Welcome to Carrots! I'm so glad you're back. You can sign up for my email newsletter here to stay in touch, or look me up on Instagram!
The other day a friend tagged me in a little Facebook literary challenge. You’ve probably seen it. You write down 10 books that have stuck with you and share then right away. They have to be right off the top of your head. You can’t hem and haw and try to pull out the fancy classics you haven’t thought of since college. And it was fun!
So, I’m sharing my list. Although, I did change one thing from my original list. I took off LOTR because you already knew that was a fave, right? And I added The Once and Future King, which I love, but haven’t shared much about.
(This post contains affiliate links. Thank you for supporting Carrots!)
1. Gilead: A Novel by Marilynne Robinson
I read this book when I was on a flight between TX and FL to visit my mom when she was going through chemo. It’s one of the most beautiful books I’ve read. And it was awkward when I was visibly crying as I read it on the airplane. It’s not sappy, I promise. It’s just GOOD.
2. Kristin Lavransdatter by Sigrid Undset
Sigrid Undset is one of the best writers I’ve ever encountered. Be sure to get the Tina Nunnally translation (the original is Norwegian and this seems to be the best translation). It’s a long book. It’s epic. And it’s glorious. Kristin is my favorite female protagonist of all time. I read KL every couple of years and am more amazed by it each time.
3. Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh
I’ve written about this one a bit. It’s my absolute favorite. I’ll never be able to explain how the story changed me. It’s like trying to explain a poem…if you could…well…it wouldn’t be a poem anymore, it would be an essay. Does that make any sense? Maybe not.
4. Mansfield Park by Jane Austen
Although it’s not my favorite Austen novel, I think it’s made me think the most. I have learned to love Fanny Price. And I die laughing at Mr. Rushworth’s “four-and-twenty speeches.”
5. Ten Ways to Destroy the Imagination of Your Child by Anthony Esolen
I’m a big fan of Anthony Esolen and I was spellbound by this book. Esolen eloquently articulates so many things that I have felt in my gut, but could never have communicated in a million years. I would describe it as life-changing. And as my kids get older, I think I need to read it again.
6. The Once and Future King by T.H. White
I have loved Arthurian tales since forever. And I think I love this one the most. Every page is a delight. A heartbreaking, glorious delight.
7. The Art of the Commonplace by Wendell Berry
Berry’s agrarian essays really changed how I view food, community, and vocation. I can’t recommend this one enough. It will make you think and change your life.
8. The Violent Bear It Away by Flannery O’Connor
My favorite of Flannery O’Connor’s works. I won’t try to summarize it. It’s weird. It’s southern. It’s full of the terrible mercy of God.
9. Till We Have Faces: A Myth Retold by C.S. Lewis
I still can’t believe that a man created such an amazing female protagonist. This is such a beautiful and haunting book. Lewis at his best.
10. Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke
It’s like Rowling meets Austen and Dickens. So fun and more footnotes in a novel than you could have thought possible. Delightful.
OK, I shared some favorites, now tell me about 10 books that have stuck with you in the comments!
I WANT TO READ ALL THESE BOOKS YAY I’M SO GLAD YOU DID THIS.
Here’s my list!
1. “Chrysanthemum” by Kevin Henkes
2. “The Awakening” by Kate Chopin
3. “Wuthering Heights” by Emily Bronte
4. “Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close” by Jonathan Safran Foer
5. “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix” by J.K. Rowling
6. “The Fault in Our Stars” by John Green
7. “Water for Elephants” by Sara Gruen
8. “Abba’s Child” by Brennan Manning
9. “Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day” by Judith Viorst
10. “Middlesex” by Jeffrey Eugenides
I got tagged to do this on FB. It took me a week to think about it and put the list together, and even then the list had twelve, not ten! Just too many great books out there.
A few of mine were Jane Eyre, The Grapes of Wrath, and Brideshead Revisited (I love it, too). I also included the play Six Degrees of Separation by John Guare, a play that walks that knife-edge between comedy and tragedy and makes us think about the walls we put up between ourselves and others. It had a profound impact on me when I first read it.
Also “The Dead” by James Joyce — not a book, but a short story, and one of the two most beautiful endings I’ve ever read.
We have some overlap! Here are my responses to my friend’s tag.
1. Confessions by St. Augustine
2. Kristin Lavransdatter by Sigrid Undset
3. Till We Have Faces by C.S. Lewis
4. The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky
5. Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh
6. Persuasion by Jane Austen
7. Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte (I know, I know #YesAllAtticWives or something)
8. That Hideous Strength by C.S. Lewis
9. Sex, Economy, Freedom, and Community by Wendell Berry
10. Ideas Have Consequences by Richard Weaver
Also, I cheated and included some honorable mentions: Democracy in America by Tocqueville, A Canticle for Leibowitz by Walter Miller, Heretics by G.K. Chesterton, The Place of the Lion by Charles Wiliams, Surprised by Hope by N.T. Wright
Tocqueville? Wow!?!
This is great! I’m part way through my second reading of the KL trilogy, but it’s a different translation. I still love it, though there are definitely paragraphs I read three times and still think “huh?” So I should try your recommended translation! Also, I’m scared to read the Ensolen book- my kids are in public school, out of a combination of necessity and belief that it’s the best choice for us, and I don’t want something that’s going to make me feel terrible about that decision (which is not something I can change). Should I stay away?
Here’s my list, right off the top of my head (but I notoriously forget everything I’ve ever read):
1. Let the Great World Spin – McCann
2. In the Skin of a Lion – Oondatje
3. Blindess – Saramago
4. Brideshead (duh) – Waugh
5. The Secret History – Tartt
6. Kristin Lavransdatter – Undset
7. To Kill a Mockingbird – Lee
8. The Omnivore’s Dilemma – Pollan
9. The Poisonwood Bible – Kingsolver
10. Our Man in Havana – Greene
Oh oh oh, I’m so glad someone else had “In the Skin of a Lion”. Here’s my list:
1. Grapes of Wrath – John Steinbeck
2. In the Skin of a Lion – Michael Ondaatje
3. The English Patient – Michhael Ondaatje
4. Jane Eyre – Charlotte Bronte
5. Little Women – Louisa M Alcott
6. The Color Purple – Alice Walker
7. Les Miserables – Victor Hugo
8. The Power and the Glory – Graeme Greene
9. Hamlet – Shakespeare
10. Daniel Deronda – George Elliot
Can I count Narnia 1-7 as one book? I have read them, in order, maybe 20+ times.
A Wrinkle in Time
Multiple Jane Austen, but mostly Emma
Orthodoxy by Chesterton
My Friend Flicka, plus the two sequels
Lewis’ Out of the Silent Planet
Edgar Rice Burroughs Mars’ series
Red Adam’s Lady by Ingram
The Search for Delicious by Babbitt
One Hundred and One Dalmations by Dodie Smith
YES on the Mars series! I thought the movie John Carter looked intriguing despite the awful name and saw it in the theatre. (It was quite good and I am bummed that there won’t be sequels!) Then I went home and read the whole series within two weeks with the kindle app. Let’s just say my husband was not pleased with what I offered for dinner each night, lol! That old school prose is so delightful, even in the scifi genre.
I can’t help looking at your list and thinking you and I have very similar taste. Such good picks! Have you read “A Severe Mercy” by Sheldon Vanauken? It’s a conversion story, autobiography, and a whole lot of elegaic beauty in a hybrid Southern and British novel all in one. If you haven’t read it yet you should! Have a box of tissues on hand…
I haven’t read any of your picks, but I love a lot of the authors and I have Kristen Lavransdatter sitting on my bedside table via the library, so now I’m really excited to start it- I love a good female protagonist! In no particular order, here are some of my favorites:
1. Harry Potter, and if I had to pick one…haha, I don’t think I could!
2. Gone with the Wind
3. Pride and Prejudice
4. Growing up bin Laden
5. Emily Dickinson’s complete poems
6. The Story of My Life: an Afghan Girlon the Other Side of the Sky
7. The Hiding Place
8. The Help
9. Standing for Something: 10 Neglected Virtues that will Heal our hearts and Homes
10. Ella Enchanted
There are so many others, but these come to mind.
Ok, I need more of an explanation as to your love for “the once and future king.” I love fantasy, I love a good Arthurian tale, I even spent the night on the Tor one summer evening long ago. But TOAFK was one of the worst books I’ve ever read, so grim and twisted, and the parts about shaving the dead man’s skin to wear as a belt or whatever for seductive purposes… (Ok, I might not be remembering that section perfectly, but I’ve tried to banish all the imagery from my mind). I like the “sword in the stone” section well enough because I enjoy the story of Arthur’s education, but even then the writing felt dark and dense.
When I read it, I finished it an wrote it off as a “classic” that no one really liked, but some critics acclaimed for some weird literary criticism reason. But this makes two Catholic women that I respect who not only like this book, but count it as formational. Why? How? Why?
