Is Bigger Better? The Longest Books I've Read

How many times did I say "chunky" in this video?
00:00 Intro
02:10 Books 15-11
04:14 Books 10-6
07:03 Books 5-1
10:11 Is Bigger Better?
10:25 Outro
SUPPORT THE CHANNEL (Buy me a new chunker!)
Amazon Wish List: www.amazon.com/hz/wishlist/ls...
FIRESIDE DISCORD
/ discord
TWITTER/X
@BooksFury
GOODREADS
goodreads.com/redfurybooks
Please LIKE, COMMENT and SUBSCRIBE! And check out some of my past videos!
Thanks for watching!

[@jach2513]

I read the Lord of the Rings when I was 11-12 (it took 7 months) and I had a paper bound version of all 3 in one. By the time I had finished it, large sections fell out in the Two Towers.

[@meruem6498]

Your version is the original Lord of Rings version. It was meant as one book, but due to a paper shortage after war in Great Britain, it was divided into three parts

[@fatman9468]

Ironic…

[@Mornings]

Based.

[@dylanduke2018]

@@meruem6498 They definitely did it for money.

[@gunnerdoo2573]

Large sections falling out of two towers? Reminds me of that tragedy

[@PhilipChaseTheBestofFantasy]

🎼"I like big books, and I cannot lie . . ."🎶🎵I thought you would appreciate the musical reference, Josh! 😁

[@SlayronReads]

Love it Phillip 😂 great to hear you’re enjoying one piece by the way!

[@PhilipChaseTheBestofFantasy]

@@SlayronReads It’s so much fun!

[@RedFuryBooks]

A dirty little secret is that I’ve done that musical number at karaoke before! 😂

[@lauraann7816]

Good one 😂

[@stevehoran6011]

I’m reading a chapter a day of War and Peace and since there are nearly 365 chapters it will take me almost the entire year, having started Jan 1

[@RedFuryBooks]

That’s a really cool way to read that book

[@s.johnson7298]

I'm doing that too, it is really amazing! It has changed the way I read.

[@duromusabc]

Chinese epic novels too (in English translation) 1- Romance of 3 Kingdoms (120 chapters ) - around 2,200 pages long 2- Dream of Red Chambers (120 chapters ) - around 2000 some odd pages 3- Water Margins (100 chapters or 120 chapters ) - around 1,900 to 2000 some odd pages long 4 - Journey to the West (100 chapters) - around 1,900 some odd pages long Whew 😥!

[@RedFuryBooks]

Wow! Do you recommend any of these? I haven’t read much Chinese literature but am enjoying Jin Yong’s series.

[@duromusabc]

@@RedFuryBooks I recommend all of them - they’re 4 of the most famous works of classical Chinese literature

[@duromusabc]

@@RedFuryBooks Jin Yong novels are number 5 after these 4 works - they inspired many of Hong Kong’s Kung fu tv series and movies back in the 70s 80s and 90s decades

[@KnjazNazrath]

If there were decent translations of those books I'd be all over them. Been tryin' to find a decent translation of the Water Margin for so long I've legit ended up havin' to resort to a podcast instead. When I say "so long", I mean I wanted to read it ever since Suikoden came out.

[@melvinshaw7574]

I have the Moss Roberts translation of Three Kingdoms which is a two volume affair, with a combined page count of 1096. It's a phenomenal read, but it's very dense.

[@DutchGreyBeard]

What a great video, Josh! Yes, more words gives an author more ‘space’ to induce emotions, life-span and real experience.

[@ExLibrisbyMikeBooklover]

Great video Josh! I was glad to see favourites of mine making your list and I should probably start reading the Stormlight Archives at some point. I tend to love big books myself and I 'm not afraid of tackling them, the only problem being often not being able to concentrate and immerse myself due to adult life and its everyday problems. It was just last summer that I managed to read War and Peace, took me about a month - part during my vacations part during the summer lull at work and family.

[@RedFuryBooks]

Yes, I agree that the chunky books have to read at the right time. It’s definitely a challenge if you can’t read them consistently.

[@SlayronReads]

Love a long chonky book I can get immersed in! However scheduling wise I usually put them towards the top half of the year (reading time shrinks in the fall) Happy reading Josh!

[@RedFuryBooks]

Thanks! Yeah, I have to time my chunkers too!

[@ToddsBookTube91]

I want to introduce myself, Todd here. I heard other booktubers mention your channel so here I am! I started reading The Blackest Heart by Durfee and that is a big book too! You mentioned lots of great books!

[@RedFuryBooks]

Thanks for stopping by! I read The Blackest Heart a week ago, but filmed this beforehand, but I bet it would’ve made the list.

