<p>This thread brought back some great memories and then wharfrat2 had to bring up one of the few books I could never get through (and which my husband loves). At least it wasn’t a series!</p>
<p>Wow…I’m right there with all of you, esp. fantasy and sci fi folks…Tolkien, all of Anne McCaffrey, all of Terry Brooks, all of Robert Jordan, all of David Eddings. S also loves R.A. Salvatore, but I haven’t gotten to him yet. (My fav Terry Brooks are the Magic Kingdom series too, with the original Knight of the Word books close behind.) Wow, I had forgotten that the Crystal Singer series (Killishandra) was Anne McCaffrey and I love her Freedom’s Landing/Freedom’s Choice, etc. series too, but nothing beats the Pern series.</p>
<p>Also, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, Harry Potter, Laura Ingalls Wilder, all of Louisa Mae Alcott (Little Men and Little Women). Most John Jakes books, esp. On Secret Service. Da Vinci Code and Angels and Demons (books are WAY better than movies). Oh and Ken Follett’s The Pillars of the Earth and World Without End. Interestingly, in Germany The Pillars of the Earth is the third most popular book after the Bible and the Lord of the Rings. </p>
<p>I always reread a book when I get to the end and feel sad that the story is over, like I’ve lost touch with people I care about. I’m 50, and I still want to be an author when I grow up. :D</p>
<p>Every summer I re-read Catcher in the Rye and Catch-22. There really is no relationsip between the two, except for the word “catch” in each title.</p>
<p>I really don’t remember how or why I started this little tradition, but I am now in my mid-50s and still reading those two books every summer. It seems like every time I pick up some little nuance that I hadn’t noticed before.</p>
<p>Thanks, srw and Centh, I am not feeling quite so silly about the Crystal Singer now!</p>
<p>Hhhmm, Sarah Caldwell, have to look for those. Centh and other fantasy folks, if you like Anne Mccaffrey, I know you will have at least tried Marion Zimmer Bradley’s OTHER series, the Darkover books. They are real classics like Zelazny’s Amber, but not mentioned much in this group.</p>
<p>lololu, you are not the only one who can’t read Tolkein. I’ve only read them because all the guys I know read them and it gives us books to talk about, but I’ve read JK Rowling more often. And I like Terry Pratchett, although I’m so busy reading all of his books that I haven’t had the chance to reread many of them yet. I tend to reread as each kid comes along and discovers an author that I’ve previously enjoyed.</p>
<p>emeraldkitty, I also like Mark Helprin’s books very much: Winter’s Tale, A Soldier of the Great War and Refiner’s Fire are my favorites; I don’t care much for his latest two.</p>
<p>I could only read Tolkein after seeing the movies (call me illiterate, but just too darned hard to follow without a picture of the characters and places in my head). After seeing the movies, D2 asked me to read them aloud (after she had read them to herself!). It took months, but we loved that read aloud experience. I can’t say I have an urge to read them again, though, life is short and there are so many good books waiting!!</p>
<p>When I was in middle & high school, I read Gone With The Wind so many times I think I still have it memorized. If I could only find a Gone With the Wind BOOK trivia contest, I could win some serious money…</p>
<p>Also reread Exodus by Leon Uris several times.</p>
<p>Now that I’m an adult I’m lucky if I get to read a book once.</p>
<p>I have read Aristotle’s Nichomachean ethics at least 4 times, Harvey Penick’s Little Red Book continuously(its on my coffee table) and McPhee’s Pine Barrrens any number of times. And lets not forget the Bible which is in the continual reading cue with Harvey!</p>
<p>Any other fantasy readers like Jim Butcher. I enjoy reading the Dresden Files. I heard there was a show but I never saw that.</p>
<p>This is a very dangerous thread. intparent, I didn’t realize a new Laurie King Russell/Holmes was coming out, you just cost me $16, darn you! ;)</p>
