Hi, :)

I have spent lots of hours reading books by the authors I mention below. Some of them are simply amazing writers and have a style that is completely different from others. Until a few years ago, my favourite author was Arthur Conan Doyle, then it shifted to P G Wodehouse. Now for close to a 4 years its JRR Tolkien.

I guess its not neccessary for a book to be a page turner for me. Selecting 10 authors from all those whose books I have read over the past 10 years or so will be quite difficult and I might miss out on one or two decent ones, but as far as I can remember these are the ones whom I like or have liked sometime in my life.

10. Erle Stanley Gardener: I suppose he’s not as good as some of the others that will follow, but I really liked his Perry Mason novels and have read almost all of them. Perry Mason is a criminal Lawyer who ’’likes to skate on thin ice’’, ie he goes totally overboard in defending his clients who have all the evidences pointing against them but somehow at the end he manages to find the real murderer. What I like about this book is that more than through investigations it is his cunning cross examinations that find out the truth. Also, he is assisted by Della Street, his confidential secretary and Paul Drake, head of Drake Investigations Agency. The last 70-100 pages of the book which are mostly filled with the courtroom drama is the best part. I believe Perry Mason also used to come in TV but I haven’t ever seen an episode of it.

9. Agatha Christie: Poirot, many people feel is just like Holmes. I don’t. Ok, they have some similarities like the same amazing deduction powers, bachelors, a friend who marries but again returns to join in the mysteries and most of the police would much rather beat him but wouldn’t shy at accepting the credit for what he does. But their are many differences too. Poirot, essentially is a comic figure. A Belgian refuge in England, he assists the police in solving some mysteries and then begins a career as a PI. I prefer Agatha Christie novels to the short stories. The Murder Of Roger Akroyd, Murder on The Orient Express are two of the best murder mysteries I have ever read. Her other characters, Miss Marple, Tommy and Tuppence, Mr Quinn and Parker Pyne weren’t that great.

8. Jeffrey Archer: I like his books very much. Most of them follow the same pattern. They begin with the birth of some person and follow his/her/their lives till either they die or are very old like As The Crow Flies, Kane and Abel, The Prodigal Daughter, First Among Equals and Sons Of Fortunes. ’’Not a Penny More, Not a Penny Less’’ his debut novel is much shorter than the others and the ending was one I would have never guessed. Other good books by him are A Matter Of Honour, The Fourth Estate, The Eleventh Commandment.

7. Ruskin Bond: I read his stories long ago and don’t remember a lot about them except that most of them were based on his life in India. Delhi Is Not Far, I seem to remember was a book I really enjoyed. His writing style is also very nice.

6. Satyajit Rai: I liked the Feluda series written by him. Feluda is sort of like an Indian Sherlock Holmes but not as good, of course. Amazing deductions (sometimes a bit weird) and a decent plot in most stories. I read them long ago but two books which I really liked were ’’The Emperor’s Ring’’ and ’’The Royal Bengal Mystery and other stories’’.

5. William Shakesphere: No point in describing him. Some of his stories which I like are Julius Ceaser, Hamlet and many others. But these were my favourite.

4. P.G. Wodehouse: An extremely hilarious writer. Life At Blandings was the first book by him that I read. It was completely amusing how things keep on twisting around. All stories of Jeeves and Wooster are excellent. His stories are based on 18th century England and sometimes America.

3. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle: Sherlock Holmes is probably my favourite fictional character, including those by JRR TOLKIEN. I’m sure everyone has some idea about Holmes. He was the greatest fictional detective ever created, who lived in London. He took drugs, much to the disdain of Watson, the name that Doyle gives himself in the book. By the way, ’’Elementary, my dear Watson’’ was a phrase never uttered by Holmes in the book. It’s a movie/theatre adaptation. The Hound of The Baskervilles is my favourite novel by ACD and the short stories are really very good. Holmes solves most cases by his amazing deduction skills. One of my favourite characters created by ACD is Mycroft, Holmes’ elder brother and more clever at deductions than him. But he was too lazy to verify his deductions and only appears once or twice in the books. He also wrote books about other characters, one of whom was a knight. I really can’t remember his name but the book wasn’t that great. It was just average considering his Sherlock Holmes stories.


2. Charles Dickens: Dickens is a well known classic author and my favourite books by him (read unabridged) are David Copperfield, Great Expectations, A Tale of Two Cities, A Christmas Carol and some others. David Copperfield is a very nice story which revolves around the life of a boy named David Copperfield (who would have ever guessed?).

1. JRR Tolkien: Oh well, I can write a lot about him and still it would never describe his greatness to perfection, and I don’t just mean about his getting the author of the century award. Look at the languages he created and the books he has written. Lord Of The Rings is by far the best book I have ever read in my entire life. And The Silmarillion is a book which I also like very much. Elves and Dwarves, and Hobbits and Men, a Dark Lord with Orcs (Goblins) and Wraiths to wreck havoc with the occasional Dragon, Troll and Balrog (For those who like LOTR as much as I do, THEY DON’T HAVE WINGS!!!) thrown in. Oh... did I mention the angelic saviours - The Valar and wizards like Gandalf (I loved Ian McKellan screaming in the movie - You Shall Not Pass!) to defeat the forces of evil. And not only these books, but even The Hobbit, History of Middle Earth, Adventures Of Tom Bombadil (Who is Tom, by the way?) and The Unfinished Tales are also pretty good books. His books are described by some as a parody of life and can be interpreted to have more or less some meaning on almost every feature of life.



Other authors I like/have liked are Jack Higgins, Ngaio Marsh, Paulo Coelho, CS Lewis, Enid Blyton.

Comics...

1. Asterix!!! Rules!! The most hilarious stuff I’ve ever read.

2. Phantom, The Ghost Who Walks

3. Archies

4. Flash Gordon