Super Smart/Intelligent Books?

[mgleaton]

Based on these three books, does anyone have any recommendations?!!!

1. Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand
2. The Ultimate Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams
3. Zola: A life by Frederick Brown

Thank-you so much!

[DATo]

I'm not sure I know what you mean by "Intelligent" books. Do you mean books which are technically superior examples of good literature, or deep and philosophical?

Of the first example I would say Middlemarch by George Elliot; of the second, just about any Shakespearian tragedy.

Personally I don't think much of Ayn Rand or her writing. I think she is both a pseudo-writer and a pseudo-philosopher. Hitchhiker's Guide, are you kidding me? Much of it is brilliant comedy which I thoroughly enjoyed but it is hardly an "intelligent" (read: profound or philosophic) book and certainly not great literature in the clinical sense. The Zola book is a biography/nonfiction and though some very profound things happened to Emile Zola in his life I wouldn't say that a book of his life, though it may be very good, is necessarily a "smart" or "intelligent" book. As I said I need to know more precisely what you mean by these terms.

One good book which is both easy to read, entertaining, and "deep" if one is perceptive enough to recognize what makes it deep, is The Old Man And The Sea by Steinbeck.

[desantismt_17]

Hitchhiker is one of my favorite books of all time. I recommend anything else by Adams. You might also try the Discworld books by Terry Pratchett. They are fantasy with a sort of Adams feel to them.

[starshipsaga]

Try The Martian by Andy Weir if you enjoy smart, funny sci-fi. The protagonist is a snarky, humorous kind of guy, but the science in the book is also very technical and detailed.