Books You're Most Thankful To Have Discovered

[Kimberly]

This is for a post I'm writing and will link back to your blog if I use your answer.

Sometimes the right books find us at the right time. What book are you most thankful crossed your path and why?

[Briana]

I am most grateful I discovered The Lord of the Rings in sixth grade. Tolkien is an exceptional storyteller, and his work has set the bar for epic fantasy. However, Tolkien was also a brilliant medievalist and linguist. My interest in his fantasy books led me to explore Anglo-Saxon literature, Middle English literature, and the history of the English language--all of which I studied more intensively in college. My academic life could have taken a very different path if I'd never read The Lord o the Rings.

Pages Unbound

[Ingrid]

The Goose Girl by Shannon Hale was the novel that pushed me out of my own little world. That would have been about four years ago. It was through that book that I got online, started a blog a few years later, and etc... Definitely one of my favourite books and one of the most influential. Not only that, but I related to Shannon Hale's characters. They seemed real, and I could relate to their inner struggles.It was very different, of course, because I wasn't taking back kingdoms or fighting wars, but the emotional struggles were something I understood, and it gave me comfort to know that I wasn't on my on.

I'm also very grateful that I discovered the Narnia books. Technically, my family discovered them, and I grew up being delved in the world of Narnia. They were books that marked my childhood, early adolescence, and then later years. They got me into Fantasy, they got me looking at faith in a brand new way, and they were just such wonderful books to get lost in. I sometimes dream about the days that I can read those books outloud to my nieces and, someday, my own children.

The Airship Library

[Jeni]

The Great Gatsby. I know, I know, it's cliched...But as the child of immigrants for whom the American Dream was a perpetual carrot at the end of a stick, I fell in love with Gatsby. The first time I read it, it felt like Nick was telling me a secret, and it changed how I saw everything around me: my parents efforts to get ahead, my grandparents struggle to learn English, their push for myself and my brothers to obtain higher education. Suddenly the vanity of all of it, and the frail validity of less seemly success (the kind you see 'in the neighborhood') came into focus.
www.dailyeni.com

[Alyxandria]

If I Stay by Gayle Forman. A review of this book has been posted on my blog. Also an artist from DeviantArt.com has provided me with a dress design inspired by the cover of the book. B-E-E-U-T-I-F-U-L! Please check it out here: http://thebooksbuzz.blogspot.com/