I started reading last year, mostly productivity stuff, but now I’m really looking to jump into fiction to unwind after a long week of uni, studying, and work. I need something to help me relax during the weekends without feeling like I’m working.
I’d love some recommendations for books that are short enough to finish in a day but still hit hard and are totally worth it. No specific genre preferences right now. I’m open to whatever. Looking forward to seeing what you guys suggest. Thank you very much in advance.
I have just the book for you!.. Ah, finish in a day, nevermind.
Any early Alistair MacLean…
Guns of Navaronne
Where Eagles Dare
When Eight Bells Toll
Night Without End
Puppet on a String
Louis Lamour’s westerns are complete popcorn and fun to read
C. S. Forester’s Horatio Hornblower books
When I was younger I binged a lot of Alistair MacLean. To continue the list with some of my other favourites:
The Satan Bug
The Golden Rendezvous
The Dark Crusader
The Last Frontier
Ice Station Zebra
Fair warning though: he’s quite formulaic and it is not recommended to finish one of his books then start another. Read a couple of books inbetween to give yourself a break.
Do androids dream of electric sheep by Philip K. Dick. It’s the basis for the blade runner movie. Short, easy to read.
That’s one of my favorite movies. I’ll get its eBook version right now.
He also did a short that became total recall. What a dude.
Someone else already suggested it, but I would second Terry Pratchett. Even though most of the books are standalone, I recommend start with the Colour of Magic and follow publication order.
YES!! I started with Guards! Guards! and I am hooked!! They’re all so good.
As the librarian would say, “Ook.”
If you read the first story (The colour of Magic + The light fantastic) you will know the story of the librarian, he start as a human there hahahah.
Another vote for Pratchett! I’m an economics fan, and making money happened to be my introduction, but there are far more common onramps.
My personal suggestion for getting a feel of Pratchett’s writing these days is monstrous regiment - technically in the discworld series, but it’s very standalone, so you get the flavor of the writing with little of the need for additional context.
I have to ask, have you read Orconomics? It’s a parody of fantasy, gaming, and economics. I recommend it to anyone who likes Pratchett, and especially if you’re into the extremely specific niche of financial fantasy satire.
I have not and I’ve now purchased the book - thanks for the recommendation!
And the entire collection is on sale right now.
$18 for all 39 books.
GNU Sir Terry
Pratchett himself did not recommend reading discworld in order. The first two books are by far the weakest of the series (although still very fun). There are guides that recommend starting points, like this:
I know there are several reading orders available depending on which stories you want to prioritize, but I like publication order because you can see him creating the world. As in you can usually see him writing some one liners that prompt some ideas which are fully explored in the next book, I don’t remember any specific things but it’s stuff like talking about Gods being as powerful as how many people believe in them right before small gods.
The Lady Astronaut series by Mary Robinette Kowal. The first book is called The Calculating Stars. Basically, an alternate history where (spoiler for the opening chapter) ::: spoiler spoiler a meteor wipes out the east coast and kick-starts climate change, causing the Space Age to start 10 years early. ::: It follows a Jewish computer (a woman who literally runs calculations for NASA, as seen in Hidden Figures) who wants to become an astronaut, and her struggles with the racism and misogyny of the 1950s.
Blood Meridian is critically acclaimed and you could read it in a day. I only got around to reading it last winter despite my “litbro” friends recommending it for years. It’s very violent but the prose style is really unique and original. The plot is kind of Moby Dick-esque where it examines mankind’s place in nature (mixed with a fair amount of Heart of Darkness).
Actually Heart of Darkness is extremely worth reading and it is probably less of an ordeal. Maybe start with that if you haven’t read it. Conrad spoke like 5 languages and English was the ~3rd he learned so he has a very interesting prose style.
“Short enough to finish in a day” seems pretty tough for me, but maybe I read slowly.
Short story books are good for casual reading in short sessions. Robot Dreams by Asimov, or Welcome to the Monkey House by Vonnegut. I used to carry each of those around and read a short story while waiting at a restaurant or at the DMV or whatever.
I really liked Altered Carbon. Approachable sci fi with drugs, violence, sex, politics, and of course high tech ideas like flying cars, AI hotels, digital consciousness.
I’ve never read a fictional book. They don’t exist. hurhurhur
But seriously, I did kind of enjoy reading the Manifold series (Origin, Space, Time) by Stephen Baxter way back when. If you’re a quick reader, I reckon you could probably zip through one of the novels in a day.
And I’d recommend reading at least a couple in order to get to know the characters, because then you could pick up the short story anthology set in the same multiverse (Phase Space), where for some you’d only need half an hour.
(Baxter has a bunch of other books and short stories - the Xeelee Sequence springs to mind - but I never got around to those, so have no idea how long the novels are, or whether they’re any good.)
Arguably the elder scrolls series has tons of fictional books.
The Lusty Argonian Maid is probably my favorite fictional book.
The Real Barenziah is good too.
The Martian and Project Hail Mary are some of the best sci-fi-of-tomorrow books I have ever read. Maybe not a single day, but neither are overly long.
I read Andy Weir’s The Martian in a single sitting. Book really grabbed me by the face.
I think Flowers For Algernon by Daniel Keyes fits the bill. Not too long and has punched everybody I’ve recommended it to in the guts.
Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky. It and its sequel Children of Ruin both explore what it means to be a person and makes you feel empathy for “the other”, beings that get more and more alien as the story moves on. Compared to most of what others mention here it is rather new. But it will become a cult classic, I am certain of that.
That’s a great series. I recommended the first book to everyone I know after reading it. For another amazing story of compassion that circles around from everything from horror, to Kant, to AI intelligence, to religious extremism before it gets there, read The Hyperion Cantos.
Currently half way through the last of the 4 (Rise of Endymion) … fantastic series!
I would recommend checking out audio books as a medium for reading. It allows you to increase the speed to whatever works for you, so 2x for me, and listen to a lot more in a day. It also frees you to listen at any times you have nothing cognitive happening, so dishes, washing, cleaning, etc.
As for single day books, the first book of the Bobiverse series by Dennis E Taylor. I loved the whole series including the recently released 5th book and the first is only 9.5 hours at normal speed, so about 4.75 at double speed.
Also All Systems Red is the first book in the Murderbot series by Martha Wells. The perspective of a SecUnit, a type of sentient cyborg, which has hacked its own programming and removed its limiters so it can act freely. This means no guard rails, no rules, no limits, which results in lots of TV shows being watched and avoiding humans. It is snarky, fun, and interesting. It comes in at 3.5 hours normal time, so 1.75 at double speed.
A Psalm for the Wild Built by Becky Chambers easily can be finished in a day.
Then Murderbot series by Martha Wells. They are fun, yet insightful and novellas. Easily finished in a day too.
Roadside Picnic. it’s a story of unmanaged survivors guilt, in an increasingly desperate and accurately depicted Soviet dystopia, where the players hustle and vie for mediocre survival even in an exceptionally bizarre, hostile, and actually alien environment, just as they would in any other terrestrial conflict zone.
There’s a good reason it spawned an epic film and 4 outstanding games so far
Best? Hard to say. But favorite?
Galactic Pot-Healer by Philip K. Dick. It’s quite short, like many of his books, and you could absolutely knock it out in a day.
