A few friends on Facebook tagged me for a response to the question: What 10 books have stayed with you? The question is daunting and it took a few days for me to compose my selections These are choices that reflect this time in my life. Here is a list of those books, in no particular order:
1. Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott
2. The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion
3. The Razor’s Edge by W. Somerset Maugham
4. Bel Canto by Ann Patchett
5. tiny beautiful things by Cheryl Strayed
6. The End of Your Life Book Club by William Schwalbe
7. The Complete Stories by Flannery O’Connor
8. The Death of Ivan Ilyich by Leo Tolstoy
9. Night by Elie Wiesel
10. The Sound and Fury by William Faulkner
Which 10 books have stayed with you? Why? Would love to hear your answers to this question.
Image: “Books” by Katherine Hodgson via Flickr.
Welcome! I am a lawyer turned freelance writer, essayist, and editor. On staff at Literary Mama and the co-founder and co-editor of the literary journal, The Sunlight Press, my essays and reported work have appeared in The Washington Post, The Lily, Saveur, Civil Eats, Brain, Child, ESPN and elsewhere. I am currently at work on a memoir on grief and culture and how it provides perspective on life’s ordinary graces. I invite you to appreciate the ordinary with me. I hope my daily practice of seeing the magic in the mundane helps you celebrate and find more of these moments in your life too.
Thanks for sharing your book list. Just downloaded TINY BEAUTIFUL THINGS. What a great read. I may have never have been fortunate to read this, if not for your blog.
Elaine,
So happy that you checked her book out. The vignettes that she profiles stay with you and her advice, I believe, is free therapy.
I have read Bel Canto and would like to read The End of your life book club and Tiny Beautiful Things. Stopping by from #Sitsblogging. Hope you stop by and join our Travel the World in Books Readathon going on this week. You can enter to win 19 titles from around the world for kids and adults.
Welcome, Tanya! I hope you check out the reads by Schwalbe and Strayed. These books helped me navigate and think about my life differently. I will check out the Travel the World tour.
I never finished Bel Canto! Now I want to find it and reread it 🙂 Thanks for sharing!
Hope you finish, Ashley. It is a great read.
I love your list. I’m familiar with all the titles you listed – I’ve read a few and many others are on my to-read, especially Bel Canto and Flannery O’Connor’s short stories. They are sitting on my shelf in fact so I would like to get to them soon! Always enjoy your book posts – thanks for sharing your list.
Thanks, Cecilia. Every time I read a Flannery O’Connor story I learn something new. My favorite is “A Good Man is Hard to Find.” Thanks for tagging me for this meme. I enjoyed composing my list.
Thanks to you I read”tiny beautiful things” I loved Cheryl Strayed’s honesty so much that I also read “Wild”. She’s become a favorite of mine. You also have Ann Patchett on the list which I am currently reading, ” The story of a happy marriage” . She is great! Wonderful list you have here.
I haven’t read any of these! I need to catch up!