<p>No one’s yet mentioned the Lymond Chronicles, Dorothy Dunnett’s 6 volume historical saga. It was once described to me as part of the “tall, thin and tortured” genre. People either love it or hate it, in part because for at least the first 100 pages of the first book (The Game of Kings) you are thinking to yourself “what in the world is going on?” Not to mention quotations in various foreign languages and not a lot of handholding for the reader. If you’re not hooked by that 100 page mark, it’s not going to be your cuppa. If you ARE hooked, you’re going to reread all 2400 or so pages several times because you see new connections between events stretching over the six volumes every time you reread. </p>
<p>Going 180 degrees in another direction, the out of print Canadian children’s classic “The Secret World of Og”.</p>
<p>Whoa, Slithey, I’m not sure I’d list the Lymond Chronicles as books I could re-read, ;). They are wonderful, though, but definitely not everyone’s cup of tea. I read the last one (Checkmate) when I was about 15 or 16, I never truly understood what was going on, but just sort of wallowed in the romance. I got both sets on EBay, and The Game of Kings is in my to be read stack, this summer I’m going to plow through all of them. it may be out of print, but some truly obsessed person published a companion volume that helps with the allusions and the foreign language phrases.</p>
<p>When I finished the Lymond Chronicles (which I read mostly breastfeeding mathson) I knew I should reread them right away, now that I knew mostly what it was all about. But it was just too daunting. I never have reread them. I loved the plotting, but rereading for me is more about the characters and I just wasn’t that keen on the characters.</p>
<p>All the things I teach. Multiple times. In fact, each semester to be fresh.
So in that category:
“Billy Budd”, SCARLET LETTER, MOBY DICK, plus, plus.
HAMLET, MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING, TEMPEST, LEAR, MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM
The ILIAD, THE ODYSSEY, THE ANEID, “Beowulf,” “Gilgamesh” Ovid
TIME TRAVELER’S WIFE, HOCUS POCUS (Vonnegut)</p>
<p>Among many others.</p>
<p>Book I read the most times: LITTLE WOMEN.
Next: PRIDE AND PREJUDICE, PERSUASION.</p>
<p>Books I keep reading because I adore them and can never COMPLETELY master them:
ULYSSES, V., GRAVITY’S RAINBOW, AND THE GOLDBUG VARIATIONS (Richard Powers)</p>
<p>Book I’ve read the most just to read that isn’t girly: UNBEARABLE LIGHTNESS OF BEING
Book I pick up the most times and peruse: NINE SHORT STORIES (Salinger)</p>
<p>Pride and Prejudice
Don’t Shoot the Dog (dog training by Karen Pryor, with many life lessons)
Harry Potter series (usually when I’m sick)
The Enchanted Forest Chronicles (Patricia C Wrede, also when I’m sick)
Lang’s collected Fairy Tales (the Blue one is my favorite)</p>
<p>cangal, the entire series was republished sometime in the last decade, and is still in print. I felt lucky to learn about the series just before it was reissued. Various Dunnet boards were filled with earlier posts about people desperately searching for (expensive) copies in used bookstores. The companion guide was republished around the same time as an easily available paperback instead of just a little privately printed samizdat distributed among just the cognoscenti 
</p>
<p>mathmom, I can’t imagine Lymond as breastfeeding reading. Especially in the 4th volume. Especially that chess game in Topkapi. </p>
<p>I read the precursor series, but it didn’t grab me the same way.</p>
<p>mythmom, I want to take your classes! Will you add Gravity’s Rainbow in the syllabus so I’ll be sure to read it again?
:-)</p>
<p>I’m a bit surprised no one has posted Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Universe, I’m not a fan but I know a lot of ppl who are fan/atic/s.</p>
<p>Mrs Weasley:</p>
<p>How about a tutorial of one? My students are CC students and I wouldn’t want to sic GR on them.</p>
<p>But you! ::rubs hands in glee::</p>
<p>I actually did my dissertation of Pynchon, and it was very well received. By I thought I was skating on thin ice.</p>