[@BookishChas]

This was a great video idea Josh! You’ve got a lot of good ones on here, and many I still haven’t read.

[@RedFuryBooks]

Thanks, Chas!

[@adnanferdousleo9528]

Such a wonderful video . Thankyou for your video

[@RedFuryBooks]

Glad you enjoyed it!

[@BooksWithBenghisKahn]

Loved this! Huge chunky books can intimidate me so many on here are still on my tbr besides the Sando ones-but I should take the plunge on them at some point!

[@jordonvh91]

I really enjoyed this video. I was looking at the shelves for missing books to guess what was coming up. Only got A Dance With Dragons before the reveal lol.

[@RedFuryBooks]

Haha awesome

[@ReadingIDEAS.-uz9xk]

Planning on reading the Count of monte Cristo this year. Best wishes with your reading choices. I hope you are reading something good.

[@RedFuryBooks]

Thank you, and I hope you love the Dumas as I do.

[@katm8128]

It’s my favorite and I was thrilled to see it in this video! I always suggest to read the penguin classics edition, as that translation is the most faithful to the original

[@GilbertHorn1]

Read this great book four times. Expect to read it again.

[@lauraann7816]

This is a cool video-- I love crazy little tidbits about things. TFS 😊

[@RedFuryBooks]

Thanks for watching!

[@bpuryea]

I've read Battlefield Earth twice and thoroughly enjoyed it both times.

[@RedFuryBooks]

Good to know some people still enjoy it! I’ll be going in open minded.

[@esmayrosalyne]

Dang, you've read some chunkers! Happy to hear that so many of these were 100% worth the time investment. I am personally really eager to read IT still, and Monte Cristo is one of those eternal TBR veterans hahah. Great video!

[@RedFuryBooks]

I hope The Count of Monte Cristo breaks through the "eternal TBR veteran" stack! (And I'm stealing that phrase! :)

[@esmayrosalyne]

@@RedFuryBooks Hahah, I am honoured to have you steal my words ;))) And I certainly hope Monte Cristo will break through sometime soon

[@redeagle999]

I live the Penguin cloth editions! Love big books.

[@Talking_Story]

Thanks for cracking the code on this question.

[@RedFuryBooks]

haha not sure if I did!

[@Thecatladybooknook_PennyD]

Yes they are!😅 I love big books and have since I was a teenager!

[@RedFuryBooks]

SAME

[@ZOMGfantasy]

Awesome video as always Josh! Not that it matters much, but I feel like the Shogun word count is vastly underestimated! It's a 53hr audiobook. Average of 9100 words per hour = 482k words!

[@RedFuryBooks]

CRAZY! Not sure if you’ve read Clavell’s Gai-Jin, but I’m reading it now and it feels WAY longer than even Shogun!

[@Johanna_reads]

Interesting results! We have very similar Stormlight feelings! Aside from Lord of the Rings, I think Toll the Hounds with 392,000 words is up there as the longest book I’ve read (it’s not my favorite book in that series).

[@RedFuryBooks]

Yes, those Malazan books will disrupt this list if/when I get to them!

[@heatherauton655]

My fav chunky is A Suitable Boy by Vikram Seth at over 591,000 words. Even a poem apologising for its size. 10 stars and a fav re read.

[@harrysumption430]

Great video. Counting the Lord of the rings as one book makes a lot of sense. The crazy thing is, you could use a similar logic to count a Feast for Crows and a Dance of Dragons together as that was the original vision which would make it extremely long. Same thing with the first 3 Dune novels. As they were, of course, all originally meant to be one giant book as well.

[@RedFuryBooks]

That's a great point about Feast and Dance - I think it was the publisher's idea to separate them, not GRRM's.

[@skraper35]

Enjoyed the video. I wonder what the stars per word would be compared to shorter books. A ‘bang for your buck’ analysis.

[@RedFuryBooks]

That would be hard to track but would be REALLY interesting!

[@aidanm.655]

Count of Monte Cristo took me 6 months to read when I was in grade 10 (I’m now in 3rd year University) and it’s by far the most rewarding book I’ve ever read. The ending is one of the most beautiful and meaningful of any book I’ve come across. It’s a journey to get there, but I remember having goosebumps at the end. Nothing beats the revenge of Edmund Dantes. One of the greatest books ever written (and also one of the longest). Glad to see another admirer of such a masterpiece.

[@RedFuryBooks]

100%!

[@iangubeli]

Bigger the page count, better the read in my opinion! I tend to look for larger books in general. You may appreciate Leaf x Leaf’s video on big books. He has some amazing picks on his list!

[@RedFuryBooks]

Oooh, I’ll definitely have to check that one out. Thanks!

