I can't really decide, but here are a few of my favorites.
* Song of Ice and Fire series. I never really liked fantasy but this series is wonderful. The TV-series (Game of Thrones) is okay but a far cry from the books.
* The Pragmatic Programmer. The best programming book I've seen. A must read for programmers I'd say.
* Introduction to Algorithms. Haven't really gone through it but so far it's been great.
I thought the series was almost a word-for-word summary of the first book, and was extremely well made, even though fitting 9 characters into 10 episodes is a tough thing to accomplish.
I've seen the series and read the first book and thought it did a pretty good job. What do you feel the TV show got wrong- not being argumentative btw, I'm just interested!
My only major inaccuracy is re: Sansa Stark. I found her to be a well-intentioned yet manipulated and confused child in the books. She just wants to be a quintessential 'Lady' - courteous, artful, etc.
In the show they made her out to be... American. Rude, spoiled, etc. Other than that I just wish they had the time and the audience to tell the FULL story in all it's glory. Of course it's expected that the sub-plots have to be trimmed of the minutiae, but the complexity and ambiguity is part of what makes ASoIaF so amazing.
Fair question. After initially seeing Sansa represented this way, I began to ask myself "Why would they do this? What advantage does it serve?"
Using the common motive of "making the show appeal to a wider [American] audience," it seemed to me that they wanted her character to hit closer to home than a polished young lady would. Of course, my opinion is just a shallow one - a thought in passing.
Thinking on it now you are probably right to question me on my association of 'rude and spoiled' with 'American,' but that was just my gut reaction. FWIW, I'm an American with minimal knowledge of the demeanor teenage girls from other societies, Western or otherwise.
I agree the TV show was pretty well made, but it just wasn't as good as the book. Obviously you can't include everything in the series and it just felt kind of flat sometimes? It generally gave a different feeling from the book I'd say, maybe not better or worse but I preferred the book more. And I really disliked all the fighting scenes from the show - in my mind they were so much cooler.
* Song of Ice and Fire series. I never really liked fantasy but this series is wonderful. The TV-series (Game of Thrones) is okay but a far cry from the books.
* The Pragmatic Programmer. The best programming book I've seen. A must read for programmers I'd say.
* Introduction to Algorithms. Haven't really gone through it but so far it's been great.