For me, it would be the Horatio Hornblower series by C.S. Forester.
When I am running, I need something with action, and if I don’t have another book handy I’ll listen to any of the Hornblower books.
I even have the fancy leatherbound set of them on the shelf–I’m not a “books on a shelf” kind of person, but I definitely made space for that set when I found it.
Well, I came here to say “Lord of the Rings” trilogy, but I’m a runner-up.
Some others: “Gone With the Wind”, yes. “National Velvet” and “Little Women” - I’ve had hardcovers of both since age 12.
“The Encyclopedia of Country Living” by Carla Emery (in case I find myself on a farm and have to learn to live off the land…very interesting and somehow comforting to read.)
And anything by Bill Bryson, but especially “Home” - a history of …well, the house, room by room, and how each evolved over time.
“Strangers in the Forest” by Carol Brink. Homesteaders in Teddy Roosevelts day.
“The Awakening Land” a Pulitzer prize winning trilogy by Conrad Richter. (it was a made-for-tv movie some years ago.)
Gulliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift. I’ve been re-reading it since grammar school. As with other frequently-read books, there’s an Annotated edition. Isaac Asimov did the annotations. They’re generally pretty good, but he gets snarky when defending science.
Alice in Wonderland (Both the Alice books, considered as one). Again, read the annotated edition. Martin Gardner did three iterations, then another edition came out after his death.
The Iliad and The Odyssey – there’s two of them, but don’t take it as a “series”. I’ve re-read the Fitzgerald translations of each many times over. After I got the audio editions of the Fagles translations, I’ve re-read them. I’m still annoyed that the audio edition of The Iliad is only a highly abridged version. They put out the whole Odyssey, why not the Iliad?
Personal Narrative of a Pilgrimage to Mecca and al-Medinah by Sir Richard Francis Burton. I’ve re-read this numerous times. I’ve also re-read a selections of his tales from the Arabian Nights more than once. I have the complete edition, but I haven’t read that all the way through, yet.
Philosophical Dictionary by Voltaire. Still subversive as ever.
Lies my Teacher Told Me by James Loewen. I’ve only re-read this on audio, but have done that many times. If you haven’t read this, you should. The way that different groups arrange to selectively teach American History was already pretty important, and it’s been getting more important with each passing year. With the Trumpistas coming into power, this is going to be one of the coming fights.
Lies Across America – since this is a collection of short pieces, this is easy to dip into and read short bits of. The theme here is that historical markers across the US aren’t regulated in any way, and people willing to get the money together have been able to slant history the way they want to. Again, this might become a live issue in the next four years.
The Gods of Eden by William Bramley (a conspiracy book that speculates all religions on Earth were inspired by extraterrestrials–I don’t really believe it is true but he actually writes a fairly coherent consistent theory compared to others of the genre.)
The Guinness Book of World Records (well not exactly because they release a new edition each year.)
Also an obscure series of books written by Cecil Adams–the name of it eludes me at the moment.
I wanted to mention this, but with a little (*) - much like Stirling’s “Dies the fire” (and for the record, they’re related series) the first trilogy is pretty contained, self-consistent, and works. The many, Many sequels after those first trilogies… well… the tightness and consistency leaves much to be desired.
Oh, me, too. I was home alone for the weekend. Mesmerized! A lot of Victoriana is hard to get through, but I ‘got’ the gist of much (same with 'Little Women")
I love the Nantucket books and wish he’d write another book or two in that series. I liked the original Dies the Fire trilogy, but gave up halfway through the fifth book (or maybe it was the fourth – can’t remember) and spent the next few years wishing he’d ignore the people who kept wanting more , and write something else instead. His new series looks really good, though, and he’s also finally written a third ‘Lords of Creation’ book.
Don’t give up completely yet – try his new series (the first book is To Turn the Tide). And Conquistador, which is my favourite book by him.
Catch-22 (Joseph Heller)
One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest (Ken Kesey)
Desert Solitaire (Edward Abbey)
Not quite as often:
Deliverance (James Dickey)
Roughing It (Mark Twain)
The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test (Tom Wolfe)
Jitterbug Perfume (Tom Robbins)
To Say Nothing Of The Dog (Connie Willis)
I don’t reread a lot of novels, but Jules Verne may make up almost half of those that I have. I exhausted what was in the library by the 6th grade. 30 or so years later when I read that those translations were crap, I read the the new translations which was really fun. I was surprised at how much of the plots I’d forgotten.
The only books I have read more than twice is the entire comic book run of The Fantastic Four which I’ve done (appropriately) four times.