Because so many Top 100 lit lists are so full of crap, I’ve decided to make my own. No Proust, no Joyce, none of those put-you-to-sleep, emperor-has-no-clothes writers that we’re supposed to like but really don’t. Just good ripping tales well told — works of fiction that I’ve read and enjoyed and can recommend. If you want to read any of them, great. If you want to argue about what’s on or not on my list, or recommend other titles that you think I ought to like, that’s also great. Friend me on Goodreads.com if you really want to mix it up. Anyway, here’s my list, sorted alphabetically by author. Enjoy!
- Edward Abbey, The Monkey Wrench Gang
- Sherman Alexie, Indian Killer
- Sherman Alexie, Reservation Blues
- Margaret Atwood, Oryx and Crake
- JG Ballard, Empire of the Sun
- JG Ballard, High-Rise
- John Barth, The Sot-Weed Factor
- Louis de Bernieres, Birds Without Wings
- Louis de Bernieres, Corelli’s Mandolin
- Luther Blissett, Q
- Marc Bojanowski, The Dog Fighter
- Roberto Bolaño, The Savage Detectives
- Paul Bowles, The Sheltering Sky
- TC Boyle, Riven Rock
- TC Boyle, Water Music
- Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451
- Ray Bradbury, Something Wicked This Way Comes
- Charles Bukowski, Ham on Rye
- Charles Bukowski, Women
- Mikhail Bulgakov, The Master and Margarita
- Anthony Burgess, A Clockwork Orange
- William Burroughs, Naked Lunch
- Miguel de Cervantes, Don Quixote
- Michael Chabon, The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay
- Raymond Chandler, The Lady in the Lake
- Raymond Chandler, The Long Goodbye
- Craig Clevenger, The Contortionist’s Handbook
- Andrew Conn, P
- Samuel Delaney, Dhalgren
- Junot Diaz, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao
- Philip K. Dick, A Scanner Darkly
- Philip K. Dick, Confessions of a Crap Artist
- Joan Didion, A Book of Common Prayer
- Joan Didion, Democracy
- Fyodor Dostoevski, The Brothers Karamazov
- Harlan Ellison, I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream
- Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man
- Louise Erdritch, Love Medicine
- Philip Jose Farmer, Lord Tyger
- F Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby
- Jonathan Franzen, The Corrections
- Charles Frazier, Cold Mountain
- Carlos Fuentes, Terra Nostra
- Gabriel Garcia-Marquez, Love in the Time of Cholera
- Mark Haddon, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time
- Oakley Hall, The Children of the Sun
- Oakley Hall, Warlock
- Joseph Heller, Catch-22
- Herman Hesse, Siddharta
- Homer, The Odyssey
- James Dickey, To the White Sea
- Denis Johnson, Already Dead
- Denis Johnson, Tree of Smoke
- James Kelman, How Late it Was, How Late
- Ken Kesey, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest
- Natsuo Kirino, Out
- Norman Mailer, Harlot’s Ghost
- Charles McCarry, Tears of Autumn
- Cormac McCarthy, Blood Meridian
- Cormac McCarthy, Suttree
- Cormac McCarthy, The Road
- Herman Melville, Moby-Dick
- Henry Miller, The Rosy Crucifixion
- Christopher Moore, Lamb
- Haruki Murakami, The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle
- Haruki Murakami, A Wild Sheep Chase
- Ryu Murakami, Coin Locker Babies
- Audrey Niffenegger, The Time Traveler’s Wife
- Tim O’Brien, Going After Cacciato
- Chuck Palahniuk, Invisible Monsters
- Chuck Palahniuk, Survivor
- Alan Paton, Cry, the Beloved Country
- Arturo Perez-Reverte, Queen of the South
- Thomas Pynchon, Against the Day
- Thomas Pynchon, Gravity’s Rainbow
- Thomas Pynchon, V
- Thomas Pynchon, Mason & Dixon
- Matt Ruff, Set This House in Order
- Salman Rushdie, The Satanic Verses
- George Saunders, In Persuasion Nation
- Nevil Shute, Pied Piper
- Nevil Shute, Round the Bend
- Wallace Stegner, Angle of Repose
- Neal Stephenson, Cryptonomicon
- Neal Stephenson, The Baroque Cycle
- Hunter S Thompson, The Rum Diary
- John K Toole, A Confederacy of Dunces
- Mark Twain, Pudd’nhead Wilson
- Mark Twain, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
- Mark Twain, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer
- Luis Urrea, The Hummingbird’s Daughter
- Kurt Vonnegut, Bluebeard
- Kurt Vonnegut, Galapagos
- Kurt Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse Five
- Nathaniel West, A Cool Million
- Nathaniel West, The Day of the Locust
- Tim Winton, The Riders
- Stephen Wright, Meditations in Green
- Rudolph Wurlitzer, The Drop Edge of Yonder
- Roger Zelazney, Lord of Light
May 17, 2009 at 7:32 am |
I have only read Fahrenheit 451, Catch-22, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest and A Clockwork Orange, but this list seems rather good, although Catch-22 is in my opinion somewhat dull. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest is definitely my personal favorite of those that I did read, so good work!
