You I Remember by Deb Eileen

I read a lot. Actually this is an understatement. I read a whole lot. If I don’t have a book on the go I feel antsy. I like my house to have stacks of books on every available service and on the weekends I read the book reviews and tear out names of even more books that I’ll plan to read. I could quit my job and do nothing but read and I still wouldn’t catch up. I come from a long proud line of readers.The only problem with reading a lot of books is you forget a lot of books. There are few things more frustrating than being 1/4 of the way through the book when you start to realize that you know what is going to happen, not because of psychic ability, but because you’ve read the book before.

Then there are the books that stay with you. The ones that you find yourself telling other people about in a rabid obsessed kind of way. You know that they NEED to read this particular book.

I’ve enjoyed reading the posts this week because it reminded me of so many books. Many of them as soon as I heard the title I remembered the book instantly. It was like coming across a great friend that I hadn’t seen in years. What surprised me is how many I remembered- I’ve killed a lot of brain cells since my mis-spent youth. Some of my favorites:

  • A Separate Peace
  • The Chocolate Wars
  • Judy Blume-pretty much all of them
  • Charlotte’s Web
  • James and the Giant Peach.

 I couldn’t decide on a favorite- it came down to one of these two:

  • The Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil Frankweiler
  • The Phantom Tollbooth

If you haven’t read The Phantom Tollbooth or The Mixed Up Files- you really should. Your life is empty and meaningless- you just don’t know it. There is no need for you to suffer- they are both still in print.

10 Replies to “You I Remember by Deb Eileen”

  1. Your enthusiasm is contagious, Eileen. However, I think you meant The Phantom Tollbooth OR The Mixed Up Files. Amazon.com featured the following review:
    “I read [The Phantom Tollbooth] first when I was 10. I still have the book report I wrote, which began ‘This is the best book ever.'”
    –Anna Quindlen, The New York Times

    Talk about being in good company.:)

  2. I bought a copy of The Phantom Tollbooth just about a year ago and loved it as much as when I read it the first time. I think it is the watch dog. Or Milo. Maybe both.

  3. When I was pregnant, my partner and I decided that if it was a boy, we would name him Milo, after Milo in The Phantom Tollbooth. It is an amazing book!

    I have not read The Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil Frankweiler but I plan to seek out a copy ASAP!

    Oh, and I’m really glad I’m not the only one who gets 1/4 (or okay, sometimes maybe 1/2) way through a book only to realize I’ve read it and know what’s coming next — particularly a bummer when you’re reading mysteries and you know “who done it” by page 75!

  4. Oooh, a Separate Peace. Forgot about that one. That was a bit gut-wrenching for me, for some reason. I’m also thinking Catcher in the Rye (which I was also reading at the time) and A Love Story …

  5. I didn’t read A Separate Peace until about 8 years ago, and it was gut-wrenching for me as a grown-up! And, Mia, I read A Love Story while I was skipping class in the high school library. It took me the full fifty minutes as I was a sobbing, heaving mass of jelly when I finished 😀

  6. Yes to Judy Blume. And also the Gordon Korman books – This Can’t Be Happening at MacDonald Hall, the book that he wrote for a grade 7 school assignment that launched his career. Talented guy.

    Plus, Twenty and Ten. An amazing book about twenty French children who hide ten Jewish children during WWII. I read it as a child and it stayed with me, all these years.

    And Jack London.

  7. A friend told me about your grog. Congrats on a great site. I’ll try to pop by now and then when I need distraction from my own deadline, 3 months away, to have my 3rd novel delivered to my editor at Penguin Putnam. All the best to you in 2007!

  8. I’m so glad I’m not the only one who forgets the books she’s read. Just happened to me with a Philip Roth novel I bought on audible.com that I’d been excited about reading for months. Yep, had already read it — only about a year before. The worst part is that I didn’t even realize I had until the second or third chapter!

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