[@emilywest1116]

My longest book I’ve read by far is Victor Hugo’s Les Miserables. Over 800 pages 😳. My problem with Hugo is that he takes 10 pages to say what he could’ve written in 1 paragraph.

[@RedFuryBooks]

Yes, I agree, there is always some "fat to trim" in Hugo's novels. Oftentimes entire chapters should be cut in my opinion!

[@jamestillman5247]

There is a huge gap in the publishing world for a publishing agency that can get the rights to create Abridged versions of the best novels of all time that people would appreciate a trimming by a keen editor's hand. If the Stand could be edited to under 800 pages I would finally read it. So many writers while talented take way too much liberty in describing the same scene for multiple pages. This is terrible for a couple of main reasons. 1) Brevity is the soul of wit. If you cant say it in one page then you are only elaborating on an unfinished thought til you feel you've written enough. 2) A reader can't feel like they are treading water. To read is to go on a journey. Can you imagine a journey where in the middle of a great bit of action you see the same set of trees move passed you for 5 minutes? It's like that for a lot of readers unless they have a thing for admiring someone's prose. But last time I checked that's not why we read fiction books. Some things deserve a little elaboration some things don't. It also leaves less room in your book to paint a story of the rest of your world. Multiple little details add up in a readers mind as they are imagining the events unfold and they process together to create a unique and complete world. These are my opinions but I feel they are based in a sensible reality that is echoed throughout the community of book lovers. Take care my fellow worms.

[@tinderbox218]

I read War and Peace entirely while commuting to and from work on the NYC subway. I don't remember how long it took me but it was less than a year and it was not a chore.

[@_KondoIsami_]

I started this video thinking it's crazy to read such long books, but it would be nice if I could read longer books. Well it turns out I read all the books you listed but I didn't even realize that they were that long because I got them as ebooks lol

[@RedFuryBooks]

Oh yeah - the ebooks can deceive you as to how long they are!

[@kevin.jenkins]

Hey Josh, nice video. I myself prefer the bigger books as I feel I usually get more out of them. Just wanted to let you know that the word counts here are way off 😂 I'm assuming you used the website that estimates word count based off the audiobook, but it doesn't seem to be very reliable when I've used it. Here's the "actual" (closest) word counts I could find. It's always crazy to me how many words are actually in these books Sho-gun - approx. 435k words (couldn't find an actual word count but the audiobook is done by Ralph Lister, who did Memories of Ice, which is 44 hours and 358k words, so I just adjusted it for the Sho-Gun audiobook which is 53.5 hours) Les Miserables - 531k words The Way of Kings - 383k words Under the Dome - 299k words Don Quixote - 430k words Words of Radiance - 403k words Battlefield Earth - 429k words A Dance with Dragons - 422k words (A Storm of Swords should also be here, as it's 424k words) The Stand - 472k words IT - 444k words Rhythm of War - 470k words Oathbringer - 462k words Lord of the Rings - 455k words Count of Monte Cristo - 464k words War and Peace - 587k words

[@RedFuryBooks]

587k is insane! Where did you find accurate counts? Granted, I didn’t search too hard, but the first three google hits were all so different, I just used one site that had all the books, so I could at least compare apples to apples.

[@marcusmusings]

the two longest books I've ever read (in terms of word count) are Atlas Shrugged and War and Peace, which were meh for me, but I love the majority of the chunckers I have read

[@angelaholmes8888]

Under the dome is the second book by Stephen king that i ever read i really enjoyed it i decided to give kings books a try because of the tv adaptation of under the dome words of radiance is my favorite book in the stormlight archives

[@BrianBell7]

Excellent video and great idea. I love Sanderson's books for the most part, but I agree entirely with the bloated nature of some of them. I thought I'd read War and Peace but now that I think about it, it might have been Crime and Punishment... I think it was back in high school or shortly thereafter. I remember it having zero magic system.

[@RedFuryBooks]

Yeah, Tolstoy wasn’t big on the magic system thing 😆

[@smilie3436]

For me its all about diversity. Long books are amazing to get lost in and to really know the character but then I have to go for some shorter ones in order to keep the rhythm going. That being said, I just finished a fanfiction that contains over 520,000 words. After a quick research I believe the longest („singular“) book I’ve read to be the Bible. It took me way too long (for someone not really religious its hard to keep up morale tho), but that will probably be my proudest reader moment for a long time😅 Thanks for making me look that up!😂😊 Awesome video :)

[@RedFuryBooks]

I'm glad you enjoyed the video! I too enjoy the shorter "palate cleanser" types of books.

[@stevegilhool8526]

I love this concept. Great video! Now I have to see if my chunkers rate higher than average. Which site did you settle on for the word count?

