The 50 Books Everyone Needs to Read, 1963-2013

This is one of the 743 lists we use to generate our main The Greatest Books list.

About this list

Flavor Wire, 51 Books

The choices here are influenced by the following: the stipulation that any specific author should not be chosen for more than one year, a general focus on fiction over other genres, and the tastes/whims/glaring prejudices of Flavorwire’s literary editor.

This list was originally published in 2013 and was added to this site almost 12 years ago.

View: List Grid Table
Rank Book Authors Year Country Language Actions
102 The Bell Jar Sylvia Plath 1963 American English
307 Herzog Saul Bellow 1964 American English
304 The Autobiography of Malcolm X Alex Haley 1965 American English
7647 Against Interpretation Susan Sontag 1966 American English
34 The Master and Margarita Mikhail Bulgakov 1967 Russian Russian
1017 Slouching Towards Bethlehem Joan Didion 1968 American English
521 I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings Maya Angelou 1969 American English
573 Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret Judy Blume 1970 American English
349 The Complete Stories of Flannery O'Connor Flannery O'Connor 1971 American English
202 Invisible Cities Italo Calvino 1972 Italian Italian
255 Gravity's Rainbow Thomas Pynchon 1973 American English
561 The Dispossessed Ursula K. Le Guin 1974 American English
1399 The Great Railway Bazaar Paul Theroux 1975 American English
981 Speedboat Renata Adler 1976 American English
398 The Shining Stephen King 1977 American English
453 The Sea, The Sea Iris Murdoch 1978 British English
2097 The Bloody Chamber And Other Stories Angela Carter 1979 British English
2603 Ender's Game Orson Scott Card 1985 American English
17010 Outside Over There Maurice Sendak 1981 American English
159 The Color Purple Alice Walker 1982 American English
1328 Cathedral Raymond Carver 1983 American English
749 Money Martin Amis 1984 British English
132 The Handmaid's Tale Margaret Atwood 1985 Canadian English
1102 Maus Art Spiegelman 1980 American English
49 Beloved Toni Morrison 1987 American English
4051 Bad Behavior Mary Gaitskill 1988 American English
1935 Geek Love Katherine Dunn 1989 American English
653 The Things They Carried Tim O'Brien 1990 American English
731 Possession A. S. Byatt 1990 British English
278 The Secret History Donna Tartt 1992 American English
488 The Shipping News Annie Proulx 1993 Canadian English
17010 The Ice Storm Rick Moody 1994 American English
1756 Sabbath's Theater Philip Roth 1995 American English
333 Infinite Jest David Foster Wallace 1996 American English
410 Underworld Don DeLillo 1997 American English
1036 Birds of America Lorrie Moore 1998 American English
259 Disgrace J. M. Coetzee 1999 South African English
2500 Pastoralia George Saunders 2000 American English
261 Austerlitz W. G. Sebald 2001 German German
415 Middlesex Jeffrey Eugenides 2002 American English
574 The Known World Edward P. Jones 2003 American English
17010 The Epicure's Lament Kate Christensen 2004 American English
3448 Magic for Beginners Kelly Link 2005 American English
291 The Road Cormac McCarthy 2006 American English
395 The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao Junot Diaz 2007 Dominican English
7881 Dangerous Laughter Steven Millhauser 2008 American English
9243 Lit Mary Karr 2009 American English
419 A Visit From The Goon Squad Jennifer Egan 2010 American English
1671 Pulphead John Jeremiah Sullivan 2011 American English
4657 Building Stories Chris Ware 2012 American English
1996 The Flamethrowers Rachel Kushner 2013 American English