> But it pains me that the best is already behind me. I knew Dawn Treader was the best book the first time around, but like I said, I never finished them all the first time around. So I never read "The Magicians Nephew" "The Horse and His Boy" or "The Last Battle." (As Stephen points out, in the "old" or, more properly, "correct" ordering system, these three books came 5th, 6th, and 7th in the series. In the "new", or "stupid" ordering system, they are 1st, 3rd, and 7th, respectively. I'm reading them the "stupid" way this time around, so I've already hit the other two, and TLB is the only book left in the series I haven't read. Strangely enough, it seems to me that it was Lewis himself who was the greatest proponent of the "stupid" ordering system, which is why they are arranged thusly today.)

He was? Man, the whole non-linearity of the second-to-last two was always really cool to me. I'd hate to read them starting with The Magician's Nephew. It was really neat to suddenly learn more about the mentioned-but-unexplored period in Narnia that "Horse" covered, and then the creation of Narnia in "Nephew" was neat.

As for reading times: I remember I used to read each book in one sitting. That's probably why I read them so many danged times, I could finish off the whole series in a week.

Oh, and for the fantasy thread that's going on above: hey, Narnia is different fantasy. No elves in sight (well, there might have been some, but not many). It may be largely copied from the Bible, but anyone who says Dawn Treader is not creative is nuts.