To choose only three makes this a challenge. I would probably have to go with The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis for the first one. A teacher read it aloud to us in the fifth grade I believe and I think it was the first fantasy book I was exposed to unless you count television where I had seen cartoons of The Hobbit and The Last Unicorn. And a cartoon of The Swan Princess that made me fall in love with Tchaikovsky. I haven’t been able to find this cartoon, there is a newer version that isn’t it, but this one had a haunting melody of Swan Lake, which also reminds me of The Last Unicorn, it wouldn’t surprise me if my mind didn’t combine the two to create a cartoon that never existed, because my memories as a child were very fluid and were rarely accurate. I seemed to live in a fantasy most of the time so telling what was real and what wasn’t is hard for me.
The second book would have to be Dragonriders of Pern my Anne McCaffery. I got it in the library when I ran out of Margaret Henry horse books to read, I loved Misty of Chincoteague, so that would have been my first foray into science fiction. Following that I would go on to discover Andre Norton and Ursula K LeGuin, and eventually, Jack Vance and a whole bunch of amazing writers.
The third book I am going to go with Les Miserables by Victor Hugo, because it made me feel like I could read anything, it was the unabridged edition. It was a very thick volume, and ignited a love for classical literature and a fortitude to read to the end no matter the size of the book. It also taught me what not to do, because there are spots where it is difficult for a modern reader, and I know what doesn’t work and what does. Even great writers can make mistakes.
This was a tough call, because a lot of books have influenced me greatly. Jack Vance’s Lyonesse, George RR Martin’s A Game of Thrones, Ursula K LeGuin’s The Left Hand of Darkness, Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, Bram Stoker’s Dracula, which I read also in the fifth grade and did a book report on, Sir Thomas Mallory’s Le Morte D’Arthur, my love for Arthurian legends, and Roger Zelazny’s Chronicles of Amber. Cj Cherryh’s Cyteen. And many, many more. I could keep going.
I used to peruse thrift stores for old sci-fi fantasy books, anything with Del Rey, or Ballantine, or DAW, or Fawcett, or Tor. I had old editions of the Lord of the Rings from the 60s, a copy of 1984 from the 50s and Dune by Frank Herbert from the 70s. All of these are gone because I couldn’t go through my books when I moved and had to get rid of them in a hurry.
I still have my 60s copy of the Silmarillion because it was in my purse at the time. But that is it. I feel the loss everyday, wish I could have planned more and panicked less. But the past is the past, and I have the memories and can find the stories easily enough.
The Infamous Jennisfora Strikes Again...or something like that 
You weren’t in my school were you? Mrs Burke read the Narnia books to us aloud in fifth grade too. And I was a huge fan of Anne McCaffrey when the Jr High librarian turned me on to them. Just crazy timing coincides.
It is possible, although my teacher was a miss Schneidmiller, she did get married later so I don’t know what her name became after that. Both nineties kids, I suppose. 🙂
Heh…no…an it hurts to say this, I was in fifth grade in 1980. Mrs. Burke read us at least half the series. She was one of my favorite teachers ever. We even had a field trip to her house once. The big bus took us there for a day and we spent the day IN HER HOME. I’d forgotten that.
Wow, I don’t think I ever went to their house.
You made me chuckle. Thank you for that. It was sorely needed. She was an awesome teacher.