Top 10 British, Irish or Commonwealth Novels from 1980 to 2005

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

About this list

The Observer, 10 Books

The Observer asked 150 literary luminaries to vote for the best British, Irish or Commonwealth novel from 1980 to 2005.

This list was originally published in 2006 and was added to this site over 12 years ago.

View: List Grid Table
Rank Book Authors Year Country Language Actions
255 Disgrace J. M. Coetzee 1999 South African English
750 Money Martin Amis 1984 British English
1374 Earthly Powers Anthony Burgess 1980 British English
248 Atonement Ian McEwan 2001 British English
1099 The Blue Flower Penelope Fitzgerald 1995 British English
1554 The Unconsoled Kazuo Ishiguro 1995 British English
64 Midnight's Children Salman Rushdie 1981 Indian English
204 The Remains of the Day Kazuo Ishiguro 1989 British English
1408 Amongst Women John McGahern 1990 Irish English
2408 That They May Face the Rising Sun John McGahern 2002 Irish English