Now that fall is just around the corner all I can think about is curling up in a comfy chair next to the window with a cool breeze coming through and a good book on my lap. Thinking back to my favorite books over the years I realized that almost all of them have something in common, which is taking me to another place and time. Before I was able to actually travel when I was growing up, I was able to magically transport myself through my favorite books. There’s just something about a great story that allows you to travel back in time to another era or to another world altogether. Below are some of my favorite books over the years and why they hold a special place in my heart.
1) Numero uno is and always will be the Harry Potter series. I can honestly say that these books completely opened my eyes to my love for reading. I was about 10 or 11 when I first read The Sorcerer’s Stone and immediately was riveted by this magical place called Hogwarts and wanted to be best friends with Harry, Ron, and Hermoine. I pretty much grew up with the Harry Potter series (spending hours in my bedroom as a kid reading these books) with the seventh and final book coming out when I was seventeen. I’m not ashamed to admit that I finished that final book as eagerly and as enraptured as I did the very first book.
What always amazed me was J.K. Rowling’s ability to create this magical world and describe it so vividly that it almost felt like you were a part of it. Anytime I wanted to I could open up a Harry Potter book and transport myself to a world where wizards and magic existed and that was pretty cool. I could go on and on about this series but I don’t want to bore you =) Just trust me, if you haven’t read this series yet, no matter how old you are, you will love it. And no, watching the movies (though good) is not a great substitute for reading these books =) Trust me.
2) Another favorite book of mine is The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah. This book takes place during World War II in Germany and France. It centers around two sisters who have very different experiences during the war. It showcases strong, dynamic, and sometimes vulnerable female characters that really draw you in as they struggle with survival, adapting to what they needed to do and who they needed to be in order to survive the war while not losing themselves along the way. I definitely recommend this book if you’re looking for a good emotional read because it has adventure, love, and sisterhood but it also has the devastation of war, heartbreak, and more. It’s a reminder of how strong women can be and how their commendable efforts during wartime often go overlooked.
“If I have learned anything in this long life of mine, it is this: in love we find out who we want to be; in war we find out who we are.” -The Nightingale
3) Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear by Elizabeth Gilbert: This book is a really great inspirational read. This is the same author of Eat, Pray, Love which is another book that I loved. Big Magic focuses on the author’s theory that ideas find us via the universe. An idea may come to you from out of nowhere, sometimes a little idea or sometimes a big idea, and you may entertain that idea or let it pass. However, if you pass on an idea or never make or create anything from it, the idea could easily become impatient and leave you to find someone else who will allow the idea to come to fruition. This book was a pretty light read, I read it in a couple of days while traveling. She writes in very friendly and humorous manner which makes her idea very approachable. I like anything that challenges the way I see the world or opens my eyes to another way of thinking and this book definitely does that. It makes me stop and think about ideas as living and breathing entities, something that requires love and attention but also the right owner to bring it to life.
It definitely inspired me to explore my creative side more often. We often are inhibited by our fear of not being good enough or “why bother doing this or doing that if nothing is going to come out of it”, so instead we decide to do nothing, we decide to be safe. But sometimes its not always about the destination but the journey. If we only have one life, why not spend it creating things, exploring, and continuously learning about stuff that we are curious and intrigued about? If you want to learn how to take better photos, take a photography class, if you want to get closer to nature, start gardening or hiking, or if you want to start your own blog, start your own blog =) Life is too short to not have fun with it.
4) One of my other favorite authors is Lisa See. I’ve read several of her books including Snow Flower and the Secret Fan, Peony in Love, and Shanghai Girls. What I love about her work is it transports me to foreign lands and past eras with most of her books taking place in seventeeth -century China, nineteeth-century China, and so forth. It’s an awesome combination of culture and history.
Some of my other favorite books are The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova (an adventurous/thrilling fictional novel that takes you through Amsterdam, Istanbul, Budapest, Romania, Bulgaria, and more) and Memoirs of a Geisha by Arthur Golden (a historical novel taking place in Japan within the secretive world of geishas).
What are some of your favorite books? Let me know what I should read next!
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