I wish I could say I read as much as others here, but I'm slow and lazy. I'll mention one, though... Roughing It by Mark Twain. It's a grab bag of stories abou

I wish I could say I read as much as others here, but I'm slow and lazy. I'll mention one, though... Roughing It by Mark Twain. It's a grab bag of stories about his journey west without much of an over-arching plot. Though one of his earlier novels, it already has his distinctive humor and a command of English you could drown in, like this: "A growing warmth suffused the horizon, and soon the sun emerged and looked out over the cloud waste, flinging bars of ruddy light across it, staining its folds and billow caps with blushes, purpling the shaded troughs between, and glorifying the massy vapor palaces and cathedrals with a wasteful splendor of all blendings and combinations of rich coloring."