In Which These Are the 100 Greatest Novels

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

About this list

ThisRecording.com, 100 Books

ThisRecording.com Editor Alex Carnevale selects his choices for the "100 Greatest Novels of All Time".

This list was originally published in 2011 and was added to this site over 11 years ago.

View: List Grid Table
Rank Book Authors Year Country Language Actions
14 Lolita Vladimir Nabokov 1955 American English
21 The Trial Franz Kafka 1925 Czech German
2 In Search of Lost Time Marcel Proust 1913 French French
6239 The Chaneysville Incident David Bradley 1981 American English
395 The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas Gertrude Stein 1933 American English
453 I, Claudius Robert Graves 1934 British English
151 Molloy Samuel Beckett 1951 Irish French
27 To the Lighthouse Virginia Woolf 1927 British English
619 The Sheltering Sky Paul Bowles 1949 American English
444 The Man Who Was Thursday G. K. Chesterton 1908 British English
94 Demons Fyodor Dostoevsky 1872 Russian Russian
1 Ulysses James Joyce 1922 Irish English
262 Austerlitz W. G. Sebald 2001 German German
72 Pale Fire Vladimir Nabokov 1962 American English
869 Woodcutters Thomas Bernhard 1984 Austrian German
353 Go Tell it on the Mountain James Baldwin 1953 American English
43 Absalom, Absalom! William Faulkner 1936 American English
1079 The Book of the New Sun Gene Wolfe 1980 American English
88 A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man James Joyce 1916 Irish English
1165 The Horse's Mouth Joyce Cary 1944 British English
255 Disgrace J. M. Coetzee 1999 South African English
10 Anna Karenina Leo Tolstoy 1877 Russian Russian
9731 Europe Central William T. Vollmann 2005 American English
63 Under the Volcano Malcolm Lowry 1947 British English
181 Light in August William Faulkner 1932 American English
455 V Thomas Pynchon 1963 American English
357 At Swim Two-Birds Flann O'Brien 1939 Irish English
1322 Devil in a Blue Dress Walter Mosley 1990 American English
57 The Idiot Fyodor Dostoevsky 1869 Russian Russian
1200 Mating Norman Rush 1991 American English
49 Beloved Toni Morrison 1987 American English
128 The Stories of Anton Chekhov Anton Chekhov 1900 Russian Russian
193 East of Eden John Steinbeck 1952 American English
91 The Tin Drum Günter Grass 1959 German German
2481 Blood and Guts in High School Kathy Acker 1978 American English
354 Hopscotch Julio Cortazar 1963 Argentinian Spanish
384 Ferdydurke Witold Gombrowicz 1937 Polish Polish
487 Rainbow D.H. Lawrence 1915 British English
227 Women in Love D. H. Lawrence 1920 British English
232 2666 Roberto Bolaño 2004 Chilean Spanish
1718 The Fixer Bernard Malamud 1966 American English
1031 The Temple of the Golden Pavilion Yukio Mishima 1956 Japanese Japanese
200 The Book of Disquiet Fernando Pessoa 1982 Portuguese Portuguese
36 Invisible Man Ralph Ellison 1952 American English
1026 Murphy Samuel Beckett 1938 Irish English
1919 The Dying Earth Jack Vance 1950 American English
7073 Augustus John Williams 1972 American English
34 The Master and Margarita Mikhail Bulgakov 1967 Russian Russian
3009 Wittgenstein's Mistress David Markson 1988 American English
81 The Castle Franz Kafka 1926 Czech German
2256 Correction Thomas Bernhard 1975 Austrian German
882 The Hour of the Star Clarice Lispector 1977 Brazilian Portuguese
2798 Goodbye, Columbus Philip Roth 1959 American English
1344 The Emigrants W. G. Sebald 1992 German German
235 The Ambassadors Henry James 1903 American English
141 Brideshead Revisited Evelyn Waugh 1945 British English
3262 The Selected Works of Cesare Pavese Cesare Pavese 1968 Italian Italian
955 Moravagine Blaise Cendrars 1926 Swiss French
4542 A New Life Bernard Malamud 1961 American English
3852 JR William Gaddis 1975 American English
123 Memoirs of Hadrian Marguerite Yourcenar 1951 French French
272 The Devil to Pay in the Backlands Joao Guimaraes Rosa 1956 Brazilian Portuguese
9 The Sound and the Fury William Faulkner 1929 American English
13814 The Bastard of Istanbul Elif Shafak 2006 Turkish English
363 The Left Hand Of Darkness Ursula K. Le Guin 1969 American English
1318 Love Medicine Louise Erdrich 1984 American English
496 Froth on the daydream Boris Vian 1947 French French
64 Midnight's Children Salman Rushdie 1981 Indian English
1277 A High Wind in Jamaica Richard Hughes 1929 British English
565 Amerika Franz Kafka 1927 Czech German
260 Song of Solomon Toni Morrison 1977 American English
1408 Amongst Women John McGahern 1990 Irish English
3888 The Moon is a Harsh Mistress Robert A. Heinlein 1966 American English
12028 The Heather Blazing Colm Toibin 1992 Irish English
10656 An Accidental Man Iris Murdoch 1971 British English
456 Let Us Now Praise Famous Men James Agee 1941 American English
1089 Suttree Cormac McCarthy 1979 American English
3396 Cities of the Red Night William S. Burroughs 1981 American English
1743 Life & Times of Michael K J. M. Coetzee 1983 South African English
7743 My Life and My Life in the Nineties Lyn Hejinian 1980 American English
217 The House of Mirth Edith Wharton 1905 American English
9221 The Rachel Papers Martin Amis 1973 British English
362 Wise Blood Flannery O'Connor 1952 American English
1458 The Ballad of the Sad Cafe Carson McCullers 1951 American English
10516 Sweet Days of Discipline Fleur Jaeggy 1989 Swiss Italian
204 The Remains of the Day Kazuo Ishiguro 1989 British English
8101 I, Tituba, Black Witch of Salem Maryse Condé 1986 Guadeloupean French
929 Our Lady of the Flowers Jean Genet 1943 French French
331 Housekeeping Marilynne Robinson 1980 American English
59 Rebecca Daphne du Maurier 1938 British English
2890 Distant Star Roberto Bolaño 1996 Chilean Spanish
120 The Big Sleep Raymond Chandler 1939 American English
657 The Elementary Particles Michel Houellebecq 1998 French French
114 The Name of the Rose Umberto Eco 1980 Italian Italian
252 The Waves Virginia Woolf 1931 British English
899 Stoner John Williams 1965 American English
2733 A Violent Life Pier Paolo Pasolini 1959 Italian Italian
419 The Daughter of Time Josephine Tey 1951 British English
426 The Moon and the Bonfires Cesare Pavese 1950 Italian Italian
1261 The Blind Assassin Margaret Atwood 2000 Canadian English