There are books you love, and then there are books that become a part of you, that you pick up over and over because you want to hold them, because you want to feel their weight and touch the pages covered in the words that mean so much to you. The covers are soft, ragged-edged and worn because you have read these books again and again, from cover to cover, or from wherever you opened them at that moment. You read to the end, or just a paragraph, pages maybe, or a single line. You know the words, but each time you read them they reverberate within you as though a bell has rung in your heart.

We all have favorite books, but what are your all-time favorites? The ones that have a special shelf all their own, the ones that you would choose to pack and be perfectly happy reading over and over on a deserted island if you were to happen to find yourself in such a situation with unlimited reading time, but, alas, a limited library? Here, friends, are my all-time favorite novels: (all photos found on Google)

Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë: If I was told I had to choose just one book, only one, one single, solitary favorite, Jane Eyre would be it. …maybe. (Letters from Westerbork is a close runner up, barely a fingertip’s distance behind in the race to the book I won’t live without. More on this book in a later post) I have six copies of Jane Eyre, plus a graphic novel. I have books inspired by Jane Eyre: Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier, Jean Rhys’ Wide Sargasso Sea, and A Girl Walks Into a Book: What the Brontës Taught Me about Life, Love, and Women’s Workby Miranda K. Pennington, and have read several others. I own three versions of the film, and if you ask me who the sexiest Rochester is, Orson Welles, Ciaran Hinds, or William Hurt, my answer is yes. (NKP: the day after I drafted this post, I discovered Jane & Edward: A Modern Reimagining of Jane Eyre by Melodie Edwards at Dollar Tree. Yes, I bought it.)

I first read Jane Eyre when I was in my early twenties; I don’t recall what made me pick it up at the library, though I do recall remembering that it was referenced in Daddy-Long-Legs. I supposed if Jean Webster liked it, I might as well give it a go. To say I loved it would be an understatement. I read it twice in the two weeks I had it checked out, and renewed it. Jane is such a powerful character, not only in the way that nineteenth century literary heroines were, but as a real person: she is flawed, angry, spiteful, willful; she is bitter about the injustices handed to her and dreams of love and happiness. And she is fiercely intelligent and believes in herself and what she deserves. Add in a curmudgeonly, brooding, love-struck-though-deceitful leading man and a madwoman in the attic (literally) and you have a perfect recipe for an amazing Gothic novel. (I will admit it does drag in one particular area, but I am willing to overlook that in favor of the rest of the book.)

Next, Ahab’s Wife by Sena Jeter Naslund. This is a truly gorgeous story, full of color, sound, texture, and life. Una Spenser is a character very like Jane Eyre: intelligent, passionate about life, seeking knowledge and truth. She makes mistakes, she redeems herself and others, she reinvents herself as she needs to. She suffers loss, heartbreak, abandonment, and literal shipwreck, and she soars like the eagles she observes from her lighthouse tower. Naslund writes real people into her narrative: artist and mathematician Phebe Folger, astronomer Maria Mitchell, and writer and activist Margaret Fuller, and pulls in the narrative of the 1820 wreck of the whaling ship Essex. You could try to call this a companion novel to Moby Dick, but that would be doing this book a disservice: Melville doesn’t even give Ahab’s wife a name; Naslund gives her a vibrant, beautiful life.

The third book on my “I-could-probably-live-without-but-don’t-want-to-try” list is The Dovekeepers by Alice Hoffman. Alice Hoffman is one of my favorite writers. I don’t bother to request her new books from the library, I just buy them. She is that good. The Dovekeepers brings readers to the final years of the Jewish stronghold of Masada during the Roman conquest of, well, everywhere. Told through the voices of four women, this book transcends time. You ask yourself what you would do for love. When faced with what could potentially be the end of forever, how would you approach each day? What would you do to see another sunrise? What spells would you weave, what histories would you make up for your listeners? Historians and archeologists are divided on what really happened at the fall of Masada in 74 AD; Flavius Josephus claimed that the Romas held the citadel siege for years, and finally entered to find the bodies of over 900 Jewish “rebels” (is one a rebel for wishing to live your life as a free person instead of a slave?); archeologists have found evidence to show that the siege may have lasted only weeks, and no evidence of mass murder/suicides. The ghosts of Masada keep their secrets, and Yael, Revka, and Yonah keep theirs.

And finally, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith. I have read and reread this beautiful coming of age story so much that pages are falling out. I had to put a rubber band around it when Bestie asked to borrow it so pages wouldn’t get lost. (I bought her a beautiful hardcover edition for Christmas) Readers meet Francie when she is eleven, and spend six years alongside her in the tenements of Williamsburg, Brooklyn. We see her striving for her distant, hardworking mother’s approval, never understanding that her mother would quite literally kill for her children if need be; we see her unwavering love for her deeply flawed, charming, devil-may-care father; we browse library bookshelves with her as she dreams of reading all of the books in her small world; we see her dreams and determination, her love of learning and her wish to fly free and discover a world away from poverty. To say this book is a heartening, wholesome story feels a little twee, but this really is the best way to describe it. It makes you laugh, it makes you cry, and it makes you appreciate all that you have. (As an aside, this book was hugely popular with soldiers stationed overseas during WW2; Betty Smith said she received more fan mail from soldiers than civilians regarding this book.) The 1945 film cuts out much of the novel, but keeps the heart of the story, and I highly recommend watching it (after you read the book, of course).

This has been a monster of a post, which is why I have broken it into two parts. Leave a comment with your favorite novels; I’ll definitely check them out!