This book thread is filed under General Stupidity- mine.
Do you ever read those stuffy book lists you see circulating, like ‘List your five most important books,’ and think to yourself- no wonder these people are so damned boring. Some of the titles give me a damned headache, they are so dull. Knowing things is great, but fiction makes life bigger and better and in color.
So, in the proud spirit of anti-intellectualism (just kidding), I am going to offer you the five books I liked enough as a teen/young adult to read again as an adult:
In no specific order:
1.) The Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings trilogy by J.R.R. Tolkien
2.) The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis
3.) The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy (and the other that followed) by Douglas Adams
4.) A Wrinkle in Time (and a Wind in the Door and a Swiftly Tilting Planet) by Madeleine L’Engle
5.) Weaveworld by Clive Barker
There are more, of course, but those are favorites. So, what fiction did you read as a teen/young adult that you have re-read as an adult (or would like to)? What pieces of fiction meant something to you? Put up your list, and pass it on to 2-3 people.
To get things started, I tag Gary Farber, Michele Catalano, Ted Barlow, Jeff Goldstein, Matt Welch, Kimmitt, Captain Ed, Laurence Simon, Kathy Kinsely and MommaBear, and Donald Sensing.
Will they play along? I dunno, but it is worth a shot. If there is something to be learned about people by their choice in nonfiction, I think we can learn something about their whimsical reading pleasures, too. Nonfiction and history books may be good for facts, evidence, and showing relationships between people, places and events, but they in many cases tend to make the world smaller
Fiction, on the other hand, makes the world bigger, more colorful, and more pleasant. Fiction seems more real, at many times, because it talks about shared truths, not absolute truths. In my opinion, of course.
If you want to join in, please do so.
Doug
The Dune series, The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, the Foundation series.
Flagwaver
Like and tend to agree with your choices, John – I just find it interesting and ironic that you, an areligious person, chose as 3 of your 5 selections overtly and intentionally religiously-inspired books. Hmmm.
Bruce Moomaw
Now, then, regarding teenage books that I can happily reread as an adult:
(1) Lord of the Rings (but NOT “The Hobbit”).
(2) Damn near anything written by adults by C.S. Lewis — especially “The Great Divorce”. (I ate him up like popcorn at age 15, and have no regrets about the fact.)
(3) Loren Eiseley’s “The Immense Journey”. (Nonfiction — like a lot of Lewis’ work — but what the hell.)
(4) Almost everything by James Thurber or S.J. Perelman. (For that matter, one keeps running into extremely funny books that no one else apparently ever heard of — among my continuing favorites, which I read at age 12, are Hildegarde Dolson’s “We Shook the Family Tree” and Doreen Tovey’s “Cats in the Belfry”.)
(5) Arthur C. Clarke’s best 1950s work — especially “The City and the Stars” and his 1950s short-story collections.
Bruce Moomaw
That’s “…written FOR adults by C.S. Lewis”. *sigh*
John Cole
I am not areligious. I just don’t think my religious views should be rammed down other people’s throats or given the power of law. I go to church occasionally, question the nature of things, think about the existence of a supernatural creator and my place in the world and why we are here.
I have the same questions most openly religious people have- I just don’t think I am right or know the answers and don’t think I have the right to tell other people how to live their lives.
We are all looking for the same answers- only the supremely arrogant among us pretend to have the answers. Surprisingly enough, the bible even addresses this, but gay-bashing and literalist interpretations of selective writings seems to rule the day with the ‘deeply’ religious:
I wouldn’t count myself as deeply religious, but I am not areligious or anti-religious. And I have definitely been in a church before and know my way, roughly, around the bible.
synuclein
1-3) Definitely the LotR trilogy (skipping the Hobbit and the “songs” in the LotR — That’s one thing I can totally respect about the movies)
4) The Right Stuff — by Tom Wolfe. I’ve also seen the movie about 15-20 times. What a great novelization of the early history of the space race.
5) The Chronicles of Narnia — CS Lewis. My daughter loves these too — it fits in nicely with her interest in Harry Potter, etc.
