Danny Dunn and the Homework Machine
by Jay Williams and Raymond Abrashkin

The most important book I have ever read? Hmmm. Do I go faux pretentious? Toss out Orwell, Nietzsche, or Dostoyevsky? Dark and twisted with Poe, King, or Lovecraft? Nah…think I will go with simple truth. The most important book I have ever read (just speaking in terms of a love of reading, nothing deep or spiritual) would have to be Danny Dunn and the Homework Machine by Jay Williams and Raymond Abrashkin. I realize this is not a pillar in the pantheon of great literature. I doubt it would even make it to the break room of the custodial staff who clean the place at night. But it is my choice for most important book because it is my earliest memory of falling into a story, of a young third grade me finishing and loving a book SO MUCH that I couldn’t wait to run back to the library to get another. A run I have been making joyously ever since. Yeah, it’s gotta be Danny Dunn!

-Brian Horne

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4 comments

akdilmore 19 January, 2012 - 12:52 pm

I loved Angela's Ashes, too, Tee.

Tee 19 January, 2012 - 1:59 pm

Isn't it wonderful, Angie? Loved that man.

Jenny_O 19 January, 2012 - 3:42 pm

So easy for me to answer that one: Madame Bovary.

Lisa Emig 19 January, 2012 - 5:01 pm

All such great books – but I'd have to go with To Kill A Mockingbird

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