Do you have a favorite book that makes you feel nostalgic and if so, what time period does it represent and why does it make you feel that way?

Huckleberry Finn,The Wind in the Willows,Of Mice and Men,Alice in Wonderland,The Catcher in the Rye,The Scarlet Ibis and last but not least Aesop’s Fables.I recently saw it in a bookstore with the beautiful illustrations I remember as a little girl.When I went back to get it,they were all gone :(

Loved Aesop’s Fables too.

There are two books for me, and both are from the same period in my life.

The first is a book I’ve mentioned dozens of times on here. It’s not a massive tome about the philosophical nature of the universe or anything like that. In fact, it’s just a simple, 213 page book about a young boy trying to live life on the dance floor, as opposed to sleepwalking through life. The book is Stephen Chbosky’s Perks of Being a Wallflower. When I was a sophomore in highschool, I could so easily relate to the struggles that Charlie, the protagonist faced. I too, was a quiet, introverted wallflower who struggled to cope with my own feelings of love, regret, and anticipation of growing up. I still read this book twice yearly, and it still makes me cry every time because there will always be parts of me in Charlie, and I will think back to those timid days I spent in early highschool trying to figure out who I was.

The second book is one that most Fluther members are probably familiar with, because it was a bestseller for a long time and was recently made into a movie. This book was The Lovely Bones, by Alice Sebold. I first read this one around the same time I read Perks. The girl I loved at the time and I read it together and had long discussions in the park over ice cream about the nature of life and death and love and whether we believed in Heaven or not. Times would quickly change, but The Lovely Bones was still probably the biggest influence for me in writing my own novel. Every time I read it now, I think back on those days when I’d lay back in the swings in the park with a girl I loved dearly but would never get to touch and talk about how, from upside down, the trees looked like they took root in the sky. I was a much different person in these times. More emotionally intuitive, and more connected with people… before I became fixated on seeking adventure and was more interested in finding love. I read these books whenever I want to remember what that was like.

@Fiddle_Playing_Creole_Bastard If you keep up with that stuff you’re going to get beat up a lot, because no other guy will be able to compete with you when it comes to sweeping the ladies off their feet. :)
Edit: I’m not serious if anyone takes this that way. His answer blew me away. I wish I could craft words like that. Very nicely done

@Fiddle_Playing_Creole_Bastard -What a lovely answer :)

As a (hopeful) scholar of Children’s Literature, a good deal of the literature I read send me on nostalgia trips both to when I was younger and to periods from long before I was born. Two that have affected in both senses is The Velveteen Rabbit by Margery Williams and Calvin and Hobbes by Bill Watterson. (I realize the latter is not a “book” but I cannot respond to this question without giving a nod to my favourite series.) Both books remind me of what it was like to be a kid, especially because toys are involved. I still get the urge to pull out my toy box (yes, I still have one) and play.

Lewis Carroll’s writings are another one. I feel oh-so-Victorian when I read his writing and also feel strongly connected with my middle-school self as that was the first time I checked out Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There from the library. I must have lived in Wonderland for months after reading the books and I wanted everyone else to go with me (until I realized the majority of the people I knew thought Carroll was a drug-smoking pedophile – I swear I will publish a scholarly refutation of this notion one day.)

@Adirondackwannabe, I’m working back to that point. I made a brief detour into pseudo-badboy territory for a while.

@lucillelucillelucille, thank you, m’dear. You are lovely as well.

@muppetish, I <3 Lewis Carrol.

I have to say Neal Stephenson’s Anathem and it represents no time period, specifically because it’s sci-fi fantasy but I belong in that world.

@Fiddle_Playing_Creole_Bastard Thank you.You’ve made my day :))

@lucillelucillelucille, you of course know that you are welcome!

A Fairy to Stay by Margaret Beatrice Lodge written in the 1920’s. It is about a young girl who meets a fairy…you can read the description on the link if you have an interest.

The reason it brings on a feeling of nostalgia is that it was one of Mom’s favorite books. She was about the same age as the girl in the story. When she ‘loaned’ her copy to me to read, there was a sense of her sharing something that was precious as a jewel.

Love In The Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. The period is the early 1900’s and the theme is a love affair that spans a lifetime.

Tess of the D’Ubervilles was an important book for me in high school. I read it on a school trip. We went by bus, and I remember reading very late at night. When I came to the climax, I was standing because the emotions were so strong.

Heart’s Blood by Jane Yolen it brings back memories of my old elementary school

Beach Music by Pat Conroy. My favorite book and my favorite author.