What are your "must read" books?

[kunoichi]

Having read through the BBC and Guardian top 100 books lists, I must admit that I find some of them boring or difficult to read. Many seem to be books people feel should be read, rather than those we may want to read because they are so enjoyable.

This year I'm taking part in the 50 books challenge and I'd love to know which books Mumsnetters would most heartily recommend across all genres, both contemporary and historical.

Some of my own all-time favourites are:

Shadow of the Wind
Memoirs of a Geisha
The Time Travellers Wife
The Lovely Bones
A Little Princess

I'll probably read The Snow Child next, but would welcome any suggestions for what I should put on my Kindle to read this year!

Since I bumped it: the Book Thief, we need to talk about Kevin, Margaret Attwood cat's eye/handmaids tale, Cormack McCarthy The Road, The Personhood Bible. Classics: Lord of the Flies, 1984, Mayor of Casterbridge. So much more but these are the first round that spring to mind.

I second the Steinbeck books also..

I'm glad anybody's cried Zombie yet, I'm going to enjoy reading this thread!

My must-reads are:
Sleep it off, Lady (Jean Rhys)
Wide Sargasso Sea (Jean Rhys)
The Cement Garden (Ian McEwan)
Mythologies (Roland Barthes)
Ghost Stories of an Antiquary (MR James)
The Haunting (Shirley Jackson)
In Praise of Older Women (Stephen Wiesnewski)

The deletion was because of spamming. Several old book threads got bombed.

oooooh and some John Irving esp A prayer for Owen meany, and Garp. And to kill a mocking bird. On a roll but must sleep ..

snow child was a lovely book: would really recommend it even though its summer!

A Fine Balance
The God of Small Things
The Kite Runner
The Long Song
Alias Grace

Forgot to say, if you think she oral thrush, a pharmacist should be able to diagnose and sell you something. Might be worth seeing if there is a pharmacy open in your area today

Whoops . Don't think I need to explain that my post was meant for another thread.

The Memory Keepers Daughter
The Light in the Window
The Help
An Evil Cradling
Forget you had a daughter
Memoirs of a Geisha also

Currently reding The Professor and the Housekeeper. Enjoying it.

Ooh like this ...

The Magic Toyshop Angela Carter
Anything by Margaret Atwood
Mara and Dan by Doris Lessing
Five People You Meet in Heaven Mitch Albom
How I Live Now Meg Rosoff (now a film)
Lord of the Flies
To Kill a Mockingbird
All of the Shadow of the Wind books (in fact anything by Carlos Ruiz Zafon)
Picture of Dorian Grey by Oscar Wilde
Northern Lights Trilogy
Lovely Bones
Through a Glass Darkly Jostein Gaarder (sobbed in a plane reading this!!)

My list is endless!! Good job I am an English teacher ...

Many of my favourite books have been mentioned already, so as to not duplicate (unless this is a massive x-post) I'll add:-

Dirk Gentlys Holistic Detective Agency by Douglas Adams. In fact, anything by him.
The Black Angel by John Connolly. Or start with Every Dead Thing and work your way through the series.
A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To My Club by Ludovic Kennedy.
Ecstasy by Irvine Welsh.
All Quiet On The Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque.

Hi all. This is my first post here.

My additions to this thread are-
To Kill A Mockingbird
Rebecca
His Dark Materials trilogy
A Song of Ice and Fire collection
A Clockwork Orange
Any Sherlock Holmes

Deffo going to read Wolf Hall and Bring Up the Bodies after seeing recommendations on here.

Loving this!

Thousand splendid suns
Kite runner
Handmaids Tale
red Tent
Oryx and Crake
we nee to talk about Kevin
a Suitable Boy
The other Boleyn girl
Jude the Obscure
moll Flanders
the Woman in White

There's probably a lot more!

Just seen this thread so thought I'd add my list of 'must reads'

• Possession by A S Byatt
• East of Eden by John Steinbeck
• Germinal by Emile Zola
• The Kite runner by Khalid Hoseini
• The Little Stranger by Sarah Walters
• Far from the Madding Crowd by Thomas Hardy
• The Line of Beauty by Alan Hollinghurst

The only books that I love that I haven't seen mentioned here (Time Travellers wife, To Kill a Mockingbird and anything by Phillipa Gregory or Anne Weir my favourites) are

The Secret Life of Bees
One Day
When God was a Rabbit
Water for Elephants