Hello! I need suggestions for my boyfriend please. 🙂
He hasn’t read a lot of books yet, he only got into reading this year because of me.
He recently read All quiet on the western front and he said it was a 10/10. He liked that it was “action packed” and liked the graphic description of war and he said he would love to read more books like this.
His second favorite was The Martian and he also liked Dune. (started the second book in the series but gave it up bc he didn’t like it that much) I recommended The Dead Zone to him thinking he would like it but he couldn’t really get into it lol.
He doesn’t have much time to read and is a slow reader so he likes shorter books.
I have no idea what to get him because I have exactly the opposite taste in books.
Suggestions can be any genre if you think it could catch someone’s attention, who is fairly new to reading.
by laluska2
19 Comments
Starship Troopers – Heinlein
Pegasus Bridge by Stephen E. Ambrose.
“In the early morning hours of June 6, 1944, a small detachment of British airborne troops stormed the German defense forces and paved the way for the Allied invasion of Europe. Pegasus Bridge was the first engagement of D-Day, the turning point of World War II.” Mainly first person accounts I believe. Read it years ago but it’s very good.
Devolution by Max Brooks is short and he will love it. Action, adventure, natural disaster, and then Bigfoot shows up
World War Z by Max Brooks is a brick of a book, but each chapter is from a different POV so it reads like a short story collection – as long as he can get through a chapter, he can put it down for a week and not get confused. One of my favorite books. Action packed, bloody, brutal, sad, funny. It has everything. And the author teaches strategy at West Point, so even though it’s a zombie book, it’s a war book too
if he likes war books look into the killing zone my time in vietnam by fredrick douglas
starship troopers is heavily influenced by actual war and isnt like the movie for the most part.
there is a sci fi book similar to starship that is called the forever war that was written by a veteran but is fiction.
Enders game
strangers in a strange land
jurassic park is also really good
edit to add the heart of darkness.
I just started Drowning by TJ Newman and it is action packed
There’s a pretty big genre of “military sci-fi” out there, but you have to watch out, because a fair number of the authors can be problematic — to say the least.
I just finished John Scalzi’s _Old Man’s War_ and enjoyed it; planning to start on the sequel soon.
From what I remember (it’s been a while) Tanya Huff’s Confederation series was solid.
A very common trope of the genre is “recreating Earth military technology in a low-tech situation.” This is used in the 1632 series (a town in West Virginia gets transplanted to 17th century Germany), the Safehold series (aliens wipe out humanity except for one colony ship, and the survivors have a religion that forbids technology) and the Prince Roger series (a battalion of high-tech soldiers with a “bratty” prince to protect gets stranded on an alien planet, and has to recruit locals into various fights in their journey back to civilization). David Weber is author or co-author for much of this. (He also has a bad habit of starting series and not finishing them; Safehold is up to ten books and counting.) He also has a very popular series, the Honor Harrington books, which have been described as “Horatio Hornblower in space.”
{/end military sci-fi}
And if you don’t know Horatio Hornblower, look up C.S. Forester, and maybe ask your BF if his military interest extends to wars on sea as well as land. It was a tremendously popular series that was adapted into both a movie and a couple of TV series.
Also in the navy section is the Aubrey-Maturin series by Patrick O’Brien, from which one book was adapted into the movie _Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World_. These were written more recently than the Hornblower novels, but I think they also average longer.
Out of curiosity, see if he might be interested in some old fashioned swashbucklers. I recently read Rafael Sabatini’s _Captain Blood_ (which was adapted into the movie that made Errol Flynn a star) and thoroughly enjoyed it.
{{Slaughterhouse 5 by Kurt Vonnegut}} for more war theme.
A short read I blew through was {{A Short Stay in Hell by Steven L. Peck}} but it doesn’t have anything in common with what you’ve mentioned.
Hmm…
How about some short story anthologies? That way, he can read one or two stories at a time.
There’s some really good ones from Raconteur Press.
i always wanna reccomend the song of ice and fire series !! its fantasy (not sure if this is a deal breaker for him) but action packed with brutal depictions of war and other atrocities. the world building is suburb and you can easily get lost in it. characters are compelling and beautifully written, each with very disinct traits and personalities.
the books are lengthy but easy to read, addictive and although it may feel overwhelming at first with the different plot lines for different characters, once youre in the swing of it it all comes together. im pretty busy so its taken me a while to get through them but didnt take away my enjoyment. mayb reccomend he reads the first chapter of GOT to see if he likes it?
He might enjoy Jon Krakauer: non-fiction.
Into Thin Air; Into the Wild; Where Men Win Glory: The Odyssey of Pat Tillman.
*Project Hail Mary* by Andy Weir. Same author as *The Martian*.
It’s quite funny and a great sci-fi read!
Project Hail Mary Andy Weir
Murderbot diaries Martha Wells
Dungeon Crawler Carl might be fun for him.
My husband loves Tom Clancy – maybe The Hunt for Red October
He might like the Jack Reacher books
Ready player one
I didn’t read it because I saw the TV show so its spoiled generally but The Expanse is a favorite of my buddies, he’ll get anything put out under that title and I am pretty sure it mixes war and scifi really well.
I think he might like some Hemingway for war drama? Or how about Ender’s Game if he enjoyed the sci-fi?
The 48 laws of power by Robert Greene
Red Badge of Courage The Things They Carried Slaughterhouse Five