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Original poster

What are your comfort reads - books that you can read over and over again?

234 replies

harpomarx · 21/06/2008 22:03

You know, those books that you have been reading for years, have old dog-eared copies of and will pick up when there is nothing new that takes your fancy.

Mine are:

Almost anything by F. Scott Fitzgerald, but especially The Beautiful and Damned.

Betty MacDonald - The Egg and I etc

Nancy Mitford Pursuit of Love, Love in a Cold Climate etc

J. D. Salinger Catcher in the Rye

Cold Comfort Farm

OP posts:
stillwaiting · 21/06/2008 23:02

Jane Eyre
Pride and Prejudice
The God of Small Things
Brideshead Revisited
Diary of a Nobody
3 Men on a boat
3 Men on a Bummel

Flamesparrow · 21/06/2008 23:01

My mum has the Pillars follow up... she is planning it as her summer holiday read though as it is massive

ScottishMummy · 21/06/2008 23:01

omdb - yes ULOB is such a good gripping read. love , passion,politics the philosophical essence of being. phew it blew me away

Threadwormm · 21/06/2008 23:00

Point taken Harpo. Another book that I love but discounted as not compforting is LOTR. I don't read 'fantasy' stuff in general, but LOTR is so much more than that. Very beautiful and sad. It is a comfort read in your sense because it is just so encompassing. You are there in a satisfyingly complete other world, and the real world can go to hell.

Twinklemegan · 21/06/2008 22:59

Following the theme of children's classics, The Railway Children, The Secret Garden, Little Women, The Little Princess, Chalet School series as I said before (and yes to the kaffee und kutchen).

Is there still a child in me struggling to get out? I think so.

liath · 21/06/2008 22:59

Stitch, I'm sure Follett has written the follow up to Pillars of the Earth but I haven't read it so don't know if it's any good.

I used to re-read a lot of fantasy stuff - Katherine Kerr, Guy Gavriel Kay etc but seem to have gone off them a bit. Think I must be getting old! I could never get into Pratchett, though.

PigeonPie · 21/06/2008 22:56

and Winnie the Pooh etc and Alice in Wonderland / Through the Looking Glass (for real comfort!)

ScottishMummy · 21/06/2008 22:56

read catcher as a teen and it seemed deep and profound i later found Holden Caulfield and book not so evocative. maybe age and stage thing

Original poster
harpomarx · 21/06/2008 22:56

Don't think a comfort read has to be 'comforting' Threadworm, iyswim - it's more the idea that it is a book in which you can totally immerse yourself and just read... could be light-hearted or quite dark. I think for me it's the comfort of knowing that I love the book but that every time I read it there will be details that I had forgotten about.

Haven't read it for a while either, omdb - but it's definitely still there on my list!

OP posts:
Cathpot · 21/06/2008 22:55

OMDB- I cant stand lord of the rings either. Find hobbits deeply irritating and desire a fiery doom for them all from early on which is clearly unjustified so I stopped reading. I suppose if the Prachett fantasy world is a problem they would be very hard to read. I have some sympathy as occasionally DH tries to press his SF books on me ( known in our house as 'Kaplatha of KThag' as this would be a typical character name, and they are invariably riding multilimbed beasts through desert wilderness commiting random violent acts and I just cant get past all that rubbish to the plot which he assures me is fabulous. I just cant really describe what I get from prachett but it really is a definite prachett only comfort feeling,maybe it is that I can enjoy really enjoy the book without having to cry at any point!

4andnotout · 21/06/2008 22:54

Chalet school series was that were they were permenantly having kaffe and kuchen?

OverMyDeadBody · 21/06/2008 22:54

Scottishmummy, it took me eight (yes eight!!) years to finally get past the first few pages of the Unbearable lightness of being, I think I just wasn't ready for it before, but have now just finished it and will definately be reading it again. It was definately good.

Issy · 21/06/2008 22:53

This reply has been withdrawn

This has been withdrawn by MNHQ at OP's request

OverMyDeadBody · 21/06/2008 22:52

harpo I have read catcher in the rye many times, but probably have outgrown it now, it seems a bit adolescent to me now, although it probably had a profound impact on me at the time!

Threadwormm · 21/06/2008 22:52

Catcher in Rye certaily a favourite here but not a comfort read as too heartaching

ScottishMummy · 21/06/2008 22:52

1984 G orwell
the grass is singing D Lessing
about a boy N Hornby
mice and men J Steinbeck
the trick is to keep breathing D Galloway
after you's gone M O'farrell
my lover's lover M O'farrell
unbearable lightness of being M Kundera

Original poster
harpomarx · 21/06/2008 22:51

aha, good, Great Gatsby gets a second vote

no one for Nancy Mitford? Catcher in the Rye?

looking for my literary soulmate

OP posts:
daffodill6 · 21/06/2008 22:51

Love the Chalet school series .... and Harry Potter too

All the John Wyndham too. Never really got Terry Pratchet but I found John Sharpe brilliant! - Blott on the Landscape etc

I remember a book when I was about 16 called Jonathan Livingstone Seagull which I found profound at the time but I've not read since....

Twinklemegan · 21/06/2008 22:50

I love Lord of the Rings, but I can't stand Pratchett.

Flamesparrow · 21/06/2008 22:49

Ooh chrysalids too

Flamesparrow · 21/06/2008 22:49

His dark Materials

Ooh and I think the Twilight Saga is joining the list

Great Gatsby

stitch · 21/06/2008 22:48

ooo, i thnk i may go get chrysalids from the library again.
triffids is wonderful. i keep waiting for it to get the big hollywood blockbuster treatment though.
good omens is another good one.
i ave only ever read pillars of the earth once, but i think it could become a comfprt read of the future.

OverMyDeadBody · 21/06/2008 22:48

the surealism of Murikami I can do, the fantasy of Pratchet I can't.

OverMyDeadBody · 21/06/2008 22:46

I've tried cath, honestly. For me the main thing that doesn't appeal is all the fantasy, I can't be doing with having to use loads of energy trying to imagine things that aren't normal. I struggles through lord of the rings too for similar reasons. I think I have no imagination. That's why I prefer non-fiction and autobiographical books I think.

Original poster
harpomarx · 21/06/2008 22:45

had forgotten Diary of a Nobody, wheresmyhamster.

thanks

OP posts: