I tried reading the books and rapidly gave up in the face of monologues that were a) repetitive, b) served as an obvious mouthpiece for the author's right wing views and c) went on for literally pages without a break (seriously, who the hell talks like that in real life unless they're giving an actual speech?)

So I stuck to the show, which is awesome and 1,000 times less rapey and more feminist than the books. And on that note, these posts here and here might be relevant to your interests. [ETA: or here and here on LJ.]