Starting with a writer's best book: bad idea?

[Nikitta]

I'm currently reading The Left Hand of Darkness and it's pretty good so far, but it pales compared to The Dispossessed, which was the first book I read by Ursula LeGuinn. That's the one which caused me to want to read more of her books because I just hit right home with me and I even had shivers of pleasure running down my spine reading it, simply because of how well written it is.

A bit of the same thing with Philip K. Dick: the first books I read was Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? and that caused me to want to read more of his books, but while the other books I have read by him have been pretty good, they just pale compared to that.

So, both are cases of reading a book, which really hits home with you in a way that only very few books do, so you decide to read more books of the same author. It's not that you expect the other books to be like the one that hit you like that, but you somehow expect them to be just as good and to also hit you - but they don't and they pale compared to the one you read first, because that was that author's best and so you'll to some degree be disappointed by the subsequent books you read by them.

Does any of this make sense to people in here?
Is it possible to read an authors best book first without it ruining all of the subsequent books you read by them?

Just wondering...

 

[Connavar]

I never read authors best book as my first. Not because the others might pale in comparison. Because almost always the first book is a library or second hand or bookmooch book.

I dont think its fair to the writer if i got his best book for free from the library. I like to support writers i enjoy. Plus its more fun as a reader to collect your favs best books.

For example my favorit SF writer is Philip K. Dick. I read Andriods as my first book of his. It was a great book character and emotional wise but i could feel he could do better.
It made me crave his other works. I knew before it wasnt seen as his best book. Maybe his most famous in mainstream thanks to some fame from a certain movie.....

I have read other books of his that are better, his skill,ideas better than in that book.


Many other authors who have become favorits has had first books for me that werent so good but i could see potential in certain areas that might be better in next book.

I think that way is much better. This way you dont expect as much from the second book cause you know the first book wasnt his/hers best book.

I cant even remember an author whose my first book was his best book and stayed that in my opinion. With my record its usually the second or third book who is the best. Thats because after a decent book you want an authors most famous book which usually has a good chance of being the best work.

Foundation and Empire is way better than Foundation heh

 

[Nikitta]

For example my favorit SF writer is Philip K. Dick. I read Andriods as my first book of his. It was a great book character and emotional wise but i could feel he could do better.
It made me crave his other works. I knew before it wasnt seen as his best book. Maybe his most famous in mainstream thanks to some fame from a certain movie.....

I didn't know of Bladerunner when I picked up Do Androids... It just appealed to me and I got it on a gut feeling. The books I have enjoyed the most, I have picked up on a gut feeling.

Mind you: I have only read 3 other books by PKD, so it's too early to tell if Do androids... is his best, but I get that feeling none the less. The Left Hand.. is only my second book by LeGuinn.

None the less: I got interestend in those two authors due to books, which really hit home with me and there's no saying if any of their other books will too.

 

[Overread]

ahh it is often the case that the first is the best = its not nessessarily because it is his best work, but because it was the first work you read of the author and as it was a good (excellent) read it hold a special place in memory that can't be replaced easily.

Also what one considers the best of an author can be the least favourite book to others - so don't worry and just enjour books for being books

 

[Connavar]

I didn't know of Bladerunner when I picked up Do Androids... It just appealed to me and I got it on a gut feeling. The books I have enjoyed the most, I have picked up on a gut feeling.

Mind you: I have only read 3 other books by PKD, so it's too early to tell if Do androids... is his best, but I get that feeling none the less. The Left Hand.. is only my second book by LeGuinn.

None the less: I got interestend in those two authors due to books, which really hit home with me and there's no saying if any of their other books will too.

I dont really care for Bladerunner. I choose that book cause i knew it wasnt seen as his best. I could get it easy from the library.

Androids really hit home with me too, i like the realationship the humans showed to animals, how much they cared for real animal,Dekkard. and the ending depressed me like most PKD books do.

The hole empathy thing which the Androids lacked was great read. when they were torturing a spider and the loony human guy was wondered about how they could do that and act like it was nothing was a real interesting scene.

 

[Pyar]

Oh wow, I was the opposite of you. I read The Left Hand of Darkness first and then The Dispossessed and I thought The Dispossessed was no where near as good as The Left Hand of Darkness. But to tell you the truth both of those books are in my top 10 favourites of all time so I thought they were both amazing. And you can't really say what a writer's best book is. In the case of Le Guin she has many "best" books.

 

[Urlik]

Oh wow, I was the opposite of you. I read The Left Hand of Darkness first and then The Dispossessed and I thought The Dispossessed was no where near as good as The Left Hand of Darkness.

I think that quite often the first book of a particular author that you read is hard to beat until you've read a few more by them and got more of a flavour for them.

it is probably to do with it being a fresh viewpoint and style of writing when you read the first, but when you read the second it isn't so new

 

[Pyan]

How can you tell if it's the authors "best" book if you've only read one? Critics and recommenders aren't infallible.

And what do you do if the universally acclaimed "best book" is, for example, the fourth in a series and knowledge of the previous ones is essential to the plot?

 

[The Ace]

The only way to discover an author's, 'Best,' book is to suck it and see.

You are the one reading it, it's your opinion that matters.

