Visual Novels - a newbie

Cupid is a good one. And it's free!

g senjou no maou, chaos;head, yandere, stiens;gate, euphoria (very very graphic and dark it contains rape and gore) https://vndb.org/ this is a database for vn's and https://forums.fuwanovel.net is a great community for vn's and otaku games.

You can try SC2VN on Steam - it's free too :)
edit: I also recommend Serena (also free).

WORLD END ECONOMiCA series. They are kinetic (meaning no decision-making) but one of the best around.

I liked Cinders though I'M not very much into VNs... it has a nice fairy tale story and a lot of different endings, depending on the decisions you make.

You can try Planetarian. It's really short (4 hours, I believe) and has zero options to pick from, basically a kinetic novel. If you want something where your choices matter and zero porn content then you should try Ever 17, a classic game acknowledged by many.

A short and highly disturbing visual novel I'd recommend is Saya no Uta.
If you're into BL then also something like Togainu no Chi or DRAMAtical Murder

My personal favourite though is anything Nasuverse so my highest recommendations would be Fate/Stay Night and Tsukihime. They are quite lengthy though, probably the lengthiest I've played to date but very much worth it. And if you like either of them there are a lot of sequels, prequels, spin-offs, anime, manga, video games etc.

View attached image.

Ever 17 - best vn I "played"

I really liked The 39 steps! :3

Some very nice Victorian sleuthing and a very nice and pleasant VN to play! :O

I am only interested in two visual novels:
Along the Edge
STEINS;GATE

CLANNAD.

Long Live the Queen

Awesome suggestions everyone, thanks so much! I will come back here in the future when I have played some :)

OMGWTFOTL is short, and doesn't involve dating or sanity.

Shikkoku no Sharnoth and Sekien no Inganock from Liar-Soft. Utawarerumono from Leaf. But they are quite long, but beautiful grafic and story.

Snatcher for Sega CD.

Ace attorney

It's a little weird one, but Hatoful Boyfriend, it made me interested in the visual novel genre. Dating, but dating in this case means getting to know someone better, and all the little (~15 minutes each) stories will build up into a better, easier to understand world and unlock a (non-canon) storyline as well. The game sounds like a joke, but it is not one. If the birds bother you, I think you can switch them into proper people :)

Oh boy, I can echo a lot of the recommendations in here. I'll try to add some new ones.

Juniper's Knot is a short free kinetic (no choices) novel that can be downloaded from here https://dischan.co/downloads/
It's about a young boy that stumbles upon a demon that's been trapped in a magic circle alone for possible hundreds of years.

I enjoyed Harmonia (which is on Steam), and I'm soon going to play Planetarian, which is made by the same company. Harmonia is about a young emotionless android that awakens in the far future in a post-apocalyptic setting. He starts living among a peaceful village of people and starts to re-learn emotions.

I have to really really recommend Fault Milestone, I thought the characters are world were intriguing (with the caveat that the game can be prone to info-dumping). It's a fairly short game, maybe 10~ hours for each chapter that's currently out, and I thought the production value felt very professional for a game made by an indie team. Fault Milestone is about a princess and her retainer/bodyguard. Their kingdom is attacked, and they try to use magic to flee to safety but end up much further from home than they expected.

9 Hours, 9 Persons, 9 Doors is coming out on Steam next week, bundled with the second game in the series. It's written by Kotaro Uchikoshi, one of the guys behind Ever 17 (which was also recommended twice already). I consider 999 to be the best visual novel ever made, and a lot of fans of the series argue that Virtue's Last Reward, the sequel that's also included, is the best. Both games are fantastic examples of stories that could only be told in the visual novel format.

As far as plot goes, on the surface, both games included are pretty similar. Nine people wake up locked in a strange place with numbered bracelets strapped to their wrists. They are told that someone named Zero imprisoned them there, and forced to play a potentially deadly game involving the numbers on their bracelets. You play as one of the nine people, and you have to try to escape and discover Zero's true identity and motive.

During the game, you're asked to solve several puzzle rooms alongside the other characters. The room escape puzzles range from easy to very difficult, but VLR has an easy mode in case you'd rather just get to the story. The puzzles aren't random, so you can also just look up solutions if you get completely stuck. The puzzles are used as both an important part of the plot and a way to break up the segments of reading with something a little more active.

And there's no dating involved, but there is a lot of death and gore. No nudity, just a few skimpy outfits.

VA-11 Hall-A Interesting game in which you interact with the world through bartending
The Yawhg Really fun, quite short great to play with friends

I recommend SC2VN. It tells the story about the e-sports scene of Star Craft 2. If you're even slightly interested in pro-gamer's life, this will be something.

Steins;Gate is one of the best things I've ever played/read. The Nonary Games is out in 5 days, not played it but that is aparently up there in terms of being one of the best VN's there is. Danganronpa 1 & 2 are excellent murder mysteries, i'd highly recommend those.

Edit: Higurashi is excellent also but a lot heavier of a read compared to the above which have more gameplay.

You could try Blazblue. if u ever get too confused by the story, theres always the fighting game that definitely won't disappoint you.
I recommend you start with continuum shift EX (second game) because it's probably more interesting (more characters etc)
And if u like it, get chronophantasma :D

Even if you don't have gamepad, keyboard controls work well. the port is really excellent.

Forgotten, Not Lost - A Kinetic Novel - Short, very cheap with a touching story.
Lucid9 - It's ok, it's also free. Has a murder mystery storyline.
VA-11 Hall-A: Cyberpunk Bartender Action - Someone already recommend it but this is the latest one that I've played and it's great.