I finished Anne of Avonlea and Anne of the Island. I spent most of Sunday afternoon reading Anne of the Island, once I got started I couldn't stop. I just read a few pages of Anne of Windy Poplar this morning before work, bad idea, I came very close to completely losing track of time. I just love reading the Anne books.  

I'm going to try to finish reading If You Survive by George Wilson before I allow myself to start another Anne book. I've been tossing this one aside for months in favor of reading whatever fiction I felt like instead of finishing what I had started.

SnowAngel

      Just recently I decided it was time for me to start on one of the more realistic retellings of Robin Hood, and the copy I happened to pull off the shelf was The Adventures of Robin Hood by Roger Lancelyn Green. Unbeknownst to me at the time, he was an unofficial inkling and student/friend of Lewis. I have immensely enjoyed it, though because of school I could read as much as I wanted to. I finished it yesterday and headed right off into The Scottish Chiefs by Jane Porter, in which I am now on page 41 and loving it! Also, as an honest, normal and self-respecting NariaWebber, I am always bouncing around in any of the 7 Chronicles.

      @rainyweather The Adventures of Robin Hood by Roger Lancelyn Green has been put on my 'favorites' shelf in my room, books I will make a good cup of tea or coffee and sit down and revisit over and over again. Some of the other books on that self are the Chronicles of Narnia, LOTR, The Hobbit, Tanglewood Tales by Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Eagle of the Ninth by Rosemary Sutcliff and King Solomen's Mines by H. Rider Haggard. The Eagle of the Ninth is not as much a rainy weather book, seeing as it is a bit more serious, but I still do love them all. I would also suggest King Arther and the Knights of the Round Table, by Roger Lancelyn Green and Men of Iron by Howard Pyle for rainy weather. Men of Iron is, in my opinion, one of the best examples of a book about a boy maturing to manhood through a lots of hard knocks and lessons learned through mistakes. The King's Shadow by Elizabeth Alder is also a great rainy weather book (or at least I enjoy it).

      @calormenwarrior Is there a definitive version of Ivenhoe or is it more like Robin Hood or Beowulf, with a bunch of different retellings by different authors? And if there are a bunch of different stories of Ivenhoe, which is considered the best or which is your favorite? Thanks!

Child of the King: SonofStone

Posted by: @rainyweather

does anyone have any good comfort books- cozy books you like to read or reread when you need a bit of happiness and hope?

Oh YES! (Hi all it's been a bit since I was in this board) One of my top favorite comfort books is "Enemy Brothers" by Constance Savery. It's British, set and written during WWII, and oh so sweet and uplifting with characters you love. 

@snowangel I wanted to recommend this next one to you too, "The Blue Castle" by L.M. Montgomery. Nothing to do with Anne, but still set in Canada with luscious descriptions. Just comfortable and happy with a nice predictable ending. I guess it's probably most meaningful to me due to being a single woman approaching the age of the main character (who is also single).

Other just comfortable happy stories:

Freckles -Porter

Laddie -Porter

The Wind in the Willows -Grahame 

A Fair Barbarian -Burnette (ofc Little Princess and Secret Garden too)

A Damsel in Distress -Wodehouse (despite the title everyone is surprisingly not much actual distress)

@sonofstone, Ivanhoe is by Sir Walter Scott; it's Scott's imagining of a knight coming home to England after going on the Crusade with King Richard the Lionheart. Based on the other books you've mentioned, I think you'd enjoy it.

@Anfinwen, I've read (and enjoyed) all the other titles on your list of comfort books, so I should track down The Fair Barbarian!

@rainyweather, one of my comfort books is called Ladycake Farm by Mabel Leigh Hunt. I also really like Meadowsweet by C. J. Milbrandt, which is the start of a cozy fantasy trilogy.

@sonofstone 

Oh, yes you must try Ivanhoe, especially since it has Robin Hood in it! As long as it's unabridged, there's only one version as it was written in English. I read the Scottish Chiefs some years ago and remember liking it. If I recall I read it because it was mentioned as an early historical novel in the style Sir Walter Scott would follow. 

