The Greatest Books Since 2000 Written by American Authors
-
1 . The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen
The Corrections is a 2001 novel by American author Jonathan Franzen. It revolves around the troubles of an elderly Midwestern couple and their three adult children, tracing their lives from the mid...
-
2 . The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz
The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao (2007) is a best-selling novel written by Dominican-American author Junot Díaz. Although a work of fiction, the novel is set in New Jersey where Díaz was raised...
-
3 . The Road by Cormac McCarthy
The Road is a 2006 novel by American writer Cormac McCarthy. It is a post-apocalyptic tale of a journey taken by a father and his young son over a period of several months, across a landscape blast...
-
4 . The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay by Michael Chabon
The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay is a 2000 novel by American author Michael Chabon that won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 2001. The novel follows the lives of the title characters, a C...
-
5 . Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides
Middlesex is a novel by Jeffrey Eugenides. It was published in 2002 and won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 2003. The narrator and protagonist, Calliope Stephanides (later called "Cal"), an in...
-
6 . Gilead by Marilynne Robinson
Gilead is a novel written by Marilynne Robinson and published in 2004. It won the 2005 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, as well as the National Book Critics Circle Award. The novel is the fictional auto...
-
7 . The Known World by Edward P. Jones
The Known World is a 2003 historical novel by Edward P. Jones. It was his first novel and second book. Set in antebellum Virginia, it examines issues regarding the ownership of black slaves by free...
-
8 . A Visit From The Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan
Jennifer Egan's spellbinding novel circles the lives of Bennie Salazar, an ageing former punk rocker and record executive, and Sasha, the passionate, troubled young woman he employs. Although Benni...
- Google -
9 . Jimmy Corrigan, the Smartest Kid on Earth by Chris Ware
Jimmy Corrigan, the Smartest Kid on Earth is a widely-acclaimed graphic novel by Chris Ware, published in 2000. The story was previously serialized in the pages of Ware's comic book Acme Novelty L...
-
10 . The Human Stain by Philip Roth
The Human Stain is set in 1990s America, the time of the culture wars, political correctness and the Bill Clinton-Monica Lewinsky scandal. The story is told by Nathan Zuckerman, a writer who lives ...
-
11 . Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn
Who are you? What have we done to each other? These are the questions Nick Dunne finds himself asking on the morning of his fifth wedding anniversary, when his wife Amy suddenly disappears. The pol...
- Google -
12 . The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri
Jhumpa Lahiri's Interpreter of Maladies established this young writer as one the most brilliant of her generation. Her stories are one of the very few debut works -- and only a handful of collectio...
- Google -
13 . Home by Marilynne Robinson
Home is a novel written by the Pulitzer Prize-winning American author Marilynne Robinson. Published in 2008, it is Robinson's third novel, preceded by Housekeeping in 1980 and Gilead in 2004.
-
14 . The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
The Kite Runner is a novel by the author Khaled Hosseini. Published in 2003 by Riverhead Books, it is Hosseini's first novel, and was adapted into a film of the same name in 2007.
-
15 . The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
In a future North America, where the rulers of Panem maintain control through an annual televised survival competition pitting young people from each of the twelve districts against one another, si...
- Google -
16 . Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk: A Novel by Ben Fountain
A ferocious firefight with Iraqi insurgents at "the battle of Al-Ansakar Canal"—three minutes and forty-three seconds of intense warfare caught on tape by an embedded Fox News crew—has transformed ...
- Google -
17 . Everything Is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer
Everything Is Illuminated is the first novel by the American writer Jonathan Safran Foer, published in 2002. It was adapted into a film starring Elijah Wood in 2005.
-
18 . Freedom: A Novel by Jonathan Franzen
Patty and Walter Berglund were the new pioneers of old St. Paul—the gentrifiers, the hands-on parents, the avant-garde of the Whole Foods generation. Patty was the ideal sort of neighbor, who could...
- Google -
19 . The Sellout by Paul Beatty
The Sellout is a 2015 novel by Paul Beatty published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux, and in the UK by Oneworld Publications in 2016. The novel takes place in and around Los Angeles, California, and c...
-
20 . The Flamethrowers: A Novel by Rachel Kushner
Arriving in New York to pursue a creative career in the raucous 1970s art scene, Reno joins a group of dreamers and raconteurs before falling in love with the estranged son of an Italian motorcycle...
- Google -
21 . Bel Canto by Ann Patchett
Bel Canto is a 2001 novel by American author Ann Patchett, published by Perennial, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers. It was awarded both the Orange Prize for Fiction and PEN/Faulkner Award fo...
-
22 . Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri
Interpreter of Maladies is a 2000 collection of nine short stories by Indian American author Jhumpa Lahiri. It won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and the Hemingway Foundation/PEN Award. It was also...
-
-
24 . Salvage the Bones: A Novel by Jesmyn Ward
Winner of the 2011 National Book Award A hurricane is building over the Gulf of Mexico, threatening the coastal town of Bois Sauvage, Mississippi, and Esch's father is growing concerned. A hard dri...
- Google -
25 . Varieties of Disturbance: Stories by Lydia Davis
Presents a collection of short fiction, including "What you Learn about the Baby" in which a mother describes how an infant disrupts her life and "Jane and Cane" details an elderly woman's search f...
- Google -
26 . The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt
Winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction 2014 Aged thirteen, Theo Decker, son of a devoted mother and a reckless, largely absent father, survives an accident that otherwise tears his life apart. Al...
