Eleven Books I Loved and Might Read Again One Day Soon

Right now, on Goodreads, I have 186 Favorite Books. 

Lots of these are books I've read multiple times, like To Kill a Mockingbird, The Good Earth,  My Name is Asher Lev, A Wrinkle in Time, and The Little Prince.

But many of them are books I've only read one time. I'd like to read some of these again. 

To keep this idea fun, I chose only the books that might be less familiar to most of you. 

Here's my list of books I loved and might like to read again one day soon.

Happenstance: Two Novels About One Marriage in Transition by Carol Shields (fiction)

"These two unique novels tell the stories of Jack and Brenda Bowman during a rare week apart in their many years of marriage. Jack is at home coping with domestic crises and two uncouth adolescents, while immobilized by self-doubt and questioning his worth as a historian. Brenda, travelling alone for the first time, is in a strange city grappling with an array of emotions and toying with the idea of an affair. Intimate and insightful yet never sentimental, Happenstance is a profound portrait of a marriage and the differences between the sexes that bring life — and a sense of isolation — into even the most loving of relationships."

The World is Not Enough by Zoe Oldenbourg (historical fiction)

"With striking realism and powerful narrative, The World Is Not Enough brilliantly recreates medieval life. This first of Oldenbourg's acclaimed historical novels chronicles the lives of nobles in 12th-century France and the catastrophic upheavals of the Second and Third Crusades."

Shooting the Boh: A Woman's Voyage Down the Wildest River in Borneo (travel nonfiction)
"A thrilling, touching, and densely instructive book, Shooting the Boh is also a frank self-portrait of a woman facing her most corrosive fears--and triumphing over them--with fortitude and unflagging wit."

Touchstone Anthology of Contemporary Creative Nonfiction: Work from 1970 to the Present (short nonfiction)

"From memoir to journalism, personal essays to cultural criticism - this unique, indispensable anthology brings together fifty unforgettable works from all genres of creative nonfiction. Selected by five hundred writers, English professors, and creative writing teachers from across the country, this collection includes only the most highly regarded nonfiction work published since 1970."

Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont by Elizabeth Taylor (fiction)

"On a rainy Sunday in January, the recently widowed Mrs. Palfrey arrives at the Claremont Hotel where she will spend her remaining days. Her fellow residents are magnificently eccentric and endlessly curious, living off crumbs of affection and snippets of gossip. Together, upper lips stiffened, they fight off their twin enemies—boredom and the Grim Reaper. Then one day Mrs. Palfrey strikes up an unexpected friendship with Ludo, a handsome young writer, and learns that even the old can fall in love."

Mrs. Bridge by Evan S. Connell (fiction)

"The wife of a successful lawyer in 1930s Kansas City, India Bridge, tries to cope with her dissatisfaction with an easy, though empty, life."

Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life by Amy Krouse Rosenthal (autobiography)

"In Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life, Amy Krouse Rosenthal has ingeniously adapted the centuries-old format of the encyclopedia to convey the accumulated knowledge of her lifetime in a poignant, wise, often funny, fully realized memoir. Using mostly short entries organized from A to Z, many of which are cross-referenced, Rosenthal captures in wonderful and episodic detail the moments, observations, and emotions that comprise a contemporary life. Start anywhere—preferably at the beginning—and see how one young woman’s alphabetized existence can open up and define the world in new and unexpected ways."

The 13 Clocks by James Thurber (fantasy)

"How can anyone describe this book? It isn't a parable, a fairy story, or a poem, but rather a mixture of all three. It is beautiful and it is comic. It is philosophical and it is cheery. What we suppose we are trying fumblingly to say is, in a word, that it is Thurber. There are only a few reasons why everybody has always wanted to read this kind of story: if you have always wanted to love a Princess; if you always wanted to be a Prince; if you always wanted the wicked Duke to be punished; or if you always wanted to live happily ever after. Too little of this kind of thing is going on in the world today. But all of it is going on valorously in The 13 Clocks."

Excellent Women by Barbara Pym (fiction)

"Excellent Women is one of Barbara Pym's richest and most amusing high comedies. Mildred Lathbury is a clergyman's daughter and a mild-mannered spinster in 1950s England. She is one of those "excellent women," the smart, supportive, repressed women who men take for granted. As Mildred gets embroiled in the lives of her new neighbors--anthropologist Helena Napier and her handsome, dashing husband, Rocky, and Julian Malory, the vicar next door--the novel presents a series of snapshots of human life as actually, and pluckily, lived in a vanishing world of manners and repressed desires. "

Suite Française by Irène Némirovsky (fiction)

"Suite Française is a singularly piercing evocation—at once subtle and severe, deeply compassionate, and fiercely ironic—of life and death in occupied France, and a brilliant, profoundly moving work of art."

True Grit by Charles Portis (western)

"In the 1870s, young Mattie Ross learns that her beloved father was gunned down by his former handyman. But even though this gutsy 14-year-old is seeking vengeance, she is smart enough to figure out she can't go alone after a desperado who's holed up in Indian territory. With some fast-talking, she convinces mean, one-eyed US Marshal "Rooster" Cogburn into going after the despicable outlaw with her."

Have you read any of these? Thoughts? 

Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together. Each Tuesday That Artsy Reader Girl assigns a topic and then post her top ten list that fits that topic. You’re more than welcome to join her and create your own top ten (or 2, 5, 20, etc.) list as well. Feel free to put a unique spin on the topic to make it work for you! Please link back to That Artsy Reader Girl in your own post so that others know where to find more information.