The 100 Best Novels Of All Time (Runners-Up)

This is one of the 759 lists we use to generate our main The Greatest Books list.

About this list

The Guardian, 489 Books

The Guardian’s 2026 list of the 100 best novels of all time ranks novels published in English, including works originally written in other languages and later translated. The list was compiled from ranked top-10 ballots submitted by 172 authors, critics, and academics from around the world, with titles scored by both number of votes and placement on individual ballots. George Eliot’s Middlemarch took the top spot, followed by Toni Morrison’s Beloved, James Joyce’s Ulysses, Virginia Woolf’s To the Lighthouse, and Marcel Proust’s In Search of Lost Time. The Guardian notes that this new list is broader than its earlier versions, with more women writers represented and a mix of canonical classics, modernist landmarks, contemporary fiction, and major works in translation.

These are the books that were voted for in the Guardian's new "100 Best Novels of All Time" list, but ultimately did not make the cut. These are the runners-up.

(Full list compiled here: https://www.reddit.com/r/books/comments/1tbfaz6/comment/oliid0l/?context=3&utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button)

This list was originally published in 2026 and was added to this site about 1 month ago.

View: List Grid Table
Rank Book Authors Year Country Language Actions
626 Promise at Dawn Romain Gary 1960 French French
2027 Quartet in Autumn Barbara Pym 1977 British English
1582 Quicksand Nella Larsen 1928 American English
784 Rabbit at Rest John Updike 1990 American English
686 Rabbit Is Rich John Updike 1981 American English
174 Rabbit, Run John Updike 1960 American English
12657 Record Of A Night Too Brief Kawakami Hiromi Japanese Japanese
552 The Red Badge of Courage Stephen Crane 1895 American English
2127 Restoration Rose Tremain 1989 British English
611 Revolutionary Road Richard Yates 1961 American English
2017 Riddley Walker Russell Hoban 1980 British English
69 Robinson Crusoe Daniel Defoe 1719 British English
2373 Roxana Daniel Defoe 1724 British English
7216 Samskara U.R. Ananthamurthy 1965 Indian Kannada
270 Malone Dies Samuel Beckett 1951 Irish French
151 Molloy Samuel Beckett 1951 Irish French
326 The Unnamable Samuel Beckett 1953 Irish French
3288 Savushun Simin Daneshvar 1969 Iranian Persian
11166 Scattered All Over The Earth Yoko Tawada 2018 Japanese Japanese
435 Scoop Evelyn Waugh 1938 British English
7216 Seasons Of Anomy Wole Soyinka 1973 Nigerian English
2733 Seize The Day Saul Bellow 1956 American English
425 Sense and Sensibility Jane Austen 1811 British English
2883 Septology Jon Fosse 2019 Norwegian Norwegian
163 Siddhartha Hermann Hesse 1922 German German
643 Silas Marner George Eliot 1861 British English
781 Simplicius Simplicissimus Hans Jakob Christoffel von Grimmelshausen 1668 German German
1620 Sister Outsider Audre Lorde 1984 American English
84 Slaughterhouse-Five Kurt Vonnegut 1969 American English
4812 Slave Old Man Patrick Chamoiseau 1997 French French
2486 Small Island Andrea Levy 2004 British English
2344 Small Things Like These Claire Keegan 2021 Irish English
539 So Long, See You Tomorrow William Maxwell 1980 American English
1394 Soldiers of Salamis Javier Cercas 2001 Spanish Spanish
2716 Something Happened Joseph Heller 1974 American English
144 Sons and Lovers D. H. Lawrence 1913 British English
282 The Sorrows of Young Werther Johann Wolfgang von Goethe 1774 German German
717 A Sport and a Pastime James Salter 1967 American English
7735 Stag Dance Torrey Peters 2025 American English
7216 Orient Express Graham Greene 1932 British English
1381 Station Eleven Emily St John Mandel 2014 Canadian English
8009 Still Life A. S. Byatt 1985 British English
7216 Strange Tales From A Chinese Studio Pu Songling 1740 Chinese Classical chinese
3914 Sudden Death Alvaro Enrigue 2013 Mexican Spanish
1448 Suite Française Irène Némirovsky 2004 French French
560 Sula Toni Morrison 1973 American English
3565 Sultana's Dream Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain 1905 Bangladeshi Bengali
2808 Summertime J. M. Coetzee 2009 South African English
1089 Suttree Cormac McCarthy 1979 American English
2854 Swami and Friends R. K. Narayan 1935 Indian English
