'Go To' Books you return to time and time again

[caspermac]

Hello,
I hope this hasn't already been talked about in another thread.
I was wondering if you have any books that you return to again and again?
Mine are the Belgariad and the Mallorean series by David Eddings, I must have read them all about ten or eleven times now. They're not the best books in the world but they're my go to books when I cant find anything else to read.

[Mutive]

I love the Hero and the Crown by Robin McKinley. It just makes me feel warm and fuzzy. I also LOVE the Iliad and have read it close to a dozen times. That said, I've read almost everything on my (very large) bookshelf at least twice.

[scarletpeaches]

Cross Stitch by Diana Gabaldon (4 times), Forever Amber by Kathleen Winsor (3 times), A Taste of Blood Wine by Freda Warrington (4 times at least).

There are others. I think of my go-to books as old friends.

[crunchyblanket]

Perdido Street Station by China Mieville
Insomnia by Stephen King
American Gods by Neil Gaiman

I'm sure there are others but those are the ones that spring to mind.

[Chris P]

I haven't re-read a book in years! Being a slow reader there simply isn't much time and there is too much else I want to get to.

However, I do plan on re-reading War and Peace and The Once and Future King at some point.

[RaineeRose]

Little Women

[Adam]

Terry Pratchett. No particular book. :)

[icerose]

I have go to authors but not go to books. There are far too many books out there to keep reading the same ones. Not to mention I remember too much of the story to make it enjoyable.

[Alpha Echo]

Little Women

This...but...

I have go to authors but not go to books. There are far too many books out there to keep reading the same ones. Not to mention I remember too much of the story to make it enjoyable.

This also. I have a stack of books I'd love to reread. Some from AP Lit that I loved or classics or just ones that I adore.

But I read so many books, and I love so many books, and new ones are always grabbing my attention. I have so many books on my to-read list that I'm always torn - do I read a new one or reread one I loved?

I usually go with the new one.

I've reread The Time Traveler's Wife and In Her Shoes. Little Women and Jane Eyre. Oh, and Cathy Lamb. I love her, and I've reread a couple of her books.

[robeiae]

The Dosadi Experiment by Frank Herbert
The Riddle-Master Trilogy by Patricia McKillip
Bored of the Rings by Harvard Lampoon
Inferno by Dante

[Satori1977]

I have a huge TBR pile, so I rarely reread books. But there are a few exceptions. Watchers by Dean Koontz. Don't even know how many times I have read it. Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen. Only read it twice, but I am itching to read it again. Then There Were None by Agatha Christie. Love her, love her books. She has so many I need to read, but I keep going back to this one. And I am starting to reread the first Harry Potter to my daughter.

[roseangel]

Terry Pratchett and Mercedes Lackey for me.

[William Haskins]

i re-read 6 books every year, without fail:

orwell's nineteen eighty-four and animal farm
twain's the adventures of huckleberry finn
golding's lord of the flies
camus' the stranger
voltaire's candide

these represent a sort of mini-canon for me.

[firedrake]

Rivals - Jilly Cooper
Eon - Greg Bear
The Great Game - Peter Hopkirk
Zemindar - Valerie Fitzgerald
Csardas - Diane Pearson

and, now and then

Lord of the Rings

[callalily61]

All 7 of Georgette Heyer's mysteries
HP Lovecraft
A half-dozen of Patricia Wentworth's mysteries
Bleak House, Our Mutual Friend, A Christmas Carol

[September]

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn - Mark Twain
Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
Rebecca - Daphne du Maurier
In The Night Garden - Catherynne M. Valente
Just about everything by Neil Gaiman

[scarletpeaches]

i re-read 6 books every year, without fail:

orwell's nineteen eighty-four and animal farm
twain's the adventures of huckleberry finn
golding's lord of the flies
camus' the stranger
voltaire's candide

these represent a sort of mini-canon for me....which is on my currently-reading pile right now.

