The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe has won the hearts of Canterbury readers and was last night named their favourite book. C. S. Lewis's classic children's tale narrowly beat the Bible and Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code in the What's Your Favourite? competition run by Christchurch City Libraries, The Press and the Christchurch Book Festival Trust. About 5000 people voted for the overall favourite from a list of 20 books decided by an earlier poll. The voting spread throughout Canterbury after libraries in the Waimakariri, Selwyn, Ashburton and Timaru districts joined in. The only New Zealand book in the top 20, and the biggest surprise, was Billy Barnz's the Goat Hunter, which tells of the author's experiences as a gun-position officer with the Kiwi contingent in the Vietnam War. It finished 12th in the poll. [More]