- Google -
27 . What Is the What by Dave Eggers
What Is the What is the story of Valentino Achak Deng, a refugee in war-ravaged southern Sudan who flees from his village in the mid-1980s and becomes one of the so-called Lost Boys. Valentino’s tr...
- Google -
28 . The Plot Against America by Philip Roth
The Plot Against America is a novel by Philip Roth published in 2004. It is an alternate history in which Franklin Delano Roosevelt is defeated in the presidential election of 1940 by Charles Lindb...
-
29 . The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen
A profound, startling, and beautifully crafted debut novel, The Sympathizer is the story of a man of two minds, someone whose political beliefs clash with his individual loyalties.
- Google -
30 . Citizen: An American Lyric by Claudia Rankine
A provocative meditation on race, Claudia Rankine's long-awaited follow up to her groundbreaking book Don't Let Me Be Lonely: An American Lyric. Claudia Rankine's bold new book recounts mounting ra...
- Google -
31 . The Fortress of Solitude by Jonathan Lethem
The Fortress of Solitude is a 2003 semi-autobiographical novel by Jonathan Lethem set in Brooklyn and spanning the 1970s, '80s, and '90s. It follows two teenage friends, Dylan Ebdus and Mingus Rude...
-
32 . A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini
After 103 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list and with four million copies of The Kite Runner shipped, Khaled Hosseini returns with a beautiful, riveting, and haunting novel that confirms h...
- Google -
33 . Pastoralia by George Saunders
If Americans in the future were to try to send us a message about where our culture is heading, they might simply point to the fiction of George Saunders. Living in a world that's both indelibly or...
-
34 . The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead
The Underground Railroad, published in 2016, is the sixth novel by American author Colson Whitehead. The alternate history novel tells the story of Cora and Caesar, two slaves in the southeaster...
-
35 . The Art of Fielding by Chad Harbach
At Westish College, a small school on the shore of Lake Michigan, baseball star Henry Skrimshander seems destined for big league stardom. But when a routine throw goes disastrously off course, the ...
- Google -
36 . The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown
The Da Vinci Code is a 2003 mystery-detective fiction novel written by American author Dan Brown. It follows symbologist Robert Langdon and Sophie Neveu as they investigate a murder in Paris's Louv...
-
37 . Dept. of Speculation by Jenny Offill
Dept. of Speculation is a portrait of a marriage. It is also a beguiling rumination on the mysteries of intimacy, trust, faith, knowledge, and the condition of universal shipwreck that unites us al...
- Google -
38 . Mortals by Norman Rush
It is at once a political adventure, a social comedy, and a passionate triangle. It is set in the 1990s in Botswana—the African country Rush has indelibly made his own fictional territory. Mortals ...
- Google -
39 . Preparation for the Next Life by Atticus Lish
Zou Lei is an illegal immigrant who works at a Chinese restaurant in Queens in search of a better life in the 'Land of the Brave'. Brad Skinner has recently arrived in New York following a tour in ...
- Google -
40 . The Great Fire by Shirley Hazzard
A Great Writer's Sweeping Story of Men and Women Struggling to Reclaim Their Lives in The Aftermath of World Conflict. The conflagration of her title is the Second World War. In war-torn Asia an...
-
42 . Unless by Carol Shields
Unless, first published by Fourth Estate, an imprint of Harper Collins in 2002, is the final novel by Canadian writer Carol Shields. Semi-autobiographical, it was the capstone to Shields's writing ...
-
43 . Collected Stories by Raymond Chandler
A complete collection of short fiction by the creator of Philip Marlowe includes stories such as "Blackmailers Don't Shoot," "The Pencil," and "English Summer."
- Google -
44 . Sing, Unburied, Sing by Jesmyn Ward
Sing, Unburied, Sing is a 2017 novel by Jesmyn Ward. It is about a family's dynamics in the fictional town of Bois Sauvage, Mississippi. The novel received overwhelmingly positive reviews, and was ...
-
45 . Cost by Roxana Robinson
When Julia Lambert, an art professor, settles into her idyllic Maine house for the summer, she plans to spend the time tending her fragile relationships with her father, a repressive neurosurgeon, ...
- Google -
46 . A Gate at the Stairs by Lorrie Moore
A Gate at the Stairs is a novel by American fiction writer Lorrie Moore. It was published by Random House in 2009. The novel won Amazon.com's "best of the month" designation and was a finalist for ...
-
47 . American Rust by Philipp Meyer
American Rust is American writer Philipp Meyer's debut novel, published in 2009. Set in the 2000s, American Rust takes place in the fictional town of Buell in Fayette County, Pennsylvania, which is...
-
48 . What I Loved by Siri Hustvedt
What I Loved is a novel written by American writer Siri Hustvedt first published in 2003 by Hodder and Stoughton in London. It is written from the point of view of Leo Hertzberg, an art historian l...
-
49 . Against the Day by Thomas Pynchon
Against the Day is a 2006 historical novel by Thomas Pynchon. The narrative takes place between the 1893 Chicago World's Fair and the time immediately following World War I and features more than a...
-
50 . Nemesis by Philip Roth
Set in a Newark neighborhood during a terrifying polio outbreak, Nemesis is a wrenching examination of the forces of circumstance on our lives. Bucky Cantor is a vigorous, dutiful twenty-three-year...
- Google -
51 . The Marriage Plot by Jeffrey Eugenides
The Marriage Plot is a 2011 novel by American writer Jeffrey Eugenides. The novel grew out of a manuscript begun by Eugenides after the publication of his novel Middlesex and portions are loosely b...