[@RedFuryBooks]

I honestly can’t remember which site I used, and I’m out of town so I can’t look at browser history. It was readinglength or something with a title like that.

[@jenniferlarregui3315]

I get so excited when I see a thick book but I open it right away to see why is it big. If it has large font or big spacing. I just put it right back on the shelf. If needs to be small print and tight spacing for me to read it. lol

[@RedFuryBooks]

HA! You shouldn't discriminate against the large fonts lol

[@Cyborg_1612]

Wanna give a shoutout to the Dune series, even though it’s not that high in word count the books are so dense with really complex information that reading it feels twice as long as it should

[@jekw23]

I second that. There’s two books worth of information squeezed into each novel. You need to think about what Herbert isn’t saying, not just what he is. And I struggle with that.

[@paingwen1235]

I love the way you review books, it just feels very homey and close

[@RedFuryBooks]

Thank you - glad you like my review style!

[@gabekarl82]

i am still reading war and peace, i have the same edition as yours, trying to annotate it but it's hard ... at first i would not last 100 pages but i carried on, felt like i am watching a period piece on Netflix ... thanks for doing this, i am going to continue stormlight archive now that book 5 coming out soon i might get that count of monte cristo

[@RedFuryBooks]

I hope you love the Dumas!

[@derekhively1210]

Great video, I just started getting into Brandon Sanderson👌 Also, has anyone ever told you that you look & sound like Bill Burr?😂

[@RedFuryBooks]

Haha I’ve heard I look like him but never been told I sound like him too! Now if I could just get paid like him… 😂

[@RRW276]

I think I've mentioned here that Shogun is in my top 5. As far as size, and so far, Shogun, Kingsbridge, Century Trilogy, IT and Swan Song are my biggest books. All of these books I personally rate a 5, except for the 2nd & 3rd books of the Century Trilogy I'd rate a 3.5 or just a thick hair under 4 lol. These days I'll only go for a large book if it's one I checked out (verified) and comes recommended by the influencers I follow. For example, I'm in the middle of The Winds of Winter, a book I've known about for a good 30 years or more... it's so dang good I can't believe I waited so long to pay any attention to it. Question for you. When you buy those nice collectors editions, do you actually read them? I typically don't and just admire the way they look on my bookshelf, and they're worth the price of admission lol! I recently paid nearly $150 for the same Shogun Blackstone edition, but I would still just go to my "reading copy that I've had since HS. And that mass market copy holds maybe more value due to the sentimentality as it was given to me by a close friend. Anyway, curious if you'll crack open that lovely grail version of LoTR 😉.

[@RedFuryBooks]

I generally do read the collectors editions. I did for the Dumas. As for LOTR I also have a nice set of Easton Press editions that I’ll likely use for my next reread. Only because that omnibus is HUGE!

[@dwokidol7354]

If you like long books, check out the Wandering Inn series, I'm on the 5th book and it's 1791 pages. There are chapters later on in the series that are 80,000 words long and it's brilliant character based writing

[@caitlinbrewer4843]

My friend once disappeared for a solid two months because he was doing almost nothing but sleeping, work, and reading those books. Then one day I woke up to find he'd bought me all of them on audible to listen to while at work.

[@RedFuryBooks]

Good to know- thanks!

[@klatchabobby]

To treat myself I read, in the last year, A Little Life, then a while later, It, followed by Infinite Jest (with Twilight bridging the gap between them) so I think I can confidently say I can handle long books now

[@paulwilliams6913]

For what it’s worth: last summer my friends and I read War and Peace together (a reread for me). One member of the group read the Pevear/Volokhosky translation and found it clunky and unpleasant, despite greatly enjoying the P&V translation of Anna Karenina (which I also loved). My point is that you may enjoy a different translation - I love the Ann Dunnigan translation but it’s a bit harder to find these days; the Anthony Burgiss is much loved, and I’ve heard great things about the recentish revised version of the Maude translation (published by Oxford World Classics), which updates the Maude translation for a more modern reader in terms of linguistic conventions without sacrificing the 19th century flavor. Or maybe it’s just not a book for you. I’m only mentioning it in case it interests you :)

[@RedFuryBooks]

This comment definitely interests me. I love the idea of different translations and have a life plan of rereading Crime and Ounishment every five years or so with a different translator. Thanks for the info - I’m screenshooting this comment.

[@paulwilliams6913]

@@RedFuryBooks good man - C&P is my favorite novel. My best friend has a PhD in Russian and says the Oliver Ready translation is the best on the market these days. Quick correction on my part: it’s Anthony Briggs who translated W&P in the 1990s (Anthony Burgiss was a novelist who loved Finnegan’s Wake…) Since you likeC&P so much, it’s worth noting that lots of people tend to naturally sift into either a Dostoevsky or Tolstoy camp. My best friend read W&P in Russian as a side project as an undergrad but struggled with C&P and didn’t like Dostoevsky until he put a ton of effort into understanding him in grad school. Le Guin straight up abandoned reading Dostoevsky when she was 25 but considered Tolstoy the finest novelist ever. And lots of people who naturally love Dostoevsky bounce off if Tolstoy. So while I encourage everyone to take a shot at W&P, it’s worth noting Tolstoy may not suit your natural temperament. But if you want to put in the work then I definitely say go for it :)

[@RedFuryBooks]

@@paulwilliams6913 this is all great to know! And although I did enjoy Anna Karenina for what it is, I think I’m firmly in the Dostoevsky camp.

[@paulwilliams6913]

@@RedFuryBooks it’s a good camp to be in. Hopefully you’ll get to The Idiot and Brothers Karamazov someday :)

[@ryanw6493]

There’s room for both! I love Tolstoy and Doestoevsky! That said, I do think War & Peace was my favorite, but Brothers K was a close second. I have only used Constance Garnett translations, mostly because they were free on Kindle.

[@xxjcipes]

Pretty sure the uncut version of the stand is much closer to the 450k words mark, but great video overall! I also love big books 📖

[@RedFuryBooks]

Thanks! And yeah, I think the website I used was a bit off with the word counts.

[@sandboxplayerz667]

@@RedFuryBooks Yes, the Stand is 470k words, and "War and Peace" 550k.

[@katm8128]

Count of Monte cristo is my favorite book of all time! Especially the penguin classics Robin buss translation, as far as I know it’s the only fully uncensored and unabridged one, as it was translated from scratch in the 90s

[@RedFuryBooks]

The mastery of the Count of Monte Cristo is evident in that I read what's supposed to be a horrible translation, yet I still find it one of the best things I've ever read.

[@katm8128]

@@RedFuryBooksit’s amazing! It’s my favorite book of all time

[@random-stuff319]

@@katm8128 Planning on reading it soon!

[@malcolmhays2726]

Well, now I had to go look at my own library to see how my own thick books rank...I use a slightly different ranking system (A+ down to F). When I averaged the top 15 books in my library, the average is around an "A." So I would tend to agree that there is a correlation between quality of the book and the size of the book. However, my own list included more than one omnibus edition of series so I was looking at the series as whole. It also includes two collections o an author's works (H.P. Lovecraft and Harlan Ellison).

[@RedFuryBooks]

Thanks for the confirmation! I think most of us think that if it's really good, we can take more!

[@Californiansurfer]

❤❤55 years old, I read only big books now. Well, I write in them and take notes and love it. I also write down date and highlight. The only issue is that al my personals activity are in my books, it like my diary. I have warehouse and all my books are there, about 1200 now.. and growing .. right now reading Determinsim by Robert Saposky. Frank. Downey library friends of the library Used book section. 6pm to 8pm volunteer..

[@RedFuryBooks]

Nice! I do think that the larger books often have more impact when they are great than a lot of shorter ones.

[@klatchabobby]

Also, It by Stephen King is actually 444,000 words. You can check by uploading the epub files to word counter websites, I do that to check the actual word counts of every book I read because I've learnt to stop trusting websites that give their estimates because they usually end up being horribly wrong the longer the book is.

[@Gruzbee]

I would love to know what books those are under your set of Wheel of Time, because of the bokeh effect from your camera they're all just blurry enough that I can't read the titles.

[@RedFuryBooks]

They are the hardcover editions of the Wheel of Time. The dustcovers are from Juniper Books, made to fit the original hardcovers, and display SO MUCH better on the shelves.

[@jonny5488]

An easy way to solve these issues word count issues is to simply count the words as your reading.

[@RedFuryBooks]

Right! 😂

[@jamesaaron7211]

When I was 9-10 my mother (single mother/only child) was going through her Russian phase, so as was her habit she had me reading them too. Dostoyevsky, Tolstoy, Solzhenitsyn, etc. Not saying they are the longest books I’ve ever read, but I doubt anything will ever seem as long as those did.

[@RedFuryBooks]

I could so see that forming your perspective!

[@cynthiafialka]

My sister has always been convinced that the chunkers are better books. I, less so. I’d better not tell her about this video, I don’t like to prove her right. 😂

[@RedFuryBooks]

HA!

[@Tbac_1047]

Wow. For a moment I thought “Bill Burr is doing book reviews now?” No offense but disappointed that’s not the case.

