BOOKS I HAVE READ MORE THAN FIVE (5) TIMES

This list does not include juvenile books like The Hardy Boys, Tom Sawyer and Black Beauty since I read those dozens of times as a kid. Only adult novels make the list:

To Kill A Mockingbird / Harper Lee: I have read this book every 2-3 years since 1977. One of the best of all time. Simple and charming yet very deep. One of the best movies of all time also ...

The World According to Garp / John Irving: When this book was released I read it two times in a row! I literally finished the book and turned back to the first page and read it again. Funny as hell and sad as hell ... a difficult combination to pull off well. Decent movie too ...

The Princess Bride / William Goldman: One of the most fun books you will ever read. The early edition (pre-movie) had one of the greatest tag lines in publishing history: What happens when the most beautiful woman in the world meets the handsomest prince in the world and he turns out to be a son-of-a-bitch? The movie is good, but the book (of course) is much much better. I read this in college and tried to interest my friends in reading it ... I had no takers. When the movie was released 20 yrs later, everyone wanted to read the book and I took great delight in reminding them I tried to make that happen years ago.

Carrion Comfort / Dan Simmons: Wow! Creepy beyond belief. And some of it takes place in Charleston! The little old Charleston matron, Melanie, is one of the creepiest characters to walk through the pages of a book. A massive, multi-plotted novel about a vast global conspiracy among "mind vampires" who use the power of their will to impose it upon weaker humans. French movie is in production ...

A Town Like Alice / Nevil Shute: A great adventure romance. A WWII book, a romance, a travel story ... all rolled into one. Shute is on my list of one of the few writers who has never written a boring book. Great BBC production for Masterpiece Theater in the 1980s starring Bryan Brown.

Dune / Frank Herbert: Towering sci-fi epic that deserves its reputation as one of the greatest sci-fi novels of all time. If you've read it, you already understand how detailed and complex the story is ... and how exciting. It takes place on a remote desert planet named Arrakis that is the only place in the known universe that produced the highly addictive spice melange. The plot is fueled by a massive power grab by feuding Intergalactic families with all the intrigue and double-crosses you might expect, along with a touch of mystical religion. Lousy movie directed by David Lynch in the 1980s and a tepid miniseries for the Sci-Fi Channel. New version is in production currently ... I'm not holding out much hope. The book is difficult to turn into a movie.

Replay / Ken Grimwood: A classic take on the time-travel novel. In the opening paragraph 43-year old Jeff Winston dies in 1988 and "awakens" in 1963 at the age of 18 ... with all the memories of his previous life intact. He lives again to the age of 43 and then dies ... and "awakens" again ... over and over and over. Kind of hope they don't make a movie ... Hollywood would screw it up like they did Jumper.

Strangers & Watchers / Dean R. Koontz: Koontz has fallen prey to the Stephen King syndrome ... publishing books that would never see the light of day if they were written by someone who was not a "name" author. However, these two books were written when Koontz was hitting his commercial (and creative) stride. Strangers is one of the best takes of the alien-abduction story that branches out in intriguing ways. Watchers is Koontz favorite book of his ... a sweet and harrowing story about a lonely man and woman who are brought together by an unsual dog. The plot of the movie Watchers was so different I'm not sure the producers ever read the book.

Ender's Game / Orson Scott Card: My personal favorite sci-fi book. Deceptively simple but full of misdirection and narrative layers. Eight-year old Ender Wiggen is an unsually intelligent boy who is sent to Battle Schoo. Several generations ago Earth luckily defeated an invading alien force called the Buggers, did not destroy them. So Earth is busy training the best and brightest to be ready to meet the Buggers when they return ... and they may be closer than you think. Movie version is in slow developement ... Card has huge control over this material ... thank goodness. Hoepfully when and if it is a movie, it will be faithful.

Cannery Row / John Steinbeck: My favorite novel by one of America's best writers. Steinbeck's "serious" books can become preachy populism (The Grapes of Wrath) , but his comic novels are flat-out hilarious and filled with great characters. The group of bums called "Mack and the boys" are some of the best comic relief in fiction. Odd and stylized movie starring Nick Nolte and Debra Winger is entertaining.