If you're into H. Rider Haggard, I really liked "Queen Sheba's Ring." And a little secret, I'm the Librivox reader for the first 10 chapters. I started it and wrote the description but decided not to continue. 

I think I read "Men of Iron" too and liked it. Might I recommend a few more nice medieval tales? Two books by Allen French "The Red Keep" and "The Lost Barron," "Otto of the Silver Hand" also by Pyle, and "Sir Nigel" and "The White Company" by Sir. Arthur Conan Doyle of Sherlock Holmes fame.

@sonofstone Like @mel said, it is an original story created by Sir Walter Scott (but, of course, settled in an important historical moment of England). However, as it is an old classic novel, it's possible to exist more contemporary versions written or adapted by other authors. I've been reading the original one.

  I didn't know Roger Lancelyn Green, that's cool! 

@coracle I haven't read that one yet, but it's on my TBR shelf! I enjoyed Castle in the Air pretty well when I read it a few years back. It reminded me of Jones' Chrestomanci books.

@Anfinwen, did you read Allen French's Rolf and the Viking Bow? That's another good one. I also like Red Hugh, Prince of Donegal by Robert T. Reilly, The Edge on the Sword by Rebecca Tingle, and Witch's Brat by Rosemary Sutcliff for nice medieval tales from various eras. 

@shastastwin yes, the Howl books and the Chrestomanci ones have a certain similarity. I love most of them,

Posted by: @anfinwen

@snowangel I wanted to recommend this next one to you too, "The Blue Castle" by L.M. Montgomery. Nothing to do with Anne, but still set in Canada with luscious descriptions. Just comfortable and happy with a nice predictable ending. I guess it's probably most meaningful to me due to being a single woman approaching the age of the main character (who is also single).

Oh, that's one I have been meaning to read for ages, I still haven't gotten my hands on a copy.

I did it, I finished If You Survive. I must just have picked the wrong time to read it because I did like it, but I had the hardest time sticking to it. 

My parents went to the local library's annual book sale last week, my dad thought it was safe to take my mom. To be fair my mom was not a reader when my parents got married, however after homeschooling for many years she got bit by the reading bug and now she can't resisted a book sale. So we now have a shelf full of Zane Grey westerns plus assorted other books which we don't actually have shelf space for yet.  

SnowAngel

You know I don't think I really have comfort reads. If anything, I tend to avoid reading books when I'm in pain because I'm scared I'll associate them with it and not enjoy them as much afterwards.  

@mel Yes, I've read Rolf, but I don't like it as much. I read "Red Hugh" many years ago, but I liked it. I haven't read the other two! It rather sounds like we're both reading Bethlehem Books publishers.   

@snowangel "The Blue Castle" is on the Hoopla library app, and there's an amateur audiobook on YouTube here: 

There's also a link under the video to the Australian Project Gutenberg page for the ebook. I don't think it's Public domain in the US yet, but YouTube hasn't taken it down, so I guess no one really cares. I bought it on iBooks when I first read it (gave myself a migraine by reading it in a little over a day if I remember).  

Other books I've read were Common Sense by Thomas Paine, 1776 by David McCullough, The Scarlet Letter by Nathanael Hawthrone, The House of Seven Gables also by Nathanael Hawthrone, Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson (the same who wrote The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde), Anne of Green Gables Series.

Posted by: @anfinwen

It rather sounds like we're both reading Bethlehem Books publishers.   

Guilty as charged! They had some really nice books. Also, speaking of The Blue Castle, have you seen the on-going webcomic adaptation? 

Posted by: @snowangel

So we now have a shelf full of Zane Grey westerns plus assorted other books which we don't actually have shelf space for yet.  

Oh, no. That's what happens to me when I take myself to a booksale.  

@mel NO! What!? I will have to check it out!