Having a kid is a nice way to rediscover all the great literature you read as a kid (recently, we’ve been re-reading Pippi Longstocking and the Ramona books — not exactly what I’d choose for personal reading, but fun anyways.)
CaseyL
The most important book to me as a new teenager was “Stranger in a Strange Land,” hands down. I read it over and over again, year after year, until I had it practically memorized. It was the first time anyone anywhere had spoken to me intelligently about life, sex, religion, politics, science, and so on. (I also OD’d on Heinlein’s work generally.)
The other major literary Formative Influence during my adolescence was Harlan Ellison.
Heinlein and Ellison were my gods. And, yes, a more ill-assorted, mutually contradictory pair of gods would be hard to find: I am aware of this. And, yes, it explains a lot :)
The Jungle Books, read and reread from childhood well into adolescence. It made an unrepentant anthropomorphile out of me. And I might be the only liberal in America who adores Kipling, warts and all.
Andre Norton’s Witchworld series, which I think I read even before Stranger, because it was my first sf/fantasy and introduced me to a genre, a worldview, I didn’t even know existed.
Ursula Le Guin’s Left Hand of Darkness and Joanna Russ’ The Female Man, for exposing me to gender issues and gender politics just as I was starting to be aware of and care about those things.
John Cole
I loved Dune, too.
And I read Pippi Longstocking, too.
My mom taught adolescent literature courses when I was 7-13, so I test drove all her books for her. The Chocolate Wars; Are you here God, It’s Me, MArgaret; Bang the Drum Slowly, all the S.E. Hinton stuff, etc.
I could list hundreds. I was also fond of Encyclopedia Brown when I was real young, as well as the Choose-Your-Own-Adventure books.
metalgrid
1. Trinity by Leon Uris
2. Life of Pi by Yann Martel
3. Julian by Gore Vidal
4. My Family and Other Animals by Gerald Durrell (and other books by the author)
5. Only Man is Vile by William McGowan
John Cole
Leon Uris is great- had to read Trinity for a class years ago.
Flagwaver
Sorry, John, I ASSumed, based on some of your posts, that you were areligious, if not anti-religious. My bad.
Actually, one of my fears for our current generation of kids (including my four) is that they will NOT respect and revere good books like we do. In this instant, “online” world, the slow, thoughtful pace of books is a hard sell. I read to my kids, and make them read as much as possible, but they have never really “taken” to reading on their own. When I was seven, I began biking the four or five miles from my house to the local branch library EVERY DAY – the librarians knew me by name. I had to drag my poor mom down there, so she could tell the librarians in person that I was permitted to use my discretion, and check books out of the “adult” section – from then on, I was on my own. It was a small library, but I read it darn near from wall to wall. One of my biggest regrets, what with work, kids, etc., is that I have fallen WAAAAYYYY behind in my reading. I used to maintain a “I’ll read these when I get the time” list for the books that came out and looked interesting, but I just couldn’t read at the time. When it got to be a couple of dozen pages, I threw up my hands and surrendered. Now, I look at new releases on Amazon, and just shrug.
Maybe, after the kids leave home, and I retire, I’ll start getting caught up (that is, if I live a couple hundred years!).
John Cole
Flag- I am not offended at all. I don;t think of myself as a very religious person at all, but I just don;t know if areligious is the right term.
I just have a general disdain for what passes as religion. Many people would take my constant ranting and raving against the actions of the minotiry of religious folks, my refusal to force others to adhere to my beliefs, or my refusal to believe the bible is the end all be all for all things as an ‘areligiouss’ position.
Harley
Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert Heinlein
The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch by Philip K. Dick
over it
I think that I have a crush on you John. ;) Your list is the mirror of mine. :)
My additions to your(already brilliant) lists:
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenence -Pirsig
The Mysts of Avalon -Marian Zimmer Bradley
Pillars of the Earth -Ken Follet
Cryptonomicon -Neal Stevenson
A Song of Fire & Ice series -George R.R. Martin
A couple other series I often suggest to others looking for summer reads:
Sword of Truth series -Terry Goodkind
Wheel of Time series -Robert Jordan
I love hearing/seeing what books people want to share with others. I try to read every book brought to my attention. Thus far, I have only come across a couple of real stinkers. But that, my friends, is a whole other list. :)
silky
1) Picked up my mom’s copy of ‘All the King’s Men’ at age 10 and at least every other year I think of a pertinent quote from it, go looking, and end up reading the whole damn thing. Amazing book.
2) The first three Stephen King Dark Tower books. Especially guilty pleasure since the last 2 were so terrible.
3) ‘The White Boy Shuffle’ by Paul Beatty
4)Early from the Dance by David Payne. So much more real than any summary you’ll read.
Flagwaver
Not to worry, John. I was raised Southern Baptist (in a Southern family), so I KNOW something about narrow-minded, chauvinistic “religious” evangelical types. That having been said, I have since “tried” Lutheran, Methodist and, finally, Catholic flavors. At least the Mackerel Snappers (of which I am now one) aren’t into that silly “sola scriptura” nonsense. Pretty much, I think most people get out of religion pretty much what they put into it. For me, personally, it’s all about the four Gospels. If you read Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, there is much solid moral philosophy there. Jesus was, whether you accept his divinity or not, a great teacher and an inspired moral philosopher. As for the rest? That’s why they call it “faith.”
Mason
Two extremely formative books in my teenage years were Stranger in a Strange Land and The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, both by Heinlein… and they’re just as good today.
Kimmitt
Sure, what the heck.
“Axiomatic,” Greg Egan.
“Snow Crash,” Neil Stephenson.
“The Sandman” (comic book series), Neil Gaiman
“Hitchhikers,” of course.
The “Mars” Trilogy (Red Mars, Blue Mars, Green Mars) by Kim Stanley Robinson
Honorable Mention:
The Discworld books by Terry Pratchett
“Ender’s Game,” Orson Scott Card
The Foundation trilogy, Isaac Asimov
“Dune,” Frank Herbert.
Kathy K
Oh, good grief. I’ve got about 2000 books, about 1/4 of which I read before age 20. How can I choose just a few?
How about things read as a pre-teen and re-read?
The Narnia series
EE ‘Doc’ Smith’s Lensman series and Skylark Series
Baum’s Oz books
Heinlein’s young adult books.
Norton’s young adult books
See, even with that I’m up to 6 and that’s with groups of books… and I could name more.
Nikki
All I have to say is I wish I had spent time reading more literature than the trashy novels I read now. As to books I read as a youth that I have re-read as an adult:
-Charlie & the Chocolate Factory and James & the Giant Peach – Roald Dahl;
-The 3 Musketeers – Alexandre Dumas
-Most everything by Judy Blume (including her adult novels, like Wifey)
-The Arabian Nights
-The Works of Hans Christian Andersen
-Everything by S. E. Hinton
-Anne MacCaffrey’s Dragonriders of Pern series (though some weren’t published until I was an adult)
-A Spell for Chameleon, The Source of Magic and Castle Roogna – Piers Anthony (after that the Xanth novels got dull, so I haven’t re-read the rest)
-Tons and tons of romances that I enjoyed enough to re-read
And a new category: fiction that I am soooo looking forward to reading — Harry Potter and the Half-blood Prince (J. K. Rowling), Origin in Death (J. D. Robb) and Eleven on Top (Janet Evanovich). The publication dates are so close together, I will be enraptured through mid July!
Slartibartfast
I’ve read Kimmitt’s list, but then again I’ve read nearly everyone else’s, where they go into SF/Fantasy. Pirsig’s book was sort of the start of a whole new area of thought for me; I still reread it from time to time and get something new out of it, but nothing on the scale of the Eureka moments of the first couple of iterations. Lila, on the other hand, was a complete disaster. I often wonder how much of Zen was factual, but it’s not really all that relevant, because to borrow a cliche, it’s the thought that counts.
