Top Ten Lists are My Favorite: Books

In keeping with the trend, I have picked the ten (sort of) books that have had the biggest impact on me. Impact is an interesting word, however, because these books are on here for different reasons. Many of them (maybe more than should be on there for a high school English teacher) were formative for me as a child. They spoke to my imagination in a way that stuck, despite reading so many other books since. Some are on the list because a character jumped off the page or because I am jealous of the author's ability to craft a sentence. Some of these books deeply affected me as a human being, pushing me to grow as a person, and some, for the shame of it, simply kept me entertained. Let's be honest. I am only ashamed that they made it on the list because I am supposed to be. Ironically, I seem to make very little time for reading, and there are many books on important lists that have never made it off my bookshelf. I've never read Vonnegut, and I've only tried Capote once. Hemingway bores me, and Ayn Rand seems like such a beast. Tolkien would take more investment than I have to give, and Lewis remains on my shelf for no particular reason. You get the idea, I think. So, for better or for worse, here is my list, honestly...in no particular order, of course.

 

(I couldn't split them, so they made it on the list as one giant book.)

Honorable Mentions: