

"Under the Frog," Tibor Fischer. Or "The Thought Gang," by same.

During long rides, I like to recite Coleridge, Browning (the Mr., not E.B.), Yeats, etc. Sometimes Shakespeare's sonnets, if the girlfriend is with me.

"The Master and Margarita" is the best book I have read.

*stars in my pockets like grains of sand- samuel delaney
*the dispossessed- ursula leguin
*between my legs- forget the author. rightwhiteline press. a book about some hippy guys' cycle tour across the states.
not all time just recent and good.

if you like Ursula K. Leguin, or if you like books, you should read Changing Planes. it's one of those books where the content excuses the premise. it's fifteen or so short stories/essays about people and cultures in alternate "planes"--based on this notion that the narrator can somehow travel through spheres of existence. but the stories are all really moving and interesting and provide excellently not-over-the-top social commentary.

speaking of books where the content excuses the premise, "the time traveler's wife." a punk inadvertantly travels through time to places he's been before and needs to figure out how to live with it. he travels back to when his wife was six, meets her repeatedly as she's growing up, and then when she's twenty, she meets him, but this is before he's met her, and they fall in love again--or is it already? the confusing chronology is dealt with well. not cheesy, either.

plus there's a great scene at a violent femmes show.

The Dharma Bums by Jack Kerouac; liked it a lot better than On the Road. The young Gary Snyder appears as Japhy Ryder.

some I've been affected by, in no particular order:

ups to "the dharma bums" favorite keroac

"the death of artemio cruz" carlos fuentes. the mexican revolution fictionalized as on man's life. beautiful symbolism

"1984" george orwell. required reading...makes you wonder if he was prophetic or merely observant

"a language older than words" derrick jensen. moving autobiographical examination of violence and denial in our society. his other books are good too.

"PIKHAL"/"TIKHAL" alexander shulgin. brilliant/mad biochemist who synthesizes and tests psychoactive drugs on himself and writes lucidly.

second "life of pi" yann martel (haven't read his first)

"memnoch the devil" anne rice. devil's side of the story of creation, evolution, history. way cool.

"alice in wonderland" lewis carroll :D

lots of good stuff on here; some i've read, some i've started, some i've meant to, and some i've not heard of...

tolkien, adams, and rowling too !

Yeah, that must be an alternate reality.

oh yeah. saw them in oakland a few years back, had a blast. bought their motorhead-guy-reading-moorhead tshirt.

i don't think anyone has mentioned this book:

Bicycle: A History

by David Herlihy.

It's new, it weighs more than it looks like it should, and you should get it at the library because it is expensive.

But man. You wanna read about bicycles, or history of same, or get a new perspective on what "fixed gear" could mean...criminy. Check this out.

Me, I'm shoppin' for some iron tires for that retro look.

Best book I have ever read:
Johnny Got His Gun
-Dalton Trumbo

I also strongly recommend Sand County Almanac, by Aldo Leopold and Sea of Slaughter, by Farley Mowatt

ada or ardor - nabokov
dead souls - gogol
(non fiction) testaments betrayed - kundera
a happy death - camus (written when he was 19 i believe. scrapped shortly thereafter and rewritten as "the stranger"... AHD is much better, in my opinion. published after his death. cant go wrong with anything by a guy that punched sartre in the mouth!)
the castle - kafka
anything by either of the bronte sisters
sexton's collected poems. (swooooon... sylvia's lesser read and better written rival)

ishigawa, an artist of the floating world and when we were orphans
gorgeous

Doystevsky. Insightful, modern raw fiction.
Ayn Rand. The Fountainhead,and Atlas Shrugged I know it's over the top, but then all epics are. Want an artistic role-model? Look no further than her heros Dagny and Roarke. Who is John Galt?
Right now I'm reading Perelandia, A work of science fiction by C.S. Lewis. (part two of a Trilogy.)

Great suggestions. I'll check some of them out and have to throw in:

Haruki Murakami - Windup Bird Chronicle
Haruki Murakami - Hard-boiled Wonderland
I second Ryszard Kapuscinski's - Shah of Shah's (lived through the revolution as a kid and appreciated this view)
Hollydor Laxness - Independent People
Jose Saramago - All the Names
Robert Pinsky's translation of Dante's - Inferno
Bryce Courtenay - Power of One

For all the chicagoans, and non chicagoans, interested in urban studies
There Are No Children Here