|
Agee, James
|
Death in the Family, A
|
1957
|
The enchanted childhood summer of 1915 suddenly
becomes a baffling experience for Rufus Follet when
his father dies.
|
|
Alcott, Louisa May
|
Little Women
|
1868
|
A small New England village in the 1800's is the
backdrop for the story of the March family.
|
|
Austen, Jane
|
Emma
|
1816
|
A study of a complex young lady of twenty, whose
egotism, snobbishness, and zeal for arranging the
affairs of others leads her into errors of
judgment.
|
|
Austen, Jane
|
Pride and Prejudice
|
1813
|
Mrs. Bennet scrambles to find husbands for her
five daughters in a gentle satire of human weakness
and prejudice.
|
|
Bradbury, Ray
|
Fahrenheit 451
|
1953
|
Reading is a crime, and firemen burn books in
this futuristic society.
|
|
Bronte, Charlotte
|
Jane Eyre
|
1847
|
An impoverished young woman finds love when she
becomes the governess of brooding Mr. Rochester's
ward.
|
|
Bronte, Emily
|
Wuthering Heights
|
1847
|
The windswept moors of England during the late
18th and early 19th centuries provide the backdrop
for this classic tale of passion and violence.
|
|
Camus, Albert
|
Stranger, The
|
1946
|
A man who is virtually unknown to both himself
and others commits a pointless murder for which he
has no explanation.
|
|
Cather, Willa
|
Death Comes for the Archbishop
|
1927
|
Set in the mid-19th century, this is the story
of a pries who sets out to win the Southwest for
Catholicism.
|
|
Cather, Willa
|
O Pioneers!
|
1913
|
Alesandra Bergson tames the wild land and leads
her less intelligent brothers to prosperity.
|
|
Cervantes, Miguel de
|
Don Quixote
|
1605
|
The saga of the fabulous knight and his simple
squire and their adventures in medieval Spain.
|
|
Chopin, Kate
|
Awakening, The
|
1899
|
An unhappy wife and mother discovers new
qualities in herself when she visits Grand Isle, a
resort for the Creole elite of New Orleans.
|
|
Conrad, Joseph
|
Lord Jim
|
1917
|
A haunted sailor, driven from port to port, from
island to island, Lord Jim is a man in search of
identity.
|
|
Cooper, James Fenimore
|
Deerslayer, The
|
1841
|
Set in 1740, during the French and Indian Wars,
Hawkeye (Natty Bumppo) discovers his identity in
the bloody struggles.
|
|
Cooper, James Fenimore
|
Last of the Mohicans
|
1826
|
The main character, Natty Bumppo, also called
Hawkeye, is at the middle of his life. Brutal
battles with the Iroquis and their French allies
comprise the storyline. Revenge, the beauty of the
unspoiled wilderness, and sorrow at its
disappearance are the themes.
|
|
Defoe, Daniel
|
Robinson Crusoe
|
1719
|
Surviving a shipwreck, the tile character lives
on an island for 28 years with only his companion,
Friday.
|
|
Dickens, Charles
|
David Copperfield
|
1850
|
A sprawling portrait of life in Victorian
England.
|
|
Dickens, Charles
|
Great Expectations
|
1860
|
Pip secretly aids an escaped prisoner who later
rewards him with a life of wealth.
|
|
Dickens, Charles
|
Oliver Twist
|
1838
|
A tale of an orphan who escapes the workhouse
only to fall among thieves in the urban squalor of
19th century London.
|
|
Dickens, Charles
|
Tale of Two Cities, A
|
1859
|
Set in the midst of the French Revolution, this
novel captures the tumult of the time interwoven
with a love story.
|
|
Dostoevski, Fyodor
|
Crime and Punishment
|
1866
|
A sensitive intellectual is driven by poverty to
believe himself exempt from moral law.
|
|
Dostoevsky, Fyodor
|
Brothers Karamazov
|
1880
|
A monumental novel about good and evil;
considered the author's masterpiece.
|
|
Doyle, Arthur Conan
|
Hound of the Baskervilles, The
|
1901
|
Sherlock Homes' best-known mystery. Set in the
moors, a terrifying ghostly hound howls for
blood.
|
|
Dreiser, Theodore
|
Sister Carrie
|
1912
|
Small town girl comes to the big city, and is
used by men and uses them to become a successful
Broadway actress
|
|
du Maurier, Daphne
|
Rebecca
|
1938
|
Gothic masterpiece about a young bride haunted
by the spectre of her husband's first wife.
|
|
Dumas, Alexandre
|
Count of Monte Cristo, The
|
1845
|
Originally published in French, the story of a
man wrongly imprisoned, who escapes after 14 years
to avenge himself on those who wronged him.
