I stumbled upon a blogger who lists her 6 favorite books that feature journals or are told in journal form. Here’s her top pick:
1. I Capture the Castle
/ Dodie Smith
A delightful English book, set in the 30’s, telling the story of Cassandra Mortmain and her eccentric family. Begins with the classic line “I write this sitting in the kitchen sink.” Art, eccentricity, Americans and true love…
The rest are:
Doctor Glas: A Novel
Diary of a Nobody (Penguin Classics)
The Golden Notebook: A Novel
Mable Riley: A Reliable Record of Humdrum, Peril, and Romance
A Prairie as Wide as the Sea
I was sort of surprised her list didn’t include classics like The Diary of Anne Frank or Harriet the Spy, but it’s an interesting list nonetheless and I’m glad it’s provided me with some unfamiliar titles to add to my reading list.
Read more at The Indextrious Reader: Booklist: Fictional Journals & Journaling News.
Glad you enjoyed the list…yes, there are so many classics that I just picked 6 novels that I love. I am thinking about making another list of real-life journals that I love, and I am sure Anne Frank will be on that one!
Right, when I wrote that I was forgetting that your list was only “fiction” as opposed to “literature.” Please keep me posted if you do another list!
Let’s not forget Papelucho!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Papelucho
I don’t know about the US, but these books are soo popular in Chile. Every kid must have read at least one.
As a child, he was the first to introduce me to writing journals and the conviction that, even though I was a kid, I had thoughts deserved to be written about.
Ariel by Lawrence Block. The diary is an important part of the story, containing possible clues to what is really going on.
I am reading For a Time Being, and the narrator is using a journal that is made from an old Proust novel where the text is cut out and replaced with a blank book. Have you heard of such a thing and how do I get one? I think it’s a wonderful idea.
Check these out:
http://www.paperbacknote.com/
http://www.reboundbooks.co.uk/default.asp
http://bookjournals.com/