[@RedFuryBooks]

Yeah, Bill Burr reviews would probably be more entertaining lol

[@philippxyz]

I love huge books. I'm almost almost at "To Green Angel Tower" which, I'm pretty sure is going to be the biggest book I've read so far

[@heidi6281]

I loved Green Angel Tower! There was only one section/chapter/plotline that could have been edited out. Come back here when you are done, I would love to know if you agree.😀

[@asdfasdf5695]

@@heidi6281 I'm assuming you're referring to the tunnels section which was also in TDC. Yeah, those sections needed some paring down.

[@heidi6281]

@@asdfasdf5695 yes that too, & the torturous time he spent in the Sithi kingdom playing that stupid game. Where was Tad’s editor??

[@asdfasdf5695]

@@heidi6281 I actually felt, after finishing the series, that Shent, or whatever it was called, had a legitimate reason. It foreshadowed the "big reveal" surrounding the prophecy. Misdirection and all that.

[@RedFuryBooks]

I’ll get to that one at some point

[@scottbilger9294]

The 4+ volumes of Stormlight Archives counts as one book. Same with Song of Ice and Fire (ie Game of Thrones)

[@duromusabc]

You recommend The Game Of Thrones epic novel (in 5 volumes ) ?

[@duromusabc]

And Robert Jordan’s iconic fantasy Wheel Of Time saga mega novel in 14 separate books published by Tor ?

[@RedFuryBooks]

Oh absolutely on both series!

[@artisans8521]

Yes.

[@johanjoseph4802]

There is one caveat to this though. We tend to give more chances to shorter books. So that it doesn't feel like a big waste of time if the book lets you down. We normally don't take such risks with Tomes 💚

[@RedFuryBooks]

That’s a great point

[@carlosfarina3665]

War and Peace 25% done with Les Miserables, Count of Monte Cristo, IT, Don Quixote, Three Musketeers, and Shogun still on my TBR. Let's add Brandon Sanderson for good measure 😂

[@RedFuryBooks]

Ha! Why not!

[@kieran8060]

Have you considered ever reading Samuel Richardson's Clarissa, the longest novel in the English language, over 0.9 million words?

[@RedFuryBooks]

I've never heard of it! And it frankly intimidates me!

[@mastersal4644]

These books are legitimate weapons. Re. Don Quixote - which translation did you read? The new one is better from my start of it (at least)

[@caitlinbrewer4843]

I keep a hardcover copy of The Stand by my bedside for this reason

[@RedFuryBooks]

Ha! True. As for the Don Quixote translation, I'm actually not sure which one I read, as I had borrowed it from my library.

[@BobsBookLog]

Re-read Edith Grossman translation! My favorite book of all time @@RedFuryBooks

[@liran.9153]

forbidden archeology is a pretty big book aswell

[@tpampe25]

He starting the video like Oh, gosh, how to say it without sounding so inapropria- alright! WHEN IT COMES TO BOOKS

[@RedFuryBooks]

Haha right?

[@toinenosoite3173]

What big books! Tbh, I have read several of those - sometimes unfortunately. However, I really would like to know what you liked about RoW, as I dnf'd it halfways in the middle of the "exciting" attack, as I found the book to be too full of nonsense and repetition ad nauseam. RoW was actually the book that totally finished my interest in BS - no more books of his ever. Not my cup of tea, simply, as I don't care about superheroes. Mistborn was okayish, I had really liked the first book of Stormlight, loved the second, and been fairly disappointed by the third. About War and Peace: I have now read tree fourths of it - luckily the Swedish translation is in four parts - and I will finish the book probably in a month. As you, I am not too impressed by the book, but our reasons seem to differ a lot. Myself, I like the general historical overwiev, but can't care less about the problems of the Russian nobility. To me, the biggest problem is the lack of human interest, i.e. who cares what happens to the one percent of Russian society or to a teenage girl with romantic fancies.

[@RedFuryBooks]

As for War and Peace, I just felt it was two books. And like you, I liked the historical parts of it, even if I would argue that Tolstoy is better at writing the characters and their stories. As for Rhythm of War, it still had a positive rating for me, but I felt was easily the worst book of the bunch. Major plotting issues and felt very very bloated.

[@shaf1485h]

I haven't started the longest book I've got. Marcel Proust In Search of Lost Time approx 3700 pages. War and Peace and Les Miserables are the longest books ive read.

[@RedFuryBooks]

That Proust scares me to be honest!

[@Henry-jp3mc]

Stormlight is good. If it was cut in half it would be excellent

[@RedFuryBooks]

Probably true!

[@snowmanofpoopp]

I've encountered a chunky one: "Gödel, Escher, Bach: an Eternal Golden Braid" by D. Hofstadter. Wonder if many people read it through:D not the easiest book to read. Of course it's non-fiction.

