Well, I made said trip to said bookstore this afternoon. And thanks to this list and Loriel's suggestions I dropped just over 90,000 won on a *stack* of books - unfortunately I couldn't find most of the books or authors you had listed. Had decided that I really wanted to start with Anne McAffrey (oh dear, did I spell that right?) but only her latest Pern book was on the shelf, and I didn't want to start in the middle of a series. Looked at a bunch of other fantasy/sci-fi books, but couldn't decide which ones looked good enough, or they didn't have the first book of the series, etc. So finally settled on the first four Harry Potter books and the seven Narnia books. The Potter books are new to me, but I read the Narnia books as a kid. Repeatedly. Think I read 'The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe' at least twenty times! Yes, they are certainly sci-fi/fantasy, but my parents let me read them because CS Lewis was a Christian writer and they are Christian allegories. We were never allowed to read fiction when I was growing up, otherwise. I think finally I found some biblical fiction books that my parents let me read because after all, they were Bible stories. And then after I left home, I was very careful not to let them see my bookshelf. Until I moved back in with them this summer. And my dad had a fit. But I told him basically, 'Dad, I'm 34 - I don't give a flying flip what you think about my viewing or reading materials.' (I just made sure that I didn't subject him to anything he doesn't approve of, like me watching shows he doesn't approve of when he's downstairs working in his office.)
Anyway... If you like Biblical fiction, I love any of the books by Ellen Gunderson Traylor. Also, I really enjoyed the Zion Chronicals series by Bodie Thoene - these two series piqued my interest in the early State of Israel as well as WW II and the Holocaust, and Judaism, which I admit, I'm really *really* ignorant about...
I can't really name books anymore - I had a lot more books on my shelf before I was forced out of my apartment last Jan (2002). I had to dump a good 4/5ths of my books. Only kept my Star Trek books, some major music and education books, and a few novels. Mostly classics. I'm reduced to about three shelves now, and those are double-stacked. (Another shelf, also double-stacked, house my video collection, which I refused to do anything to!)
Hopefully these two sets I just got today will be a start to re-building what I'd lost...
Melisma (under her Rock, off to start in on Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone - a new English-language book: Yippee!!!
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