Introduction

Books that pop to mind when people insist on asking me what my favorite book is:

• the entire Harry Potter series (by J.K. Rowling, but you probably already knew that)
• anything by Laura Ingalls Wilder, but especially her Little House series
• His Dark Materials, a fantastic series by Philip Pullman
• everything Kristin Cashore has written so far (Graceling, Fire, Bitterblue)
• anything by Roald Dahl, whether for kids or for adults, but especially Matilda and "Lamb to the Slaughter"
• The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis
• A Wrinkle in Time and its companion novels by Madeleine L'Engle

(Of course, there are plenty of other books that I adore and re-read, but these are the absolute top of the top, as far as I'm concerned, works I can just come back to again and again and again because they're just so solidly excellent.)