-
52 . Nowhere Man by Aleksandar Hemon
Nowhere Man is a novel by Aleksandar Hemon, published in 2002 and named after the Beatles song "Nowhere Man". The novel (subtitled The Pronek Fantasies) centers around the character of Jozef Pronek...
-
53 . Family Life by Akhil Sharma
Finally joining their father in America, Ajay and Birju enjoy their new, extraordinary life until tragedy strikes, leaving one brother incapacitated and the other practically orphaned in this stran...
- Google -
54 . What Belongs to You by Garth Greenwell
Garth Greenwell's What Belongs to You appeared in early 2016, and is a short first novel by a young writer; still, it was not easily surpassed by anything that appeared later in the year....It is n...
- Google -
55 . Honored Guest by Joy Williams
With her singular brand of gorgeous dark humor, Joy Williams explores the various ways–comic, tragic, and unnerving—we seek to accommodate diminishment and loss. A masseuse breaks her rich client's...
- Google -
56 . Magic for Beginners by Kelly Link
An engaging and funny second collection by an original voice.
- Google -
57 . Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders
Lincoln in the Bardo is a 2017 experimental novel by American writer George Saunders. It is Saunders's first full-length novel and was the New York Times hardcover fiction bestseller for the week o...
-
58 . Tree of Smoke by Denis Johnson
Tree of Smoke is about a man named Skip Sands who joins the CIA in 1965, and begins working in Vietnam during the American involvement there. The time frame of the novel is from 1963 to 1970, with ...
-
59 . The Last Samurai by Helen DeWitt
Sibylla, an American-at-Oxford turned loose on London, finds herself trapped as a single mother after a misguided one-night stand. High-minded principles of child-rearing work disastrously well. J....
- Google -
60 . The Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead
The Nickel Boys is a 2019 novel by American novelist and writer Colson Whitehead.
-
61 . The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold
The Lovely Bones is a 2002 novel by Alice Sebold. It is the story of a teenage girl who, after being brutally raped and murdered, watches from heaven as her family and friends go on with their live...
-
62 . Europe Central by William T. Vollmann
Europe Central takes place in central Europe in the 20th century, examines a vast array of characters, ranging from generals to martyrs, officers to poets, traitors to artists and musicians. It dea...
-
63 . The Martian by Andy Weir
The Martian is a 2011 science fiction novel written by Andy Weir. It was his debut novel under his own name. It was originally self-published in 2011; Crown Publishing purchased the rights and re-r...
-
64 . The Help by Kathryn Stockett
The Help is a 2009 novel by American author Kathryn Stockett. The story is about African-American maids working in white households in Jackson, Mississippi, during the early 1960s. A USA Today arti...
- Google -
65 . The March by E. L. Doctorow
Doctorow's new novel is set towards the end of the American Civil War and follows General Sherman's epic march with sixty thousand Union troops through Georgia and the Carolinas, one of the major m...
-
66 . The Early Stories by John Updike
This grand collection of 103 stories gathers together almost all the short fiction that Updike published between 1953 and 1975, beginning with "Ace in the Hole" and ending with "Love Song for a Moo...
-
67 . Forever: A Novel by Pete Hamill
This widely acclaimed bestseller is the magical, epic tale of an extraordinary man who arrives in New York in 1740 and remains ... forever. Through the eyes of Cormac O'Connor - granted immortality...
- Google -
68 . Snow Flower and the Secret Fan by Lisa See
Lily is the daughter of a humble farmer, and to her family she is just another expensive mouth to feed. Then the local matchmaker delivers startling news: if Lily's feet are bound properly, they wi...
- Google -
69 . Leaving the Atocha Station by Ben Lerner
Adam Gordon is a brilliant, if highly unreliable, young American poet on a prestigious fellowship in Madrid, struggling to establish his sense of self and his relationship to art. What is actual wh...
- Google -
70 . Tenth of December by George Saunders
Tenth of December is a collection of short stories by American author George Saunders. It includes stories published in various magazines between 1995 and 2009. The book was published on January 8,...
-
71 . Habibi by Craig Thompson
Habibi is a graphic novel by Craig Thompson published by Pantheon in September 2011. The 672-page book is set in a fictional Islamic fairy tale landscape and depicts the relationship between Dodola...
-
72 . Before We Were Free by Julia Alvarez
Anita de la Torre never questioned her freedom living in the Dominican Republic. But by her 12th birthday in 1960, most of her relatives have emigrated to the United States, her Tío Toni has disapp...
- Google -
73 . Erasure by Percival Everett
Percival Everett's Erasure is a blistering satire about race and writing Thelonious "Monk" Ellison's writing career has bottomed out: his latest manuscript has been rejected by seventeen publishers...
- Google -
74 . Zone One by Colson Whitehead
From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Underground Railroad A pandemic has devastated the planet, sorting humanity into two types: the uninfected and the infected, the living and the ...
- Google -
75 . Ooga-Booga by Frederick Seidel
From the winner of the PEN/Voelker Award, poems of love, terror, rage, and desire. Here I am, not a practical man, But clear-eyed in my contact lenses, Following no doubt a slightly different line ...
- Google -
76 . Veronica by Mary Gaitskill
A finalist for the National Book Award and National Book Critics Circle Award, here is an evocative novel about female friendship in the glittering 1980s. Alison and Veronica meet amid the nocturna...
- Google -
77 . The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake by Aimee Bender
Discovering in childhood a supernatural ability to taste the emotions of others in their cooking, Rose Edelstein grows up to regard food as a curse when it reveals everyone's secret realities.
