Mason's Book Picks: Ender’s Game

Next up in Mason’s Book Picks: Ender’s Game – Orson Scott Card
Another book I was only recently introduced to by my awesome wife (who has great taste in books)

This is the kind of sci-fi I want to read. It's thoughtful, emotionally piercing, and generally amazing for the sense of inexorable doom which hangs over the (incredibly sympathetic) protagonist.

Ender’s Game avoids so many pitfalls of sci-fi by being simply a great story.

You won't find all that sciency-science, nor is it weighted with cartoony characters (such as the dreaded "buxom-amazon-who-wears-revealing-clothes-while-kicking-butt-and-is-essentially-a-masculine-character-with-boobs-because-the-author-doesn't-understand-women") which sometimes rear their heads in sci-fi. (come on, we've all read our share of chauvinist novels.)

It is a masterfully written work. Go buy it peoples. Go buy it.

Mason's Book Picks: Something Wicked This Way Comes

Next up in Mason’s Book Picks: Something Wicked This WayComes – Ray Bradbury

Ray Bradbury is an unstoppable rebel force of writerly awesome. There is no past tense when referring to Ray Bradbury because he lives forever. (Kind of like Yoda.)

If you've never read Something Wicked This Way Comes, stop what you're doing and go buy this book.

This was one of the first books where I understood for a writer how deep the love of language could go.

I was lucky enough to read it when I was about 12 or 13 (the age of the protagonists in the story). But there's no time like right now to read it for the first time. Go buy it folks.

Mason’s Book Picks: The Postman

I read a compulsively.

Some of you know what I'm talking about.

 

At the breakfast table I read the cereal boxes, front back and sides.

When I’m sitting in the doctor’s office or waiting for an oil change I pick up any old magazine, regardless of whether I care about the contents. (Sports Illustrated and Redbook come to mind)

And because I share the house with three members of the female persuasion (four if you count the cat) I have read any number of chick lit and mommy memoirs (as well as marketing books and children’s picture books).

I also read a lot of books by choice. But it’s those rare few books that I will go out of my way to recommend to others.

These are the books that had a powerful impact in some way or another on my very inner being. Some are books from my formative years, some I only recently was introduced to. Either way, Mason’s Book Picks will be a running off-the-top-of-my-head list of those books which influenced me as a writer and as a person.

They are in no particular order, honestly. I’m shooting from the hip here.

First up: The Postman by David Brin

I only recently discovered this book in my wife’s collection. I remembered seeing the trailers for the movie back in the day but never saw it. I’m glad I didn’t, because cracking open this brilliant dystopic novel sight-unseen was an incredible experience.

The writing captivated me with it’s almost Philip K. Dick-esque noir terseness. And the battle of ideals and ideas was very enthralling.

Look out next week or so when I throw another Mason’s Book Pick at you.