[@jamieshannon9809]

15 Shogun - Got - Not read. 14 Les Miserables - Got - Currently reading. 13 The Way Of Kings - Not got - may get. 12 Under The Dome - Got - Started reading but never finished. 11 Don Quixote - Got - Started to read but stopped. A tough read. 10 Words Of Radiance - Not got. 9 Battlefield Earth - Got - Started to read but stopped years ago. Will need to be reread. 8 A Dance Of Dragons - Not got. 7 The Stand - Got - Read but will need to do so again. 6 IT - Got (I think) but not sure if I have read it. 5 Rhythm Of War - Not got. 4 Oathbringer - Not got. 3 The Lord Of The Rings - Got - But is has been years since I read it. 2 The Count Of Monte Cristo - Got - Read but will need a re-read. 1 War & Peace - Got - Read but didn't enjoy it.

[@suburbanyute340]

LRH started a cult

[@mdavidmullins]

Your word counts are *way off.* According to Calibre (which actually counts the words in the ebooks, and in my experience matches exactly to reading length), the books in question total as follows: _Shogun_ is 437k (1,527 pp.) _Les Misérables_ is 479k to 619k depending on translation and probably supplementary materials. (1,674 pp. to 2,164 pp.) - Christine Donougher's translation (dumbly titled _The Wretched)_ is about 13% notes, so this probably delineates the difference. The 479k is probably the accurate total. _The Way of Kings_ is 385k (1,346 pp.) _Under the Dome_ is 336k (1,174 pp.) _Don Quixote_ is 429k (1,1500 pp.) _Words of Radiance_ is 456k (1,594 pp.) _Battlefield Earth_ is 418k (1,461 pp.) _A Dance with Dragons_ is 439k (1,534 pp.) _The Stand_ is 477k (1,667 pp.) _IT_ is 450k (1,573 pp.) _Rhythm of War_ is 462k (1,615 pp.) _Oathbringer_ is 455k (1,590 pp.) _LOTR_ is 555k (1,940 pp.) _The Count of Monte Cristo_ is 462k (1,615 pp.) _War and Peace_ is 600k (2,097 pp.)

[@RedFuryBooks]

Good to know - I wish that site had popped up in my Google search!

[@mdavidmullins]

@@RedFuryBooks Not a site. It's software fore ebooks.

[@RedFuryBooks]

@@mdavidmullins that explains it. Glad to know this software exists.

[@Kamakazi152.]

You'd think with ebooks being so prevalent, someone would have written a piece of software that could accurately measure the word count of a novel. I have to imagine most manuscripts written in the last couple of decades have been submitted to the publishers digitally, written in a word processor that already keeps track of that, so really the software would just have to check old novels that exist in ebook form.

[@RedFuryBooks]

Right? That seems like such an easy thing to do!

[@rausaen]

I think the longest I've ever read is Lord of the Rings. 1100 pages, but worth it. I want to challenge myself to read War and Peace, but don't know if I will get around to it.

[@tintinismybelgian]

Jerusalem is a long book. The middle section with the Dead Dead Gang is practically a book in itself.

[@planetgannet]

Love the chunksters.

[@RedFuryBooks]

100%!

[@travisolson9190]

How long does it take to read 900+ page books?

[@RedFuryBooks]

Most books I average 50-60 pages an hour, so a 900 page book is about 18 hours of reading for me.

[@jimlebiker]

It would be good to see a list of chunky non-fiction books.

[@RedFuryBooks]

That's a good idea - I don't do as much nonfiction reading as I used to, though.

[@feranmiolorundare7351]

2:13 I swear if I had read the physical version of Shogun there is no way I would have finished it. That is really intimidating.

[@RedFuryBooks]

Haha, yeah, it's a heavy book!

[@wolfme4030]

‘Better’ is subjective, but I am interested in hearing about the books that you have on the list.

[@TrynePlague]

I have "The Tale of Genji" sitting in my shelf, untouched, for like 10 years... 750000 words.. I just can't find the courage. Even though I had no problem with Lord of the rings or Three Body Problem trilogy.. I'm just afraid I won't be liking it and I hate not finishing what I started..

[@RedFuryBooks]

Good luck!

[@seabassdarapper]

An average book score at 4 feels a little soft. Like, are all these 5 star books you mention really equally as good as one another? Cause that seems statistically impossible

[@RedFuryBooks]

It all depends on the rating scale. My scale doesn't mean a 5-star book is perfect, but simply a book that I loved, so my ratings may score higher than some. I've seen others that will only rate a book 5-stars if they think it's their absolutely favorite book. Everything's relative.

[@Algorithm_Poison]

My wife likes to joke about my "nerd books". I like to open up the book she's currently reading and compare the font/spacing sizes to mine. Lol. Her's will be roughly the same thickness but mine is 3-4 times longer. She fines it annoying

[@RedFuryBooks]

Haha nice

[@bodine57]

Surprised there's no Peter F. Hamilton here. "The Reality Dysfunction" would be a perfect fit.