[IdiotsRUs]

Terry Pratchett. No particular book. :)


Me too! I can remember the story, but that's not what matters on the re-read. It's how he tells it.

Also, Merchanter's Luck by CJ Cherryh. *sigh* A couple of her other books too--she's strangely hit or miss for me, but when she hits, hoo boy!

[Strychnine]

I usually re-read like this because I get all nostalgic about my intermediate/high school years, so I read Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy, Garth Nix's Abhorsen books, and Rebecca.

[Kitty27]

The Bluest Eye and Beloved By Toni Morrison

Invisible Man By Ralph Ellison

Anything By Donald Goines. A lot of my friends look down on him because his stuff is old school urban lit. But I love the realness and cred he brings. I grew up in that world in a different time,but the same issues he wrote about were still present.

Mama Black Widow by Iceberg Slim. A masterpiece and so heartbreaking but I can't stop reading it.

Interview With The Vampire By Anne Rice. I LOVE this book.

The Autobiography Of Miss Jane Pittman By Earnest Gaines

A Christmas Carol By Charles Dickens

[William Haskins]

The Autobiography Of Miss Jane Pittman By Earnest Gaines

what a fantastic book. read it several times as a teenager, and still vividly recall cisely tyson's excellent portrayal in the film.

[druid12000]

Clive Barker's The Great and Secret Show and Imajica. Both master works of art as far as I'm concerned. I've read both probably five times apiece and always find new tidbits that I missed the first few times.
Stephen King's The Stand, because it's brilliant and terrifying and can be read a hundred times.
Lovecraft. Anything by him. I don't really know why either. He's so dry, but it's delicious too.
Charles DeLint, Memory and Dream. The first of his stories I ever read and I was hooked.

[Mr. Anonymous]

I don't really have go-to books in the sense of reading and re-reading. However, for each of my novels I draw inspiration from other novels that I look upon as sort of older siblings to my own books.

For To Grandma's House With Socrates, I had in mind Catcher in the Rye (Salinger), and The Life of Pi (Martel), and Peter Pan (Barrie.)

For my wip novel, Away We Go, I have in mind Never Let Me Go (Ishiguro), The Lessons (Alderman), and A Separate Peace (Knowles.)

[Sunnyside]

The Grapes of Wrath. Every year. Maybe even twice.

[DreamWeaver]

Every October I read Roger Zelazny's "A Night in the Lonesome October."

Other books I re-read regularly:
The Lord of the Rings
All the Harry Potter books, but I've probably read The Deathly Hallows the most often.
Pride and Prejudice
Madame Bovary
The Last of the Mohicans
The Three Musketeers
Dune
Selections from The Complete Works of Shakespeare

[Mr. Anonymous]

The Grapes of Wrath. Every year. Maybe even twice.

was my favorite book for a long time, maybe still is. Haven't re-read it though, afraid it won't be as good as I remember it to be. Also, I remember steinbeck goes on about the weather for pages at a time, lol. Have less patience for that than I did when I first read Grapes, though he is a fantastic writer.

[caspermac]

I love Niel Gaiman, I might have to go and look out one of his books again. I read a lot of new material as well, but sometimes, when I'm not 'feeling' anything new I return to David Eddings. Or C.J Sansom's books

[Grrarrgh]

Once a year, I usually go through It and The Stand by Stephen King, Heart-Shaped Box by Joe Hill, the Harry Potter series, and And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie. I have a huge TBR, but I always make room for those.

Side note, I met Joe Hill at Comic-Con last week and he liked my T-shirt so much he made his son quit playing video games on his DS to come over and see it. Highlight of my year, possibly my decade. :)

[graywillow]

LITTLE WOMEN -- yes, re-read often.
ANNE OF GREEN GABLES -- golly, yes.
LORD OF THE RINGS -- I've read this too many times, the first "read" when I was maybe twelve, understanding a mere portion of it.
THE LITTLE PRINCE.
DUNE.
THE GREAT GATSBY.
PEACE LIKE A RIVER.