May 17, 2009 at 9:49 am |
Mentioned Vonnegut and not Mother Night?
May 17, 2009 at 12:42 pm |
That’s a good one too.
May 17, 2009 at 6:53 pm |
Great list – right now I’m listening to another Haruki Murakami book on my IPod – Kafka on the Shore – but how could you leave out Jonathan Carroll – my favorite book of his being Outside the Dog Museum. Having little time for pleasure reading lately, I love being able to get in some good books on my drive to work. I’ll have to look up some of the ones I don’t recognize from your list. Thanks for the recommendations!
May 19, 2009 at 3:54 pm |
Thanks for the suggestion, Lisa – I’ve added Jonathan Carroll to my to-read list
May 17, 2009 at 8:05 pm |
I love it when a list makes the heart beat a little faster! Edward Abbey, OH YEAH! And I think Catch-22 is one of the absolute best reads ever, I’ve read it over and over. Recently read Time Traveler’s Wife and enjoyed it a lot, but maybe it could have ended a little earlier? I thought it ran out of steam at the end. I’d like to strongly recommend Rain of Gold by Victor Villasenor. I also think Thoreau’s Walden is awesome, but I may be alone in that… Thanks for the list.
May 19, 2009 at 3:55 pm |
Thanks for the suggestion. I’ve added Rain of Gold to my to-read list. Sounds like something I’d enjoy, as I am a fan of Luis Valdez (Always Running) and the late, great Oscar Acosta (Revenge of the Cockroach People).
May 17, 2009 at 10:57 pm |
Thanks for the list. I’ve bookmarked the page, so I can return if I ever finish Moby Dick, which is on your list.
May 19, 2009 at 4:07 am |
I just wish you had some stories about war and how it affected people. That Tim O’Brien cracks me up. The Things They Carried…couldn’t keep it together. Whoever said Catch-22 was dull either didn’t read the book or couldn’t understand it. Sorry either way. I’m a couple novels behind on Chuck P. so at least I know what to pick up. What should I take for a long plane ride? 11+ hours.
May 19, 2009 at 3:52 pm |
Another good war story (on the list) is “To the White Sea,” about a B-29 gunner shot down over Tokyo during the fire-bombing. By James Dickey, who also wrote “Deliverance.”
Chuck P’s last two, Rant and Pygmy, were both very good – but my faves are still Survivor and Invisible Monsters.
For an 11-hour flight, I’d go with anything by Pynchon, Stephenson, or Rushdie. All long-winded SOBs in the best possible way.
August 10, 2009 at 9:34 am |
I am nipples hard ecstatic that Q made the list. I remember once upon a time a certain book club grumbling with resolve that a book based in Reformation era Europe written by four anonymous Italian riders would surely be a pure stinker. And I didn’t fool myself for a second that JR by William Gaddis would make the list.