Top Ten Tuesday: 10 Books I Refuse to Let Anyone Touch

Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish  and is now hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl.

This week’s topic is books that you won’t let anyone touch. I’ve always been such a huge fan of reading that I would loan out my books left and right. I would get so excited when someone said they wanted to read a book, and I had it! I even turned my little library of books into a library for my younger siblings and mom.

But, now that I’m older, I’m a lot more possessive of my books, and there are some I wouldn’t lend over my dead body (they’ll probably be buried with me).

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1. The Eye of the World by Robert Jordan

I started reading these books when I was a high school freshman. I was enchanted by the end of the first page. But I won’t part with my copy because it’s been with me for almost 2 decades and it was signed by Jordan’s widow.

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2. The Colour of Magic by Terry Pratchett

I started reading these books at the recommendation of one of my college friends. That was shortly before I left to study abroad in Denmark. I didn’t take many books with me, but quickly learned of a bookstore that sold books in English. This and The Light Fantastic came from that bookstore.

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3. The Magic Circle by Katherine Neville

I read this just because I have the same first name, spelled the same way. I thought it might be interesting, but it was much better than I thought. When I met my husband, he expressed an interest in reading more, so I suggested Neville’s books. Later on, we learned she was doing a reading and signing session at a local bookstore. Of course we had to go!

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4. The Ultimate Hitchhiker’s Guide by Douglas Adams

Yet another book I read based on a friend’s recommendation. Later on I found out he just meant the first book and not the whole series. But I wasn’t sure, so got the whole thing from that Danish bookstore.

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5. Persuasion by Jane Austen

Every year at Barnes and Noble, they had the classics in a different binding. One year, it was these cute little books with very thin pages. I thought they were adorable, so I got a bunch. I have more than just Persuasion, but this one also turned out to be my favorite Austen book.

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6. The Savage Garden by Mark Mills

Another book I got in Denmark. But I loved this one so much that I read it almost every month for about a year. It’s now been years since the last reading, but I still won’t let anyone touch it. That shark sticker on the corner is not part of the cover. I don’t know how it got there.

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7. Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte

Okay, I don’t love this book, but it was a gift from my mom. She’s also a huge reader and this is one she passed down to me. I have no idea how old it is, but it’s the only book I have from her that’s still in good condition (we’ll discuss the tattered copy of The Phantom Tollbooth another day).

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8. Stand in the Wind by Jean Little

When I was 12, we went to visit family in Canada. In one of the airports, I saw some books. This one caught my eye, though I couldn’t tell you why. Apparently, my enjoyment of collecting books in other countries started here. I never saw this book in an American bookstore, so I’m not letting this one go, and my kids are not allowed to touch it. Yet.

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9. The White Tribunal by Paula Volsky

This one isn’t signed, wasn’t read by my husband, and didn’t come from another country. But it has a special place in my heart. When I was 14, I picked up this book. I have distinct memories of sitting in my Natural Science class and reading this before class started. I remember becoming insanely frustrated by a single word, though it took me a couple of days of trying to puzzle it out before I finally looked in a dictionary. I learned what “inevitable” means. It’s also a good book.

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10. South of Superior by Ellen Airgood

I’ve entered a lot of giveaways on Goodreads since I joined in 2012. I entered the one for this book because I could. The next day I was stunned when I got the email saying I’d won a copy. A couple of weeks later, I received it in the mail and immediately started reading. So far, it’s still the only book I’ve won.