I've decided to go the route of books I enjoyed the most and still remember fondly. Fact is, I could pick anyone of them up right now and stay up all night reading them. That is the true test of a good book, good to me that is. I've always read voraciously and still can't sleep unless I've read for at least half an hour in bed, no matter how tired I am. I will keep doing it until my eyes wear out and then I'll switch to audio books. 

My favourite books tend to be non-fiction, especially biographies, and auto-biographies but anything that is well-written and interesting, at least to me, attracts my attention. My guilty pleasures are mysteries and psychological thrillers, and a good trashy novel every once in a while. And yeah, I will still read anything at all rather than read nothing, and that includes advertisements and the backs of cereal boxes.

Anne of Green Gables by Lucy Maud Mongomery

I've always rooted for the underdog and this book is one of the reasons why. I still haven't been to Prince Edward Island, but one day I will visit the shrine to this fictional, freckled redhead who stood up for herself and others with humour and sass.

The Diary of Anne Frank by Anne Frank

This book literally changed my life. Not only did Anne become my heroine and personal touchstone -- I was younger than her when I first read it, but my admiration persists to this day. Her diary turned me into a World War Two aficionado. I wanted so badly to be Jewish after I read it. My interest in personal interpretations of war has since expanded to World War One. Anne Frank also made me want to become a writer.

Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte

It was a tough choice between this and anything by Jane Austen but the passion and poetry of Bronte's writing reflect my personal style more than Austen's technical brilliance. Again, the story of an underdog who finds love and redemption against the odds in an era brutally repressive to women. 

Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert Heinlein

I can still remember the excitement I felt as I read this book in one sitting. Wow! Imagine all the possibilities of mankind and outer space! My mind reeled. My interest in science fiction waned, but not before I learned to love Kurt Vonnegut, Harlan Ellison, Philip K. Dick and William Gibson among many others. 

The Works of Edgar Allan Poe by Edgar Allan Poe

My late father owned this collection, which then became my late brother's,  and it sits battered and yellowed on a bookshelf near me as I write this. Poe's fantastical imagination, his mastery of suspense, character and mystery inspire me still. Together with his tortured life, his fiction is an irresistible draw. My favourite mystery writer for a while has been James Burke and his Dave Robicheaux series, but I also love all the early  hard-boiled stuff, and Dennis Potter's The Singing Detective. 

The Magus by John Fowles

I first read The Collector by this author and it crystallized my love of psychological thrillers. Then I read Fowles' first book, The Magus, which apart from being one of the most captivating "trickster" novels ever written, made me want to travel to Greece and everywhere else. It is exotic, sexy, mystical and perplexing right to the last page, which offers readers a very contemporary choice of two endings.

On the Road by Jack Kerouac 

It was already dated by the time I read it but the raw energy and sheer storytelling power of this book still make me gasp. I mean, who wouldn't want to party with Neal Cassady, at least for a little while? I still can't think about it without wanting to throw a few things into an overnight bag, gas up the car, and drive fast to an unknown destination. Jazz would definitely be on the soundtrack. I also love Ken Kesey's earlier books. 

The Women's Room by Marilyn French

This righteously angry novel summed up so many books about feminism and independent women I had known and read about up to that point. The works of Doris Lessing, Betty Friedan, Germaine Greer, especially Germaine Greer, Gloria Steinem, and certainly not least, Simone de Beauvoir, were all represented in one form or another by the characters. Many books followed, especially Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale, but this is the one that I remember the most.

The Portable Dorothy Parker by Dorothy Parker

Her poetry, her short stories and especially her bon mots made me want to drink martinis with her and the gang at the Algonquin Round Table for a long time, at least until I read Marion Meade's sad biography of her life. She wasn't afraid to speak her mind, or to pay the price during a shameful era in American history, proving that she was more than just a razor-sharp wit.  

1984 by George Orwell

For all the obvious reasons but also because it confirmed everything I had always suspected about mankind's ability for self-deception. 

Honourable mention:

Charlotte's Web by E. B. White

Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott

Out of Africa by Isak Dinesen

P.S. Your Cat is Dead by James Kirkwood, Jr.

In Cold Blood by Truman Capote

The Prince of Tides by Pat Conroy

Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell

Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky

Les Miserables by Victor Hugo

Silent Spring by Rachel Carson

The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand

Understanding Media by Marshall McLuhan

All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque 

anything by Henrik Ibsen or Anton Chekhov

anything by Carol Shields, Margaret Laurence or Alice Munro 

anything by Ernest Hemingway. He wrote tight like nobody else.