This week’s Top Ten Tuesday is a really fun one: a list of the books I wish I could read again for the first time. For some books, there is nothing quite like the magic of reading them for the first time, no matter how good they are on a reread.

1. The entire [amazon_link id=”0545162076″ target=”_blank” ]Harry Potter[/amazon_link] series by J.K. Rowling. I will never forget discovering those books, and the slow reveal as new books were published. When I began reading them, the movies hadn’t been released yet. I read them in 2001, right before the first film came out. At that time, [amazon_link id=”0439358078″ target=”_blank” ]Harry Potter and the Order the Phoenix[/amazon_link] hadn’t been published yet.
2. [amazon_link id=”0618640150″ target=”_blank” ]The Lord of the Rings[/amazon_link] by J.R.R. Tolkien. Such a gripping read the first time around. I haven’t managed a full reread. I usually get bogged down somewhere in [amazon_link id=”0618574956″ target=”_blank” ]The Two Towers[/amazon_link].
3. [amazon_link id=”0385737645″ target=”_blank” ]Revolution[/amazon_link] by Jennifer Donnelly. I loved this book. It’s still my top read for 2011, and it influenced me a great deal. I know I have been more open-minded about music since I read it, and I have been listening to music a lot more, too. I’m not sure I would be if not for this book.
4. [amazon_link id=”0143105426″ target=”_blank” ]Pride and Prejudice[/amazon_link] by Jane Austen. I was so thrilled by this book the entire time I was reading. Jane was actually funny! And I loved the characters and setting.
5. [amazon_link id=”1451635621″ target=”_blank” ]Gone with the Wind[/amazon_link] by Margaret Mitchell. I know I loved it the first time, but I’m not sure how I’d feel on a reread. It’s such a revisionist history of the South in so many ways. It would be interesting to come to it the first time again without any of the baggage I’ve accumulated over the years.
6. [amazon_link id=”0061205699″ target=”_blank” ]To Kill a Mockingbird[/amazon_link] by Harper Lee. How would it be to read this again with the hope that Tom might be freed by that white jury?
7. [amazon_link id=”0345441184″ target=”_blank” ]The Mists of Avalon[/amazon_link] by Marion Zimmer Bradley. My favorite King Arthur book. I ate it up when I read it for the first time in 1996 or 1997. I would like to read it again, but more than anything, I wish I could read it for the first time again.
8. The [amazon_link id=”0440423201″ target=”_blank” ]Outlander[/amazon_link] series by Diana Gabaldon. This was another fun discovery. I read up through [amazon_link id=”044022425X” target=”_blank” ]Drums of Autumn[/amazon_link], but it took [amazon_link id=”0440221668″ target=”_blank” ]The Fiery Cross[/amazon_link] quite a while to come out, and I never have read that book or any subsequent ones.
9. [amazon_link id=”0061990477″ target=”_blank” ]The Thorn Birds[/amazon_link] by Colleen McCullough. I read it so long ago, and I’ve never reread it, even though I’ve meant to. I would like to read it for the first time.
10. [amazon_link id=”B000GH2YPG” target=”_blank” ]Rebecca[/amazon_link] by Daphne du Maurier. So suspenseful! How fun would it be to read again without knowing what happens or how it will end?