Im beginning to get very interested in her writing just by hearing stuff on this forum. Any suggestions on what I should start out reading of hers?
Start with We The Living or The Fountainhead. Rand is arguably more consistent in her early years then later on, so either of those will give you a good idea of her thought. After that, tackle Atlas Shrugged to flesh it out. Afterwards, Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology and Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand (by Leonard Peikoff) are good non-fiction materials on her thought. Also, other philosophers, including Chris Sciabarra, Douglas Rasmussen, Douglas Den Uyl, Tibor Machan, and Roderick Long, have been influenced by Rand in various degrees, and their works, although more difficult, are also worth pursuing.
Market anarchist, Linux geek, aspiring Perl hacker, and student of the neo-Aristotelians, the classical individualist anarchists, and the Austrian school.
Kelley's The Logical Structure of Objectivism is worth checking out too and is up online, in unpublished form.
Freedom of markets is positively correlated with the degree of evolution in any society...
Funny story here...So I just bought my first Ayn Rand book and I went with 'We the Living'. I run into my English/Humanities teacher who is a hardcore obama maniac, all about universal health care and is as far left as they get here in Texas. She is one of my favorite teachers and is one of the most loving individuals I know but shes just kinda screwed up in the head when it comes to fiscal policy...anyway, she asks what Im buying and I show her. Shes pretty amazed and is like 'wow, I cant believe youv heard of her blah blah blah Im so impressed'..and then she says "I have the Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugg but have never read either. Its just so hard for me to read her stuff when I think about how big of a capitalist she is." I had to bite my tongue when she said that, but I am pretty sure she thinks im a socialist like she is because all of my papers bash bushes administration, I write about how ridiculous the patriot act, how stupid the war in Iraq is, etc etc, and the way she said 'capitalist' was so mocking.