|
|
Dumas, Alexandre
|
Three Musketeers, The
|
1844
|
Originally published in French, this story is
about the adventures of four fictional
swashbuckling heroes during the reign of Louis XIII
and Louis XIV.
|
|
Eliot, George
|
Mill on the Floss
|
1860
|
The tragic story of the affectionate Maggie
Tulliver and her sober and intolerant brother.
|
|
Eliot, George
|
Silas Marner
|
1861
|
A friendless weaver cares only for his gold
until he finds an abandoned baby girl who he raises
as his own child and is redeemed by his love for
her.
|
|
Faulkner, William
|
Intruder in the Dust
|
1948
|
The story of a murder mystery and race relations
in the South.
|
|
Faulkner, William
|
Sound and the Fury, The
|
1929
|
The story of the decay and fall of an
aristocratic Southern family, told through four
different points of view
|
|
Fielding, Henry
|
Tom Jones
|
1749
|
A vivid picture of England in the mid-18th
century, this story is a comic romance.
|
|
Fitzgerald, F. Scott
|
Tender is the Night
|
1934
|
The semi-autobiographical novel of a
psychiatrist who marries one of his patients; as
she recovers, he disintegrates.
|
|
Fitzgerald, F. Scott
|
This Side of Paradise
|
1920
|
First novel by Fitzgerald about the changes of
the Jazz Age and the 1920's.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Flaubert, Gustav
|
Madame Bovary
|
1857
|
A story of adultery; a bored middle-class wife
sets out to achieve her romantic fantasies, and
ends up in financial and psychological ruin.
|
|
Forster, E.M.
|
Passage to India, A
|
1924
|
Clash of cultures in British India after the
turn of the century. Beautifully written story of a
simple misunderstanding that turns into a
tragedy.
|
|
Forster, E.M.
|
Room With a View, A
|
1908
|
A privileged young British woman decides to
marry for love even though her suitor is from a
lower social class.
|
|
Greene, Graham
|
Power and the Glory, The
|
1940
|
The story of a Catholic priest tortured by
alcohol and fear.
|
|
Hardy, Thomas
|
Far From the Madding Crowd
|
1880's
|
Love and romance enliven a bleak country setting
in this classic.
|
|
Hardy, Thomas
|
Mayor of Casterbridge, The
|
1886
|
An English novel that follows the rise and fall
of a man, the mayor of the fictional city of
Casterbridge.
|
|
Hardy, Thomas
|
Return of the Native
|
1878
|
An English novel that features a young man who
has returned to England from France.
|
|
Hardy, Thomas
|
Tess of the D'Urbervilles
|
1891
|
The tale of Tess Derbeyfield, a strong, young
country girl who is betrayed by two selfish
men.
|
|
Hawthorne, Nathaniel
|
House of the Seven Gables, The
|
1851
|
Set in mid-19th-century Salem , Massachusetts,
this book is a study in hereditary sin.
|
|
Heller, Joseph
|
Catch-22
|
1961
|
A bitter, powerful, savagely funny account of
WWII bombing missions.
|
|
Hemingway, Ernest
|
Farewell to Arms, A
|
1929
|
World War I is the setting for this love story
of an English nurse and a wounded American
ambulance officer.
|
|
Hemingway, Ernest
|
For Whom the Bell Tolls
|
1940
|
The epic story of Robert Jordan, who fought,
love, and died with the anti-Fascist guerrillas of
the Spanish Civil War.
|
|
Hemingway, Ernest
|
Old Man and the Sea, The
|
1952
|
An old Cuban fisherman fights a relentless,
agonizing battle with a giant marlin.
|
|
Hemingway, Ernest
|
Sun Also Rises, The
|
1954
|
The story of an expatriate newsman in the
1920's.
|
|
Henry, James
|
Turn of the Screw, The
|
1898
|
One of the most famous ghost stories, told
through the journals of a governess trying to save
her two charges from demonic influences.
|
|
Hudson, W.H.
|
Green Mansions
|
1904
|
An exotic romance set in the jungles of South
America.
|
|
Hugo, Victor
|
Hunchback of Notre Dame, The
|
1831
|
Set in 15th-century Paris, the novel evokes life
in medieval Paris, and features, a hunch-back, a
beautiful gypsy, and an evil archdeacon.
|
|
Hugo, Victor
|
Les Miserables
|
1862
|
Originally published in French, this novel is
set in the Parisian underworld. It follows Jean
Valjean, a victim of society who was imprisoned for
19 years for stealing a loaf of bread, but
eventually finds redemption.
|
|
Huxley, Aldous
|
Brave New World
|
1932
|
In a chilling vision of the future, babies are
produced in bottles and exist in a mechanized world
without soul.