It ought to be noted that Cryptonomicon is, more or less, a sequel of sorts to The Baroque Cycle. It makes me wonder whether Stephenson’s plan all along was to go Lucas on us. If you weren’t paying attention, the common elements are:
1) Waterhouse
2) Shaftoe
3) Enoch Root
4) Hacklheber
5) Dengo
6) Comstock
7) The gold having the odd properties, which was eventually formed into sheets with data punched into it, and eventually found in the submarine off of Luzon (IIRC)
8) Halaby
9) Indirectly (and humorously) Gomer Bolstrood
Ah, crap. This has already been done. I should have known. The thing I’m most curious about is if Enoch Root is immortal, or a name that passes from generation to generation, kind of like The Phantom.
Slartibartfast
I’ve read Kimmitt’s list, but then again I’ve read nearly everyone else’s, where they go into SF/Fantasy. Pirsig’s book was sort of the start of a whole new area of thought for me; I still reread it from time to time and get something new out of it, but nothing on the scale of the Eureka moments of the first couple of iterations. Lila, on the other hand, was a complete disaster. I often wonder how much of Zen was factual, but it’s not really all that relevant, because to borrow a cliche, it’s the thought that counts.
It ought to be noted that Cryptonomicon is, more or less, a sequel of sorts to The Baroque Cycle. It makes me wonder whether Stephenson’s plan all along was to go Lucas on us. If you weren’t paying attention, the common elements are:
1) Waterhouse
2) Shaftoe
3) Enoch Root
4) Hacklheber
5) Dengo
6) Comstock
7) The gold having the odd properties, which was eventually formed into sheets with data punched into it, and eventually found in the submarine off of Luzon (IIRC)
8) Halaby
9) Indirectly (and humorously) Gomer Bolstrood
Ah, crap. This has already been done. I should have known. The thing I’m most curious about is if Enoch Root is immortal, or a name that passes from generation to generation, kind of like The Phantom.
Slartibartfast
Odd. I don’t think I did anything at all that might be construed as an intention to post that twice.
Christie S.
Hmmm…LOL, I guess I’ve been eclectic most of my life. Let’s see…some of my favorite books as a tween/teen:
1. Shakespeare’s The Tempest – read when I was 11.
2. Grease – the play, not the movie.
3. Chronicles of Narnia
4. V.C. Andrews…the series started when I was in 8th or 9th grade, can’t remember exactly.
5. Science Fiction Hall of Fame annual short story compilations. I still have several volumes.
Did anyone other than me find T.S. White’s Once and Future King boring beyond description? I love fantasy sci-fi to this day, but really hate the Arthurian legends. Arthur was a schmuck, Merlin was a meddling pest, Lancelot was stupid beyond belief and Guienevere…I’m sorry, but I would’ve smacked the bitch.
The only character I really felt bad for was Morgainne. Sort of in the Annakin Skywalker mode long before it was in fashion.
Gary Farber
One of my problems here, John, is that my “list” is several hundred books long. “…what fiction did you read as a teen/young adult that you have re-read as an adult (or would like to)…?”
Can you give any criteria for narrowing it down, to say, under one hundred? Or, if you want any non-arbitrary answer, narrowing it down considerably further? Like, I dunno, what books did I read during the first week of the second month of my twelth year, or something, although that wouldn’t work because I couldn’t possible remember what I read when. But I generally was reading about 3 books a day, on average, as a youth, from around 7 up to around age 14-15 or so. Mostly good books still worth rereading, or so at least a third were.
“Science Fiction Hall of Fame annual short story compilations.”
There’s something wrong with that statement, because, speaking as somone who worked on the latter two of the Hall of Fame volumes, there were only four, and none of them were annual. There were several other “Best of The Year” anthologies, of course, depending on which era one is speaking of (Terry Carr, Don Wolheim, Art Saha, Gardner Dozois, David Hartwell, Ellen Datlow, etc., etc.).
bg
Just to add to the pile:
The Phantom Tollbooth
Matilda
The Great Brain (series)
The Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankenwiler (did I get the title right?)
Soup/Soup and Me (they start to suck after those two)
Would anyone like to guess why there’s so much Sci-Fi/Fantasy on our lists?
And thanks for doing this John. When the other book lists were running around, I’d get excited then read their selections and think “ugh.”
Slartibartfast
I thought White’s TOAFK was marvelous, Christie. Just as a point of calibration.
