ITT: Personal 10/10s.
What book, in your eyes, is perfection? What makes you feel like that with this book?
Post any book, post multiple books, whatever. Who gives a shit if someone disagrees, this thread is all about that book that you just can't have enough of, whether it's a classic, it's contemporary or something you feel is underrated.
I want to hear about your 10/10s, user.
This is my 10/10, no doubt. It's so full of fantastically detailed characters - Jean Valjean is really a character we should all aspire to be like, always wanting to better himself - and quaint set-ups that gradually build into very satisfying pay-offs (everyone happens in the book for good reason and very little feels like padding).
Many of the chapters are just heartbreaking. I cried when Cosette is told to go and play with her new doll. It made me feel more appreciative of the things and freedom as a child I had. Cosette's death after never seeing Cosette again under false hopes that if she just stayed alive for a few more days then everything would be OK was another heartbreaking moment for me. The book also captures tension brilliantly too, for example. when Thernardier threatens to kidnap Cosette while he shackles up a supposedly-not-Jean Valjean. Any moment with Javert is exciting too, he's possibly one of my favourite antagonists: arrogant, cocky, a bit misanthropic due to his own poor upbringing, but he uses all that to serve justice by the law's standard.
I think I discovered my newest favourite book, a genuine solid 10/10. There's some interesting digressions the book takes through philosophy, history, politics (my favourite was the digression focusing on the importance of Paris and how every ancient cultural icon has a significant equivalent in 1800s Paris), etc. Even when new characters are introduced in the second half of the novel, they don't feel underwritten. Marius is a great character and it's fantastic to see him grow from his childhood, tough relationship with his grandfather, the group of outcast friends he falls in with, how he matures, etc.
It's a long book at 1400+ but you're doing yourself a disservice if you don't read it.
East of Eden. Lit calls Steinbeck “middlebrow” And maybe the rest of his stuff is... but EoE is a 10/10 for me.
Alyosha the Pot is one of the greatest short stories ever written.
People only call Steinbeck "middlebrow" because he's not flashy. I love his work because it's so straightforward and well crafted, every sentence and scene counts and the themes are well presented.
That's more than what you can say for so many meme authors today.
Steinbeck is great and people who think otherwise are trying too hard
Perfect Autumn/Winter-core.
Perfect conversation starter with qt literary grils.
Perfect atmosphere, pacing and tone.
Haunting and tragic.
What isn't there to love?
...
the covers for wuthering heights always look spooky, how reflective is that of the actual text
Fairly. It is a gothic novel, after all
Everything I've heard about it before just seemed to give the impression of a girly romance book no better than what you could see in the supermarket
thanks user, will check it out now
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The Count of Monte Cristo
I haven't encountered one, sadly.
The best books I've read are One Hundred Years of Solitude, The Brothers Karamazov and Infinite Jest. All have their flaws.
It is the perfect novel.
>I am testing greentexting LUL
alright, gonna read it now, sounds great
2666. I wouldnt say its perfect but the way Bolaño sustains a feeling of dread and inspires glimmers of hope is something i havnt yet expeirenced in any other novel.
Right there with you.
is r/books raiding us?
Culture of Critique by Kevin Macdonalds.
Until i read this the world was a mystery ad I was a sheep walking around blind. Now I truly see.
The man without qualities
The overcoat.
Unironically by far my favorite read. Never have I felt so intimately connected to a novel and it's characters. They still live within me, as hokey as that seems. Franzen is a master.
Dorian Gray
Letters to a Young Poet
Notes From Underground
One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich
Steppenwolf
It's a stretch to say I've felt perfectly gratified by anything I've read but in the case of the aforementioned books I can only put that down to my own flaws, or the finite pleasure that literature can offer.
Lanark
On Stranger Tides by Tim Powers.
Seconding Steppenwolf.
Also Suttree.
I wouldnt call them perfect books tho theyre just favorites
10/10 despite the fact it's written as it was a recycled play for theater. Essential male-core.
Beautiful prose and descriptions, otherworldly atmosphere. Character that first glance seem merely comic but develop into sympathetic and multi-dimensional breathing creatures. Original ideas and vision, littered with meaning just beyond our understanding (thinking of Keda and the Old Man). The same goes for Gormenghast, and nearly so for Titus Alone, though that ventures into the surreal.
Invisible Cities and Cuttlefish Bones
This also although it's not a full 10/10
9.5/10 Cathy is a bitch.
I think Ivan Denisovich is underrated compared to Solzhenitsyn's other novels, which focus a bit too much on the setting. The way the main character's mindset gradually adapts to the camps was pretty inspiring, although it's questionable whether it was really a good thing.
Pic related. Intentionally or not, every sentence is hilarious and the book deconstructs the shallowness of the medium and "alternative" teen subcultures that are just as conformist as the cultures they define themselves against.
>Republic; Plato
>Prometheus Bound; Aeschylus
>Alice's Adventures in Wonderland; Lewis Carroll
>Irrational Man; William Barret
This one for me, too. 2666 actually made me cry at the beginning of Archimboldi's part when Archimboldi's father is describing him.
I agree that his other novels are underrated. I've read August 1914 and The First Circle as well, the latter was excellent.
I found One Day more bleak than inspiring; the apathy and resignation, and the way his attention goes to the most insignificant breaks from the monotonous hell of his existence. It's just a fucking masterpiece in terms of psychological insight.
From the ones posted so far, it's my favourite, and probably one of the most important books ever writen but not a 10/10 for sure. Though the idea of a 10/10 books sounds laughable either way.
>fantastically detailed characters
Bullshit. Most are flat caricatures.
>everyone happens in the book for good reason
Bullshit, there are a lot coincidences, which is also a fucking point.
>very little feels like padding
Are you fo real?
Underrated post.
"The Sot-Weed Factor is one of those rare works that not only balances hilarity and high thinking but somehow manages to render them indistinguishable."
Personal 10/10, personal favorite book, personal wish more people would read this so I can discuss it with others. If you have any interest at all in colonial Maryland/Virginia, you owe it to yourself.
My diary, desu
A Wizard of Earthsea + The Farthest Shore
Tone and prose is just the right amount of mythical to underline the messages about everything's finitude and the necessity for one to accept it -especially his own death and overall futility.
the book equivalent of a vanitas