I'm curious to see if anyone else has that one specific special book that they keep going back to re-read -- and never tire of or replace.
I'll share mine: The Annotated Sherlock Holmes set edited by W. S. Baring-Gould - a monstrous 2 volume set in a green slip-case.
http://www.amazon.com/ANNOTATED-SHER...8703201&sr=1-3
Now long out of print, I still have the original set I began reading in the 70's. I received this set as a gift when I was in college, living in tiny apartments on a tiny income - so I couldn't afford to buy - or have room to store - a lot of books. I used to start at the beginning, read straight through, and then start again. This set has the marvelous Paget drawings from the Strand Magazine publications and marvelous annotations (by folk dedicated to proving that Holmes & Watson were real people with real lives).
I recently purchased the new edition of The Annotated Sherlock Holmes - a 3 volume set edited by Leslie S. Klinger, but it just wasn't the same reading experience.
http://www.amazon.com/New-Annotated-...8703295&sr=1-2
http://www.amazon.com/New-Annotated-...8703295&sr=1-1
My most memorable reading anecdote connected with the Baring-Gould volumes included the participation of my pet mouse. At the time, I had a black mouse (rescued from a lab facility) named Eldon who lived on my kitchen table (didn't have a desk). I used to read while I ate, and Eldon had the run of the table and used to share my meals (visualize a tiny black mouse perched on the edge of a soup bowl full of chicken noodle soup eating one noodle like a strand of spahgetti). One night I closed the volume and heard shrill squeeking! You guessed it! Eldon had been reading too (or at least sitting on the open page - kind of like Desperaux if you've seen the movie) and was now an unhappy bookmark! Fortunately both the book and Eldon survived.
So give - what book have you lugged around and read over a lifetime of reading?