The 2013 Top Ten Project Lynette Robertson & Rhonda Seamons

The Top Top Ten List

from the Book at Barnes & Noble

1. Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy

2. Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert

3. War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy

4. Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov

5. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain

6. Hamlet by William Shakespeare

7. The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald

8. In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust

9. The stories of Anton Chekhov

10. Middlemarch by George Eliot

The Task

Please provide us with a list, ranked, in

order, of what you consider to be the ten

greatest books you have read. Please

don’t include the scriptures (we all love

them). Other than that, there are no limits.

You can choose fiction or non-fiction, any

work, any writer, and any time period.

“Top Ten” is terribly vague: do you mean top ten most influential or most life-changing or most interesting or best written or most entertaining or most irritating or most provocative or...? Well, obviously you are aware of this but intentionally left it vague in order not to give the list any particular bias. So, here’s my top ten list, based on... well, what first popped into my head, then ranked in order of...ummm, I have no idea. Mostly, they’re books that have engaged, troubled, challenged, or changed me in valuable ways both because they are beautifully written and because they profoundly affected my mind and heart.

The 2007 Top Top Ten List

from the BYU-Idaho Faculty Survey

1. Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor E. Frankl

2. The Lord of the Rings Trilogy by J. R. R. Tolkien

3. Les Misérables by Victor Hugo

4. Jesus the Christ by James E. Talmage

5. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee

6. Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen

7. The Hiding Place by Corrie ten Boom

8. Mere Christianity by C. S. Lewis

9. The Chronicles of Narnia by C. S. Lewis

10. King Lear by William Shakespeare

The Same Task, Once Again

Please provide us with a list, ranked, in

order, of what you consider to be the ten

greatest books you have read. Please

don’t include the scriptures (we all love

them). Other than that, there are no limits.

You can choose fiction or non-fiction, any

work, any writer, and any time period.

Do you know how many times I have used your list?

I love adding books to my Amazon “wish list” as I

check out the unusual ones that people have read.

So glad you are updating it.

Thanks for doing this again. I look forward to seeing

a new list. My list is different today than it was all

those years ago, but not much due to the passage of

time. The main reason is that any top ten list I come

up with is an arbitrary list of 10 of my many favorite

books—probably the ones that happen to sound

most appealing to me based on my present mood.

Tomorrow I'd probably send a different list. But I do

really, really love these books; even if they aren't

always my top 10, they are definitely top 50.

This was a painful undertaking. I feel like I have

betrayed or slaughtered some of my darlings that

have not made the list. But, seeing as the list has

now been stable for two whole days, I feel that I

need to send it in now before I change my mind yet

again. So, with apologies to Augustine, Austen,

Thoreau, and Kafka, here is my top ten (for the next

few hours at least).

Each time I read your introduction about the prophet

and the moving of the 675 volumes, I smile. How

could I ever leave any of my books behind? My

Kindle will hold 3500 books, but somehow it’s not

quite the same as the feel of the book in my hands.

Will the next generation value these hundreds of

books that I have in my library? Will anyone fight

over them when I am gone?

De gustibus disputandum non est.

(There’s no disputing tastes.)

The 2013 Top Top Ten List

from the BYU-Idaho Faculty Survey

1. To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee

2. The Lord of the Rings Trilogy, by J. R. R. Tolkien

3. Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen

4. Jesus the Christ, by James E. Talmage

5. Man’s Search for Meaning, by Viktor E. Frankl

6. The Hiding Place, by Corrie Ten Boom

7. Paradise Lost, by John Milton

8. The Hobbit, by J. R. R. Tolkien

9. Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, by Herman Melville

10. The Brothers Karamazov, by Fyodor Dostoevsky

10. The Brothers Karamazov, by Fyodor Dostoevsky

In perhaps the consummate Russian novel, Dostoevsky dramatizes the spiritual conundrums of nineteenth-century Russia through the story of three brothers and their father’s murder. Hedonistic Dmitri, tortured intellectual Ivan, and saintly Alyosha embody distinct philosophical positions, while remaining full-fledged human beings, Issues such as free will, secularism, and Russia’s unique destiny are argued not throuh authorial polemic, but through the confessions, diatribes, and nightmares of the characters themselves. An unsparing portrayal of human vice and weakness, the novel ultimately imparts a vision of redemption. Dostoevsky’s passion, doubt, and imaginative power compel even the secular West he scorned. (The Top Ten)

9. Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, by Herman Melville

This sweeping saga of obsession, vanity, and vengeance at sea can be read as a harrowing parable, a gripping adventure story, or a semiscientific chronicle of the whaling industry. No matter, the book rewards patient readers with some of fiction’s most memorable characters, from mad Captain Ahab to the titular white whale that crippled him, from the honorable pagan Queequeg to our insightful narrator/surrogate (“Call me”) Ishmael, to that hell-bent vessel itself, the Pequod. (The Top Ten)