- Google -
78 . The Possessed by Elif Batuman
No one who read Elif Batuman's first article (in the journal n+1) will ever forget it. "Babel in California" told the true story of various human destinies intersecting at Stanford University durin...
- Google -
79 . White Girls by Hilton Als
Combining elements of memoir, criticism, fiction and non-fiction, the book's essays create a portrait of "white girls", a category in which Als includes everyone from Truman Capote to Flannery O’Co...
-
80 . Do Everything in the Dark by Gary Indiana
Follows the experiences of downtown New Yorkers at crossroads in their lives, from a gay couple who find themselves growing distant, to an interracial couple lapsing into heroin addiction, to a for...
- Google -
81 . The Bonesetter's Daughter by Amy Tan
Struggling to regain her voice and express her true feelings to her husband, ghostwriter Ruth Young discovers that her inability to speak closely parallels the story of her mother LuLing's early li...
- Google -
82 . The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas
Sixteen-year-old Starr Carter moves between two worlds: the poor neighborhood where she lives and the fancy suburban prep school she attends. The uneasy balance between these worlds is shattered wh...
- Google -
83 . A Constellation of Vital Phenomena: A Novel by Anthony Marra
In a small rural village in Chechnya, eight-year-old Havaa watches from the woods as Russian soldiers abduct her father in the middle of the night and then set fire to her home. When their lifelong...
- Google -
85 . Oblivion: Stories by David Foster Wallace
In the stories that make up Oblivion, David Foster Wallace joins the rawest, most naked humanity with the infinite involutions of self-consciousness--a combination that is dazzlingly, uniquely his....
- Google -
86 . Spreadeagle by Kevin Killian
Set in San Francisco, fiftyish gay novelist Daniel Isham presides over a complicated ménage financed not only by family money but by the huge success of his kitschy, feel-good “Rick and Dick” novel...
-
87 . The Broken Earth Trilogy by N. K. Jemisin
This is the way the world ends. For the last time. A season of endings has begun. It starts with the great red rift across the heart of the world's sole continent, spewing ash that blots out the su...
- Google -
88 . The Lazarus Project by Aleksandar Hemon
The only novel from MacArthur Genius Award winner, Aleksandar Hemon -- the National Book Critics Circle Award winning The Lazarus Project. On March 2, 1908, nineteen-year-old Lazarus Averbuch, an E...
- Google -
89 . The Sluts by Dennis Cooper
Set largely on the pages of a website where gay male escorts are reviewed by their clients, and told through the postings, emails, and conversations of several dozen unreliable narrators, The Sluts...
- Google -
90 . Red Clocks by Leni Zumas
Five women. One question. What is a woman for? In this ferociously imaginative novel, abortion is once again illegal in America, in-vitro fertilization is banned, and the Personhood Amendment grant...
- Google -
91 . The Time of Our Singing by Richard Powers
The Time of Our Singing (2003) is a novel by American writer Richard Powers. It tells the story of two brothers involved in music, dealing heavily with issues of prejudice. Their parents met at Mar...
-
92 . The Needle's Eye by Fanny Howe
Fanny Howe's The Needle's Eye: Passing through Youth is a sequence of essays, short tales, and lyrics that are intertwined by an inner visual logic. The book contains filmic images that subvert the...
- Google -
93 . The Last Report on the Miracles at Little No Horse: A Novel by Louise Erdrich
A New York Times Notable Book For more than a half century, Father Damien Modeste has served his beloved Native American tribe, the Ojibwe, on the remote reservation of Little No Horse. Now, nearin...
- Google -
94 . Eat the Document by Dana Spiotta
Dana Spiotta, whom Michiko Kakutani called "wonderfully observant and wonderfully gifted...with an uncanny feel for the absurdities and sadness of contemporary life" (The New York Times), has writt...
- Google -
95 . Super Sad True Love Story by Gary Shteyngart
Super Sad True Love Story is the third novel by American writer Gary Shteyngart. The novel takes place in a near-future dystopian New York where life is dominated by media and retail.
-
96 . The Largesse of the Sea Maiden: Stories by Denis Johnson
Twenty-five years after Jesus' Son, a haunting new collection of short stories on mortality and transcendence, from National Book Award winner and two-time Pulitzer Prize finalist Denis Johnson The...
- Google -
97 . Notes from No Man's Land: American Essays by Eula Biss
Winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award for Criticism Winner of the Graywolf Press Nonfiction Prize A frank and fascinating exploration of race and racial identity Notes from No Man's Land...
- Google -
98 . Home Land by Sam Lipsyte
Catamount Notes, the Eastern Valley High School alumni newsletter, is filled with tales of success from the school's graduates, until Lewis "Teabag" Miner, class of 1989, sends a hilarious confessi...
- Google -
99 . Sleeping It Off in Rapid City by August Kleinzahler
The first broad retrospective of August Kleinzahler's career, Sleeping It Off in Rapid City gathers poems from his major works along with a rich portion of new poems that visit different voice regi...
- Google -
100 . All Grown Up by Jami Attenberg
Who is Andrea Bern? When her dippy therapist asks the question, Andrea knows the right things to say: she’s a designer, a friend, a daughter, a sister. But it’s what she leaves unsaid—she’s alone, ...
- Google -
101 . Fine Just the Way It Is by Annie Proulx
A collection of nine western-themed tales features an array of pioneer country inhabitants from different backgrounds.
- Google -
102 . Born Confused by Tanuja Desai Hidier
Tanuja Desai Hidier's fantastically acclaimed cross-cultural debut comes to PUSH! Dimple Lala doesn't know what to think. Her parents are from India, and she's spent her whole life resisting their ...
