h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I hate books you can only read once - and anything with a pastel cover pretending to be about typical modern female behaviour should be shredded for hamster bedding.

A few that have stood the test of time for me...

Agatha Christie - any and all: surprisingly easy to forget who dun it. Or maybe that's just me. I've enjoyed many of them several times and only ever have the slightest inkling of familiarity.

Alan Plater - The Beiderbecke Trilogy: No-one much has heard of this, though some will have seen the TV series. Out of print but if you see a copy snap it up - soooo funny. Wahay the lads!

John Buchan- Huntingtower, 39 Steps, Greenmantle etc: yes they are a little similar to each other but the plots are cracking and the settings glorious.

LM Montgomery - Anne of Green Gables series: reading them as an adult you can really appreciate the characterisation and humour.

CS Lewis - Narnia books: Despite their rather obvious 'message', extremely engrossing and difficult to put down.

Pratchett - The Discworld: always worth a re-read, others have said all that needs to be said really. I really like the Johnny stories too.

Dorothy L. Sayers - Wimsey books: More difficult to forget the criminals but generally elegant.

Kingsley Amis - Lucky Jim: What next? What really would be next? Ignore all screen adaptations; only the book will do.

Willans & Searle - Molesworth: As any fule kno

I had to read many, many books during my years as an Eng. Lit student but I can't really remember them! Shows I'm a low-brow girl at heart then.

Idling

Why the obsession with re-reading?
It is true that a good anything will bear more than one reading, viewing or indeed listening. Surely a good book is one that was enjoyed or worthwhile, hopefully both, but any list is subjective and likely to be idiosyncratic. Nothing wrong with low brow, not all good stuff is high art and not all high art is as good as its reputation might suggest. My poor list of brilliant books would include.
Perfume- Patrick Suskind
Les Miserables-V. Hugo
Riotous Assembly- T. Sharpe
Presumed innocent-Scott Turow
Things can only get better-J. O'farrell
the Wimbledon Poisoner-Nigel Williams

I don't think re-reading is an obsession. It's just that if something is good you want to repeat the experience. If you don't want to read a book again, I doubt you thought it was all that good to start with!

And yes, these lists are subjective - isn't that the point? It's to share our own likes and dislikes, in the hope of encouraging others to try them - not lay down the law about what IS the best book ever!

And I promise - I am under no illusions about the intrinsic 'goodness' of high art. If you've ever read any 17th century womens' poetry you will know what I mean...

Idling

>It's just that if something is good you want to repeat the experience. If you don't want to read a book again, I doubt you thought it was all that good to start with!<

I don't think I'd agree with you there. Certainly if I read a book three or four times than that makes it probably a really good book (like Anne of Green Gables, What Katy Did, What Katy did next (though not as much as What Katy Did), anything I wrote in 'logic, bears and deja vu', ANYTHING by Gerald Durrell etcetera etcetera)... but I don't think it works vice versa. Just because I can't bear to read a book a second time doesn't, usually, mean it was not all that good to start with. For example, the Silmarillion (Tolkien)- I am never picking that up again in my life, but I'll still say it was a really good (if confusing) read. I think Issac Asimov's books are also very good (very simple too, I might add), but I wouldn't read them again.