rooruu's fifty best books

I thought, enough with the lists from other people and companies - what's MY list of top books/reads/authors?


So I thought about it, and wandered along the bookshelves, and here's the list.

It's a brew of children's and adult fiction, classics and bestsellers and bestselling classics, out of print stuff, newer books, some narrative nonfiction (it's my list, I get to make up the rules!).  Some I've reread recently, others not so recently.  But if I had to have just fifty books (well, some are series, but you get my drift), right now this is the list (note: no guarantee it won't change sometime - heck, I only read a couple of these books for the first time recently - who's to say I won't find more treasure soon.  Happy to.).

rooruu’s fifty books

rules:

alphabetical order by author

fiction and narrative nonfiction

each author only once – so fifty authors (and you can say series)

if you post this list on your blog, please include a link back to the source, http://rooruu.blogspot.com 

1. Margaret Atwood        The handmaid’s tale
   
2. Jane Austen                 Pride and prejudice
   
3. John Berger                 Ways of seeing
   
4. Geraldine Brooks        Year of wonders
   
5. Bill Bryson                  The lost continent
   
6. Truman Capote            In cold blood
   
7. Margaret Craven          I heard the owl call my name
   
8. Marcia Davenport        The valley of decision
   
9. Annie Dillard               The writing life
   
10. Paige Dixon                 A time to love and a time to mourn
    
11. Louise Erdrich             The blue jay’s dance
    
12. M.F.K. Fisher              The art of eating
    
13. Frederick Forsyth         The day of the Jackal
    
14. Diana Gabaldon           Outlander (Cross Stitch) series
    
15. Louann Gaeddert         Perfect strangers
    
16. Kate Gilmore               Remembrance of the sun
    
17. Elizabeth Goudge        The white witch
    
18. Kenneth Grahame        The wind in the willows
    
19. Helene Hanff                84 Charing Cross Road
    
20. Georgette Heyer           Regency novels (eg. The Grand Sophy)
    
21. William Horwood        Skallagrigg
    
22. Ted Hughes                 The iron man
    
23. Sebastian Junger          The perfect storm
    
24. Jan Karon                    At home in Mitford
    
25. Cecil Maiden               Beginning with Mrs McBee
    
26. Robin McKinley          Sunshine
    
27. Anne Knowles             Matthew Ratton
    
28. Patricia MacLachlan    Sarah, plain and tall
    
29. Alastair Maclean         The Golden Gate
    
30. Norman Maclean         A river runs through it
    
31. Melina Marchetta        Saving Francesca
    
32. Ursula Le Guin           A wizard of Earthsea (series)
    
33. William Least-Heat Moon   Blue highways
    
34. L.M. Montgomery      Anne of Green Gables (series)
    
35. Audrey Niffenegger    The time traveler’s wife
    
36. Tim O’Brien                The things they carried
    
37. Arthur Ransome          Swallows and Amazons
    
38. Alice Sebold                The lovely bones
    
39. Mary Ann Shaffer        The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society
    
40. Nevil Shute                   Pastoral
    
41. Mary Stolz                    The seagulls woke me
    
42. Patrick Süskind             Perfume
    
43. Rosemary Sutcliff         The mark of the Horse Lord
    
44. Agnes Sligh Turnbull    The wedding bargain
    
45. Anne Tyler                    The accidental tourist
    
46. Cynthia Voigt                Come a stranger
    
47. Evelyn Waugh               Brideshead revisited
    
48. Jean Webster                  Daddy Long Legs (series)
    
49. Laura Ingalls Wilder       Little House series
    
50. John Wyndham              The day of the triffids
    

Do you want to play along? (If you do, leave a comment and a link to your blog so I can see your choices too). 

Either 

use this list as it stands, and add your own evaluations thus:
*** my top pick on this list
** read it, a favourite
* read it
~ read it, indifferent
^ would like to read it/plan to read it

or 

write up your own list of fifty favourite books, alphabetical by author, and leave a comment so I can take a squizz.

If something above isn't familiar to you, the Amazons often have either editorial reviews or reader reviews, even for out of print titles.