<p>If you like Tolstoy you might like Trollope - another 19th century novelist interested in politics and society. The Barchester chronicles begin with Barchester Towers the Palliser novels (more political) begin with Can You Forgive Her. </p>
<p>You might also enjoy Edith Wharton - in particular The Age of Innocence.</p>
<p>I agree with Marite’s recommendation of Lucky Jim - it’s wickedly funny. OTOH I tried to read The Red and the Black this summer (I was supposed to read it for AP French a million years ago and I still hated it.)</p>
<p>If you liked the Curious Incident - you might want to try Elizabeth Moon’s Speed of the Dark. It’s another take on what it means to be autistic.</p>
<p>Newer books that others have mentioned here that I also liked: Remains of the Day and Atonement.</p>
<p>What about Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance? A life-changing book for many. Has it ever been decided whether it should be considered fiction or non-fiction?</p>
<p>Maybe reading it with * Les Liaisons Dangereuses* would provide it the necessary context? I suppose one has to be familiar with post-Revolution French social history to truly appreciate this story of social climbing. It makes me think it should be read in tandem with Vanity Fair</p>
<p>I have no aptitude for science, but strangely enough some of my favorite books have been non-fiction and science-related: Longitutde by Sobel (? not sure of exact name or spelling), A Brief History of Time by Hawking (even the book’s name is brilliant), and Watson’s The Double Helix. </p>
<p>Also, David McCullough’s 1776 reads like a novel. It’s really a page-turner.</p>
<p>I think I need to just get past the very slow start. OTOH I hated Vanity Fair too. Vanity Fair didn’t have a single sympathetic character - I hated every second I had to spend with them. I love the movie of Les Liaison Dangereuses, don’t think I’ve ever had to read it. I’ve liked plenty of other 19th century French novels - Zola, Balzac, Hugo, Flaubert, Proust (though I guess Proust is really 20th c) come to mind. I just have this block with Stendhal! </p>
<p>I find a book being on the curriculum, likely to make me like it less. I think that’s why I love Trollope so much - I never had to read him for school!</p>
<p>I read Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance while on a cross country road trip - another book I didn’t get.</p>
<p>Marite, I think I more or less understand the social history and the social climbing. I just find LReLN uninteresting, exacerbated by some decision making by the characters that I found to be…so French. Chacun a son gout. Et honi soit la vache qui rit.</p>
<p>In contrast, I found Les Miserables, even with its long digressions, quite interesting. But you know the old saying…wherever Hugo, I will follow.</p>
<p>Yep. Or as PDQ Bach would say, “chaconne a son gout.” I agree, it’s very French. What can I say? </p>
<p>Mathmom: Les Liaisons dangereuses is an epistolary novel, so it is very mannered compared to 19th century works (Jane Austen started out writing Sense and Sensibility as an epistolary novel, too). It was published in 1782 whereas Le Rouge et le Noir was published in 1830 and reads far more like a modern novel.</p>
A life-changing book for many. Has it ever been decided whether it should be considered fiction or non-fiction?</p>
I suppose one has to be familiar with post-Revolution French social history to truly appreciate this story of social climbing. It makes me think it should be read in tandem with Vanity Fair</p>