After much deliberation - seriously, making this list took a long time - I am happy to present my list of 100 novels which I will read over the next 5 years. Come visit the main web page at The Fill in the Gaps Project, made by the uber-wonderful Emily.
A
Adams, Richard. Watership Down
Alcott, Louisa May. Good Wives
Alcott, Louisa May. Jo’s Boys
Alcott, Louisa May. Little Men
Alexander, Lloyd. The Prydian Chronicles
Angelou, Maya. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
Avi. The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle
B
Baxter, Charles. Feast of Love
Bellow, Saul. Henderson the Rain King
Bradbury, Ray. Farenheit 451
Bronte, Anne. The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
Bronte, Charlotte. Villette
Brooks, Gwendolyn. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
Bryson, Bill. A Short History of Nearly Everything
Bryson, Bill. A Walk in the Woods
Bryson, Bill. The Mother Tongue: English and How It Got That Way
Buck, Pearl S.. The Good Earth
Burgess, Anthony. A Clockwork Orange
Byars, Betsy. Summer of the Swans
C
Camus, Albert. The Stranger
Cather, Willa. O Pioneers!
Chabon, Michael. The Yiddish Policemen’s Union
Clarke, Susanna. Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell
Collins, Wilkie. The Woman in White
Conrad, Joseph. Lord Jim
Cooper, James Fenimore. The Deerslayer
D
Dante. The Inferno
De Beauvoire, Simone. She Came to Stay
Defoe, Daniel. Robinson Crusoe
Dickens, Charles. A Tale of Two Cities
Doyle, Sir Arthur Conan. The Hound of the Baskervilles
Dreiser, Theodore. An American Tragedy
Du Maurier, Rebecca. Rebecca
E
Eco, Umberto. The Name of the Rose
Eggers, Dave. A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius
Eliot, George. Middlemarch
Ellison, Ralph. The Invisible Man
Eugenides, Jeffrey. Middlesex
F
Faulkner, William. As I Lay Dying
Foer, Jonathan Safran. Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close
Forster, E.M.. A Passage to India
Foucault, Michel. Discipline and Punish
G
Gaiman, Neil. The Graveyard Book
George, Jean Craighead. Julie of the Wolves
H
Hammet, Dashiell. The Maltese Falcon
Heller, Joseph. Catch-22
Hemingway, Ernest. The Old Man and the Sea
Herbert, Frank. Dune
Homer. The Iliad
Hosseini, Khaled. The Kite-Runner
Hurston, Nora Zeale. Their Eyes Were Watching God
I
Irving, John. The Cider House Rules
J
Jacobs, Harriet. Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl
Joyce, James. The Dubliners
K
Kaye, M.M.. The Far Pavilions
Kerouac, Jack. On the Road
Kingsolver, Barbara. The Poisonwood Bible
Kipling, Rudyard. Kim
Kundera, Milan. The Unbearable Lightness of Being
L
L’Engle Madeline. And Both Were Young
L’Engle, Madeline. Meet the Austins
Lawrence, D.H.. Sons and Lovers
Lewis, Sinclair. Kingsblood Royal
Lowry, Lois. Number the Stars
M
Mitchell, Margaret. Gone with the Wind
Moore, Alan. Watchmen
Morrison, Toni. Beloved
N
Nabokov, Vladimir. Lolita
Naslund, Sena Jeter. Ahab’s Wife
O
O’Dell, Scott. Island of the Blue Dolphins
P
Paterson, Katherine. Jacob Have I Loved
Pears, Iain. Stone’s Fall
Peet, Mal. Tamar
Pessl, Marisha. Special Topics in Calamity Physics
Plath, Sylvia. The Bell Jar
Porter, Katherine Anne. Ship of Fools
Pullman, Philip. The Golden Compass
R
Rand, Ayn. Atlas Shrugged
Rawls, Wilson. Where the Red Fern Grows
Robinson, Marilynne. Gilead
Rushdie, Salman. Midnight’s Children
S
Scott, Sir Walter. Ivanhoe
Shelley, Mary. Frankenstein
Shikibu, Murasaki. The Tale of Genji
Spenser, Edmund. The Faerie Queen
Steinbeck, John. Cannery Row
Sterne, Laurence. Tristram Shandy
Stoker, Bram. Dracula
Swift, Jonathan. Gulliver’s Travels
T
Taylor, Mildred D.. Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry
U
Updike, John. The Poorhouse Fair
V
Virgil. The Aeneid
Vonnegut, Kurt. Slaughterhouse Five
W
Walker, Alice. The Color Purple
Waugh, Evelyn. Brideshead Revisted
Welty, Eudora. The Optimist’s Daughter
Wharton, Edith. House of Mirth
Woodson, Jacqueline. After Tupac & D Foster
Woolf, Virginia. A Room of One’s Own
Wright, Richard. Native Son
Watership Down is good! I suggest reading it, then watching the animated movie. Winning combination.
ReplyDeleteOMG you have some of my favorite reads: The Graveyard Book, Island of the Blue Dolphins,The Golden Compass, Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close. . . Happy reading!
ReplyDeleteYeah I could have told you that it would take a couple of hours to make this list. I accidentally went over the 100-book limit to 112. We'll see if that's a good or bad thing in five years.
Number the Stars is really easy to read but it has a strong meaning. And so is Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry.
ReplyDeleteHoly Cow! That's a lotta books....good for you! :)
ReplyDeleteGoodness! That is a lot of books but great choices. Will you keep a list of what you have read on your blog? I think this is a super idea!
ReplyDeleteIn the words of Janice.... Ohhhh Maaiiii Goowdddd!!! That's some list! I know you manage at least 3 blogs. And then you read so much too?
ReplyDeleteYou must have a time-turner don't you???
This is amazing!
What a list and an exciting literary venture for you!
ReplyDeleteFYI: The village of Kingsclere where I serve right now is the location for the actual Watership Down. It is a beautiful down and is adorned with lots of wonderful rain puddles when it is wet (as LC and I have discovered).
I never read the book "Watership Down." But I saw the animated version when I was a kid. WOW!
ReplyDeleteneat list, aerin... a bunch of these i've read, some i've not heard of
ReplyDeleteno marcel proust or joe campbell? ;)
A Most Excellent list, Aerin! I know that Caged Bird & Catch-22 are at the top of my list, too. I think I'll delve further into some of the titles you recommend, so thanks! And PS: Don't forget today's Silly Sunday Sweepstakes!
ReplyDeleteI love this list. I think Lord Jim would take me a year to read by itself, but I also see a lot of favorites on the list.
ReplyDeleteBest of luck!
Fascinating list! I wish you the best of luck.
ReplyDelete