Books that I have read more than twice.

[Parson]

I also do not read a book twice. In fact of all the books I've read, save the Bible and a few other religious books, the only ones read 2 times or more are the first eight books of David Weber's Honor Harrington series and his "Apocalypse Troll."

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

It's hard for me to say. After a couple of readings I often will read favorite parts of favorite books, rather than the whole book again, although sometimes when I start out reading favorite scenes I'll find myself going back and reading the ones I skipped. So I may remember reading a book for a third, fourth, or fifth time and it wasn't the whole book, or remember skimming when I actually ended up reading the whole thing. At my age, it's hard to keep these things straight. So there are dozens of books I find myself uncertain about and won't list them.

These ones I know (probably because with most of them I first read them at a comparatively young age, so I had time to read them a few more times before I started losing track), in no particular order, and limiting myself only to SFF genre books:

The Hobbit
The Lord of the Rings
The Once and Future King
A Christmas Carol (it's got ghosts, so I consider it fantasy)
The Silver Chair
The Horse and His Boy
Lud-In-The-Mist
Gate of Ivrel
Well of Shiuan
Fires of Azeroth
Serpent's Reach
A Wizard of Earthsea
The Tombs of Atuan
The Riddlemaster of Hed
Heir of Sea and Fire
Harpist in the Wind
The Curse of Chalion
Sorcery and Cecilia
Moon of Three Rings
Year of the Unicorn
The Little White Horse
Linnets and Valerians
The Blue Star
Havemercy
Dragon Soul
Steelhands
Port Eternity
The Greater Trumps


And this is not counting short stories I've reread numerous times (lots of Sylvia Warner Townsend and George MacDonald, for instance, among others).

I have all sorts of reasons for rereading a book. To savor the words if the prose is exceptional. Because I find a story particularly moving. Because I want to be swept up in the world again. But most I will admit are comfort reading, books I can escape into (because they are just fun, I adore the character interactions, they have great dialogue, etc.) when I am feeling sick or depressed or tired or bored.

 

[Vince W]

I've read a few books multiple times.

Dune, Dune Messiah, Children of Dune, God Emperor of Dune, Heretics of Dune, Chapterhouse: Dune
The Hobbit
Lord of the Rings
Conan Chronicles (Robert E. Howard's original stories)
Ringworld, Ringworld Engineers
Horatio Hornblower series
The Culture series
Starship Troopers
Space Cadet
Starman Jones
Forever War
Foundation, Foundation and Empire, Second Foundation
Good Omens
Neverwhere
...

I'm sure there are others.

 

[althea]

I have read all of Robin Hobbs books many times,and yes,I mean all,including The Soldier Son series which no one seemed to like.
I have also read and reread all of C.S.Sansom's books (about Matthew Shardlake) at least twice.
I read the early books in Jean Auel's Earth 's Children series over and over as the gap between them appearing was a long time. Once we got onto The Plains of Passage,they began to lose their thrill for me.
Then there were the Terry Goodkind years,less said about those the better.

 

[Randy M.]

The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson
Something Wicked This Way Comes by Ray Bradbury
The Circus of Dr. Lao by Charles Finney
The Island of Dr. Moreau by H. G. Wells
The War of the Worlds by H. G. Wells
The Land of Laughs by Jonathan Carroll
The Hobbit by J. R. R. Tolkein
The Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula K. Le Guin
The Face in the Frost by John Bellairs
The Turn of the Screw by Henry James
The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury
At the Mountains of Madness by H. P. Lovecraft
The Case of Charles Dexter Ward by H. P. Lovecraft
The Mist by Stephen King
From the Teeth of Angels by Jonathan Carroll
The Werewolf of Paris by Guy Endore
The Quatermass Experiment by Nigel Kneale
Kwaidan by Lafcadio Hearn
Our Lady of Darkness by Fritz Leiber
Ficciones by Jorge Luis Borges
Hell House by Richard Matheson
Tales of Horror and the Supernatural by Arthur Machen
The Bone Key by Sarah Monette
Goblin Market by Christina Rossetti
To Walk the Night by William Sloane
Night Has a Thousand Eyes by Cornell Woolrich
The Wonderful O by James Thurber
A Night in the Lonesome October by Roger Zelazny


The first four listed I've read 4-6 times. The rest are 2-3 times.

Randy M.

 

[Ian Fortytwo]

Here are some of my non-genre books.
Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson.
The Thirty-nine Steps, by John Buchan.
The Half Hearted, by John Buchan.
The Sign of Four, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.
Pickwick Papers, by Charles Dickens.
Great Expectations, by Charles Dickens.
The Mayor of Casterbridge, by Thomas Hardy.
Rogue Male, by Geoffrey Household.
The Lord of the Flies, by William Golding.
The Shepherd, by Frederick Forsyth.
The Guns of Navarone, by Alistair Maclean.

And three nonfiction books.

The Colditz Story, by P. R. Reid.
The Latter Days of Colditz, by P. R. Reid.
The Great Escape, by Paul Brickhill.

 

[Steve Harrison]

The only books I can read again and again are the Flashman novels by George MacDonald Fraser and The Stand by Stephen King.

 

[Ned Marcus]

I've reread many books multiple times: the Shannara Series, Vorkosigan Saga, most of Moorcock's books, Magician trilogy, and the Empire Series.

Those are the ones that come to mind first, but I'm sure there are others. A lot of poetry, too, but I'm not sure that counts. There are also lots of books I love that I can only read once, too.

 

[Rodders]

I don't often reread books, but the ones I've read more than once are Iain M. Bank's The Player of Games which I have read about 7 times. I adore it and it is my favourite book, by far.