Maybe something having to do with the affinity dweebs have with the Internet? Just guessing.
Christie S.
Science Fiction Hall of Fame annual short story compilations.”
There’s something wrong with that statement, because, speaking as somone who worked on the latter two of the Hall of Fame volumes, there were only four, and none of them were annual. There were several other “Best of The Year” anthologies, of course, depending on which era one is speaking of (Terry Carr, Don Wolheim, Art Saha, Gardner Dozois, David Hartwell, Ellen Datlow, etc., etc.).
Sorry about the misstatement…I’m talking about the sci-fi short story anthologies that come out each year. They’re not all by the same publisher, they just seem to have the same title. Best of…Year’s best…Hall of Fame, etc…
I just really enjoy the short story formats.
And you worked on two of the “real” volumes?! ::squeak of fan-aticism:: How very cool!!
LOL…can I get your autograph? Are you famous?
timekeeper
Hmmm. bg finally mentioned “The Phantom Toolbooth” (the book, not the movie), but nobody mentioned “Harriet the Spy” (the book, not the movie) or any of the Oz books (not the movies).
In the science fiction genre, I have always loved Clarke’s “Rendevous With Rama”, “2001” and “2010” (the books, not the movies, especially “2010”), and “Cradle” (all of which I read in high school), “Nor Crystal Tears” (by Alan Dean Foster) and the offbeat “Mirabile” (by Janet Kagan). I’m also a confirmed Star Trek geek, with the vast majority of the books from the first four series.
A lot of people mention the Narnia chronicles, but I have only read one book in the whole series—”The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe”.
bg
Then there’s the category of fiction that’s intended for adults but I really grooved on as a kid, like Catcher in the Rye and Lord of the Flies. Those two, especially Catcher, showed me what a book could really do. I completely reevaluated my thoughts on fiction after reading those.
Mr.Ortiz
I just skimmed the comments, so maybe I missed something, but I’m shocked that nobody’s mentioned Vonnegut. Slaughterhouse 5 was the first non-kids book I ever read (I was 11 or 12) and it put me off reading for YEARS (seriously, like, a decade) because I felt like everything I read before then was a waste of time and I didn’t want to read another book (voluntarily, anyway) until I understood what made a book great. I hate wasting time.
Turns out not reading is a lousy way to build your literary criticism skillz, but I think I’m cured. I’m half way through a complete collection of Jorge Luis Borges’ short stories, and they’re as exciting to me at 25 as Vonnegut was at 12.
Kimmitt
Slarti — Enoch is immortal; this is conclusively established during The System of the World.
Mr Furious
I’ll play. Limited to books I read before college (if I can remember that far back):
1. LOTR Trilogy (also skipping the songs)
2. Stephen King’s “The Stand”
3. Jaws
4. The Godfather
5. SE Hinton
I LOVED The Hardy Boys and Tom Swift, but I’m not sure I’d read ’em again now…
Books I can’t wait for my daughter to be old enough for:
1. Mrs Frisby and the Rats of NIHM
2. James and the Giant Peach
Books everyone else here seems to love that I never read:
Hitchhiker’s Guide
All the Narnia besides LW&W
The McCaffrey Dragon books
Classics I somehow missed:
All Orwell
Lord of the flies
Catcher in the Rye
Halffasthero
– Dune – Frank Herbert
– Lord of the Rings – JRR Tolkien
– Catcher in the Rye – JD Salinger
– Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas – Hunter Thompson
– Night Shift – Steven King (Technically high school)
Slartibartfast
Looks like I’m going to have to reread; my memory has that connection not quite as firm as that. Given that both my reading comprehension and my memory leave much to be desired, I’m not sure which is more to blame.
Gary Farber
“Are you famous?”
Not particularly. But you may worship me and I will allow you to quickly touch the hem of my sleeve nonethless. I’ve been a small cog in the wheel of publishing several hundred books in years past, in various capacities, from assistant editor to editorial assistant to copyeditor to proofreader to writer of cover copy, and the like; nothing much grander. Oh, and one of innumerable (almost) “Assistant Editors” of Amazing Science Fiction and Fantastic Stories magazines back in the Seventies. My peak probably came when Tappan King offered me the Managing Editor position for Twilight Zone Magazine and the companion horror digest magazine, which I declined to take an editorial assistant position at Avon Books, circa 1986 (thus working on the Hall of Fame, volumes III and IV (or maybe it was just IV, actually?). These days I blog.
