How 'bout pina coladas around 8? We can accomplish so much more.
You know, there’s really no reason we couldn’t do both, unless we have so many pina coladas that doing anything “at dawn” becomes out of the question. Hung over Mung and all, you know.
Good call. And, while I haven’t read anywhere near all of them, I get the impression that Rex Stout’s Nero Wolfe books are, as well.
Any excuse to use the wonderful Brian Cox is good enough for me.
Two from John Varely
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Wizard, Titan, Demon… A trology that is satisfying, consistant, has character devlopment, great and heart moving story telling, and broke much new ground in Science Fiction
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His “Many Worlds” collection of both short stories and novels that take place in a Solar System that had just begun extra eart colonization efforts (Moon, Mars, Asteroids, Moons of Saturn, Jupiter, The Rings of Saturn, and more). Internally consitant, recurring characters that grow and change over time, and more…
regards
FML
You really think so? I thought II was better than I, but III was a huge letdown. Maybe 20% better than #I which isn’t a ringing endorsement considering they probably spent 15 times more money making it.
I saw it once when it came out but have never felt the urge to see it again. The other two I have seen multiple times.
I gotta say that Travis McGee is so much better than Spenser it’s not even a contest, but the guy who can give McGee a contest and win is Lew Archer. You will have a tough time even finding his books in print anymore but Ross McDonald, no relation to John D. and Gregory (Fletch series) was one of the all-time greats.
Did you block Thunderdome from your mind?
Colleen McCullough’s Masters of Rome series remained pretty good throughout. At least throughout the number I’ve read so far.
Marc
James Lee Burke’s Dave Robicheaux thrillers have been just about the best genre fiction on earth for many years. Now he has begun a series about lawyer Billy Bob Holland which is just as good.
Michael Connelly’s Harry Bosch books are uniformly great.
Bernard Cornwell’s series of Sharpe books are all good. As are his books about Arthur. I’m about to embark on his trilogy about an archer, set in the 1300’s.
I couldn’t get to grips with his series set in the American civil war though, maybe it is time to go back and have another go, everything else he writes is so good!
My favorite trilogies are the Bernard Sampson series by Len Deighton actually one verrrrry long story. 9 books in all with a tenth that provides a lot of background, they are IMHO uniformly excellent.
Rome was consistantly good - including 'cause I see them more as a mini-series than a real ‘show.’ YMMW, of course.
The Dark Tower books were consistantly OK/Good until book five, which is an excellent point to stop reading them.
To answer the OP, though, I’d have to say I’ve enjoyed all the Harry Potter books evenly, though the 4th was a real breaker. Ditto for the Lord of the Rings movies, though the third possibly dipped just a notch below 1 & 2. Also, the X-Wing series (By Michael Stackpole and Aaron Allston, if I remember rightly) were consistently amusing and entertaining, if not exactly high-brow. (Man, I’ve been looking for my lost copy of Book 6: Iron Fist for seven years)
I have to disagree. In both cases, the first one is good, the second one is better, and the third is bloody awful.
If including TV is not too much of a foul, I’d have to say Band of Brothers, for me, was perfect throughout. Also the anime series Cowboy Bebop, including the movie.
George R. R. Martin’s Song of Fire and Ice series (so far).
Elizabeth Moon’s Sheepfarmer’s Daughter trilogy is also wholly excellent.
Do I even need to second/third/whateverth the Harry Potter books?
I was going to cite John MacDonald’s Travis MacGee books. So put me down as as “Me too”
A couple of people have already mentioned Discworld and Rome so I’ll submit a couple of comic books…Bone and Fables were/are consistently incredible.
Hi All…
I think the Lonesome Dove series of books (Lonesome Dove, Dead Man’s Walk, Comanche Moon and Streets of Laredo by Larry McMurtry are all fantastic. *Streets of Laredo * is probably the only one that takes a little dip but only because of the ending. .
Owen Parry’s Civil War mystery series featuring Abel Jones are consistent through six books. Jones is a great character. He’s ex-military, with prejudices typical of the times, but a somewhat open mind.
He also gets gradually shorter in each book. In the first book, Faded Coat of Blue, he describes himself as shorter than average. Keep reading, and he has a hard time getting on a horse, and his uniforms are specially tailored. By the sixth book, he’s “diminutive”.
Same thing happens with his wife. He describes her as beautiful in the first book, but as time goes by, we learn that she’s plain (and short, maybe hunchbacked) and he praises her good nature and big heart.
I found it charming. Through the books we see Abel’s courage, wit, intelligence, and steadfastness, and as we learn these important things about him, he becomes comfortable revealing his physical shortcomings, the things that might make a bad first impression. I just love him.
Personally I thought “Master and Commander” was his weakest book and from then on they were just about excellent.
Calvin and Hobbes - started out strong, maintained a high level of quality, and ended before it declined