The Forge of God by Greg Bear. Just for that ending. WOW!

Stephen King's The Stand (the uncut edition). Even now, this book has some of the best characterisation that I have ever read.

 

[Randy M.]

These are the non-SF/F/H books I remember reading more than once,

The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner
As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner
Absalom, Absalom by William Faulkner
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
The Hound of the Baskervilles by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
The Maltese Falcon by Dashiell Hammett
The Thin Man by Dashiell Hammett
Red Harvest by Dashiell Hammett
The Underground Man by Ross Macdonald
My Life and Hard Times by James Thurber
The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway
in our time by Ernest Hemingway
Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
Maus by Art Spiegleman
The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler
The Long Goodbye by Raymond Chandler
The High Window by Raymond Chandler
Dubliners by James Joyce
The Portage to San Cristobal of A. H. by George Steiner


Randy M.

 

[Extollager]

Here are some of my non-genre books.
Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson.
The Thirty-nine Steps, by John Buchan.
The Half Hearted, by John Buchan.
The Sign of Four, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.
Pickwick Papers, by Charles Dickens.
Great Expectations, by Charles Dickens.
The Mayor of Casterbridge, by Thomas Hardy.
Rogue Male, by Geoffrey Household.
The Lord of the Flies, by William Golding.
The Shepherd, by Frederick Forsyth.
The Guns of Navarone, by Alistair Maclean.

And three nonfiction books.

The Colditz Story, by P. R. Reid.
The Latter Days of Colditz, by P. R. Reid.
The Great Escape, by Paul Brickhill.

Buchan, Dickens, and Doyle!

 

[The Big Peat]

Books I've read more than twice...

The Belgariad/Malloreon/Elenium/Tamuli by the Eddings
The Riftwar & Serpent War series, also The King's Buccaneer by Raymond E Feist
Mistress of the Empire by Feist and Wurts
The Shadow Rising by Robert Jordan
From the Discworld series by Sir Pterry: Mort, Reaper Man, Small Gods, Lords and Ladies, Soul Music, Intersting Times, Maskerade, Feet of Clay, Hogfather, Jingo, Carpe Jugulum, Fifth Elephant, The Truth, Thief of Time, Night Watch, Monstrous Regiment, Thud!
Take a Thief and By The Sword by Mercedes Lackey
The Falco series up to One Virgin Too Many (excluding Poseidon's Gold) by Lindsay Davies
Tinker Tailor Soldier Sailor & Smiley's People by John Le Carre
Daggerspell by Katherine Kerr
Mossflower/Mariel of Redwall/The Long Patrol/Redwall/Salamandstron/The Pearls of Lutra - Brian Jacques

I'm probably missing some. When I like something, I can submerge myself in it a lot. It's why I'm listening to When Is The Future by VNV Nation for the 10th time this week.

 

[Justin Swanton]

Lord of the Rings and Silmarillion (Silmarillion more often)

Nervous Conditions by Tsitsi Dangarembga. It's an extraordinary book that takes place in the Eastern Highlands of Zimbabwe (my country).

Cry the Beloved Country by Alan Paton. South Africa's classic novel.

The City and the Stars by Arthur C Clarke. I reread it recently and it is a good tale, just philosophically unsatisfying as is all of Clarke's work.

A Canticle for Liebowitz

The Loved One by Evelyn Waugh. It just appeals to my cynicism.

Brideshead Revisited by the same author.

 

[Extollager]

The Loved One by Evelyn Waugh. It just appeals to my cynicism.

Brideshead Revisited by the same author.

Waugh! How about A Handful of Dust? I've read that one seven times.

 

[Vince W]

Just added Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut as it's the 50th anniversary of this amazing book.

 

[Luiglin]

Too many to list but all dependent on the mood I'm in or want to be in.

 

[Justin Swanton]

Waugh! How about A Handful of Dust? I've read that one seven times.

Read it too, and probably more than once come to think of it.

 

[Cayleb]

Where to start? Yes Parson, The Apocalypse Troll grips me every time and there is the pretty little love story concealed therein.

The first few Honour Harringtons (my spelling differs here) and The Safehold series.
Then, further down this page, Flashman, to which I must add the Sharpe novels. Somebody mentioned Matthew Shardlake which has a great attraction and the wonderful St. Mary's tales by Jodi Taylor always attract me.

I suppose the whole thing is about "What sort of story do I feel like reading right now?" Sometimes it's a pure science fiction novel (Starship Troopers), sometimes something historical (Cornwell's four book truncated series about Nathaniel Starbuck, a Northerner fighting on the Confederate side in the American Civil War for instance - I do wish he'd write more of those) or, as I mentioned, Shardlake, rich in historical detail.

But whatever mood I'm in, a return to an old friend on my bookshelf is always a nostalgic wander through happy memories. Some of those memories go back almost seventy years for on that bookshelf is a set of Authur Ransome's children's adventure books to which I still return occasionally. Some of you might remember the title of the first in the series - "Swallows and Amazons".

 

[Paul_C]

I've read most of Iain M Banks' books multiple times, the same goes for Terry Pratchett.

Quite lot of Asimov, LOTR and The Hobbit, M John Harrison's Light trilogy, the Lensman books, masses of Agatha Christie and The Phantom Tollbooth.

 

[Cayleb]

Forgot to mention one book, very important to me, "First Light" by Geoffrey Wellum. At the start of the book he is concerned only to be picked for the school cricket XI. By the end of summer in the following year he is in a Spitfire fighting for his life over southern England. Talk about growing up in a hurry.