[Radone]

I've probably bought and sold well over 500 books in my life so far. When I was younger, I never thought about maybe keeping the really good ones because I needed the cash from selling them even more.
Now I've got a son, and I want him to share in my love of SF/F, but the old books that I love are out of print. So, I've started rebuilding my library thanks to Amazon (commercial plug). I just bought God Stalk, Dark of the Moon, and Seekers Mask by P.C. Hodgell (great fantasy. If you keep in mind that it was written 20 years ago, you'll see that many more recent female protaganists are derivative of the main character in this series-it isn't complete yet BTW). I also bought the Fionavar Tapestry by Guy Gavriel Kay (should be in every fantasy library). And lastly, I bought Liege-Killer by Christopher Hinz (sorta cyberpunk with the coolest badasses as the enemy).

[Radone]

Whoops! I forgot to ask my question.
What books would you want to own so that you could let your kids read them when they're older?
Recently joined Sci Fi Book Club and got LotR, the Hobbit, the Dragonriders of Pern, The First Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, Dune, and Enders War (has Enders Game and Speaker for the Dead) - can't believe I never kept all those books.

[cgw]

I have copies of most books that are at the top of my list. I am looking for hard-cover copies of books I am missing or the best of the books that I have (well worn) paperback versions (Dune, Lord of Light, etc.).
No hurry but I would like to have a fairly complete library of my favorite/and other good books both scifi and other.
My son can read them or not at his leisure.

[Hobbit]

Been working on this one for years.... :D

There's a lot out there. I guess it would depend when you were trying to get your son to read them, Radone - Covenant is not for the 'young'!

But I would include:


Foundation Series
Hobbit (LoTR later!)
Dune (later)
Dragonflight
a Heinlein or two (juveniles to start) - my first was Tunnel in the Sky;
an Arthur C Clarke (poss not 2001, though my signed copy of 2001 would be one of my first grabs in a house fire! :) ) probably the City and the Stars or the Songs of Distant Earth, but there are many others...

Actually, the recent Millennium reprints have picked quite a few goodies which I would include: Flowers for Algernon, Earth Abides, Day of the Triffids...lots more!

[Nevyn]

To answer the question , every book that I've read since I started reading fantasy (good & bad) and re-purchase the ones that I loaned and have never seen again.

[athenix]

I actually just bought a new copy of The Hobbit as a present for my boyfriend while he's stranded in South Carolina filming the Civil War epic "Cold Mountain" - the topic of books we wish we had kept from childhood came up the other day and he named that as the book that he really wishes to reread (and so do I!), so I felt it would be an appropriate gift. And we will definitely hold on to it!

The other books that were mentioned were The Chronicles of Narnia (C.S. Lewis - he hated them because he was forced to read them for schoolwork, but recognizes their merit)...

A Wrinkle in Time, et al. (Madeleine L'Engle - I loved these as a child and am quite looking forward to reading them again)...

The fantasy novels (The Book of Three, The Black Cauldron... The Prydain Chronicles?) by Lloyd Alexander (any children of ours will also have the accompanying computer game ... because, me being me, I have an Apple IIGS in working order which I use for word processing and obscure games)...

The Wind in the Willows (my mother read this to me as a child, and it's a great read-out-loud book)...

Alice in Wonderland/Through the Looking Glass - truly charming. My best friend from high school absolutely adores these books and has managed to integrate them successfully into a number of her papers for college.

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy trilogy ... these were the essence of my high school experience, and I just bought the omnibus edition and am rereading them.

And I would love to get my hands on the children's series by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor dealing with witches ... my mother bought them for me when I was in middle school and I just adored them.

Such good, good memories....
I would love to find copies of the "horror-fantasy"