I was challenged to list the top 10 books that made a lasting impression on my life. Here’s my list:

1. Angle of Repose by Wallace Stegner:  The first assigned reading I stayed up all night reading.  Wallace Stegner is the voice of the American West.  And I am still half in love with Oliver Ward. (And Jamie Fraser.)
2. Peace like a River by Leif Enger: The best opening pages I have ever read, and I am SUCH a sucker for a good quest novel.  Throw in the American west, and you’ve got me- hook, line, and sinker.
3. No Great Mischief by Alastair McLeod: A tragic and beautiful account of family ties, the presence of the past, and a destroyed Scotland preserved in Canada.
4. Where Rivers Change Direction by Mark Spragg: a bald and lyrical memoir of growing up on a dude ranch on Wyoming’s continental divide, where rivers changes direction.
5. Midnight’s Children by Salman Rushdie: introduced me to magical realism, post colonialism, and the history of India all in one fell swoop.
6. East of Eden by John Steinbeck: After a rash of escapist novels and a binge of television watching, reminded me why I read literature in the first place.
7. All the Pretty Horses by Cormac McCarthy: love and duty and justice and the romance of the cowboy all meet in the American West.
8. The Outlander Series by Diana Gabaldon: Scotland, history, time travel, grand adventure, escapism, romance, character development eight books strong.  ‘Nuff said.
9. The Amelia Peabody Mysteries Series by Elizabeth Peters: About the time I got over my fantasy of becoming the female Indiana Jones, I discovered Amelia Peabody and it started all over again…
10. City of Thieves by David Benioff:  The best based on a true story/great quest novel/war novel/ work of fiction I have ever read.  This book has it all.

Plus, since this task is nearly impossible, and Terra/BooksforHer gave me license to cheat, lets just make it fifteen:

• Cowboys are my Weakness by Pam Houston:  If  I was going to teach lit students the concept of “voice,” this is what I’d use.  Mature lit students, that is.
• Rules of Civility by Amor Towles: A stunner of a character, a portrait of an age, and a twist or two.
• Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen: It is THE well-known classic for a reason.
• Silencing the Past: Power and the Production of History by Michel-Rolph Trouillot: for reminding me why I am a historian
• AND The Metaphysical Club by Louis Menand: for giving voice to the philosophy of history I didn’t even know I had.

In case anyone really cares.