So many of the classics. There is no end to the list. I read a lot of Foucault philosophy.

One of my utter favorite, more contemporary novels is THE SHADOW OF THE WIND by Carlos Ruis Zafon. If you've never read, you must-must-must.

ETA: Those are specific books. I *always* return to Virgina Woolf diaries, and Margaret Atwood novels. They save me. :)

[caspermac]

I've never read little women but i really should invest in a copy.

[Vexen]

Let's see... Clan of the Cave Bear (too bad the series suffers from a bad case of Sequelitis (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/Sequelitis)) by Jean Auel. Insomnia, by Stephen King. When Christ and His Saints Slept, by Sharon Kay Penman.

[bearilou]

Dune by Frank Herbert
Different Seasons by Stephen King
Witch Hunter by C.L. Werner
The Scarlet Pimpernel by Baroness Orczy
Chronicles of the Black Company by Glen Cook
Anything by Robert E. Howard, especially Solomon Kane and Conan

[DreamWeaver]

Side note, I met Joe Hill at Comic-Con last week and he liked my T-shirt so much he made his son quit playing video games on his DS to come over and see it. Highlight of my year, possibly my decade. :) Ok, so describe this t-shirt. Or better yet--pictures!!!!!

[LJD]

you know, I haven't reread any books for a long time. so many new things to try.

But I had several such books when I was a kid. Anne of Green Gables, Emily of New Moon. Various Gordon Korman books. All-of-a-Kind Fmily. Ballet Shoes.

[Shadow_Ferret]

With so many books I haven't read, I don't see any reason to reread a book.

[Jamie Stone]

ANNE OF GREEN GABLES -- golly, yes.
DUNE.


Well, you picked my top two! I just finished rereading Anne of Green Gables and Anne of Avonlea and now I'm in the first half of Anne of the Island. I LOVE these books, they're sort of a guilty pleasure because I know there's not all that much literary merit--they're very much a slice of life sort of thing without suspense or major conflict or anything resembling a plot other than the fact that they follow this spirited girl's life--but they are just so amazing at taking me to another place and time. Dune's also fabulous and people complain about how sci-fi-y it is, but I've never been a fan of much sci-fi yet I love it for its characters, its world-building, its villains, and what it tells about human nature.

Anyways, the rest of my go-to list includes ALAS BABYLON (Pat Frank), LIFE OF PI (Yann Martel), DAUGHTER OF THE FOREST and SON OF THE SHADOWS (Juliet Marillier--not such a fan of Child of the Prophecy), HARRY POTTER (especially PoA, OotP, HBP, and DH), and... I think there are more but I can't remember them all right now.

Oh, CLAN OF THE CAVE BEAR is good, too! I enjoyed rereading them several times but I really didn't like Shelters of Stone and I don't think I'll bother to pick up the Land of Painted Caves. The first one was the best, then in the second one it seemed like Ayla invented every useful contraption known to man... Mammoth Hunters was better. I liked 1 and 3 the best.

[Jessianodel]

Harry Potter. They were what first inspired me to write so I always love re-reading them. Also; Touching Spirit Bear by Ben Mikaelsen, although the sequel wasn't as good.

[escritora]

The Bluest Eye - Toni Morrison
The Reader - Bernard Schlink
Like Water for Chocolate - Laura Esquivel
Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck

[screenscope]

George MacDonald Fraser's Flashman novels. I read them all again every few years.

[HuntfortheWildborn]

Tolkien's The Hobbit.

[mccardey]

Marilynne Robinson's "Gilead" - magical book! Also a quiet little thing called "Edens Lost" by Sumner Locke Elliott and "Tirra Lirra By The River" by Jessica Anderson. All three of them, lovely books - but Gilead is the one I'd want to be buried with.

[glendalough]

I love to reopen Under The Tuscan Sun and have quite a few dog-eared pages I go to quickly. It takes me to the villa I wish I owned in Tuscany.

Also, Memoirs Of A Geisha. I enjoyed it so much for my first reading, reading bits and pieces or starting it over takes me back to the first time I read it.

David Copperfield. I can read it from any page and go on and on, enjoying it.

[Max Vaehling]

Haven't re-read anything for a while because I'm way behind on my new books. But when I have the time, all my Neil Gaiman and Douglas Adams books are regular reads.

And Harriet The Spy. That one's an all-time (and all-age, so far) favorite.

Looking back further, there are some books I used to pick up more than once, but kinda reached my saturation point. Foucault's Pendulum by Umberto Eco is one of those. (If you don't know that one, it's The DaVinci Code for smart people.) Steinbeck's Tortilla Flat, and absolutely Huckleberry Finn.

I still re-read my comic books a lot.

[CheG]

Aria of the Sea by Dia Calhoun. It hits me every time.
Nausicaa of the Valley of Wind by Hayao Miyazaki.

And The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill is turning into one of those books.

Though lately I haven't had time to read much of anything...

[Duncable]

Oooh, I like this topic! I think I'll be stealing some of the books mentioned here and adding them to my reading queue. :)

Some of mine are:

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series, by Douglas Adams, who also happens to be my favorite author of all time (no matter how many times I read about the mattresses that flollop floopily, or about the real problem with time travel being which tense to use, I literally :roll:)

The Ender's Game series of novels (including the Bean-centered books) by OSC

Catch-22 by Joseph Heller

Clan of the Cave Bear series by Jean Auel (first two are phenomenal, third is decent, and after the 4th it goes downhill, but still some of the most fascinating books I've ever read)

The Great Gatsby by, umm...someone I can't recall and I don't feel like googling it. ETA: F. Scott Fitzgerald!

Harry Potter by J.K. Rowling (shut up you!!)

PS: In case you would like to :roll: as well, please enjoy the following excerpt from Restaurant at the End of the Universe: http://pages.cs.wisc.edu/~param/quotes/guide.html (I need to work on my HTML, I couldn't get the <a> tag to work for me...)

[justkay]

"The Color Purple" - Alice Walker.

"Bastard Out of Carolina" - Dorothy Allison.

[Max Vaehling]

Forgot some:

Making God by Stefan Petrucha - short, fast-paced, self-published book about how some media shark builds a religion from a psychotic's ramblings. From the guy who always took the weirdos' side when he was writing X-Files comics. Not the best, but since it's a very quick read, I've managed to squeeze it in every now and then. And it's fun.

Flyboy Action Figure Comes with Gas Mask, by Jim Munroe. First read it as a free download, then bought the book and read it again, not for the last time. Real-life superheroes with an alternative, activist lifestyle.

[stormie]

Time And Again (almost every winter) by Jack Finney

The Cider House Rules (almost every fall) by John Irving

Jaws (almost every summer) by Peter Benchley

The Great Gatsby (almost every summer) by F.Scott Fitzgerald

I don't think I have a "springtime" book.

[DragonHeart]

I don't reread as much as I used to but just like movies, there are a few books I turn to when I'm feeling sick/upset/depressed and need the comfort of some old literary friends:

Pretty much anything by Michael Crichton, but specifically The Lost World. First adult novel I ever read. Been years since I read it last but I can still recite entire passages by heart.

The Green Rider series by Kristin Britain. Pretty much everything about the series just kind of resonates with me.

Actually, that's about it as far as comfort books go. Most of the others I read when I was much younger and they no longer have the same comfort value as they used to.

[childeroland]

The Alice books. Most delightful use of fantasy tropes I've ever encountered. The riddles, the sadness of the need to grow up.

Pride and Prejudice. Austen's voice, the three-dimensionality of Darcy and Bennett (maybe the most delightful heroine of English literature along with Alice) and of their world.

Lolita. The language and the sadness, as well as the dignity which the heroine finally finds against all odds justify returning to this book over and over.

