The Almighty Five That I Can Read Ever and Ever Again:


Diana Gabaldon - Outlander  (in fact, I'll claim the first trilogy as One Thing)
George RR Martin - Game of Thrones
Dan Simmons - Hyperion
Joseph Heller - Catch-22
Colleen McCullough - The Thorn Birds



The first four are pretty obvious.  Yes, Thorn Birds is sheer melodramatic guilty pleasure reading, but the characters of Archbishop Contini-Verchese and Rainer Moerling Hartheim are standout gems.

I am going to be predictable.

1. Complete works of Shakespeare -- not sure which of my many editions of this I would take -- either the really old one (1865) or the complete illustrated or the Riverside or the big paperback.

2. Silmarillion -- because I might actually finish it when I have nothing better to do and it would be interesting as a foundation for a new civilization.  I like experiments.

3. Sagas of the Icelanders -- maybe it would inspire me to build a ship and try to escape the island.

4. Les Miserables -- because it is 1600 pages of people who are more miserable than I am.

5. Any reasonably large book on quantum physics because I'll have the time to try and understand it.

1) MS&T
2) Malazan series
3) Salman Rushdie - The Satanic Verses
4) Ratha's Creature - Clare Bell (for the kids!)
5) A collection of Sherlock holmes stories

... if I had to choose from what is currently on my bookshelves?

- Journey to the West by Wu Cheng'en
- History of Art by H.W. Janson, 5th Edition
- the Otherland Series, because there are only 3 books in MS&T
- the OED, because the box set I own includes a magnifying glass which is sure to come in handy
- the Wheel of Time series, because it would require time on a desert island for me to have the patience to follow the scramble that is meant to be a plot, not to mention the cast of thousands

If I weren't restricted to books I already have, I'd trade the Wheel of Time series for a really concise and extensive tome on surviving on (and escaping) a desert island.

Last edited by cyan (2008-12-06 02:42:25)

Tad, yay! Good to see you again. :) 

Okay, books!

Otherland - Did we agree Otherland counts as one? I figure if LotR does.... and while it would be hard to choose between those two (because I am newly, late-in-life in complete love with LotR), Otherland is also completely magical and takes us to all these different places, and has a lot of meaning-of-life stuff in it, and it brings back many fond memories of long days spent debating the mysteries of the story with my new TWMB and ListServ friends. Also, my Otherland is signed with many friendly, smile-bringing Tad-words, while LotR is not. So I can be like, "Hey kids, let me tell you a story about Uncle Tad...." (Because it's a desert island, I can make up my own family history! Upside!)

Peter Pan - Rationally because I'd need something for the kids, but really because this is one I just never get tired of, and I will obviously need a tearjerker on a desert island, without chick flicks to get me by. (Yes, I always cry at the end of Peter Pan. Every single time.)

The Great Gatsby - I've always been a sucker for this one, and am in love with it a different way each time I read it.

Shakespeare Complete - As soon as that's an option, it's not like I can put it back, man! History, bawdiness, hours of entertainment for the whole apocolypse clan.

Bill Bryson's A Very Short History of Nearly Everything - A history of the universe and humanity's triumphs and foibles, and because Bryson's easygoing humor always has a way of making me feel like, ah, life's not so hard, everything is okay. With my penchant for taking things too seriously, I really need that.

Last edited by Marian (2008-12-17 13:13:49)

Aan`allein wrote:

@Marian: by the phrasing of Tad's question, Otherland doesn't count as one. :( Only books which actually exist as a single volume in the real world. LotR does, but publishers just haven't caught on yet that Otherland needs the same treatment. So totally unfair!)

Yeah, it occurred to me since my post, too, that I couldn't count the hypothetical One Volume of Doom, since I wanted my signed ones, which are definitely not one volume.

Oh, well. *pulls Otherland out of desert island shopping cart* I can't just take one of the books, because then I'd always be wondering what I was forgetting that happened later/before.

Hmm. I need at least one Tad book. Caliban's Hour, then, which is fab, and I can write dissertations in the sand cross-referencing that and The Tempest.... and besides, the cover art on the red one could keep my imagination going even when I lose my glasses! ;)

Last edited by Marian (2008-12-06 15:45:53)

Kiema wrote:

I am going to be predictable.

1. Complete works of Shakespeare -- not sure which of my many editions of this I would take -- either the really old one (1865) or the complete illustrated or the Riverside or the big paperback.

2. Silmarillion -- because I might actually finish it when I have nothing better to do and it would be interesting as a foundation for a new civilization.  I like experiments.

3. Sagas of the Icelanders -- maybe it would inspire me to build a ship and try to escape the island.

4. Les Miserables -- because it is 1600 pages of people who are more miserable than I am.

5. Any reasonably large book on quantum physics because I'll have the time to try and understand it.

I was considering taking the Sagas and the Eddas, too. :)

Magpie wrote:

As for the descendants... weren't we talking about a deserted island? I wasn't aware humans are capable of parthenogenesis.

Well, see, the island could be deserted before we got stuck there, right? Then the plane crash lands during the nuclear fall-out, and you don't know if humanity survived, and it is your duty to procreate with the skeezy guy from A12.

Or you could go to the island pregnant.

This is such a totally unfair question....

If I manage to bind my entire collection of books together with duct-tape, would that then count as one?? PLease???

*pouts* Prolly not...

Okay...

1. Ulysses by James Joyce. (being stuck on a desert island would finally force me to get through it, allthough chances are I might drown myself first)

2. LOTR (I've already read it 20 times and will definitely be able to read it again)

3. The war of the flowers (as the Otherland serie is out by vote... and taking just the one book would be too frustrating)

4. The Goblin Companion by Brian Froud and Terry Jones (because you never know what you might meet, and even if I don't meet anything, I'll at least be able to perfect my drawing of goblins)

5. (hard choice, still pondering taping up all the other books) The unbearable lightness of being by Milan Kundera (because I just could not live anywhere without that book)

Kiema wrote:

I shall break rules and begin the first inter-island library, rowing from island to island in my makeshift bamboo boat, braving the depths of the sea and creatures to exchange various volumes of Otherland and other series we all would like to read.

Foul! I cry foul!

*Only b/c i think it was a great idea and wished I thought of something like that first! :D*

Just don't open the hatch.

1. How to Build a Boat, Cee Sick

2. Desert Island on $5 a Day, Didya Packawallet

3. Learning to Love Coconut Milk, Howie Runs

4. How to Build a Boat Sand Castle, Gritty Sails

5. LOTR, Duh!!