Must-reads (Sunday Salon)
While pondering this question on Quora — What is your list of must-read fiction books? – I came up with a list of 10 books that I consider must-reads from both contemporary and classic literature. To my surprise, the books sorted naturally into themed pairs, and of course, that suggested further books that should be on the list. So, here is my revised and expanded list of 10 20 must-read novels covering 5 7 essential themes.
Theme 1: The Great American Novel
- To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
- The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
- Extra credit: East of Eden by John Steinbeck
Theme 2: Enduring Female Character
- Emma by Jane Austen
- Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
- Extra credit: Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert
Theme 3: Dystopian Visions
- Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell
- Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
- Extra credit: The Road by Cormac McCarthy
Theme 4: Experiments with Narrative Structure
- Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
- Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell
- Extra credit: Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut
Theme 5: Comic Satires
- The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams
- Good Omens by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett
- Extra credit: reread Catch-22
Theme 6: Other Worlds
- Dune by Frank Herbert
- The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin
- Extra credit: The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien
Theme 7: The Unreliable Narrator
- The Debt to Pleasure by John Lanchester
- The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson
- Extra credit: Life of Pi by Yann Martel
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Shannon,
I haven’t read Good Omens, or The Road but I agree with the rest of your list. I’ll have to read those pronto.
Best, Brad
I’m almost finished Jane Eyre and it’s a good read, though the endurance of the character leaves something to be desired. I also recently read Emma and it was enjoyable, but again, not really “enduring.”
By “enduring” I meant that even though those books were written a long time ago, their main characters endure and still impact readers today. Sorry that wasn’t clear.