It's Entertainment Weekly's "New Classics" List. It's an interesting list, sure. I have read 20 of the books on the list (crossed out below) and loved them all except The Da Vinci Code (meh) and The Corrections, which I couldn't finish.
I have also bolded the ones I have in my house (via my spouse, gift, long term loan or my own purchase) that I haven't read yet. There are quite a few of those too. I'm happy to see several graphic novels on the list.
What do you think?
1. The Road , Cormac McCarthy (2006)
3. Beloved, Toni Morrison (1987)
4. The Liars’ Club, Mary Karr (1995)
5. American Pastoral, Philip Roth (1997)
7. Maus, Art Spiegelman (1986/1991)
9. Cold Mountain, Charles Frazier (1997)
10. The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, Haruki Murakami (1997)
11. Into Thin Air, Jon Krakauer (1997)
12. Blindness, José Saramago (1998)
13. Watchmen, Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons (1986-87)
14. Black Water, Joyce Carol Oates (1992)
15. A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, Dave Eggers (2000)
17. Love in the Time of Cholera, Gabriel García Márquez (1988)
18. Rabbit at Rest, John Updike (1990)
19. On Beauty, Zadie Smith (2005)
20. Bridget Jones’s Diary, Helen Fielding (1996)
21. On Writing, Stephen King (2000)
22. The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, Junot Díaz (2007)
23. The Ghost Road, Pat Barker (1996)
24. Lonesome Dove, Larry McMurtry (1985)
25. The Joy Luck Club, Amy Tan (1989)
26. Neuromancer, William Gibson (1984)
27. Possession, A.S. Byatt (1990)
28. Naked, David Sedaris (1997)
31. The Things They Carried, Tim O’Brien (1990)
32. Parting the Waters, Taylor Branch (1988)
33. The Year of Magical Thinking, Joan Didion (2005)
37. Persepolis, Marjane Satrapi (2003)
39. Interpreter of Maladies, Jhumpa Lahiri (2000)
40. His Dark Materials, Philip Pullman (1995-2000)
41. The House on Mango Street, Sandra Cisneros (1984)
42. LaBrava, Elmore Leonard (1983)
43. Borrowed Time, Paul Monette (1988)
44. Praying for Sheetrock, Melissa Fay Greene (1991)
45. Eva Luna, Isabel Allende (1988)
46. Sandman, Neil Gaiman (1988-1996) (The first one..)
47. World’s Fair, E.L. Doctorow (1985)
49. Clockers, Richard Price (1992)
51. The Journalist and the Murderer, Janet Malcom (1990)
52. Waiting to Exhale, Terry McMillan (1992)
53. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay, Michael Chabon (2000)
54. Jimmy Corrigan, Chris Ware (2000)
58. Drop City, TC Boyle (2003)
59. Krik? Krak! Edwidge Danticat (1995)
60. Nickel & Dimed, Barbara Ehrenreich (2001)
61. Money, Martin Amis (1985)
62. Last Train To Memphis, Peter Guralnick (1994)
63. Pastoralia, George Saunders (2000)
64. Underworld, Don DeLillo (1997)
65. The Giver, Lois Lowry (1993)
66. A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again, David Foster Wallace (1997)
67. The Kite Runner, Khaled Hosseini (2003)
70. Cloud Atlas, David Mitchell (2004)
71. The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down, Ann Fadiman (1997)
73. A Prayer for Owen Meany, John Irving (1989)
75. Cathedral, Raymond Carver (1983)
77. The Remains of the Day, Kazuo Ishiguro (1989)
78. Eat, Pray, Love, Elizabeth Gilbert (2006)
79. The Tipping Point, Malcolm Gladwell (2000)
80. Bright Lights, Big City, Jay McInerney (1984)
81. Backlash, Susan Faludi (1991)
86. And the Band Played On, Randy Shilts (1987)
87. The Ruins, Scott Smith (2006)
89. Close Range, Annie Proulx (1999)
90. Comfort Me With Apples, Ruth Reichl (2001)
91. Random Family, Adrian Nicole LeBlanc (2003)
92. Presumed Innocent, Scott Turow (1987)
93. A Thousand Acres, Jane Smiley (1991)
94. Fast Food Nation, Eric Schlosser (2001)
95. Kaaterskill Falls, Allegra Goodman (1999)
98. The Predators’ Ball, Connie Bruck (1989)
99. Practical Magic, Alice Hoffman (1995)
100. America (the Book), Jon Stewart/Daily Show (2004)
8 comments:
Are you telling me you haven't read Eva Luna and The secret history? Those are among my alltime favourites...
I've read mostly the same ones you have.
I really think you'll like _Blindness_ and _Eat, Pray, Love_.
If you haven't read Bridget Jones, then I bet you haven't read any other Fielding? I really love Olivia Joules (but it is goofy!) and I think you would like _Cause Celeb_.
I liked _Comfort Me with Apples_ but I love (and lifted the cheesecake and carbonara recipes from) _Garlic and Sapphires_.
That sounds like a reading challenge in the making - I've hardly read any of those books.
you should read the kate atkinson. it's excellent.
a.
Whew...I've only read 3 on the list! Beloved, Eat, Pray Love, Terry McMillian)
Gotta up my reading! Some of these are on my nightstand...or in a pile on the floor by my bed.
Oh...sigh...LOL!
4. Loved the Liars Club (but couldn't get into the second part of her autobiography(
7, 37. Great, and not just in the genre.
29. How can you not love a book where you know what is going to happen and refuse to believe it will?
30. Case Histories is totally worth reading. Very entertaining.
39. One of my favorite books ever. Made me reconsider my anti-short story bias.
48, 78. Over-rated.
I would write more, but already this is a long comment.
You should start the Stephen King "On Writing" book - I think you'll really enjoy it.
Two of the books on your to-read list that I really liked are:
The Kite Runner and Eat, Pray, Love. I hated Love in the Time of Cholera.
I post mini-reviews of books I read at http://booksontheedge.blogspot.com/.
Chris L
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