What book or books do you wish you could erase from your mind and re-read for the first time?

[Bill]

My first choice would be "A Prayer for Owen Meany," then the LOTR trilogy.

[Aoibhínn]

Mine would be by John Steinbeck

[Alondra]

Ellie wrote: "Mine would be by John Steinbeck"

I cannot just pick one.

LoTR is a great pick; also HP7, which opened up so many kids to the actual joy of picking up a book and loving it. me too

Would love to read It; Interview With the Vampire, The Book Thief and about 30 more books. Basically, everything on my favorites list! :D

[Paulfozz]

I don't think I'd want to do this with any book really, I find re-reading deepens the experience and in some cases my first reading of a book wasn't as enjoyable as later re-readings. If I could do this with movies though... ;-)

[[deleted user]]

all Gaiman books. I just want to go back to how they all made me feel the first time reading, like you know you have something great in your hands, just dont know how great till you get to the end!

[Tee27]

Bill wrote: "My first choice would be "A Prayer for Owen Meany," then the LOTR trilogy."

Great topic! I'll have to really think about this one....Too many books come to mind.

[Janice]

A little different - I wish I could erase from my mind and NEVER HAVE READ "Johnny Got His Gun" by Dalton Trumbo. It was the most disturbing, horrifying book I ever read, and it has been over 40 years since I read it.

[Sara]

Definitely The Hobbit. It's such an epic story, and I remember reading it for the first time. I was completely enthralled. Also, the entire Harry Potter series. Oh! And of course To Kill A Mockingbird. That book was fantastic.

[Anirudh]

Hey!! new to the group but NOT new to compulsive, obsessive book buying. When I first saw this group I thought I had found my real birthplace :-) I am from India, but enough with introductions!!

The one book (rather stories) that I wish I could re-read without any prior memory would be the Sherlock Holmes collection and quite frankly, I am surprised no one mentioned them yet. I really envy someone who hasn't read any and is about to start with 'A study in Scarlet'. Oh the wonder and sleepless nights, spent rushing through the foggy London outdoors filled with hansom cabs and handsome mysteries, looking over the shoulders of Holmes and Watson with thrill and unending adventure!! I wish could take their place and be swept away once again. Sigh! wishes wishes...

[Ceren]

there are so much of them, but recently my roommate borrowed my copy of Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close and her enthusiasm makes me want to read that book for the first time. Wish i could.

[Joanne]

"Mama Makes Up Her Mind"

[Tee27]

I have a few:

Tears of a Tiger

The Twilight Series

I Am the Messenger

Roots

[Rebecca]

I wish I could forget Harry Potter and read them all again. Reading them for the first time and not knowing what was going to happen was amazing. I started reading them when I was probably about eight years old,my nan got me the first four in a boxset for christmas and after that, every time the next one was coming out, my mum pre-ordered it for me and I read them within a few days.

[Jersey]

Rebecca wrote: "I wish I could forget Harry Potter and read them all again. Reading them for the first time and not knowing what was going to happen was amazing. I started reading them when I was probably about ei..."

Me, too! Harry Potter is the first series I read at a young age and I wanted to forget all of it and feel the magic it had cast upon me the first time I opened it. *sigh* Good old days...

In addition to that, I would really be happy if I forget everything about The Book Thief and read it like I do the first time :)

[Nelleke]

Lord of the Rings, definitely. If I also can erase the movie from my head, so I can imagine the hobbits myself, in stead of the imagition Peter Jackson created.

[Philip]

Oh, boy, too long a list to post here, but here are a few:
House of Leaves
Neuromancer
Red Nails

[Joseph]

The Cat Who Had 60 Whiskers. The series was wonderful until this one. The author Lilian Jackson Braun had been very sick for a long time and the publishers made the bad mistake of having a ghost writer finish the book for her. It was terrible! I wish I had never read it, it was an insult to what had been a very good mystery series until then. And then Mrs. Braun died. It would have been better if they had just left the readers hanging to make up their own minds how things would have ended rather than have a terrible ghost writer try to tie up the loose ends in an absolutely horrible way.