 

[AE35Unit]

I always let myself decide which is an authors best book rather than relying on hype and blurb. In the case of A C Clarke it could be said that Childhood's End is his best book,but i preferred Rendezvous with Rama.

 

[Nikitta]

How can you tell if it's the authors "best" book if you've only read one? Critics and recommenders aren't infallible.

That's not what I meant, Pyan. I meant when you read a book by an author you've never read before and it knocks your socs off, so you decided to read more by him/her, only to find that they're not nearly as good as the first one you read - in your own opinion and judgment, of course - I'm not talking about universally the best or what other people think is the best, at all.

That's what I wrote in my first post and I thought I'd made that pretty clear.

 

[Pyan]

Ah, I see what you mean - it's the shock of the new, so to speak.

If this happens every time you find a new author, that the first one that you read makes the other stories by them seem not as good, you'll run out of writers.

But you actually said "Is it possible to read an authors best book first without it ruining all of the subsequent books you read by them?", and you use the phrase "author's best book" several times, and I thought you were referring to a generally acknowledged "best", not your own, perfectly respectable, opinion.

 

[Nikitta]

Ah, I see what you mean - it's the shock of the new, so to speak.

If this happens every time you find a new author, that the first one that you read makes the other stories by them seem not as good, you'll run out of writers.

But you actually said "Is it possible to read an authors best book first without it ruining all of the subsequent books you read by them?", and you use the phrase "author's best book" several times, and I thought you were referring to a generally acknowledged "best", not your own, perfectly respectable, opinion.

Fair enough. I could've been more clear.

Thankfully, it doesn't happen to every time I find a new author; only the ones where the first one hits me directly, which not all books by authors I've just found does. In fact, the number of books that have done that to me is fairly low.

 

[Connavar]

The only way to discover an author's, 'Best,' book is to suck it and see.

You are the one reading it, it's your opinion that matters.

I dont really care what book is the best in other people's opinions when i have read it. There are many books that are thought weaker ones of some authors that i think are the best.


Only time i care about which books is the best works of authors is when im trying them.

I rather get one less famous book of an author from the library than his most famous work.

For example i was trying Andre Norton and Fritz Leiber recently, i could have gotten Witch World and first Fafhrd and Gray Mouser books from the library but i didnt.

Now that i have read Leiber and enjoyed the first story i can get the good looking Fantasy Masterwork collection of his most famous work.

 

[Pyan]

Isn't there a danger there though, Conn, that the first one you read by a new author is an atypically bad one, and you give up there and then, missing out on a lot of good reading.

For example, IMHO, the worst (!) Pratchett/Discworld is Carpe Jugulum: if I had read that first, I may have lost out on the rest of the series.

 

[Connavar]

Isn't there a danger there though, Conn, that the first one you read by a new author is an atypically bad one, and you give up there and then, missing out on a lot of good reading.

For example, IMHO, the worst (!) Pratchett/Discworld is Carpe Jugulum: if I had read that first, I may have lost out on the rest of the series.

I expect many authors to write more than one good book

For example i think The Drawing of The Dark by Tim Powers being his first typical TP historical fantasy, is better his than more famous and World Fantasy Award winning Declare and his famous on Stranger Tides.

Not because it was my first book but the characters was were awesome and the myths more interesting in the first book. I think its the only first book of a favorite author which is still the best book IMO.

Also i choose the ones that sound good. The ones chron members or others i know recommend. Im not looking for a great book but a good read.

 

[Pyan]

Yes, but if you had hated The Drawing of The Dark, would you have even tried Declare or On Stranger Tides?

 

[Connavar]

Yes, but if you had hated The Drawing of The Dark, would you have even tried Declare or On Stranger Tides?

Not likely.

But i have hated multi award winning books that was what an authors hole rep was build upon.

So that doesnt mean anything. I can dislike any book no matter how famed it is or how its seen as a writers best work.

Of course i didnt hate it because i reaserched it alot. Knew what to expect.

Another example is The Black Company. It is almost only what Cook's fantasy rep is built upon. The prototype of Erikson and his kind but i disliked that book so much.

The most wasted money of all my book hauls. Why ? Because i bought something that didnt excite me only because it was seen as classic fantasy....

I learned alot from that.

 

[flygin]

I've had more of a problem with finding a current work by a new-to-me author on one of the front tables at B&N, loving the book, and then going back and reading earlier works by the same author, and not liking them. For example, with Michael Chabon, I loved The Adventures of Kavalier and Clay. I then went and read Wonderboys, and The Mysteries of Pittsburgh. I didn't really like Wonderboys (althought that might have been because I had seen the movie, and liked it), and I thought The Mysteries of Pittsburgh was a horrible piece of crap. I actually regret reading it, it was such a waste of time.

Now that I'm thinking about it, when I read a new author, I read their books that didn't get as good reviews first, then move on from there. And I think it's because of experiences like I've had above. I wonder if I've missed out on good books because I do that.

 

[Hypnos164]

If i'm coming directly to a new author I like to start with their first novel (unless that was 10's of years and dozens of books ago) - rather than a "best" / award winning / most popular one.

After all it must have been good enough to get another book published and while it probably contains some rough edges it also reveals, i think, a lot about their future promise. The first novel probably having - in practice - a 5-10 year gestation without deadline pressure or other factors.

A chronological approach also allows you to follow the author's growing skills and confidence as a writer.