Fancy reading myself a book. I know there have been topics on this in the past, but starting a book is a big commitment, and I bought one based on one of those topics once, and it was over 900 pages long man! Needless to say it's still in the bookshelf.
So to increase my chances of reading it, I'm narrowing the criteria:
It must be something written in the 21st century. It must be under 300 pages. And it must be friggin' awesome.
Go.
Are you a gamer? Chris Brookmyre's "Bedlam" was a lot of fun if so.
Sorry, 376 pages, just checked. Doesn't meet your criteria.
How about some China Mieville? (Can't immediately check page count though.)
The Martian
Not a gamer, no. I could maybe push over 300 pages for something exceptionally awesome. But the shorter, the better.
James Herbert's The Rats is well worth a read. No idea how many pages though.
The Martian was very enjoyable.
Finally got round to "Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep" ( the book behind Blade Runner) and it's really good.
Have you considered graphic novels?
If you can go over 300 pages then there's Peter F Hamilton's "Night's Dawn" trilogy OK, all three books add up to about 3000 pages, and it's more Space Opera with Horror tinges than pure SF or Horror writing, but I liked it.
First book is called "The Reality Dysfunction"
http://www.iain-banks.net/uk/the-state-of-the-art/
State of the Art,
Collection of short stories
Graphic novels are a maybe... No idea if I'd like them or not.
The Martian could be a goer. Looked dull as dishwater when I picked it up in Waterstones t'other day. The description pretty much read 'Dude stuck on mars, by himself'. You'd think there'd not be much to write about that amount of boredom, but it has very good reviews on Amazon.
Have you read [i]House of Leaves[/i] by Mark Danielewski?
It wasn't written in the 21st century, it's 700 pages, and it's only friggin awesome in parts. Scary as hell though - v celebrated book in the horror genre in recent years.
Finally got round to "Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep" ( the book behind Blade Runner) and it's really good.
Sorry got to disagree on that. Its a wonderful example of the film being far superior to the book on which its based.
Graphic novels are a maybe... No idea if I'd like them or not.
Sorry, reading back that sounded like a pissy comment, but I was serious. If you want something shorter, fun and easy to read I think it might be right up your street.
Marcus Sakey the brilliance saga is worth a look
Dark matter by Michelle Paver it's a ghost story rather than horror but is very atmospheric and pretty short, don't know the page count offhand but if thats too long then its the Beano for you.
Enjoying the brilliance series but they aren't exactly awesome, not like the Martian, the best review About from here "WorldClassAccident goes to Mars", which does sum it up nicely.
first of a trilogy but "the passage" by Justin Cronin is pretty damned awesome & I don't read horror (oops nearly 900 pages)
I know it bends your rules, but the short only 164 pages, "I am legend" by ricard matherson, is a friggin awesome book (don't judge it by the film), but is little older than you asked for (sci-fi horrorish)
All You Need is Kill by Hiroshi Sakurazaka would seem to meet your criteria
http://www.amazon.co.uk/All-You-Need-Is-Kill/dp/1421527618
270 pages
[url= http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Passage_(novel) ]The Passage by Justin Cronin[/url]
Paperback comes in at 1008 pages (edit: the[url= http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Passage-Justin-Cronin/dp/0752883305 ] french version[/url] does at least), I don't remember it being a particularly long book so maybe a 300 page count is a *tad* optimistic?
[url= http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Gone-Away_World ]'The Gone Away World' by Nick Harkaway[/url]. Ticks both sci-fi and horror boxes.
Not sure about page length though.
Finally got round to "Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep" ( the book behind Blade Runner) and it's really good.
Philip K Dick is generally amazing, I advise you read as much as you can of his stuff
The Passage by Justin CroninPaperback comes in at 1008 pages (edit: the french version does at least), I don't remember it being a particularly long book so maybe a 300 page count is a *tad* optimistic?
I'm reading that at the moment. It's pretty good. It started off very well, then dipped a bit, and now seems to be building up a head of steam again.
The English version is something like 980 pages, so well in excess of the OPs requirements.
I'd be looking for a collection of short stories, the series listed [url= http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Year%27s_Best_Science_Fiction ]here[/url] is a good starting point.
OK, the book itself is more than 300 pages, but the individual stories are considerably less.
Under the Skin - Michel Faber
304 pages for the paperback - so close.
195 pages
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224 pages
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202 pages
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Tigerman by Nick Harkaway is on my desk, 336 pages, about to start it.
Again Peter Hamilton, and again more than 300 pages, but
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I think the perfect book is...
The Attrocity Archives by Charles Stross and then the rest of the "Laundry Files" books.
Sci-fi/horror/urban magic/spy written with a sense of humour.
IME it doesn't matter how many pages long a book is - if it's good you'll want to keep reading.
My favourite book recently was Stephen Kings Joyland - and 288 pages long! Won't blow you away with awesomeness but just a really good story...
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If you haven't read it, I highly recommend Enders Game. One of my all-time favourite books from any genre and I'm not much of a reader these days.
Absolute classic.
TPTcruiser - MemberTigerman by Nick Harkaway is on my desk, 336 pages, about to start it.
Enjoyed immensely.
Colin-T - MemberI think the perfect book is...
The Attrocity Archives by Charles Stross and then the rest of the "Laundry Files" books.
Sci-fi/horror/urban magic/spy written with a sense of humour
I've just finished 'The Rhesus Chart' which is his latest 'Laundry' book - enjoyable, but from his blog posts it appears he's moving to a more 'ensemble' writing style instead of focusing on Bob, and that reflects it. Still, intelligently-written knockabout fun for geeks - what more could one want?
I was stuck on a delayed/cancelled train last night with no book, no mobile signal and my laptop, and thankfully I had a Kindle app downloaded on the lappy which had (for some reason not fully understood by me) only downloaded the Fuller Memorandum. It kept me sane for the 3 hours I was stranded.
I really enjoyed The Martian.
Currently enjoying The Humans by Matt Haig. Comes in at 290 pages so just in spec.
I really enjoyed The Gone Away World, mentioned above, but I recall it's a fairly weighty tome.
[i]"Consider Phlebas"[/i] the First book in the Culture series by Iain M Banks, a bit over your 300 page limit at 471 but pretty awesome Sci-fi IMO.
Got me hooked on the Culture series which I then polished off over the course of the last year (10 books)... just after Banks died unfortunately...
I'd also suggest "Wool" by Hugh Howey, except I think it's over 500 pages and is perhaps a bit iffy in parts, but it's neat Sci-fi concept worked up into novel form, and the start of yet another serial...
Just finished Departure by AG Riddle. Liked it.
A mate and I have had a number of conversations about SF books in the pub recently, especially about the size, and I reckon it's almost impossible to find books under 300 pages now.
Contrast with the books I used to buy in the early 70's, Roger Zelazny, Arthur C Clarke, John Brunner, Isaac Azimov, Larry Niven, et al, none of which were much more than 180-200 pages, then books like Niven's 'The Mote In God's Eye' started to appear, with 560 pages, and monster sized fantasy novels with over 600 pages, and the rot set in.
Thanks for the recommendations. Maybe the 300 page limit is a bit optimistic. It's not that I don't like reading. I read all the time. But if a long book slows down at any point I find it too much of a chore and eventually give up. If it's awesome all the way through I'll stick with it.
Have you thought about audiobooks, I can't recommend them enough, listen while you do other stuff (even cycling). Though I seem to struggle to get other ppl to take to them like I have. Again the Richard Matherson book or World War Z (again forget the film), are flippin brilliant in Audiobook format.