10 Harper’s Bazaar editors on the books that changed their lives

When I was about eight, I was given a copy of this book as a birthday present from an elderly neighbour. At the time, reading wasn’t something I chose to do outside of my Year 2 requirements, but after I had devoured the story of 10-year-old Andy and her Sylvanian Family rabbit, Radish, caught in the middle of an acrimonious divorce, I was hooked on books to the extent that I earned myself the nickname ‘Belle’. As is no doubt the case for thousands of other girls, Wilson singlehandedly made me fall in love with reading, which in turn made me want to pursue a career in journalism. So, thank you, Yvonne – you probably never realised how influential that birthday present was. Siân Ranscombe, beauty editor

I’ve only read this book once, as a teenager, and am still so struck by its succinct, powerful beauty that I recommend it to everyone. I can still quote lines from this book that I read 20 years ago: “Like a miraculous circuit, each draws strength from the other. I see that I must give what I most need.” Hannah Ridley, associate art editor

In four essays/chapters, Ali Smith reflects on art through the story of two bookish people, lovers, one alive and one not. Her sentences do acrobatics: clauses run backwards, words deflect definitions, fiction forward-rolls into fact and fact back-flips into fiction. Propriety and punctuation often fly out of the window, but it’s not annoying and it never clouds the meaning. If I say it’s a study of the relationship between art, ideas and writing – after all, the four sections were originally lectures given at Oxford – it sounds pretty heavy-going. But it is the opposite. It is funny, profoundly moving, it boggles my mind and opens my eyes. It is a party that I am looking forward to returning to many times in years to come. Charlotte Brook, commissioning editor

A lush, beautifully-crafted story that revolves around a pair of unusual twins and their family in rural Kerala, India. It’s been 21 years since its release (and roughly 12 since I paid a visit to Kerala, inspired by it) but this tale of personal sorrow – who gets to love whom and by how much – is still incredibly vivid, piercing and heady, and still moves me just as much today as it did when I first read it. Kim Parker, executive fashion and jewellery director

Madame Bovary tells the story of Emma, a farm girl who plunges into fantasy – via romantic novels and impassioned affairs – as a respite from her dreary marriage to a man she does not love. Lyrical and expertly crafted, the narrative frequently dips into her feverish imagination, revealing the full extent of her frustrated desires. Never before had I so deeply related to a fictional character; the tragic ending made me sob for days. What most struck me about Madame Bovary was the way it takes sentimental literature to task for building unrealistic expectations around romance (something that endures today with pop songs, movies and reality TV). The book is a fascinating commentary on how our cultural consumption influences our characters. Yasmin Omar, sub-editor/entertainment writer

I was lucky to have To Kill a Mockingbirdon on my GCSE syllabus, and even luckier to have a teacher who understood that this book was just as much a lesson in morality as it was in modern American literature. In my all-girls school, where popularity and beauty could easily reign supreme, it taught us the life-long lesson that integrity, wisdom and strength were paramount. Atticus is still up there as one of my all-time literary heroes. Katy Young, global luxury beauty director

When I was a teenager, I used to scour my parents' Sunday Times every weekend to read AA Gill's restaurant reviews. Pithy, clever and entertaining, they served as cultural commentary as well as his take on whatever was happening in the dining world. When I heard he had a book about his travel experiences, I bought it straight away. He offered such insight and brought such originality to every destination he visited, and always without cliche or superfluence or indulged conjecture. AA Gill brought everything to life for me, be it his account of India and the "absolutely perfect Taj Mahal" or the plains of Africa. Like so many other aspiring hacks, it not only made me want to be a journalist and, probably to his horror, informed so much of how I think and see so many issues, from social welfare to the refugee crisis. It also taught me the crucial, basic foundation of journalism - to find out the truth and report that truth as you see it. I have read all of AA Gill's books, but it is this one - the one that I keep by my bed when I'm feeling stuck and uninspired - that is the most dog-eared and well loved. Ella Alexander, deputy digital editor

The House of the Spirits was my first taste of magical realism when I read it in my late-teens and it ignited in me a lifelong love of both the genre and of Latin America. Against the backdrop of social and political upheaval in post-colonial Chile, the book follows four generations of the Trueba family which revolves around the strong women at its core whose lives straddle the fine line between the real and the surreal: Rosa the beautiful who was born with green hair like a mermaid; Clara who can predict future events and move salt shakers with her mind; Blanca and Alba who can call on the spirits. Allende normalises the magic in her stories so artfully, interweaving the supernatural with the actual so that you find yourself accepting it as truth and that’s what had such an impact on me: the idea of finding the magic in the everyday. It’s an outlook I’ve tried to follow ever since. Rosie Arkell-Palmer, junior fashion editor