Right now, maybe $50, but only because I’m renting a room in a house and don’t have space for a bookshelf. But if I had my own place and built an office with a bookshelf, I’d easily pay $200 for a hardcover version of my favorite books.

Came here to reply to this

Chapter 108, ‘Memories’ in Rhythm of War makes me tear up every time I read it. Sometimes I just read that chapter randomly to make sure I still have feelings because I’ve found I’ve become more cynical as I’ve aged.

The Hitch-hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams is also way up there.

I really enjoyed the first book. I love the absurdity of the book, but I felt it lost steam by the end of the second book, so I didn’t continue with the series.

I love absurdity in stories. Things that, when you’re high, make you go, “WTF is going on right now? This makes no sense, it’s giving me a panic attack because I have no clue what is happening.” And the first HGttG book gave that to me.

Dungeon Crawler Carl has kinda scratched that itch for me, in a completely different way, and same with Discworld, but I can’t find other series that really handle that Dan Harmon style of absurdity meshed with sci-fi or fantasy.

Brandon Sanderson

I liked the Mistborn trilogy, mostly the magic system, but didn’t much care for the fact that the two main characters were young adults (I’m not much of a fan of stories with teen protagonists unless it’s done reeeeally well), though I did find the prophecies to be fun. To me, I didn’t get why it was so popular in the fantasy space. A nice read, but it didn’t blow me away, which was what I was expecting due to its popularity. I had no desire to read Sanderson again.

I had a buddy say that his Stormlight Archive was loads better and that if I got through the first book and felt the same as I did with Mistborn, then the rest of the series will be an utter slog. I came in not having high hopes that the series would be great, but that it would be as mid as Mistborn.

Well, The Way of Kings was absolutely and utterly spectacular. I jammed through the four released books in two months. Each of the four books had me up till 3am to read their climaxes in one sitting. No book before or since has done that to me. It’s right up there in my top 3 all time books series, regardless of genre, and Book 5 is my most anticipated read for next year.

I haven’t read the second trilogy of Mistborn, though my buddy says it’s a completely different cast and vibe.

I DNF’d after chapter two of Malazan book 1, but only because I realized that I have too many 3- and 4-book fantasy series I’d rather complete (plus all the one-off fiction and nonfiction books) before spending a whole year only reading Malazan.

Anything Cosmere

Red Rising

John Steinbeck

But honestly, simply knowing they’re a consistent fiction reader (not solely non-fiction/self help/personal finance/etc either, there’s definitely a time and place for that but if you never read fiction, ugh) is enough to make me swipe right on a girl even if I don’t immediately find her super hot. She’s gotta be at least somewhat attractive, though.

Agreed