Shakespeare's plays. The verbal texture may well be the greatest the world has ever seen, as Nabokov said. The characters are certainly the most bottomless, the deepest, the closest to putting living, breathing flesh on the page.

The Inferno. Dante's b*tchy takes on his contemporaries especially makes this the most fun of the whole poem.

Ulysses. Proves that every person's story in all its particulars is a giant story, a Homeric epic. Plus, Bloom gets Molly at the end, and a son in the delightfully erudite Stephen; the good guy triumphs.

Homer's epics. The best adventure stories I've ever read, period.

The Narnia books. Just a world to live in.

[bkendall]

I have read The Winds of War by Herman Wouk, The Count of Monte Cristo, and the original Jason Bourne trilogy several times. Of course, there are others that I wish I could get back to but I never do. Even though I have an eidetic memory, that doesn't keep me from reading these over and over again. If I can read this book several times, it means the story is so great, I don't mind knowing what's about to happen. It's all about the journey of reading for me.

[fredXgeorge]

All the Harry Potter books, though DH most of all probably
The Hobbit
Helen of Troy by Margaret George

[Bookewyrme]

It used to be the Belgariad and the Mallorean for me as well, but I got so I didn't always have time to re-read the entire series in a go, and that's about the only way I'm capable of reading David Eddings. So now I'd say it's Bujold's A Civil Campaign, Shards of Honor and Paladin of Souls. I think I've re-read those three twice this year alone.

[synger]

The Riddlemaster series
The Deed of Paksennarian series
Dune
Secret Garden
Pride and Prejudice
Eight Cousins (Alcott)
the Alice books

And I have a bunch of what I call "candy" books -- old friends that I have read so many times but are very easy reads... by McCaffery, Norton, Heinlein, Piers Anthony, Lackey, etc.

[Rhoda Nightingale]

I don't reread as often as I once did, because my TBR pile is so huge, but I have read the entire Harry Potter series about three times--not including individual rereads of particular books.

Also, Robin McKinley's Sunshine
Anne Rice's The Vampire Lestat (strangely the only one of the Vampire Chronicles I just can't get enough of--I love that bratty, narcissistic vampire)
Anything by Neil Gaiman
Anything in Koji Suzuki's Ring saga

[MackenziLee]

I am constantly going back to Jane Eyre and 1984. But I just read the same parts over and over again. There are sections of 1984 I have probably only read once, and other pieces I have read so many times I could probably recite. That's the best part of rereading; skipping over the boring bits :)

[Jess Haines]

These are a few of the books I reread:

THE LEGEND OF HUMA
BLACK SUN RISING
THE SECRET
THE TRUE CONFESSIONS OF CHARLOTTE DOYLE

I know there are others, but I'm blanking on the titles right at the moment.

[Jake Barnes]

The Sun Also Rises. It's the book that made me want to be a writer.

[Marumae]

I have waaaaay tooo many of these,

The Hobbit, I reread this so often.
Dragon Jouster Series, Last Herald Mage Series by Mercedes Lackey
Treasure Island
Jane Eyre
The Elenium and Tamuli by David Eddings
Prospero's Children by Jan Siegel.

[Andain]

Brave New World.

Something about it... I dunno what it is. Probably the reason I started writing sci fi as well as fantasy instead of just fantasy.

[alaskamatt17]

Jurassic Park by Michael Crichton. I've read this book 7 or 8 times between third grade and senior year of high school, not since, though. For a long time, this was my favorite book, and I still love it.

The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien. I've read the series 3 times and will probably read it at least once more. At one point I wanted to try to memorize this (fat chance).

Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson. I've read this one twice, probably will read it again at some point.

Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn Trilogy by Tad Williams. I've read this twice, but will probably not do so again. It was my first exposure to epic fantasy back in grade school, and I read it again last year. Though I was able to appreciate the great characterization, nothing else stands out from the rest of the genre.

