Man. Actually reading through this thread, I realized I recognize a lot of the authors you guys are reading, and I feel dumb that I didn't realize I knew of them when I first read through the posts. I have a book by the author (T.C. Boyle) in the original post called "A Friend of the Earth." I bought it on discount years ago at B&N. And Liss read something by Chuck Klosterman. I just realized that is my recent ex's favorite author. He had his first girlfriend read one of his books, and a couple of days later she broke up with him.
Right now I'm reading these:
James Gibson's "The Ecological Approach to Visual Perception
Terry Pratchett's "The Colour of Magic"
Jose Saramago's "All the Names"