Your Top 10

I read frivolous stuff to escape. Can't remember any of the titles.

chompers said:

I read frivolous stuff to escape. Can't remember any of the titles.

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More or less my story...

I have favorite books, but a lot depends on my mood, or what category we're talking about, or how much nostalgia tainting is acceptable when compiling a Top 10 list. In other words, any list I compile would probably be meaningless outside my own head... and I can pretty much guarantee that none of the titles have any relation to great literature, outside raw entertainment value.

What can I say? I'm a simple creature. But, in the interest of killing time, I'll list a few that linger in the memory:

The Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn trilogy (photo-finish with the Shadowmarch quartet), by Tad Williams.
Jeremy Thatcher, Dragon Hatcher, by Bruce Coville.
The Bartimaeus trilogy, by Jonathan Stroud.
The Temeraire series (mostly books 1-5), by Naomi Novik.
The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle, by Avi.
Hatchet, Brian's Winter, and Brian's Return, by Gary Paulsen.
The Way of Kings, by Brandon Sanderson.
A Song of Fire and Ice (the first three, so far), by George R. R. Martin.
The Lord of the Rings trilogy, by J. R. R. Tolkien.

That's only nine... or significantly more than 10, by individual books, but it's all my brain's coming up with at the moment.

Brightdreamer said:

Hatchet, Brian's Winter, and Brian's Return, by Gary Paulsen.

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Wow, I didn't know Gary Paulsen had continued on with the story of Hatchet. I remember reading that book, but only because it was required. It bored me to tears. haha One man's trash is another man's treasure...

chompers said:

Wow, I didn't know Gary Paulsen had continued on with the story of Hatchet. I remember reading that book, but only because it was required. It bored me to tears. haha One man's trash is another man's treasure...

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There's some personal nostalgia with that choice - it helped me through a Very Difficult Time. And, yes, he continued it... though he should've stopped after Brian's Return, IMHO.

A good list, Jacob, though I'm no fan of Fitzgerald. But I'd put Monte Cristo at the top of my great novels list, and happy to see that you rate it highly as well.

caw

I liked Hatchet, consider it one of my favorites. Along with Ladies and Gentlemen, Lenny Bruce! (non-fic) and Stone City and The Stand and. . .

Prime example of eclectic tastes. Or would that be, no accounting for taste? Dubious tastes?

Counting series/trilogies as one book... and in no particular order...

One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Eva Luna by Isabel Allende
Four Ways to Forgiveness by Ursula K. LeGuin
The Sharing Knife: Beguilement by Lois McMaster Bujold
Kushiel series by Jacqueline Carey
My Family and Other Animals series by Gerald Durrell
Samaria series by Sharon Shinn
Troubled Waters by Sharon Shinn
Hyperion quartet by Dan Simmons
Mars trilogy by Kim Stanley Robinson

No particular order:

The Lord of the Rings--JRR Tolkien
Catch-22--Joseph Heller
The Blue Castle--LM Montgomery
The Perilous Gard--Elizabeth Marie Pope
The Daughter of Time--Josephine Tey
A Wrinkle in Time--Madeleine L'Engle
Something Wicked This Way Comes--Ray Bradbury
Pride and Prejudice--Jane Austen
The Hangman's Beautiful Daughter--Sharyn McCrumb
Street of the Five Moons--Elizabeth Peters

Well, I don't know if I'm supposed to list the top 10 best books in my opinion or if I'm supposed to list my top 10 favorites, but the latter is far easier, so that's what I'll give you. Keep in mind, however, that the list changes almost constantly. Today, it goes something like:

1. The Adventures of Augie March by Saul Bellow
2. A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again by David Foster Wallace (I don't know if non-fiction is allowed, but I otherwise stand by this pick)
3. The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen
4. Go Tell It On The Mountain by James Baldwin
5. Portnoy's Complaint by Philip Roth
6. A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers
7. The Broom of The System by David Foster Wallace
8. Mercury by Ariana Reines
9. White Teeth by Zadie Smith
10. The Crucible by Arthur Miller

I liked Hatchet and I I could still vividly recall that scene where he dives down to the crashed plane in the lake (still traumatized).

My top ten books (in no particular order):

Seabiscuit by Laura Hillenbrand
The Silmarillion by JRR Tolkien
The Alanna quartet by Tamora Pierce
Paladin of Souls by Lois McMaster Bujold
Kushiel's Dart and the other Kushiel/Imriel books by Jacqueline Carey
Candide by Voltaire
Summer Knight by Jim Butcher (my favorite from the Dresden Files)
Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows by JK Rowling
The Killer Angels by Michael Shaara
Dealings with Dragons by Patricia Wrede

Some books, in no particular order:

The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald
To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
The Shining - Stephen King
Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
Gone Girl - Gillian Flynn

I don't know if I have 10, but here's my top:

A Thousand Splendid Suns - Khaled Hosseini
The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
Angelfall - Susan Ee
Hamlet - Shakespeare
Kafka On The Shore - Haruki Murakami
Norweigan Wood - Haruki Murakami
Before I Fall - Lauren Oliver

1. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
2. Little Women
3. A little Princess
4. Horatio Hornblower
5. Treasure Island
6. Jane Eyre
7. Harry Potter
8. Little House on the Prairie
9. The Truce at Bakura (a Star Wars Extended Universe book)
10. Green Eggs and Ham (the first book I ever learnt to read)