8. The Hobbit, by J. R. R. Tolkien

A great modern classic and the prelude to The Lord of the Rings. Bilbo Baggins is a hobbit who enjoys a comfortable, unambitious life, rarely traveling any farther than his pantry or cellar. But his contentment is disturbed when the wizard Gandalf and a company of dwarves arrive on his doorstep one day to whisk him away on an adventure. They have launched a plot to raid the treasure hoard guarded by . . . a large and very dangerous dragon. Bilbo reluctantly joins their quest . . . “A glorious account of a magnificent adventure, filled with suspense and seasoned with a quiet humor that is irresistible . . . All those, young or old, who love a fine adventurous tale, beautifully told, will take The Hobbit to their hearts.” (New York Times Book Review)

7. Paradise Lost by John Milton

Recasting the biblical story of Adam and Eve’s fall from grace, this epic poem details Satan’s origins, his desire for revenge, his transformation into the serpent, and his seduction of Eve. The poem extends our understanding of Christian myth in lush and challenging language. Though Milton seeks to explain “the ways of God to man,” he gives Satan—”Better to reign in hell than serve in heaven”—the best lines. (The Top Ten)

6. The Hiding Place by Corrie ten Boom

The Hiding Place proves that the light of God's love can penetrate even the darkest recesses of despair, places like the Nazi extermination camp at Ravensbruck. After protecting Dutch Jews in a secret room in their home, Corrie ten Boom, her sister and father were discovered, arrested, and imprisoned. Only Corrie survived, but her faith in God remained strong-so strong that, after the war, she could forgive a former camp guard in a face-to-face meeting. More than just a spellbinding adventure, The Hiding Place is a life-changing story. (Amazon)

5. Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor E. Frankl

Psychiatrist Viktor Frankl’s memoir has riveted generations of readers with its descriptions of life in Nazi death camps and its lessons for spiritual survival. Between 1942 and 1945 Frankl labored in four different camps, including Auschwitz, while his parents, brother, and pregnant wife perished. Based on his own experience and the experiences of others he treated later in his practice, Frankl argues that we cannot avoid suffering but we can choose how to cope with it, find meaning in it, and move forward with renewed purpose. (Amazon)

4. Jesus the Christ by James E. Talmage

The author has departed from the course usually followed by writers on the Life of Jesus Christ, which course, as a rule, begins with the birth of Mary’s Babe and ends with the ascension of the slain and risen Lord from Olivet. The treatment embodied in these pages, in addition to the narrative of the Lord’s life in the flesh comprises the antemortal existence and activities of the world’s Redeemer, the revelations and personal manifestations of the glorified and exalted Son of God during the apostolic period of old and in modern times, the assured nearness of the Lord’s second advent, and predicted events beyond—all so far as the Holy Scriptures make plain. (Jesus the Christ)

3. Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen

“It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife,” reads this novel’s famous opening line. This matching of wife to single man—or good fortune—makes up the plot of perhaps the happiest, smartest romance ever written. Austen’s genius was to make Elizabeth Bennet a reluctant, sometimes crabby equal to her Mr. Darcy, making Pride and Prejudice as much a battle of wits as it is a love story. (The Top Ten)

2. The Lord of the Rings Trilogy by J. R. R. Tolkien

An Oxford medievalist, Tolkien drew on his vast knowledge of mythology, theology, and linguistics to imagine this epic trilogy. The books chronicle the hobbit Frodo’s attempt to destroy the magical ring of Sauron, Lord of Darkness. The Fellowship of the Ring introduces the men, dwarves, and elves summoned by the wizard Gandalf to protect Frodo. In The Two Towers Frodo and his companion Sam continue their quest toward Mount Doom, while the rest of the fellowship are brought into the battle detailed in The Return of the King. (The Top Ten)

1. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee

Tomboy Scout and her brother Jem are the children of the profoundly decent widower Atticus Finch, a small-town Alabama lawyer defending a black man accused of raping a white woman. Although Tom Robinson’s trial is the centerpiece of this Pulitzer Prize-winning novel—raising profound questions of race and conscience—this is, at heart, a tale about the fears and mysteries of growing up, as the children learn about bravery, empathy, and societal expectations through a series of evocative set pieces that conjure the Depression-era South. (The Top Ten)

The 2013 One-Hit Wonder List

• Beyond Culture, by Hall

• Catch-22, by Heller

• Endurance, by Lansing

• I and Thou, by Buber

• Influencer, by Patterson

• Life of Heber C. Kimball, by Whitney

• On the Origin of Species, by Darwin

• Peace Is Every Step, by Nhat Hanh

• Persuasion, by Austen

• The Chosen, by Potok

• The Shallows, by Carr