What is the best book you have ever read?

[Toni2011]

I'd love to know which books really stick in people's minds. Any genre, any author.

I read so much - at least a book a week, unless they are really long ones, so this is tough...
Just finished "Never let me go" - read "When we were orphans" before that so am clearly a big fan of Kazuo Ishiguro.
Over the years I have returned countless times to "I capture the castle" by Dodi Smith, "Anna Karenina" and "The Bronze Horseman" trilogy ("Tatiana and Alexander" and "The Summer Garden") by Paullina Simons.

The great gatsby - f scott fitzgerald
A suitable boy - vikram seth
Emma - jane austen
lots of marion keyes

For me it would be The Kite Runner.

It's such a personal thing. I have lent this book out to friends who haven't been as enthusiastic about it. I've read and loved so many books but you asked for 'the best book' and imo this is it.

Yay, Elephants

Another 'favourite' vote for Behind the Scenes at the Museum.

'Best' book, as in the one that has stayed with me longest, is one I read at college - Their Eyes Were Watching God, by Zorah Neale Hurston. Unbelievably powerful, painful, beautifully written ... just incredible. But I am slightly wary of going back to it because the experience is so emotional.

And anything by Anne Marie MacDonald - Fall On Your Knees and As The Crow Flies. Also pretty powerful books, quite difficult at times, but unputdownable.

Oh, and Lucky Jim. A book I read at least once a year, and it makes me cry laughing every time.

Best in terms of really getting inside your head and giving everything a good jiggle: The Man In The High Castle by Philip K Dick

Best story I've read recently: Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel

jajas have you read 'not so quiet' ? The authors name escapes me but it was a alias anyway.

The pitch was to write a 'send up' of All Quiet on the Western Front and call the author Erica Remarks. The eventual author was so disgusted by this that she wrote NSQ. Its about women ambulance drivers in WW1. It is magnificant.

Anyway - thought you might like it

Gibbons Decline And Fall by Sheri S Tepper.

Just the most unusual, original story I've ever read... six middle-aged women save the world... layered, complex, long, but not difficult to read at all, well-drawn characters, and very thought provoking, especially the choice at the end. It's haunted me (in a good way) ever since I read it.

Clive James. Unreliable Memoirs. Funny
and clever with it. "Gabby"

Several!
Lolita.
Line of Beauty. So good that I am never going to write again.
Birdsong.
Anything by Thomas Hardy.

SO hard to pick just one, The Grapes of Wrath, several by Garcia Marquez.

Interesting that there are so many votes for "Behind the Scenes at the Museum" as I have read it recently because so many people recommended Kate Atkinson and that was the first one I found. Now I'm not sure whether I want to bother reading any of her others! I think my all time best must be "Wild Swans" by Jung Chang because it opened my eyes to a whole new world of experience - things that happened within my lifetime that I had no idea about.
Also love Kazuo Ishiguro & must read more of his!

I have to add Harry Thompson's biography of Peter Cook to my modest list, although I see we are mainly talking about fiction here.

The Life and Opinion of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman by Laurence Sterne

a suitable boy
the scarlet letter
pride and prejudice (of course)
scarlet and black
master and margarita

my top 5! today anyway

Don't think I could narrow it down to just one but An Evil Cradling, Brian Keenan, had a very impact on me.

and another vote for Birdsong

actually midnight's children has to be on there, of course
and the red badge of courage
and diderot's the nun

no there are too many

doh. "very impact"???

meant "very big impact"

The Dispossessed by Ursula le Guin - it really changed my perspective on life (not as a teenager, didn't discover it til I was in my 30s).

Mansfield Park would run it a close second as best book ever though - I love all of Jane Austen's books (Northanger Abbey not quite so much) - but MP is very much my favourite.

So many that I love ...

I think my favourite is 'Three Men in a Boat'. Still laugh-out-loud funny considering how long ago it was written.

Favouite? Possibly Midnight's Children

Closely followed by
A Suitable Boy
Behind the Scenes at the Museum
The Lovely Bones
Any Angela Carter
The Hours
Purple Hibiscus and also Half of a Yellow Sun (Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie)