In 2020 I’m answering a list of 52 journal questions. Read about it here.
Best book you read this year.
The best book I’ve read so far this year is not a new-to-me book. Any other year if you’d asked me this question it would have been something new. But never having had to live through a year like 2020, I’ve found comfort in old favourites.
These are the books that are like a warm hug. You can sink into them, knowing you’ll find old friends on the page. It’s not to say I haven’t read some fabulous new books this year. I have. It’s just that the books I’ve loved reading the most have been the ones that have brought me comfort year after year.
Maybe it’s because I don’t have to concentrate. Or worry it won’t be a happy read. Or have to think too hard about the story. Or even that if I only have a couple of minutes to spare I can still disappear into the book, because I know the story so well.
So what is the best book? Technically a series, the best book for me this year has been Anne of Green Gables by LM Montgomery (and the books that follow).
Anne of Green Gables was the first book I fell so in love with that I could never part with it. I read them first from the library, but eventually had to have my own copies so I could reread when I wanted. There are a number of books that fall into this category now (and they fill a bookshelf). But this was the first. And maybe why, when times are troubled, it’s the book I seek out.
Do you have an old favourite you still read? Or is there another book you can recommend for 2020?
July 17, 2020 at 10:32 pm
Awww your picture of the book is from the year I was born!!
My go-to “re-read” for comfort is “Ella Enchanted”. The movie is straight-up trash and should be burned and then the ashes mixed into a smelly pile of poo. But the book is this amazing wonderful fantasy land that I adore! Of course, it is locked in my classroom right now so I don’t have access to it haha.
July 18, 2020 at 9:57 am
Oh no, you don’t have it at hand! The books on my favourite books ever bookcase are never left anywhere (or lent to anyone except the Barbarians).
July 18, 2020 at 8:51 am
I used to reread more often than I do now. But I will read anything by Ray Bradbury over and over!
July 18, 2020 at 9:58 am
I’ve read Fahrenheit 451, but it was aeons ago. I can hardly remember anything but the basic premise. Not sure if I’ve read any others by him (I have a feeling he does scary and I don’t do scary).
July 18, 2020 at 9:33 am
I’ve been doing a lot of rereading, too. I just started reading the books in a series I started a while ago (but never got around to finishing), so I’m getting a bit of the new but with the comfort of familiar characters.
July 18, 2020 at 10:00 am
That’s nice, Liz. New but familiar. I have some books in my TBR pile that will be like that. New releases from authors I am reading the series of. And I have read some this year, but I keep going back to my favourites bookshelf. In fact, I just started a Stephen Donaldson duo (Mordants Need) from that bookcase which I haven’t reread in quite a while.
July 19, 2020 at 1:46 am
Yeah but it’s ok! I took it to school for one of my more advanced readers and she found it difficult to get into but within a week there were about 10 stickie notes inside with other girls reading it LOL
I made the mistake of mailing my favourite book to someone and I haven’t spoken to him in almost two years but when I last did I said when he was done with it (he had had it for like 5 months already) to send it back and guess who still doesn’t have it!?! I was just reminded about it two days ago so I’m a little bitter about it still lol it was a “living copy” – what I like to call a book where my friends write their own comments and ideas in the margins as they read it. I am so upset.