I also have to correct myself: there were five Hall of Fame volumes: Volume One, the confusingly named Volume II A, Volume II B, III, and IV. #1 was the original short stories chosen by vote by SFWA as the (extremely) rough equivalent of what was considered, in retrospect, likely to have won Nebulas for Best Short Story in the years prior to SFWA and the Nebula’s existent; II consisted of the same for novellas, thus providing stories of such length that it had to be split into two volumes; and III and IV coming from… jeez, I forget this many years (about twenty) later, and don’t have copies handy, nor much interest in looking it up. But these were quite different from any other “Best of the Year” anthologies, of which, as I mentioned, there have been a number of series.
Don’t forget to post another post nagging me to respond to this post, John, even though you’ve not responded to my comment on it.
;-)
John Cole
Gary- Try to keep it under 25.
Gary Farber
“Can you give any criteria for narrowing it down, to say, under one hundred? Or, if you want any non-arbitrary answer, narrowing it down considerably further?”
“Under 25” doesn’t actually present any criterion, you know. It’s a parameter for the result, not for deriving the result.
tzs
Ummm…Andre Norton’s books, the Iliad and the Odyssey, C.S. Lewis, Pratchett, anything by Clarke, Prince of Foxes, Count of Monte Cristo, African Genesis, Heinlein, Alan Nourse….Madeleine L’Engle.
Everything by Georgette Heyer, Dorothy Sayers, and Mary Stewart. Georgette Heyer’s mysteries, especially. George McCutcheon’s Graustark novels (which are a lovely collection of turn-of-the-century romanticism and swashbuckling.)
Bruce Moomaw
Glad somebody else mentioned Gerald Durrell’s 1950s books — even if they are nonfiction.
As for what they tried to ram down my throat in high school: the one thing I took to enthusiastically was “King Lear”. Grim story, but, my God, what intelligence and marvelous language.
Kimmitt
Slarti — reread the conversation between Waterhouse and Isaac re: Root near the end of System, then find confirmation in Isaac’s miraculous recovery from gaol fever.
This in addition to various more subtle textual clues which pointed in multiple directions.
Doug Purdie
I can’t read non-fiction either, although I prefer it on the big or small screen.
von
Non-pretentious stuff? You mean the stuff I really liked as a kid, rather than the stuff I just pretended to like?
— Narnia
— Lord of the Rings
— The first couple Terry Pratchett “Diskworld” novels
— After reading the following, immediately forget that I wrote the following: Those “Dragonlance” books. (Be brave and admit you read and loved them too; I must’ve read each of ’em three or four times each when I was 15 or 16.)
— Neuromancer and/or the Thomas Covenant series.
Kathianne
Well my list would look a lot like yours, til #3.
Scarlet Pimpernel by Baroness Orczy.
Watership Down by Richard Adams
Little Women by Louisa May Alcott-(I first read this at about 7 or 8, then re-read every other year til about 18. Then started again when my daughter was 4.)
Robert
I can only come up with two books I loved as an adolescent and have re read as an adult and would re read again on my death bed: Orwell’s 1984 and The Trial, Franz Kafka. All the rest seem too boring to me now–and I’ve really tried.
trainitr
dog training mortgage mobile office mobile ringtone mobile video auto donation auto financing auto rental auto tire auto warranty
Makvey
credit unions in houston credit unions in houston credit unions in houston
police federal credit union police federal credit union police federal credit union
wright patman federal credit union wright patman federal credit union wright patman federal credit union
police and fire federal credit union police and fire federal credit union police and fire federal credit union
cp federal credit union cp federal credit union cp federal credit union
florida aircraft federal credit union florida aircraft federal credit union florida aircraft federal credit union
sikorsky federal credit union sikorsky federal credit union sikorsky federal credit union