[@RedFuryBooks]

I haven't read Hamilton yet. Some day!

[@fabiancalderon6729]

Proof that size matters!

[@RedFuryBooks]

HA!

[@akellerhouse83]

You should read the book Going Clear by Lawrence Wright. That book will explain to you why no one should support L Ron Hubbard. I read a lot of memoirs by people who escaped from scientology, and I don't think I could ever read Battlefield Earth. I'm sorry. I'll get off my soap box now. Lol

[@EricMcLuen]

Hubbard appears in Sex and Rockets - a biography of Jack Parsons and the crearion of the JPL. Hubbard is presented as a con man.

[@RedFuryBooks]

Haha we’re all allowed some soapbox moments here and there 😆

[@akellerhouse83]

@ericmcluen5177 He is a total con man. I cannot understand how people listened to his garbage and decided to follow him.

[@DarkSydeSean1]

Maybe because I'm reintroducing myself to reading, but I feel really overwhelmed with big books.

[@RedFuryBooks]

That's valid, and there are a lot of amazing books that are shorter.

[@DarkSydeSean1]

@RedFuryBooks I just finished Starship Troopers today and I enjoyed it. I'm gonna read Gunslinger by Stephen King next.

[@DarkSydeSean1]

@@RedFuryBooks both of which are 200 something page books.

[@mwont]

Check out In the search for lost time - +4000 pages.. One of the longest novels ever written.

[@RedFuryBooks]

Sounds daunting!

[@dsmoons]

Wu Cheng'en "Journey to the West"

[@StElna]

Shogun is 438,000 words and The Stand is 470,000 words. It by King is 448,000 words. I checked them on Microsoft Word.

[@tintinismybelgian]

Something else that could account for some of the discrepancies between word counting systems is whether or not they take hyphenated words and count them doubly or singly.

[@SuperPlastered]

The answer for me is a resounding no. In fact, I find lengthy books in need of editing.

[@RedFuryBooks]

I agree with some books could benefit from stronger editing, but there are some that are absolutely perfect at their long length. (The Count of Monte Cristo to name one)

[@SuperPlastered]

@@RedFuryBooks I’ve read Dumas. He’s a MUCH better writer than those of the 1000 word crazy now days. It’s amazing how we can go back and reread those classics and they hold up. Sanderson, not so much.

[@ViriuZ7]

Did you forget about the wheel of time books? half of them would be on this list

[@RedFuryBooks]

The site I used didn’t list those books as high. This is definitely not scientific

[@Existomalus]

"Not everyone loves this book quite like I do." The Way of Kings has a 4.7 rating with 487,000 people rating it. Those are seriously impressive numbers. I think quite a few people love this book just as much as you, including myself.

[@RedFuryBooks]

I think my Way of Kings statement was less about the overall rating than how it's perceived in the series. I see a lot of people say they didn't like it as much as the others. But glad we both did!

[@HashtagNerd]

longest book ive read is around 500 pages, don't think that will be exceeded anytime soon.

[@TannerCLynn]

Is this Bill Burr's brother? LOL

[@TrueMiz]

I read Homestuck, so. *Shrugs*

[@eliotopian]

A big book is amazing if you love it. Or horrible if you hate it and keep being told “it gets so good! Keep going!” No. Dnf that thing! 😂

[@RedFuryBooks]

Haha right?

[@tintinismybelgian]

Jerusalem was a long read.

[@ailianr]

[laughs in danmei fan]

[@devanshi2193]

Surprised none of the wheel of time made it.

[@RedFuryBooks]

I think that's a result of the website I used! I had thought a few of them would make the list.

[@TheDigitalReader]

Forsooth, i think the fix is in! I mean really why would you read a 1000 plus page book that was crap, thats like having 1 slice of bad pizza and then eating the other 7 (and if anyone in the comments have ever done that, you've been hurt by something :0)

[@RedFuryBooks]

That's a great point about the book size, but I also don't know if I've ever had a bad slice of pizza!

[@TheDigitalReader]

LOL, cant argue with that, but what is the longest book you read all the way to the end that that was a stinker? I would be interested to know a list of your longest books that you did not like including DNFs@@RedFuryBooks

[@RedFuryBooks]

@@TheDigitalReader looking at my shelves, probably the lowest rated chunker I finished was The Pickwick Papers by Charles Dickens. Definitely not one of his best!

[@bryanhatcher5281]

Rating the greatest novel ever written by a human being 3 stars! 😳😬😂

[@RedFuryBooks]

I think I have good taste in books, but not all the time 😂