|
|
James, Henry
|
Portrait of a Lady, The
|
1881
|
The study of a young American girl as she
travels to Europe and becomes the victim of her own
narrow provincialism.
|
|
James, Henry
|
Wings of the Dove, The
|
1902
|
Set in London and Venice, this story features
the clash between the naive Americans and the
sophisticated, often decadent Europeans.
|
|
Kafka, Franz
|
Castle, The
|
1930
|
A symbolic story about a surveyor adrift in an
incomprehensible "castle."
|
|
Kafka, Franz
|
Trial, The
|
1937
|
A respectable worker in a bank is suddenly
arrested and spends the rest of his life fighting a
charge against himself about which he can get no
information.
|
|
Kipling, Rudyard
|
Captains Courageous
|
1897
|
A spoiled rich boy is thrust into the tough
world of the Grand Banks fishermen.
|
|
Kipling, Rudyard
|
Kim
|
1901
|
An English boy raised as a native of India is
led by a friend on an odyssey throughout the
country.
|
|
Knowles, John
|
Separate Peace, A
|
1959
|
The story of a friendship between two boys at an
Eastern prep school during the early years of
WWII.
|
|
Koestler, Arthur
|
Darkness at Noon
|
1941
|
A novel that exposes the reality behind the
great Russian state trials of the 1930's.
|
|
Lawrence, D.H.
|
Sons and Lovers
|
1913
|
The story of an English coalmining family at the
turn of the century, and the coming of age of one
son, Paul.
|
|
Lee, Harper
|
To Kill a Mockingbird
|
1960
|
A Young girl tells of life in a small Alabama
town in the 1930s and her father's defense in court
of an African American accused of raping a white
woman.
|
|
Lewis, Sinclair
|
Arrowsmith
|
1925
|
Doctor Arrowsmith finds pettiness and small
minds an obstruction to progress.
|
|
Lewis, Sinclair
|
Babbitt
|
1922
|
The story of Babbitt, the ultimate
conformist.
|
|
Lewis, Sinclair
|
Main Street
|
1920
|
Carol Kennicott is caught between her desires
for social reform and individual happiness
|
|
London, Jack
|
Call of the Wild, The
|
1903
|
The story of a heroic dog in the Klondike.
|
|
London, Jack
|
Sea Wolf, The
|
1904
|
A vivid sea adventure.
|
|
Malory, Thomas
|
Morte D'Arthur
|
1470
|
A medieval tale; an Arthurian romance. The first
account of the Arthurian legend in English
prose.
|
|
Maughom, Somerset
|
Of Human Bondage
|
1915
|
A medical student's bondage to his own lameness
and to his love for an unappreciative woman.
|
|
McCullers, Carson
|
Heart is a Lonely Hunter, The
|
1953
|
A cross-section view of humanity in a Southern
town.
|
|
McCullers, Carson
|
Member of the Wedding, The
|
1946
|
A young Southern girl is determined to be the
third party on a honeymoon, despite all advice.
|
|
Mitchell, Margaret
|
Gone With the Wind
|
1936
|
Flaming epic of Civil War times.
|
|
Nordhoff, Charles
|
Mutiny on the Bounty
|
1932
|
A vivid narrative based on an actual mutiny in
1789.
|
|
Orwell, George
|
1984
|
1949
|
A great modern classic of "negative utopia" with
chilling implications for our own time.
|
|
Pasternak, Boris
|
Dr. Zhivago
|
1957
|
Vivid story of Russia and its revolution along
with a tale of an extraordinary love which endures
hardship, tragedy, and time.
|
|
Rawlings, Marjorie
|
Yearling, The
|
1938
|
A Pulitzer prize winning story of a 12-year-old
boy and the fawn he adopts.
|
|
Rolvaag, O.E.
|
Giants in the Earth
|
1927
|
A giant novel about the peasant immigrants who
broke America to the plow.
|
|
Rostand, Edmond
|
Cyrano de Bergerac
|
1897
|
The story of the finest swordsman of France, a
gallant soldier, brilliant wit, and tragic lover
with a huge nose.
|
|
Salinger, J.D.
|
Catcher in the Rye, The
|
1951
|
Armed with sarcasm and daydreams,
sixteen-year-old Holden Caulfield leaves his
Pennsylvania prep school for New York City.
|
|
Saroyan, William
|
Human Comedy, The
|
1943
|
Warm and captivating story of an American family
in wartime.
|
|
Scott, Sir Walter
|
Ivanhoe
|
1820
|
An adventure set in medieval England.
|
|
Scott, Sir Walter
|
Kenilworth
|
1821
|
An historical novel set in Elizabethan
England.
|
|
Scott, Sir Walter
|
Rob Roy
|
1817
|
A novel that celebrates the "primitive"
highlander of the 1760's.
|
|
Shaw, George Bernard
|
Pygmalion
|
1913
|
A cockney flower girl is transformed into a lady
by a professor of phonetics.
|
|
Shelley, Mary
|
Frankenstein
|
1818
|
A horror tale that questions the belief that
science always leads to progress.
|
|
Sienkiewicz, Henryk
|
Quo Vadis?
|
1896
|
Historical novel originally published in Polish.