- Google -
103 . A Dog's Purpose by W. Bruce Cameron
This is the remarkable story of one endearing dog’s search for his purpose over the course of several lives. More than just another charming dog story, A Dog’s Purpose touches on the universal ques...
- Google -
104 . LaRose by Louise Erdrich
LaRose is a novel by the author Louise Erdrich, published in 2016 by HarperCollins Publishers. The book was reviewed by multiple publications, including The New York Times, The Kansas City Star, Wi...
-
105 . All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr
A blind French girl on the run from the German occupation and a German orphan-turned-Resistance tracker struggle with their respective beliefs after meeting on the Brittany coast.
- Google -
106 . The Orphan Master's Son: A Novel by Adam Johnson
The son of an influential father who runs an orphan work camp, Pak Jun Do rises to prominence using instinctive talents and eventually becomes a professional kidnapper and romantic rival to Kim Jon...
- Google -
107 . The Echo Maker by Richard Powers
On a winter night on a remote Nebraska road, twenty-seven-year-old Mark Schluter flips his truck in a near-fatal accident. His older sister, Karin, his only near kin, returns reluctantly to their h...
-
108 . Empire Falls by Richard Russo
A small, fictional mill town in Maine called Empire Falls, though once booming in industry, is quickly deteriorating. Owned by the powerful Whiting family, the town can no longer sustain itself. Se...
-
109 . Twilight of the Superheroes by Deborah Eisenberg
A collection of short works includes the tales of a group of friends whose efforts to acquire a luxurious Manhattan sublet are halted by the September 11 attacks, a teacher's Roman holiday in the w...
- Google -
111 . Ready Player One by Ernest Cline
Ready Player One is a 2011 LitRPG science fiction novel, and the debut novel of American author Ernest Cline. The story, set in a dystopian 2040s, follows protagonist Wade Watts on his search for a...
-
112 . Ghost by Jason Reynolds
Aspiring to be the fastest sprinter on his elite middle school's track team, gifted runner Ghost finds his goal challenged by a tragic past with a violent father.
- Google -
113 . Her Body and Other Parties: Stories by Carmen Maria Machado
Finalist for the National Book Award for Fiction “[These stories] vibrate with originality, queerness, sensuality and the strange.”—Roxane Gay “In these formally brilliant and emotionally charged t...
- Google -
114 . The Essential Dykes to Watch Out For by Alison Bechdel
From the author of Fun Home -- the lives, loves, and politics of cult fav characters Mo, Lois, Sydney, Sparrow, Ginger, Stuart, Clarice, and others For twenty-five years Bechdel’s path-breaking Dyk...
- Google -
115 . I, Alex Cross by James Patterson
You can't run Detective Alex Cross is pulled out of a family celebration and given the awful news that a beloved relative has been found brutally murdered. Alex vows to hunt down the killer, and so...
- Google -
116 . Homesick for Another World by Ottessa Moshfegh
Ottessa Moshfegh’s dark, confident, prickling stories are mostly about youngish men and women who have taken a wrong turn somewhere and find themselves hunkering down in nowhere towns, dismal cabin...
- NY Times -
117 . American Innovations by Rivka Galchen
A brilliant new collection of short stories from "the conspicuously talented" (Time) Rivka Galchen In one of the intensely imaginative stories in Rivka's Galchen's American Innovations, a young wom...
- Google -
118 . Stranger Things Happen by Kelly Link
A debut collection of extraordinary stories from an award-winning author.
- Google -
119 . Matterhorn by Karl Marlantes
In the tradition of Norman Mailer's "The Naked and the Dead" and James Jones's "The Thin Red Line," Marlantes tells the powerful and compelling story of a young Marine lieutenant, Waino Mellas, and...
- Google -
120 . You Shall Know Our Velocity by Dave Eggers
In his first novel, Dave Eggers has written a moving and hilarious tale of two friends who fly around the world trying to give away a lot of money and free themselves from a profound loss. It remin...
- Google -
121 . Jayber Crow by Wendell Berry
In a novel set in a small-town "Heaven," the rural Kentucky farmer-philosopher returns to his fictional Port William to explore themes of love, suffering, and joy. Reprint. 40,000 first printing.
- Google -
122 . March by Geraldine Brooks
Mr. March, an abolitionist and chaplain, is driven by his conscience to leave his home and family in Concord, Massachusetts in order to participate in the war. During this time, March writes letter...
-
123 . Redeployment by Phil Klay
Redeployment is a collection of short stories by American writer Phil Klay. His first published book, it won the 2014 National Book Award for Fiction and the National Book Critics Circle's 2014 Joh...
-
124 . Less by Andrew Sean Greer
Less is a satirical comedy novel by American author Andrew Sean Greer, following gay author Arthur Less as he travels the world on a literary tour. The book covers themes such as romantic love, ...
-
125 . The Lion and the Mouse by Jerry Pinkney
In this wordless retelling of an Aesop fable, an adventuresome mouse proves that even small creatures are capable of great deeds when he rescues the King of the Jungle.
- Google -
126 . Binocular Vision by Edith Pearlman
Tenderly, observantly, incisively, Edith Pearlman captures life on the page like few other writers. She is a master of the short story, and this is a spectacular collection.
- Google -
127 . The Collected Stories of Deborah Eisenberg: Stories by Deborah Eisenberg
Twenty-seven short stories by "a contemporary master" (The New York Times). Since 1986 with the publication of her first story collection, Deborah Eisenberg has devoted herself to writing "exquisit...
