How do you define a favourite book?
Can a book be a favourite if you’ve only read it once? Or does returning to those pages over again have to be a part of favouritness? Favourosity? Sorry, but favouritism just doesn’t work there, somehow. :o) Anyway, where was I? Ah yes…
I have a range of books I’d describe as favourite, and they tend to qualify in different ways. I wonder if I can compile a top ten list, and have each qualify in a different way. Let’s give it a shot!
1. Busman’s Honeymoon, Dorothy L Sayers.
Qualifies by being the book I own in the most formats, I think. Hardback, paperback, read on audio (unabridged), performed on audio (tape, PC and ipod). Probably my Desert Island must have.
2. Gone-Away World, Nick Harkaway.
Read once, comparatively recently and was gripped. Qualifies by being a brilliant read and taking me somewhere I hadn’t been before. Would love to get it on audio but doesn’t seem to be available in the UK yet. Probably not one to read every week, but one to dive back into some time in the future.
3. The Mystery of the Blue Train, Agatha Christie.
Another one that’s owned in many formats. I adore Christie’s classic whodunnits, and this is my favourite Christie, so qualifies on that count.
4. Down Under, by Bill Bryson.
Bryson’s description of being chased (maybe!) by dogs in a park in Australia is sheer comic genius. And his love affair with monotremes. Probably the funniest book I own, and a favourite for so being.
5. Guards, Guards! by Terry Pratchett.
On audio CDs this pretty much lives in the player in my motorhome and gets me to whatever campsite I’m aiming for entertained and unstressed. Because it’s so familiar I don’t have to worry about missing bits when the driving needs more than auto-pilot. My favourite driving book.
6. Good Housekeeping’s combined cookery book.
It was my Mum’s. Nuff said.
7. One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn.
I’ve read ODinLoID several times and always enjoyed it. This means I get to say that something intellectual, by a classic Russian author I can’t spell without checking, is one of my favourites. Which makes me feel terribly brainy. So it’s one of my favourites.
8. Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable.
Despite the fact that these days I’d look it up on the web, Brewer’s is always within reach and I could no more sell it, give it, or throw it away than jump off a cliff. It’s just one of those things I need to own. A favourite, for sure.
9. Smiths at Sea, by Stanley & Colin Smith.
Not just a charming story, but published by my ex-BF and good friend Robin, and Colin Smith is a lovely bloke who’s bought me lunch more than once bless his cottons, so has to be a favourite.
10. The next book I read and enjoy.
Who doesn’t love finding a new book, or even better a new author’s work, that turns out to be a new love of their life? That’s my favourite book of all: the one around the corner.
I made it! Or did I cheat? What do you think?
Happy reading! x
