 | The Lord of the Rings (3 Book Box set) by J.R.R. Tolkien
Buy new: £11.96 / Used from: £11.99 Truely amazing book, in the realm of fantasy, Tolkien is peerles. Middle Earth is one of the few fantasy worlds I can get lost in.
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 | The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien
Buy new: £4.37 / Used from: £0.01 I think I enjoyed the Hobbit more than LotR, if I'm honest. It has more of a close, personal feel as opposed to the epic grandeur of LoTR.
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 | Crime and Punishment (Penguin Popular Classics) by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Buy new: £2.16 / Used from: £0.01 Maybe I didn't fully appriciate this when I first read it, but the impact it had on me was undoubtedly a large one.
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 | East of Eden (Steinbeck "Essentials") by John Steinbeck
Buy new: £6.49 / Used from: £4.47 East of Eden and The Grapes of Wrath are two of the most important books from my early teenage years. They provided me with a beautiful insight into how hard life can be.
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 | Little Dorrit (Penguin Classics) by Charles Dickens
Buy new: £5.99 / Used from: £0.70 I read a fair amount of Dickens as a teenager, but Little Dorrit stands out as one of the most memorable, along with Oliver Twist.
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 | Les Miserables (Classics) by Victor Hugo
Buy new: £7.11 / Used from: £0.01 Les Miserables totally absorbed my mind for the time it took to read and lingered long after. I seem to have an affinity for tales of tragedy and hardships.
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 | The Princess and the Goblin (Puffin Classics) by George MacDonald
Buy new: £3.69 / Used from: £0.01 I read this many, many times as a child. I wish I knew where my copy is now...
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 | Where the Wild Things are by Maurice Sendak
Buy new: £4.01 / Used from: £1.84 Essential! Though this list isn't really meant to be about children's books, this has a place on any list of great books.
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 | The Handmaid's Tale (Contemporary classics) by Margaret Atwood
Buy new: £4.97 / Used from: £0.01 I have been a huge fan of Atwood's writing since reading this book, and her dystopic Oryx and Crake is, in my opinion, even more powerful.
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 | Gormenghast (Gormenghast Trilogy (Book Two)) by Mervyn Peake
Buy new: £5.98 / Used from: £0.01 Perhaps my favourite book. Ever. The whole trilogy is amazing, though I have never managed to read all of 'Titus Alone'. I also like Peake's 'Letters From a Lost Uncle' and 'The Hunting of the Snark'
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 | Lord of the Flies by William Golding
Buy new: £4.36 / Used from: £0.38 Deeply disturbing, and higly compulsive reading. Children can be as rotton as the rest of us!
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 | The Woman in White (Penguin Classics) by Wilkie Collins
Buy new: £5.64 / Used from: £1.80 Although I don't read so much now, I used to have a great affection for classic British writing.
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 | Moonfleet (Puffin Classics) by John Falkner
Buy new: £4.46 / Used from: £0.01 An excellent tale of adventure, friendship, loss and love.
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 | Just So Stories for Little Children by Rudyard Kipling
Buy used from: £0.10 A great book for curious, imaginative minds.
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 | Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame
The Wind In The Willows should be read by everyone. It's one of the best books around.
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 | The Chronicles of Narnia by C. S. Lewis
Buy used from: £18.48 I'm not sure I'm as fond of Narnia as I used to be. But I know I enjoyed all these books when I first read them.
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 | The Railway Children (Penguin Popular Classics) by E. Nesbit
Buy new: £2.22 / Used from: £0.01 I can't think of anything else to add to this list for now (although there are plenty more) so I will sign off with this, a story of children's ability to cope in difficult times.
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