This week's Top Ten Tuesday on The Broke and the Bookish is: Ten Authors I Own the Most Books By. Which, to be totally honest? I can't really answer. Because my bookshelves are double stacked and architecturally delicate and I have further stacks of books all over the place, and they're not organized, so I can't even just count them. So this is total guess work. You ready?
Instead of including pics of all the books, because the whole point of this is that there are a lot of them, I'll include my favorite one or the one I'm most looking forward to reading by each. In no particular order....
1. Christopher Moore
I think I have most of his books - Fool, Lamb, Island of the Sequinned Love Nun, Bloodsucking Fiends, You Suck, Bite Me, A Dirty Job, The Lust Lizard of Melancholy Cove, Sacre Bleu, Coyote Blue, Griff and, most recently, The Serpent of Venice which I got for my birthday.
2. Neil Gaiman
I'm not sure which books I still have (I broke rules and lent some of these), but at some point or another I have had: Good Omens; Coraline; The Graveyard Book; Fragile Things; Unnatural Creatures; Anansi Boys; American Gods; Neverwhere, Fortunately, the Milk; and The Ocean at the End of the Lane.
3. Tom Robbins
I loved his books when I was in my late teens and early 20s. There are a lot of authors I own many books by, but few I've actually read all of. His, I read. I have: Jitterbug Perfume, Still Life with Woodpecker, Another Roadside Attraction, Even Cowgirls Get the Blues, Skinny Legs and All, Half Asleep in Frog Pyjamas, Fierce Invalids Home from Hot Climates, Villa Incognito and his most recent book, a memoir which I haven't yet read, called Tibetan Peach Pie. I'm saving it.
4. Charles Dickens
I haven't read much Dickens (yet). I read A Christmas Carol, half of Bleak House and started several others but didn't finish them. However, by dint of his being such a venerable and long-published author, I have ended up with many of his books because I like to collect beautiful books. I've got several of the tiny, leather bound Collins editions, and a few of the Penguin cloth bound ones. I think part of what's to blame for my woefully low completion rate is that I know so many of the stories already. And some of them are LONG. I enjoyed what I read of Bleak House, but I just couldn't get to the end.
I do plan to read them at some point though, and when I do I'll have beautiful editions of: A Christmas Carol, Bleak House, Hard Times, Great Expectations, A Tale of Two Cities, The Old Curiosity Shop, The Pickwick Papers, Dombey & Son, Little Dorrit and Nicholas Nickleby. Possibly one or two others that I can't find right now.
5. Armistead Maupin
While on a trip to San Francisco last year, I picked up Tales of the City, which seemed appropriate. I got through that, More Tales of the City and half of Further Tales of the city, but I've got the whole series except the most recent - The Days of Anna Madrigal.
6. Hunter S. Thompson
I think I have all of his, though because they're largely collections of various articles, essays and other writings, I've tended to dip in and out rather than reading from cover to cover. I think The Rum Diary is still my favourite, though.
7. J.K. Rowling (aka Robert Galbraith)
I couldn't pick just one Harry Potter book, so I had to include a pic of all of them. I also have The Casual Vacancy, The Cuckoo's Calling and The Silkworm.
8. Bill Bryson
Bryson is largely responsible for my love of travel memoirs. I started with Notes from a Small Island and In A Sunburned Country and quickly cycled through A Walk in the Woods, I'm A Stranger Here Myself, Neither Here Nor There, The Lost Continent and Bill Bryson's Africa Diary. I also have but haven't finished: Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid, A Short History of Nearly Everything and I can't remember if I have At Home in e-format.
9. John Irving
I read A Prayer for Owen Meany in high school which had a huge impact on me and was quickly followed by The World According to Garp (which, in retrospect, wasn't particularly appropriate), The Cider House Rules, A Son of the Circus, and The Fourth Hand. I've also got A Widow for One Year, Until I Find You, Last Night In Twisted River and In One Person - all of which I've started, none of which I've finished yet.
10. Sue Townsend
Oh, how I love Sue. The Adrian Mole Diaries were such a huge part of my childhood reading! I've got the whole Adrian Mole series (some of which are the original copies I was given as a child) as well as some of her stand-alone novels - Number Ten, Queen Camilla, The True Confessions of a Middle-Aged Woman and possibly one or two more that I can't remember right now.
Phew, that felt like a very long post! Sorry guys! But now it's your turn to get back at me - which authors do you hoard? Share, share, share!