Time to unlurk..
Michel H. as below is well worth reading - even his novellas.

Martin Amis - Money - is always guaranteed to get people's backs up. The wife couldn't take it and gave up after 50 pages. Note that this was in direct contradiction to my oft-stated rule of giving any book 100 pages to prove itself before you turf it.

Richard K. Morgan for sci fi esp Altered Carbon. a very good debut indeed.
Keen on Iain M. Banks as well in terms of modern SF bit find the Culture series get a little samey.

I second Bill Bryson for travel books and general thoroughness. Esp Short History.

American Psycho - Bret Easton Ellis - is another great modern read and another likely to piss others off esp if they take the misogyny seriously. One book where the film did it justice.

Non-fiction? try Natural Navigator (can't remember the author right now). very well written and brilliant to really clarify stuff like how the hell did navigating by the stars work for the early civilizations.

Righto, will have to go through the library lending list to see what other gems I've had over the years.
(wino.NZ The Ayatollah of rock n' rolla..., Fri 6 Jan 2012, 6:15, 1 reply)

I've similar taste it seems
Can't recommend Bill Bryson enough.

My main critisism about Iain M Banks though is that it's a cracking good lead up to something, but you see the pages dwindling at the back and wonder when it's all going to kick off. Usually it's in the last two pages.

Having read a few by Bret Easton Ellis, I can't help skip the odd page here and there, especially if it's describing a suit in no less than 1000 words. Excellent read, but with some rather slow bits inbetween...
(Kliper Filllets Getting noticed by twats on the internet since, Fri 6 Jan 2012, 7:34, closed)