Most of us have our favourite books that we like to reread every now and then, but nothing beats that very first moment you read a cherished book; discovering its many secrets and following its twists and turns. Yes, it is true that if wait long enough, changes in yourself mean that rereading a book can make it feel like a new book. Even the dimming of memory can cause a jolt in a section you’d forgotten, but it never quite captures the thrill of a first read.
With this in mind, I asked you to choose one book or series that you would like to unread so you can experience reading it for the first time once more. Here are the 20 top books you would like to unread.
Storming ahead to top our poll with 30 votes is the Harry Potter series by J. K Rowling. No single book in the series stood out, you wanted to read them all for the first time.
Buy the Harry Potter Boxset – US
Buy the Harry Potter Boxset – UK
Joint second place is held by two timeless classics. With 11 votes each, Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird and Margaret Mitchell’s Gone with the Wind proved to be popular choices.
Buy to Kill a Mockingbird – US
Buy to Kill a Mockingbird – UK
Next, with 8 votes, came J.R.R Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings. An ever present favourite with our reading addicts, this trilogy always seems to get a mention.
Buy The Lord of the Rings – US
Buy The Lord of the Rings – UK
The Fault in Our Stars by John Green brings us back to contemporary fiction, with 6 votes in favour of reading this book for the first time again.
Buy The Fault in our Stars – US
Buy The Fault in our Stars – UK
The much loved novel The Book Thief by Markus Zusak follows, with 5 of you wanting that first time thrill once more.
Three books shared the next place, with 4 votes each. You were unable to separate Khaled Hosseini’s The Kite Runner, Stephenie Meyer’s The Twilight Saga, and Jean M. Auel’s The Clan of the Cave Bear series.
Buy The Clan of the Cave Bear – US
Buy The Clan of the Cave Bear – UK
Many books took 3 votes each, and these were:
Little Women – Louisa May Alcott
The Stand – Stephen King
A Prayer for Owen Meany – John Irving
Angela’s Ashes – Frank McCourt
Chronicles of Narnia – C. S. Lewis
Jane Eyre – Charlotte Bronte
Outlander series – Diana Gabalden
The Time Traveler’s Wife – Audrey Niffenegger
Atlas Shrugged – Ayn Rand
Of Mice and Men – John Steinbeck
I hope you enjoyed the list, especially as you chose what was on it. There were almost 200 books mentioned in all, far too many to list but feel free to add your own suggestions in the comments.
I’m astonished that on a reading site, you show the movie version of LotR. Long before it was a movie, it was a series of books that many of read and reread and studied maps and added every Tolkien book or book about Tolkien & his works.
“you know, in a lot of ways, I think that movies are the new books” (Bad Teacher)
I agree. There are lots of BOOK versions.
I would love to read the harry potter series again and again
The Secret Garden! The best book ever. I wish I could re read again and again with the same wonder and exploration as the first time!
YES!!!
“American Saviour” by Roland Merullo
I wish I could read ‘In the name of the wind’ and ‘wise mans fear’ by Pateick Rothfuss again for the first time and all of Robin Hobb’s fantasy Farseer novels I get reader envy when people read them for the first time!!
Oh yes
I am rereading as many of the high school required reading books from the 60’s as I can remember and find. As I do, I find that it is like reading them for the first time. My perspective and memory of them is so changed 50 years later! There is a wonderful reason they were “required reading” then and should be now! They are truly worth the time and effort, even if I wasn’t convinced back then.
Rebecca. The journey from mousy, afraid-of-life girl to take charge woman, the eeriness of Mrs. Danvers, the truly shocking revelations about Max. I had no idea where the book was going. All with a heroine who has no name.
I wouldn’t “unread” anything … I’d just re-read it. Why would I want to deprive myself and only have once, the enjoyment, when I can have it twice, thrice or more! 🙂
The Count of Monte Cristo
Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell
Pride and Prejudice
Persuasion
Wuthering Heights
Jane Eyre
Good omens, Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman
Freedom – Frantzen
100 Years of Solitude. It was such an amazing thing, to experience magic realism for the first time, not even knowing it was, or would be, a genre. “He can write that? She can disappear with butterflies? Astounding.
Emma!
Recently finished William Finnegan.s “Barbarian Days”, and would love to begin it afresh. A great read!