If you think that Till We Have Faces is Lewis at his best then I strongly, strongly recommend his Space Trilogy (Out of the Silent Planet, Perelandra, & That Hideous Strength) to you. If you have a love of well defined characters, Christian/Catholic themes, and myth, along with a penchant for Arthurian Legend these books will send you over the edge of delight. They are truly divinely inspired- that is the incessant thought I had while reading. I have searched long and hard for a book I could point out as my favorite. This trilogy finally did it. I really don’t know why these books aren’t mentioned more often when speaking of Lewis.
The first book to ever really strike and stay with me was The Giver by Lois Lowry – I read it in the 5th or 6th grade.
Other than that A Proud Taste for Scarlet and Miniver by E.L. Konigsberg and any of the historical fiction saint biographies by Louis de Wohl such as The Quiet Light and The Living Wood- the books are outstanding and he has such an interesting personal history.
I am about to start the Kristin Lavransdatter Trilogy but am now wondering if I need to seek out your recommended translation instead….
I’ve always loved Lewis but since reading Perelandra this summer I want to read EVERYTHING HE EVER WROTE! It was incredible. I just reserved Till We Have Faces from the library, so thank you!
It’s so good, Kaitlin! And can you believe I haven’t read the space trilogy? what’s wrong with me?
Kristin Lavransdatter is on my list of to-read novels. Enjoyed your list! I just posted mine! Hope you’ll hop over and take a look!
Oh my gosh, Haley! I have read none of these! None! I could just hug you right now for a new list of to-reads!!! Woot!!
(I wanted to add that a couple I have read other works by the author, but not the specific books you recommended like C.S. Lewis and Jane Austen and I just bought a book by Flannery O’Conner because I was told I *had* with such enthusiasm that I immediately obeyed)
I want to read Brideshead Revisited, but many of the reviews say the book hints at a homosexual relationship between two of the characters. It sounds like and interesting novel. I’m just not sure what to expect. Normally, I would just read it regardless. But, I have 4 kids, so please tell me its worth my time! (I’m nursing and my hormones are crazy…am I going to cry???)
Great list! Oh, wow, totally w/ you on #1,3,6 & 8. Also, I think Austen and O’Connor are great but can’t recall if I’ve read all of Mansfield Park and VBIA. The Esolen book, though, hmmm. Mixed thoughts at best. http://wp.me/p2Rf8D-Oa
And in response to Jen ^ the relationship you’re referring to is possibly homosexual, possibly just a “romantic friendship.” (It threw me for a loop when I first watched the BBC miniseries, when I was in high school.) Either way, it’s part of the protagonist’s long, lonely search “looking for love in all the wrong places.” It’s beautiful and profound.
In undergrad Marilyn Robinson came to our university and spoke. You should read Housekeeping if you have not!
Quick question here! On your recommendation, I borrowed Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell from the library and am 3 chapters in. I generally like scifi/fantasy, adore the Harry Potter series, and am fine with extra powers set in “real life,” but I’m having some doubts about this one, especially with that cathedral scene. Any extra thoughts on the level of magic or disrespect for the Church in this book? Should I give myself a few more chapters…?
I actually haven’t read a couple of those, and they’re now going on my To Read list. Thank you! As for mine (because you know I can’t resist):
1. A Song for Nagasaki by Paul Glynn, SJ (the book I most often recommend to people and have NEVER gotten anything less than a rave review from anyone in response)
2. The Silver Chair by CS Lewis–my all-time favorite of the Chronicles 6.
3. The Great Divorce by CS Lewis
4. Sense and Sensibility
5. My Sisters the Saints by Colleen Carroll Campbell
6. What it Means to Be A Christian by Joseph Ratzinger
7. Anne of the Island by LM Montgomery
8. Jane Eyre
9. Attachments: Why You Love, Feel, and Act the Way You Do by Tim Clinton
10. Happy Are You Poor by Thomas Dubay
1.) Watership Down by Richard Adams
2.) The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien
3.) Pride & Prejudice by Jane Austen
4.) H.M.S. Surprise by Patrick O’Brian
5.) O Pioneers by Willa Cather
6.) Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell
7.) A Good Man is Hard to Find by Flannery O’Connor
8.) Cranford by Elizabeth Gaskell
9.)Farmer Boy by Laura Ingalls Wilder
10.) The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
To Kill a Mockingbird
The Sound and The Fury
The Help
Personality Plus
Anne of Green Gables (the whole series)
The Witch of Blackbird Pond
Congratulations on your pregnancy news!!! And thank you for the Kristin Lavransdatter intro – through the Simple show- I am LOVING IT! Have you read H is for Hawk? Obvious choice given your Once and Future King pick. Also Letter to the King by Tonke Dragt is brilliant!
Some of mine are:
The Wind in the Willows
Anne of Green Gables
The Green Dolfin Street
The Sadow of the Wind