[French Maiden]

Blackdagger Brotherhood seried By JR Ward. My favourite series of all time. When I don't want to start something new or just want to re-connect with old friends, I'm all too willing to pick them up nad delve right on in.

The Wicca/Sweep series by Cate Teirnan. A highschool series i used to read with my friends, but still enjoy from time to time.

Cross My heart by Maureen McArthy.
A highschool project turned into leasure reading.

Sookie Stackhouse series by Charliane Harris.
Each time a new book is brought out I can't help myself but to read the whole series over again.

Most of my books I read over. How can i not? They're hold my of dearest friends.

[Nualláin]

The Longest Journey by E.M. Forster is a dear old friend. I don't re-read very much as a rule, but I always come back to that one. It's a perfect example of why I started writing, a flawed book that almost bursts apart with the author's sheer ambition and joy in writing it.

When I have creative inertia, wrestling with revisions or just putting off picking up a pen, all I need to do is open the darn thing to the first page and read those marvellous opening lines to be reminded why I keep on scribbling.

[virtue_summer]

Anything by Ray Bradbury. I've read Fahrenheit 451 multiple times. I also regularly reread short stories from his collections. Some favorite stories: "The Fruit at the Bottom of the Bowl," "The Small Assassin," "Invisible Boy," and "A Sound of Thunder."

Joe Hill's short story collection 20th Century Ghosts, especially "Pop Art."

Stephen King's Bag of Bones. I was just dipping back into it last night.

Honestly, I don't reread novels a lot, although I definitely have some lying around I intend to go back to. I plan to reread Tananarive Due's stuff and Joe Hill's novels, for example. I used to reread a lot into my teen years, but for some reason that's slowed down as an adult.

[Tanglewood]

For me it's 'It' by Stephen King. I tend to skip over the last 20 pages or so (and anyone who's read it could probably guess why) but up until that point it is, to my mind, the most inventive and chilling horror novel ever written.

[Flicka]

I don't keep books I don't intend to read several times, so I think I've read all books I own at least three times...

Gaudy Night by Dorothy Sayers. I'm sure I've read it ten times. I generally tend to read the same golden era mysteries over and over again, but this is one of my favorite books in any genre.
Shining Through by Susan Isaacs. I've read that way more than ten times.
Howl's Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones. I love DWJ!
Game of Kings by Dorothy Dunnett. It's the only one of her books I really, truly enjoy without wanting to strangle and dismember someone (usually Lymond, but the Niccolò-series can drive me round the bend too).

[Hip-Hop-a-potamus]

* Anything Considered- Peter Mayle (it's like reading champagne. Light, funny, wonderful details about the Luberon as most of his do)

* Loving Frank- Nancy Horan (sheer perfection. I aspire to her greatness. It's what got me doing fictionalized bios)

* The Memory of Eva Ryker- Donald Stanwood (first read this when I was 12, and it inspired me to become a writer. Also inspired the twisteroo in the plot of my first novel, which is now basically trunked)

* Alamo House, or Women Without Men, Men Without Brains- Sarah Bird (hilarious, and if you want to know what Austin, TX was like in the 80s, you'll laugh your ass off)

* The Boyfriend School- Sarah Bird (ditto about the hilarious and Austin in the late 80s. Was made into the movie "Don't Tell Her It's Me" with Shelley Long and Steve Guttenberg, but they destroyed it, and transplanted it from Austin to South Carolina. Don't ask me why).

[trickywoo]

I reread most of L.M. Montgomery's novels annually.

Jane Austen's work (but not Northanger Abbey - ugh)

The Lord of the Rings trilogy

And, when a new George RR Martin book comes out, I'm forced to reread the whole series to keep it straight - haha!

The Count of Monte Cristo

Calvin and Hobbes - probably not annually but every so often it's just the right thing. ;)

Love books like these that feel like visiting with old friends.

[reiver33]

Voice of the Whirlwind
Metropolitan
Only Forward (of course)