- Google -
128 . Fortune Smiles: Stories by Adam Johnson
Fortune Smiles is a 2015 collection of short stories by American author and novelist Adam Johnson. It is Johnson's second published short story collection, after his 2002 book Emporium and his firs...
-
129 . Everyman by Philip Roth
The book begins at the funeral of its protagonist. The remainder of the book, which ends with his death, looks mournfully back on episodes from his life, including his childhood in Elizabeth, New J...
-
130 . The Great Man by Kate Christensen
The Great Man: A Novel is a 2007 novel by American author Kate Christensen. It won the 2008 PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction, beating nearly 350 other submissions and earning Christensen the $15,000 ...
-
132 . Collected Poems by Jack Gilbert
Jack Gilbert (February 18, 1925 – November 13, 2012) was an American poet. Born and raised in the Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania neighborhood of East Liberty, he attended Peabody High School before fa...
-
133 . My Name Is Lucy Barton by Elizabeth Strout
My Name is Lucy Barton is a 2016 New York Times Bestselling novel and the fifth novel by the American writer Elizabeth Strout.[1] It was first published in the United States on January 12, 2016 thr...
-
134 . Everything Begins and Ends at the Kentucky Club by Benjamin Alire Sáenz
Presents a collection of short stories about contradiction and conflict in the lives of those who reside on the border lands around the Rio Grande.
- Google -
135 . The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie
Bestselling author Sherman Alexie tells the story of Junior, a budding cartoonist growing up on the Spokane Indian Reservation. Determined to take his future into his own hands, Junior leaves his t...
- Google -
136 . Lord of Misrule: The Morganville Vampires by Rachel Caine
In the college town of Morganville, vampires and humans coexist in (relatively) bloodless harmony. Then comes Bishop, the master vampire who threatens to abolish all order, revive the forces of the...
- Google -
137 . Lila by Marilynne Robinson
Lila is a novel written by Marilynne Robinson that was published in 2014. Her fourth novel, it is the third installment of the Gilead series, after Gilead and Home. The novel focuses on the courtsh...
-
138 . The Overstory by Richard Powers
The Overstory is a novel by Richard Powers published in 2018 by W.W. Norton. It is Powers's twelfth novel. The novel is about nine Americans whose unique life experiences with trees bring them toge...
-
139 . Everything Inside: Stories by Edwidge Danticat
A REESE'S BOOK CLUB PICK WINNER OF THE NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD One of the Best Books of the Year NPR, Time, Esquire, BuzzFeed, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel A roman...
- Google -
140 . The Buddha in the Attic by Julie Otsuka
The Buddha in the Attic is a 2011 novel written by American author Julie Otsuka about Japanese picture brides immigrating to America in the early 1900s.
- Google -
141 . War Dances by Sherman Alexie
A bestselling collection of stories and poems from literary icon Sherman Alexie Winner of the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction, War Dances blends short stories, poems, call-and-response, and more int...
- Google -
142 . Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout
Olive Kitteridge (2008) is a novel by American author Elizabeth Strout. It is a collection of 13 connected short stories about a woman named Olive and her immediate family and friends in the town o...
-
143 . We are All Completely Beside Ourselves by Karen Joy Fowler
Coming of age in middle America, 18-year-old Rosemary evaluates how her entire youth was defined by the presence and forced removal of an endearing chimpanzee who was secretly regarded as a family ...
- Google -
144 . The Round House by Louise Erdrich
National Book Award Winner One Sunday in the spring of 1988, a woman living on a reservation in North Dakota is attacked. The details of the crime are slow to surface as Geraldine Coutts is traumat...
- Google -
145 . The Caprices by Sabina Murray
Winner of the PEN/Faulkner award for fiction in 2003, The Caprices is a collection of stories artfully told across the theatre of the Pacific Campaign of World War II. An Anglo-Indian cavalryman, h...
-
146 . The News from Paraguay by Lily Tuck
A historical epic that tells an unusual love story, The News from Paraguay offers a kaleidoscopic portrait of nineteenth-century Paraguay, a largely untouched wilderness where Europeans and North A...
-
147 . Brown Girl Dreaming by Jacqueline Woodson
A multi-award-winning middle grade novel about the author’s own coming of age as an African American in the ’60s and ’70s growing up in South Carolina and Brooklyn, N.Y.
-
148 . Collected Poems by Jane Kenyon
Jane Kenyon (May 23, 1947 – April 22, 1995) was an American poet and translator. Her work is often characterized as simple, spare, and emotionally resonant. Kenyon was the second wife of poet, edit...
-
149 . Three Junes by Julia Glass
Three Junes follows the McLeods, a Scottish family, throughout their lives and relationships. Its members are Paul and Maureen, and their sons: Fenno, and twins David and Dennis. At the opening of ...
-
150 . Shadow Country by Peter Matthiessen
Shadow Country is actually a trilogy of books about Florida sugar cane planter and outlaw Edgar Watson all collected in one volume, re-edited, and retitled. Set in Florida's Ten Thousand Islands re...
-
151 . The Fifth Season by N. K. Jemisin
The Fifth Season is a 2015 science fantasy novel by N. K. Jemisin. It was awarded the Hugo Award for Best Novel in 2016. It is the first volume in the Broken Earth series and is followed by The Obe...
-
152 . House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski
A family relocates to a small house on Ash Tree Lane and discovers that the inside of their new home seems to be without boundaries.
