Text appeal - people's favourite books

Pot-boilers top the list of the library's most-requested books, but when it comes to people's all-time favourites, there's no clear winning genre.
More than a century after it was first published, the Edmond's Cookery Book is still one of this country's most popular books, appearing month after month, year after year, in the best-sellers list.
When my mum died two years ago, I inherited her 1960-something edition, along with her mother's much-used, tea-stained copy of the Deluxe Edition 1959. My own dates from my flatting years, and although it's no longer in everyday use, I still make the grapefruit marmalade (page 175) and sultana cake (page 44). The Edmond's was one of the first recipe books I bought. I now have a library of the things.
Other books that have left their impression - aside from Pippi Longstockings, Dr Seuss and the Famous Five series when I was a kid - include a couple of classics I read as part of my sixth form English syllabus; Thomas Hardy's The Mayor of Casterbridge and D.H. Lawrence's Sons and Lovers. Those two books not only shattered any adolescent illusions I had about the niceties of the human condition, but still stand as powerful statements on "civilised" life.
"Books change lives" is the theme of this year's NZ Book Month. Now in full swing - with organisers delivering $5 book vouchers to 750,000 school children and a million householders and literary events happening around the country - the celebration of reading was launched seven years ago to help promote local writing talent and encourage us to read more home-grown books.
Staff at Tauranga's five city libraries issue some two million books each year, with romance being the most popular genre, followed by Westerns and children's books. American romance writer Nora Roberts, Tauranga's own Lynley Dodd and children's author Geronimo Stilton ( the pen name of Elisabetta Dami) are the "hottest" authors.
To mark Book Month, indulge asked some literary types, along with some local identities, about their most memorable reads.
Cassy Green, member of Tauranga Writers and the New Zealand Society of Authors. She runs Scribblyfish Communications.

Once, while backpacking across Europe in my 20s, I found myself in Corfu on a murderously hot afternoon. I settled into a nearby tarverna with an ice-cold coke. The only English title displayed on its creaking bookstand was a moussaka-splattered copy of The Bone People by Keri Hulme.
The first few pages were disorienting. I wondered if I'd stumbled across an author still reeling from a bad acid trip in the 70s. I checked for missing pages. But there was something fascinating about the writing and I persevered. The tumblers in my mind seized, rolled over and started to click into place one by one. As I fell into stride with the elegant rhythm of the language the words began to rise off the page like a beautiful hallucinogenic dream.
I found myself on a faraway seashore with crystalline-salted rock pools and cool stone towers, all locked up inside the champagne mind of a hermit. A different world simply rose up before me.
From that moment on I thought of books in an entirely new way. I know many people find it hard to read, mainly due to the prologue, but I have re-read it several times, and each time find more depth.
Ben Ruthe, top track and road runner from Tauranga.

As I am sure any father does, I enjoy reliving my youth through the eyes of my almost-2-year-old son Sam (too much so, my wife probably says).
Every night Sam runs into his bedroom and grabs a book to read before bed. The Other Ark by Lynley Dodd, which was gifted by our lovely retired neighbour, Dorothy, is Sam's favourite. It tells how, when the flood comes, Noah organises various animals into rows to board the ark in an orderly fashion. Unfortunately the ark is not big enough and his friend Sam Jam Balu is called on to help. But Sam Jam isn't as prepared as Noah, the animals are uncooperative and the rickety ark is second-best.
Armory Dilloes, Carnival Cats and Mad Kangaroosters join the animal queue, along with a huge array of other comical creatures that make this book a great laugh and one that I can strongly recommend to any young child (or parent, for that matter). The energy of the flowing, rhyming verse is matched by the beautiful artwork that brings these creatures to life.
Cloe Petterson, 38, is a marketing adviser at Tauranga City Library.

The mum of two - daughter Lucie is 15 and son Riley, 2 - says she chooses books using two methods: by author and by random cover selection, followed by a quick scan for "tone" and reading appeal.
My Mum gave me The Vintner's Luck, by Elizabeth Knox, for my birthday in 1998, the year it was Tony Ryall developed a taste for Gabriel Garcia Marquez's works while planning an OE that never quite eventuated. published. At the time I had a 3-year-old and was living in Hamilton.
It absolutely enthralled me - it was a pleasure to become lost in the tale of yearly rendezvous between a French vintner and an angel - and made me dead-keen to seek out all of Knox's books and read them. She has a very unusual writing style, with lots of layers and amazing complexity.
Having read the book so many times, I found the movie disappointing. It didn't at all represent the longevity and emotional depth of the relationship between Sobran and the angel Xas, and it skipped over the threads of passion and loss and everyday life woven through the book.
I've now got several of Knox's books in my personal collection and had the pleasure of meeting her at Papamoa Library during Book Month 2007. I took along all my books and she signed them.
I treasure my copy of The Vintner's Luck - it has my mum's message of love in the front and the author's autograph on the title page.
Tony Ryall, MP for Bay of Plenty and Minister of Health.

My favourite book is Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez, a story about unrequited love set in South America. I was planning to do my OE in South America before I stood for Parliament, so I went through a phase of reading books by this Colombian author. I have yet to visit Colombia and am still trying to find time for my OE.
First Among Equals, by Jeffrey Archer, is the most detailed, captivating political novel I have read. About four fictional British politicians, it maps their private and public lives as they vie to become Prime Minister. Archer's own private and public life is just as interesting.
I also enjoy John Grisham books. His legal thrillers are hard to put down. He led a very interesting life before he started writing - from working on a road-repair gang, to going to university where he got a law degree, to a stint as a US congressman.
Dame Lynley Dodd, author and illustrator.

If there was one book you might expect Dodd to choose as having had the most impact on her life, it would probably be her own Hairy Maclary From Donaldson's Dairy. Written in 1983, it was the first in the series of children's books that went on to become global best-sellers and for which, in 2002, she was made a Distinguished Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit.
But Dodd is adamant. She says the works of Jane Austen - Emma, Pride and Prejudice - are the books that influenced her most. I read my first Jane Austen when I was 13 and I have been addicted ever since. She's also a fan of A.A. Milne's Winnie the Pooh.
Richard Cornelius is a former chemistry professor and owns BA Readers in Tauranga.

For me the choice comes easily: Webster's Third International Dictionary, Unabridged, published by Merriam-Webster, Inc.
My parents gave this to me some 40 years ago, and it soon took a prominent position in my living room. I have moved half-a-dozen times since then (including to New Zealand from the United States), but the book has stayed with me. I enjoy the etymologies, the collections of synonyms and the book's completeness, but the lucidity of the definitions attracts me the most.
The dictionary uses over 10,000 words to describe all the meanings of the word 'take' and the idioms that use the word.
This volume of 2662 pages weighs in at 5kg. I confess I have not read it in its entirety, but I have spent far more time among its pages than I have among the pages of any other book. I gave copies to my three children when they reached the age at which I received my copy.
I can think of no stronger statement of the value I place on my Webster's.