So she's writing a blog about pretty good books. But what is a good book? You got yer Classics, you got your Beach Reads you got your Fast-Paced Thrillers, you got your Heartwarming Stories of Redemption, you got your various flavors of Fantasy and Sci-Fi, you have coming-of-age novels, romances, swashbuckling adventures, fight-the-power, hero discovers his/her own hidden strength anti-totalitarian epics, and so on and so forth.
I kinda like them all, personally. As long as there's one or two great elements- plot, characters, wit, writing style that's really interesting, I'm in. Also, I very firmly believe in happy endings. Don't get to the end of the book and kill off your main character out of spite. I will hate you and write you nasty letters. And a book has to not insult my intelligence. So. Here's my list.
Fantasy
Lord of the Rings
The Dresden Files
The Chronicles of Narnia
Terry Pratchett's entire lexicon
Historical Fiction
Pillars of the Earth
The Other Boelyn Girl
The Heaven Tree Trilogy
Coming of Age Stories
The Tripod Trilogy
The Catcher in the Rye
Special Topics in Calamity Physics
Books for Rainy Days
The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society
Love Walked In and Belong to Me
The Stories of Eva Luna
James Herriot's vet stories
Alexander McCall Smith's No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency series
Mystery/thriller
Labyrinth by Kate Mosse
Laurie King's Mary Russell series