- Google -
153 . Fates and Furies by Lauren Groff
Fates and Furies is a 2015 novel by American author Lauren Groff. It is Groff's third novel and fourth book. The book takes place in New York and examines how the different people in a relationship...
-
154 . Haunted by Chuck Palahniuk
Haunted is a novel made up of stories: twenty-three of the most horrifying, hilarious, mind-blowing, stomach-churning tales you'll ever encounter. They are told by the people who have all answered ...
- Google -
155 . The Stories of Ray Bradbury by Ray Bradbury
A volume of 100 top-selected stories by the iconic writer includes Martian tales, pieces inspired by life in Mexico and offbeat reminiscences of a childhood in Green Town, Illinois. By the National...
- Google -
156 . Stories of Your Life and Others by Ted Chiang
Stories of Your Life and Others is a collection of short stories by American writer Ted Chiang originally published in 2002 by Tor Books. It collects Chiang's first eight stories. All of the storie...
-
157 . A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara
A Little Life is a 2015 novel by American novelist Hanya Yanagihara. The novel was written over the course of eighteen months. Despite the length and difficult subject matter it became a bestseller.
-
158 . No Country for Old Men by Cormac McCarthy
Llewelyn Moss, hunting antelope near the Rio Grande, stumbles upon a transaction gone horribly wrong. Finding bullet-ridden bodies, several kilos of heroin, and a caseload of cash, he faces a choic...
- Google -
159 . Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng
Little Fires Everywhere is a 2017 novel by American author Celeste Ng. It is her second novel and takes place in Shaker Heights, Ohio where Ng grew up. She described writing about her hometown as "...
-
160 . Circe by Madeline Miller
"A bold and subversive retelling of the goddess's story," this #1 New York Times bestseller is "both epic and intimate in its scope, recasting the most infamous female figure from the Odyssey as a ...
- Google -
161 . Mystic River by Dennis Lehane
Mystic River is a novel by Dennis Lehane that was published in 2001. It won the 2002 Dilys Award and was made into an Academy Award-winning film in 2003.
-
162 . Swamplandia! by Karen Russell
Swamplandia! is a 2011 novel by Karen Russell. Set in the Ten Thousand Islands, off the southwest coast of Florida, it is the story of the Bigtree family of alligator wrestlers who live on Swamplan...
-
163 . The Leavers by Lisa Ko
Lisa Ko is an American writer. Her debut novel, The Leavers, won the 2016 PEN/Bellwether Prize for Socially Engaged Fiction and was a finalist for the 2017 National Book Award for Fiction. She has ...
-
164 . The Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson
The Way of Kings is an epic fantasy novel written by American author Brandon Sanderson and the first book in The Stormlight Archive series. The novel was published on August 31, 2010 by Tor Books. ...
-
165 . Wolf in White Van by John Darnielle
Wolf in White Van is the first novel by the American author and singer-songwriter John Darnielle. Wolf in White Van tells the story of Sean Phillips, a reclusive game designer whose face has been s...
-
166 . The Collected Stories of Amy Hempel by Amy Hempel
Amy Hempel (born December 14, 1951) is an American short story writer, journalist, and university professor at Brooklyn College.
-
167 . The Water Dancer by Ta-Nehisi Coates
The Water Dancer is a 2019 novel by Ta-Nehisi Coates. It is his first novel and was published on September 24, 2019, by One World, an imprint of Random House. It is a surrealist story set in the pr...
-
168 . How I Live Now by Meg Rosoff
How I Live Now is a young adult novel by Meg Rosoff, first published in 2004. The book won three notable awards including the Michael L. Printz Award and received generally positive reviews.
-
169 . The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern
The Night Circus is a 2011 fantasy novel by Erin Morgenstern. It was originally written for the annual writing competition NaNoWriMo over the span of three NaNoWriMos. The novel has a nonlinear nar...
-
170 . The Wise Man's Fear by Patrick Rothfuss
The Wise Man's Fear, also called The Kingkiller Chronicle: Day Two, is a fantasy novel written by American author Patrick Rothfuss and the second volume in The Kingkiller Chronicle. It was publish...
-
171 . Commonwealth by Ann Patchett
Commonwealth is the seventh novel by American author Ann Patchett, published in 2016. The novel begins with an illicit kiss that leads to an affair that destroys two marriages and creates a relucta...
-
172 . The Destroyers by Christopher Bollen
When Charlie and I were young, we played a game called Destroyers. . . . We were sharpening our instincts, jettisoning attachments. We were honing strategies for survival. . . . Arriving on the Gre...
- Google -
173 . Drop City by T. Coraghessan Boyle
Drop City is a 2003 novel by American author T. Coraghessan Boyle. The novel describes the social evolution of a group of free spirits, not unlike the inhabitants of the real Drop City in Colorado....
-
174 . Red at the Bone by Jacqueline Woodson
"Gorgeous, moving…A story of love—romantic and familial—and alienation, grief and triumph, disaster and surviva." —Nylon "For those still mourning the loss of Toni Morrison, it’s essential that you...
- Google -
175 . Eileen by Ottessa Moshfegh
Eileen is a 2015 novel by Ottessa Moshfegh, published by Penguin Press. It is Moshfegh's first novel.In September 2016, it was shortlisted for the 2016 Man Booker Prize.
-
176 . The Poppy War by R. F. Kuang
The Poppy War is a 2018 novel by R. F. Kuang, published by Harper Voyager. The Poppy War, a grimdark fantasy, draws its plot and politics from mid-20th-century China, with the conflict in the novel...