[Rebecca]

@Nelleke - I saw the films before reading the books, as I was young when they came out and I couldn't get into the books. But now I'm about 20% through The Return of the King and I wish I'd had the chance to imagine what the characters look like for myself while I read the books

[Jenna]

Les miserables-- read it +20 years ago and am planning to reread very shortly

[[deleted user]]

I agree on the Harry Potter series -- I wish I could go back in time and re-experience the entire thing again: reading the books, waiting in line at midnight for the new releases, seeing the films, all of it! Love them.

To a lesser degree, the Twilight series -- don't love them as much as HP, but still a fun read, and I bawled my eyes out the first time I read them, LOL.

BTW, this is a great question!

Here are a few more I'd love to experience for the first time again:

Rant

One Hundred Years of Solitude

Catch-22

Life of Pi


There are actually too many for me to list any more! I guess I'm just a nostalgic person!

[[deleted user]]

Yikes, how could I forget Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell?!

I would read and erase this one to re-read as often as possible -- such an amazing book.

[Melissa]

I think mine would be Little Women

[Lára]

Too much of them but here are some:

Inheritance Cycle by C. Paolini
Rae Wilder by Penelope Fletcher
Wings (just the 1st one) by Aprilynne Pike
Pandora by Anne Rice
Blood and Gold by Anne Rice
Dracula by Bram Stoker
Demian by Herman Hesse (my all time favourite book)
Harry Potter by J.K.Rowling
Lord of the Rings by Tolkien
Hobbit by Tolkien (the movie (3D) was awesome!)
Poison Diaries by Maryrose Wood

... okay, this is hard, just take a look at my "favorites" and "ultimate favorites" shelf - every book that is in my "favorites" is the book I´d like to read again but I can´t because I don´t re-read books.

[Karen M]

Paul wrote: "I don't think I'd want to do this with any book really, I find re-reading deepens the experience and in some cases my first reading of a book wasn't as enjoyable as later re-readings. If I could do..."

I feel the same way. Certain books (The Hobbit, Little Women, Harry Potter Boxed Set, etc.) need/earn/call to me for a re-read and I don't want to forget I read them already. I usually see things I didn't remember from the first or second read.

[Philip]

A Princess of Mars

It's one of the few books I have a CLEAR memory of reading as a kid--where I was sitting, what the book itself looked like (a very old edition from the public library) -- and what it smelled like, even. I think that's where I developed my love of the SMELL of old books!

[Cindy]

I'm a new member and this is the first group I've joined...I know I'm not supposed to repeat, but I HAVE to say "Prayer for Owen Meany" would be my first "wish I could read it all over from scratch"! I cried big-time tears on one page and laughed on the very next. It grabbed me and never let me go...

[Jocelin]

The Mistmantle Chronicles by M.I. McAlister
The Night Huntress series by Jeaniene Frost.

[Louise]

American Gods and Night Train to Lisbon

[Tracey]

Probably the Jim Bucther books - and I know it's not fantasy, but Denis Lehane's Kenzie & Gennaro books...

[Nazia]

This is such a cool topic because I have always wished (and even mentioned this fantasy to family members) that I could erase The Harry Potter series from my mind and then re-read it. I actually only read from The Goblet of Fire (which is my favourite of the series) and watched some of the movies before even reading the novels so I would wish to completely erase all the books and movies of the series and start all over again from The Philosophers Stone novel. That would be wonderful!

I also would love to erase and re-read The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar by Roald Dahl. This story captured me when I read it in primary school and I would love to experience that again. I even remember the classroom that I read it in (I think I was suppose to be preparing for an exam/test) and how I was so deeply into it that the classroom just melted away (I was really annoyed when the teacher interrupted me and told me I should be studying rather).

I haven't really felt that way about any other books even if I really enjoyed them. Anyway, if I need to experience any book again, I just re-read the book or portions from it such as the first chapters of:

The Book of Lost Things and Norwegian Wood which I absolutely loved.