700 Tales of the City Armistead Maupin 1978 American English
7216 Tamarisk Row Gerald Murnane 1974 Australian English
6235 Tar Baby Toni Morrison 1981 American English
1589 Tarka the Otter Henry Williamson 1927 British English
7632 Telephone Percival Everett 2020 American English
168 Tender Is the Night F. Scott Fitzgerald 1934 American English
4988 Territory Of Light Yuko Tsushima 1979 Japanese Japanese
117 Tess of the d'Urbervilles Thomas Hardy 1891 British English
8473 Textermination Christine Brooke-Rose 1992 British English
344 The Thirty-Nine Steps John Buchan 1915 British English
280 The Adventures of Augie March Saul Bellow 1953 American English
339 The Adventures of Oliver Twist Charles Dickens 1837 British English
6235 The Affirmation Christopher Priest 1981 British English
389 The Alchemist Paulo Coelho 1988 Brazilian Portuguese
314 The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay Michael Chabon 2000 American English
235 The Ambassadors Henry James 1903 American English
395 The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas Gertrude Stein 1933 American English
429 The Baron in the Trees Italo Calvino 1957 Italian Italian
4214 The Beginning of Spring Penelope Fitzgerald 1988 British English
1385 The Bell Iris Murdoch 1958 British English
103 The Bell Jar Sylvia Plath 1963 American English
273 The Betrothed Alessandro Manzoni 1827 Italian Italian
5469 The Birthday Boys Beryl Bainbridge 1991 British English
1136 The Black Prince Iris Murdoch 1973 British English
604 The Blind Owl Ṣādiq Hidāyat 1937 Iranian Persian
7216 The Bloater Rosemary Tonks 1968 English English
1099 The Blue Flower Penelope Fitzgerald 1995 British English
1145 The Bone People Keri Hulme 1984 New Zealand English
310 Bonfire of the Vanities Tom Wolfe 1987 American English
838 The Book of Daniel E. L. Doctorow 1971 American English
8530 The Book Of Night Women Marlon James 2009 Jamaican English
1050 The Buddha of Suburbia Hanif Kureishi 1990 British English
2885 The Busconductor Hines James Kelman 1984 British English
4294 The Castle franz kafka 1926 German German
4 The Catcher in the Rye J. D. Salinger 1951 American English
2640 The Child in Time Ian McEwan 1987 British English
5029 The City & the City China Miéville 2009 British English
556 The Code of the Woosters P. G. Wodehouse 1938 British English
1636 The Collector John Fowles 1963 British English
11507 The Coming Bad Days Sarah Bernstein 2021 Canadian English
237 The Corrections Jonathan Franzen 2001 American English
87 The Count of Monte Cristo Alexandre Dumas 1844 French French
1202 The Country Girls Edna O'Brien 1960 Irish English
1005 The Dark Is Rising Susan Cooper 1973 British English
569 The Death of the Heart Elizabeth Bowen 1938 British, Irish English
1800 The Deptford Trilogy Robertson Davies 1970 Canadian English
8026 The Dew Breaker Edwidge Danticat 2004 American English
4568 The Dirty Dust Máirtin Ó Cadhain 1949 Irish Irish
8693 The Discomfort Of Evening Lucas Rijneveld 2018 Dutch Dutch
553 The Dispossessed Ursula K. Le Guin 1974 American English
5829 The Easter Parade Richard Yates 1976 American English
4296 The Emperor's Babe Bernardine Evaristo 2001 British English
6991 The Employees Olga Ravn 2018 Danish Danish
7216 The Empty Book Josefina Vicens 1958 Mexican English
644 The English Patient Michael Ondaatje 1992 Canadian English
3057 The Enigma of Arrival V. S. Naipaul 1987 British English
671 The Fall of the House of Usher Edgar Allan Poe 1839 American English
4797 The Fish Can Sing Halldor Laxness 1957 Icelandic Icelandic
7216 The Fortnight In September R. C. Sherriff 1931 British English
335 The Garden of the Finzi-Continis Giorgio Bassani 1962 Italian Italian
2244 The Gathering Anne Enright 2007 Irish English
956 The Girls of Slender Means Muriel Spark 1963 British English
2487 The Golden Compass Philip Pullman 1995 British English
741 The Goldfinch Donna Tartt 2013 American English
26 The Grapes of Wrath John Steinbeck 1939 American English
989 The Grass Is Singing Doris May Lessing 1950 British English
215 The Haunting of Hill House Shirley Jackson 1959 American English
118 The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter Carson McCullers 1940 American English
190 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy Douglas Adams 1979 British English
146 The Hobbit J. R. R. Tolkien 1937 British English