-
177 . Bowlaway by Elizabeth McCracken
A sweeping and enchanting new novel from the widely beloved, award-winning author Elizabeth McCracken about three generations of an unconventional New England family who own and operate a candlepin...
- Google -
178 . An Absolutely Remarkable Thing by Hank Green
An Absolutely Remarkable Thing is a novel by Hank Green. It was published on September 25, 2018, and is Green's debut novel. Announced on September 19, 2017, the novel is the first of a two-book deal.
-
180 . The Twelve Lives of Samuel Hawley by Hannah Tinti
“A gripping American-on-the-run thriller . . . a brilliant coming-of-age tale and a touching exploration of father-daughter relationships.”—Newsweek “One part Quentin Tarantino, one part Scheheraza...
- Google -
181 . The Emperor's Children by Claire Messud
The Emperor's Children is a 2006 novel by the American author Claire Messud. The author's third—and her first best-seller—it was longlisted for the 2006 Man Booker Prize.
-
182 . Who Fears Death by Nnedi Okorafor
Who Fears Death is a science fantasy novel by Nigerian-American writer Nnedi Okorafor, published in 2010 by DAW, an imprint of Penguin Books. It was awarded the 2011 World Fantasy Award for Best No...
-
183 . An Untamed State by Roxane Gay
An Untamed State is the debut novel of writer Roxane Gay, first published in 2014 by Grove Atlantic.
-
184 . Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned by Wells Tower
Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned is a short story collection by the American writer Wells Tower. It was published to excellent reviews, including by Michiko Kakutani and Edmund Wilson. Kakutan...
-
185 . Anything Is Possible by Elizabeth Strout
Anything Is Possible is a 2017 novel of related stories by Elizabeth Strout. It returns to the fictional rural town of Amgash, Illinois, the protagonist's hometown in Strout's 2016 novel My Name Is...
-
186 . My Year of Rest and Relaxation by Ottessa Moshfegh
My Year of Rest and Relaxation is a 2018 novel by American author Ottessa Moshfegh. Moshfegh's second novel, it is set in New York City in 2000 and 2001 and follows an unnamed protagonist as she gr...
-
187 . The Interestings by Meg Wolitzer
Named a best book of the year by Entertainment Weekly, Time, and The Chicago Tribune, and named a notable book by The New York Times Book Review and The Washington Post “Remarkable . . . With this ...
- Google -
188 . Flight Behavior by Barbara Kingsolver
Flight Behavior is a 2012 novel by Barbara Kingsolver. It is her seventh novel, is a New York Times Bestseller, and was declared "Best book of the year" by the Washington Post and USA Today.
-
189 . The Position by Meg Wolitzer
The Position: A Novel (ISBN 0-7432-6178-X) is a 2005 novel by Meg Wolitzer. It tells the story of a book titled Pleasuring: One Couple's Journey to Fulfillment and the effects it has on a family.
-
190 . The Story Of Edgar Sawtelle by David Wroblewski
The Story of Edgar Sawtelle: A Novel is the first book by American author David Wroblewski. It became a New York Times Best Seller on June 29, 2008, and Oprah Winfrey chose it for her book club on ...
-
191 . The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
The Time Traveler's Wife, published in 2003, is the debut novel of American author Audrey Niffenegger. It is a love story about a man with a genetic disorder that causes him to time travel unpredic...
-
192 . Savages: A Novel by Don Winslow
Running a lucrative marijuana operation in Laguna Beach, environmentalist Ben and mercenary Chon confront an adversary in the Mexican Baja cartel who kidnaps their playmate and confidante Ophelia, ...
- Google -
193 . The Terror by Dan Simmons
The Terror is the name of a 2007 novel by American author Dan Simmons. The novel is a fictionalized account of Franklin's lost expedition of HMS Erebus and HMS Terror under Captain Sir John Frankli...
-
194 . Building Stories by Chris Ware
Presents an illustrated tale, told in various books and folded sheets, about the residents in a three-story Chicago apartment building, including a lonely single woman, a couple who are growing to ...
- Google -
195 . Carter Beats The Devil by Glen David Gold
Carter Beats The Devil is a historical mystery thriller novel by Glen David Gold
-
196 . The Blazing World by Siri Hustvedt
Named one of the New York Times Book Review’s 100 Notable Books of the Year ** Publishers Weekly’s Best Fiction Books of 2014 ** NPR Best Books of 2014 ** Kirkus Reviews Best Literary Fiction Books...
- Google -
197 . Dangerous Laughter by Steven Millhauser
Thirteen darkly comic stories, Dangerous Laughter is a mesmerizing journey that stretches the boundaries of the ordinary world.
- Google -
198 . Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer
Jonathan Safran Foer follows his best-selling debut novel, Everything Is Illuminated, with an unexpectedly hilarious and affecting story about New York City in the period following September 11 Ext...
- Google -
199 . The Epicure's Lament by Kate Christensen
Hugo Whittier–failed poet and former kept man–is a wily misanthrope with a taste for whiskey, women, and his own cooking. Afflicted with a rare disease that will be fatal unless he quits smoking, H...
- Google -
200 . The Yiddish Policemen's Union by Michael Chabon
The Yiddish Policemen's Union is a 2007 novel by American author Michael Chabon. The novel is a detective story set in an alternative history version of the present day, based on the premise that d...
-
201 . I Loved You More by Tom Spanbauer
Tom Spanbauer’s first novel in seven years is a love story triangle akin to The Marriage Plot and Freedom, only with a gay main character who charms gays and straights alike. I Loved You More is a ...
- Google