Set in ancient Rome, it tells the story of a love
between a young Christian woman and a Roman
officer.
|
|
Steinbeck, John
|
Cannery Row
|
1945
|
A look at the conditions and lives of California
migrant workers in Monterey.
|
|
Steinbeck, John
|
Grapes of Wrath, The
|
1939
|
An Oklahoma farmer and his family leave the Dust
Bowl during the Great Depression to go to the
promised land of California.
|
|
Steinbeck, John
|
Of Mice and Men
|
1937
|
Short-tempered George and child-like Lennie area
mismatched pair who share a dream of owning a farm
of their own.
|
|
Stevenson, Robert Louis
|
Kidnapped
|
1886
|
After being kidnapped by his villainous uncle,
16-year-old David Balfour escapes and becomes
involved in the struggle of the Scottish
highlanders.
|
|
Stevenson, Robert Louis
|
Treasure Island
|
1883
|
A boy's coming-of-age story and an adventure
with pirates and treasure.
|
|
Stowe, Harriet Beecher
|
Uncle Tom's Cabin
|
1852
|
A dramatic story that focused on the plight of
the slaves; often cited as one of the causes of the
American Civil War.
|
|
Swift, Jonathan
|
Gulliver's Travels
|
1726
|
Gulliver goes on four unusual voyages. Swift
satirizes pride, selfishness, greed, and
dishonesty.
|
|
Thackery, William Makepeace
|
Vanity Fair
|
1848
|
A novel about early 19th-century English
society. If offers many characters and a
multi-layered view of the human condition.
|
|
Tolstoy, Leo
|
Anna Karenina
|
1877
|
Sensual, rebellious Anna renounces respectable
marriage and position for passion and freedom.
|
|
Tolstoy, Leo
|
Death of Ivan Ilyich
|
1881
|
A high court judge comes face to face with his
own mortality.
|
|
Turgenev, Ivan
|
Fathers and Sons
|
1861
|
A Russian classic that studies the conflict
between the generations.
|
|
Twain, Mark
|
Adventures of Tom Sawyer, The
|
1876
|
The setting is a small Mississippi River town in
the 1830s, and the main character is Tom Sawyer, a
mischievous and irresponsible but good-hearted
boy.
|
|
Twain, Mark
|
Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, A
|
1889
|
Hank Morgan, cracked on the head by a crowbar in
19th century Connecticut, wakes to find himself in
King Arthur's England.
|
|
Twain, Mark
|
Innocents Abroad
|
1869
|
A humorous travel narrative based on Twain's
travels to Egypt, Europe, and the Holy Land.
|
|
Twain, Mark
|
Life on the Mississippi
|
1883
|
A memoir of life on the Mississippi during the
steamboat era and Twain's observations on greed,
gullibility, tragedy, and bad architecture.
|
|
Verne, Jules
|
20,000 Leagues Under the Sea
|
1870
|
A 19th-century sci fi tale of an electric
submarine, its eccentric captain, and the undersea
world.
|
|
Verne, Jules
|
Around the World in 80 Days
|
1873
|
Phileas Fogg's fantastic circling of the
globe.
|
|
Voltaire
|
Candide
|
1759
|
The adventures of Candide and Doctor Pangloss is
a cynical trip through this "best of all possible
worlds."
|
|
Warren, Robert Penn
|
All the King's Men
|
1946
|
The story of politics and power in the 1930s in
the American South
|
|
Well, H.G.
|
Time Machine, The
|
1895
|
The Victorian time traveler finds a way to
travel through time to the distant future.
|
|
Wharton, Edith
|
Age of Innocence, The
|
1920
|
A Pulitzer Prize-winning novel that presents a
picture of upper-class New York society in the late
19th century.
|
|
Wharton, Edith
|
Ethan Frome
|
1939
|
A simple New England farmer is trapped by forces
he cannot control.
|
|
Wilder, Thornton
|
Bridge of San Luis Rey, The
|
1927
|
A monk's quest to find meaning behind the deaths
of 5 people from a Peruvian bridge collapse.
|
|
Wolfe, Thomas
|
Look Homeward, Angel
|
1957
|
Powerful and poetic autobiographical novel by
one of America's major literary figures.
|
|
Wolfe, Thomas
|
You Can't Go Home Again
|
1940
|
An autobiographical novel that features the
author's views on American society in the 1930's as
he travels to Europe and back.
|
|