I covered book series you reread over and over, such as the Nero Wolfe Mysteries for me.
Now, standalone books, not really part of a series-
For me it is Lord of the Rings- of course, but also’
American Gods
and The Hounds of the Morrigan.
what is yours?
Paul Bowles, Collected Short Stories
George Orwell, Collected Essays
Dostoevsky, Crime and Punishment
Krishnamurti, any and all titles.
First two that come to mind are “Cross Country” by Robert Sullivan and “Confederates In The Attic” by Tony Horwitz.
Everything by Miss Manners
Uncle Johns Bathroom Readers
Modesty by Wendy Shalit
Manners for nice people who sometimes say F*ck by Amy Alkon
That was interesting.
Kind of a series, but I enjoy them also.
‘A River Sutra’, by Gita Mehta
(It’s been a long time, though. Thinking on it, I might read it again very soon. It might well suit just now…)
I’ve read Herman Wouk’s “main work” (as he himself referred to it) — “The Winds of War” and “War and Remembrance” — several times.
I’ve read the most popular books by Arthur Hailey — “Hotel “, “Airport”, “Wheels”, and “The Moneychangers” — many times
Lois McMaster Bujold, Ken Follett, Robert Heinlein, and S.M. Stirling.
The Famished Road, by Ben Okri.
It’s not an easy book - most people I recommend it to recoil in horror after a few pages. But if you stick with it, it’s most amazing, and the last sentence always make me weep. Every time I read it, it seems beautiful in a new way.
(And not only do I keep reading it, I keep buying it. Optimist that I am, I give the book away to people who I hope against hope will appreciate it. Then I have to buy a new copy. I think I’ve bought it 3-4 times now.)
Three Men in a Boat by Jerome K. Jerome.
The Prisoner of Zenda by Anthonty Hopkins
The Witches of Karres by James H. Schmitz
Everything by Matthew Reilly, several by Wilbur Smith.
I’m currently re-reading the whole Harry Potter series.
Same here. Arthur Haileys never get old to me; they’re always fun and interesting, no matter how many times I’ve read them.
Another one would be Bel Kaufman’s Up the Down Staircase. I don’t know why, but I return to it every few years.
I’m assuming we’re talking fiction books here. I have a number of non-fiction books, to which I refer frequently. But no matter how much I refer to them, they’re still non-fiction reference books.
Proust’s Recherche. The gospels with the commentary compiled by Aquinas in his Catena aurea.
Vergil, especially his Georgics. Homer.
Pound’s Cantos.
There are some works/books that never seem to get old to me, so every number of years I come back to those mentioned above, among others.
Kafka (all), Horace (all), and Seneca. Augustine.
I’d rather re-read any of the above authors than “work through,” for example, the NYT compilation of best selling books. For me, life’s too short to fritter away on inferior literature.
Yeah, that’s the assumption I made as well. Reference books are another thing altogether: I would not be without them, but I cannot say I read them in the same way as other texts.
Is Strong Medicine by Arthur Hailey a good novel? It’s actually his only novel at my library. The summary looks good yet the other ones mentioned sound intriguing.
Rex Stout’s Nero Wolfe.
C.S. Forester’s Hornblower.
George MacDonald Fraser’s Flashman.
Lee Child’s Jack Reacher.
And of course Lord of the Rings.
Five books that I pick up and re-read every few years are On the Beach by Nevil Shute; Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut; The Great Escape by Paul Brickhill; The Human Comedy by William Saroyan; and Richard Matheson’s novella I Am Legend.
Anthony Hope.
I read Ulysses every couple of years.
Also, books I read every five years or so: Graham Greene’s The Power and the Glory, Pat Barker’s Regeneration, Barry Unsworth’s Sacred Hunger, George Eliot’s Middlemarch.
The Dragon Riders of Pern series by Anne Maccafrey
The Jack Ryan series by Tom Clancy
The Harry Potter Series by J. K. Rowling - Currently re-reading at the moment
Different Seasons by Stephen King
The Stand by Stephen King
Catch 22 by Joseph Heller
J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings
Robert Heinlein’s Starship Troopers and The Rolling Stones
Roger Zelazny’s Lord of Light
Several of Larry Niven’s short story collections.
Frank Herbert’s Dune