Most of us have read a lot of great books; in fact, I’ve
read so many, I can’t possibly name them all here. Some are classics, some
bestsellers, some indie, but all charged with energy that still resonates so
powerfully that I’ll never forget their
titles or storylines.
When you think about it, most books stay with us for
a reason – something going on in our lives at the time we read them, we connect
with the characters on an emotional level, or they’re simply so entertaining
that we’re taken away, whisked into another world we enjoy so much, we hate for
the book to end.
Here’s my list of 13 books in random order (I had to
make it a baker’s dozen). Tell me about some of the books from your list in
comments or on Facebook. You never know – we might have some of the same
selections:
Octavia
Butler’s “Kindred” (strong heroine)
“The
Twilight Saga” (strong heroine)
Tananarive
Due’s “My Soul To Keep”
NIV
Bible (first time I actually understood)
“To
Kill a Mockingbird”
“The
Count of Monte Cristo”
Toni
Morrison’s “Beloved” (hated the movie, though – too dismal)
“Lord
of the Flies”
Jacqueline
Carey’s “Kushiel’s Legacy” series (beautiful prose, strong heroine [her
weakness becomes her strength], and excellent treatise of gray areas in each of
us)
“Chronicles
of Narnia”
Christine
Feehan’s “Carpathian” series (yes, the entire series – inspired me to write
professionally)
Nalini
Singh’s “Arch Angel” series (again, all of it)
J.R.
Ward’s “Blackdagger Brotherhood” series (some more than others, but yeah,
pretty much all of these, too)
So, I might have cheated a bit with the four entire
series, but feel free to do the same J
Comments
Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand (movie coming out - can't wait!)
Ender's Game (the movie didn't do it justice)
The Red Tent by Anita Diamant
Nefertiti by Michelle Moran
• Chronicle of a Death Foretold by Gabriel GarcÃa Marquez. I can't forget the opening sentence: "On the day they were going to kill him, Santiago Nasar got up at five-thirty in the morning to wait for the boat the bishop was coming on." The rhythm of the plot is amazing.
• Creation by Gore Vidal. I've read this one when I was about fifteen, and I was so excited by Cyrus' journeys...
• Crime and Punishment by Dostoyevsky. I swear I felt like I had killed the old woman myself (for a while). Book hangover for months.
• Catch-22 by Joseph Heller. This one got me shocked and laughing out loud at the same time – for a long time.
• Baltasar and Blimunda by José Saramago. For his style (not sure how it works on the translation, but the original, in Portuguese, is simply awesome, a masterpiece).
• MacunaÃma by Mário de Andrade. I've read this one during high school, and probably I'm the only one who enjoyed this reading at that age. By this book I understood the concepts of Modernism, and it also totally changed the way I see my own country, Brazil.
Great discussion, Dariel! :)