i don’t think it is possible for me to come up with a true list of top 10 books. i can’t favor the same way a book that i loved 20 years ago. and i can’t omit it from the list because 20 years ago i loved it much more than i love my favorite book today. so far, i think, there is a favorite book for each period of my life. here it goes backwards:
10. geek love by katherine dunn
9. diary and invisible monsters by chuck pahlaniuk (tie between these two)
8. letters to milena, and some of the short stories, and some of the castle chapters by franz kafka (tie between these three and i can’t count the entire content of the castle)
7. one flew over the cuckoo's nest by ken kesey
6. arc de triomphe by erich maria remarque
5. the forsyte saga by john galsworthy
4. three musketeers by alexander dumas
3. set of stories about pioneers-heroes by different authors
2. the wizard of the emerald city by alexander volkov (improvisation based on the wonderful wizard of oz by l. frank baum)
1. il romanzo di cipollino by gianni rodari
i am reading a book now (the final confession of mabel stark by robert hough) that can get close to ending on this list as well, although it is highly unlikely to expect it to knock out geek love.
2 comments:
Very interesting list...I should read some of these. I think you should make another list of just books read in the past 10 years.
And wow we have the same 2 favorite CP books. At least we overlap somewhere ;-) Actually I love most of these. Wizard of Oz...good choice. I love the Russian version although the orginal is great. Have you heard of the book WAS? Look it up online.
What does a book need to have to make it onto this list? I mean, is there a "rule" to the types of books you like? These are all so different but I wonder if there is something at the core.
When I was younger for example, for some reason, all my favorite books had male narrators. I thought that was kind of weird but interesting. That isn't the case anymore.
Here are my "top 10" (in quotes bc I cheated a lot) although these change depending on the day of the week and the weather
Honorable Mentionions: Slaughterhouse 5, Diary, Invisible Monsters, Blonde, amd I am a sucker for Agatha Christie
10. Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close and Time Traveler's Wife can share the modern fiction slot
9. Sound and Fury, Jude the Obscure, and Great Gastby can share classic American/British fiction slot
8. Cat's Cradle and Princess Bride can have the comedy slot.
7. I can't pick my favorite Margaret Atwood, but just to annoy you I'll say Blind Assassin. But Handmaid's Tale, Oryx & Crake, and Alias Grace come close behind. You should give another one of these a try, just to see if it was the book or the author.
6. To Kill A Mockingbird
5. The Fountainhead
4. Harry Potter and His Dark Materials can have the fantasty series slot
3. Hamlet, although its so hard to pick a favorite Shakespeare. I love his comedies. I'm in a not great mood today so Hamlet it is.
2. Crime and Punishment and Master and Margerita (yes Russian lit can share a space and I'll pretend that isn;t cheating)
1. 1984 By George Orwell
i like your list better. but now i am afraid to read books you like;) looked up book WAS - not for me
and rule? the books that i like presently need to have interesting plot, it has to be written using interesting but at the same time easy to read words. there has to be an interesting way of telling the story. it should be something new. i think it's like that for everyone, just the definition of these is different from person to person.
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