What is the best book you have ever read?

I see John Fowles' The Magus has been mentioned in this thread. I read it twice in my 20s. On the second occasion, I was on the Greek island where it is said and I'm sure we found the villa. The book was so strange and so perfect that I feel I would spoil it if I were to read it again thirty years later so it sits on my bookshelf calling me.

I couldn't get on with Owen Meany at all...
My desert island book would have to be 'Cider with Rosie' by Laurie Lee. So poetic, nostalgic, sad, funny and the one I just couldn't be without. If I were allowed to take just one more it would be 'The Worst Journey in the World' by Apsley Cherry-Garrard. You'll never complain about being cold again. A fantastic true adventure story. Increasingly, I'm drawn to non-fiction.

Zemindar, by Valerie Fitzgerald. Sadly the only book she ever wrote, if you enjoyed Gone With The Wind, I think you'll enjoy this.

Such A Long Journey - Rohinton Mistry

The best book I've ever read was written in the 80s - Little, Big by John Crowley. I must have read it dozens and dozens of times, and I sometimes just let it fall open and read one of the chapters - they have beautiful and mysterious titles - in fact it's beautiful and mysterious all round. It won awards at the time, but not many people seem to have read it. It's like a lesson in good English without being starchy and when I read it I feel I've slid into a warm bath of escapist dreaming. It's centred around the world of Faerie but not twee in the least and the chapters involving a dystopian New York are so vividly drawn I have the architecture and characters and startling little vignettes in my head even now. (Going to put Poldark book no. 9 down and get Little, Big off the shelf again right now in fact)

Reading the thread, so many books come up again and again and I've got loads on my list now so thanks damnedgrubble

When Marnie Was There - Joan G Robinson
Another massive fan of John Irving - Owen Meany just pips The Hotel New Hampshire and Garp into joint second place
Any Human Heart - William Boyd
She's Come Undone - Wally Lamb
Never Let Me Go - Kazuo Ishiguro
Anna Karenina
First Love - Ivan Turgenev
Miss Smilla's Feeling for Snow - Peter Hoeg

Intimacy by Hanif Kureishi.

Plains of passage by Jean Auel part of the earth children series.

So many and some of my favourites have already been mentioned but I'll add;
As a teen The Dice Man, Catcher in the Rye and Jonathon Livingston Seagull.
And Animal farm
The Woman Who Walked into Doors
Under The Duvet
And Notes From a Small Island, as books that stand out for me off the top of my head.

The God of Small Things is my absolute favourite, utterly gorgeous writing!

A few others I've loved have already been mentioned - Owen Meaney... just wonderful.

Also loved Snow Falling on Cedars (David Guterson). Whenever I need a good old laugh it's got to be Rachel's Holiday (Marian Keyes)

I love The Joy Luck Club. Amy Tan's novels are wonderful they take you on a spiritual journey

My favourite book of hers is The Bonesetters Daughter (as mentioned before)

If by best book you mean one that I read over and over again then:

Pride and Prejudice
The time travellers wife
A fault in our stars
The girl you left behind
The handmaid's Tale (only read once so far but that was a month ago and I already want to read it again)

Thanks for the thread, I've topped up my wish list and found 2 books sitting on my bookshelf that I haven't read yet - Keep the aspidistra flying and A prayer for Owen Meany - so I am very happy.

I would be good if this thread were moved from chat eventually so we don't lose such a good list of books.

Just finished joy luck club (again on audio) and bought it because I love mah Jong! Really enjoyed it. Owen Meany was hit & miss for me-long sections where not much happened & overhyped but still good.

Or to quote from that very book...."so many meaning depending on what you hold in your heart"

I want to add my affection for "The Joy Luck Club", a book that I felt had an actual real life impact on my development when I read it in uni. Books are so personal that way - different meanings depending on the time and space the reader is in when consuming them.

So many to choose from however have narrowed it down to

To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
Anybody Out There - Marian Keyes (full snotty sobs with every page turn) may be not good to read if you have had a recent bereavement.

Shogun by James Clavell

Anything by Robert Crais, Terry Pratchett, Carl Hiaasen and CJ Sansom.
Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett

Too many, really, but I will mention the two I am most impressed with recently:

"The Goblin Emperor" by Katherine Addison
"The Red Abbey Chronicles #1" by Maria Turtschaninoff

PS I'd also recommend Deluge by Richard Doyle (nephew of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

So many, but possibly John Fowles the Collector. Film did such a disservice to the book. I'm still horrified by it now and I read it when I was about 15, so 30 years ago.

Jane Eyre, Wise Children by Angela Carter, The Humans by Matt Haig.

Birdsong, Watership Down and The Hitch-hikers guide to the galaxy.

I can't narrow it down to one but these are my favourites:

Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
Ethan Frome - Edith Wharton
Good morning, midnight - Jean Rhys
Tess of the D'urbeyvilles - Thomas Hardy
Trainspotting- Irvine Welsh
The crimson petal and the white - Michel Faber
Fingersmith - Sarah Waters
Oranges are not the only fruit - Jeanette Winterson
Remains of the day - Kazuo Ishiguro
Blonde - Joyce Carol Oates

And this thread has reminded me how much of loved A prayer for Owen Meany!

I would also say the Magus by John Fowles.

I read it years ago and I wonder whether I was just at the right age for it to make the impression that it did. Ive never re-read it. Now I'm older it might not be as good

Fingersmith - Sarah Waters
Gone with the Wind - Margaret Mitchell
The God of Small Things - Arundhati Roy
I know this much is True - Wally Lamb
Alias Grace and the Handmaids Tale - Margaret Attwood
The Stand - Stephen King
All of the Narnia books - CS Lewis