1000 Novels Everyone Must Read

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

About this list

The Guardian, 997 Books

Selected by the Guardian’s Review team and a panel of expert judges, this list includes only novels – no memoirs, no short stories, no long poems – from any decade and in any language. Originally published in thematic supplements – love, crime, comedy, family and self, state of the nation, science fiction and fantasy, war and travel – they appear here for the first time in a single list.

Who Voted?
There's not a lot of concrete information about the exact number of critics who voted. If we go by the critics mentioned on many of the summaries of the books, and how many editors at the guardian at the time, I think a safe assumption would be 40 people worked on this list. If anyone has any additional information please let me know.

This list was originally published in 2009 and was added to this site about 2 years ago.

View: List Grid Table
Rank Book Authors Year Country Language Actions
4644 Friday The Rabbi Slept Late Harry Kemelman 1964 American English
1086 Misery Stephen King 1987 American English
5517 Dolores Claiborne Stephen King 1992 American English
247 Kim Rudyard Kipling 1901 British English
5685 The Constant Gardener John le Carré 2001 British English
633 Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy John le Carré 1974 British English
233 The Spy Who Came in From the Cold John le Carré 1963 British English
16 To Kill a Mockingbird Harper Lee 1960 American English
5356 52 Pick Up Elmore Leonard 1974 American English
1111 Get Shorty Elmore Leonard 1990 American English
5353 Motherless Brooklyn Jonathan Lethem 1999 American English
1500 The Bourne Identity Robert Ludlum 1980 American English
2135 Cop Hater Ed McBain 1956 American English
2188 No Country for Old Men Cormac McCarthy 2005 American English
3858 Enduring Love Ian McEwan 1997 British English
3519 Sidetracked Henning Mankell 1995 Swedish Swedish
1322 Devil in a Blue Dress Walter Mosley 1990 American English
3041 The Great Impersonation E. Phillips Oppenheim 1920 British English
4308 The Strange Borders Of Palace Crescent E. Phillips Oppenheim 1934 British English
1299 My Name is Red Orhan Pamuk 1998 Turkish Turkish
6568 Toxic Shock Sara Paretsky 1988 American English
8699 Blacklist Sara Paretsky 2003 American English
5413 Nineteen Seventy Four David Peace 1999 British English
8238 Nineteen Seventy Seven David Peace 2000 British English
3503 The Big Blowdown George P. Pelecanos 1996 American English
8880 Hard Revolution George P. Pelecanos 2004 American English
8324 Lush Life Richard Price 2008 American English
242 The Godfather Mario Puzo 1969 American English
455 V Thomas Pynchon 1963 American English
441 The Crying of Lot 49 Thomas Pynchon 1966 American English
7842 Black And Blue Ian Rankin 1997 British English
7944 The Hanging Garden Ian Rankin 1998 British English
9611 Exit Music Ian Rankin 2007 British English
1324 A Judgement In Stone Ruth Rendell 1977 British English
6410 Live Flesh Ruth Rendell 1986 British English
6082 Dissolution C. J. Sansom 2003 British English
3041 Whose Body? Dorothy L. Sayers 1923 British English
497 Murder Must Advertise Dorothy L. Sayers 1933 British English
3021 The Madman Of Bergerac Georges Simenon 1932 Belgian French
4644 The Blue Room Georges Simenon 1964 French French
1275 The Laughing Policeman Maj Sjöwall, Per Wahlöö 1968 Swedish Swedish
1094 Gorky Park Martin Cruz Smith 1981 American English
170 Of Mice and Men John Steinbeck 1937 American English
2460 The League Of Frightened Men Rex Stout 1935 American English
511 Perfume Patrick Suskind 1985 German German
279 The Secret History Donna Tartt 1992 American English
419 The Daughter of Time Josephine Tey 1951 British English
4308 The Getaway Jim Thompson 1958 American English
2443 Pudd'nhead Wilson Mark Twain 1894 American English
1888 A Dark Adapted Eye Barbara Vine 1986 British English
1739 A Fatal Inversion Barbara Vine 1987 British English
6846 King Solomon's Carpet Barbara Vine 1991 British English
1940 The Four Just Men Edgar Wallace 1905 British English
1010 Fingersmith Sarah Waters 2002 British English
107 Native Son Richard Wright 1940 American English
759 Thérèse Raquin Émile Zola 1867 French French
4644 The Face Of Another Kobo Abé 1964 Japanese Japanese
93 Little Women Louisa May Alcott 1868 American English
3577 Behind the Scenes at the Museum Kate Atkinson 1995 British English
1649 Cat's Eye Margaret Atwood 1988 Canadian English
5344 Epileptic David B 1996 French French
6737 Room Temperature Nicholson Baker 1990 American English
510 Eugenie Grandet Honoré de Balzac 1833 French French
228 Father Goriot Honoré de Balzac 1835 French French
2437 The Crow Road Iain Banks 1992 British English
4402 The L Shaped Room Lynne Reid Banks 1960 British English
1060 Fun Home Alison Bechdel 2006 American English
270 Malone Dies Samuel Beckett 1951 Irish French
1337 A Legacy Sybille Bedford 1956 German English
298 Herzog Saul Bellow 1964 American English
666 Humboldt's Gift Saul Bellow 1975 American English
390 The Old Wives' Tale Arnold Bennett 1908 British English
1564 G. John Berger 1972 British English
1271 Extinction Thomas Bernhard 1986 Austrian German
1292 Two Serious Ladies Jane Bowles 1943 American English
8540 Any Human Heart William Boyd 2002 British English
231 Death of Virgil Hermann Broch 1945 Austrian German
845 Evelina Fanny Burney 1778 British English
450 Way of All Flesh Samuel Butler 1903 British English
6471 The Sound Of My Voice Ron Butlin 1987 British English
23 The Stranger Albert Camus 1942 French French
2696 Wise Children Angela Carter 1991 British English
720 The Professor's House Willa Cather 1925 American English
1152 The Wapshot Chronicle John Cheever 1957 American English
271 The Awakening Kate Chopin 1899 American English
449 Les Enfants Terribles Jean Cocteau 1929 French French
2372 The Vagabond Colette 1910 French French
3039 Manservant And Maidservant Ivy Compton-Burnett 1947 British English
4940 Being Dead Jim Crace 1999 British English
5152 Quarantine Jim Crace 1997 British English
568 The Mandarins Simone de Beauvoir 1954 French French
2372 Roxana Daniel Defoe 1724 British English
38 Great Expectations Charles Dickens 1860 British English
18 The Brothers Karamazov Fyodor Dostoevsky 1880 Russian Russian
8075 My New York Diary Julie Doucet 1999 Canadian English
2488 The Millstone Margaret Drabble 1965 British English
1172 My Family And Other Animals Gerald Durrell 1956 British English
740 Silence Shūsaku Endō 1966 Japanese Japanese
2244 The Gathering Anne Enright 2007 Irish English
418 Middlesex Jeffrey Eugenides 2002 American English
79 As I Lay Dying William Faulkner 1930 American English
9 The Sound and the Fury William Faulkner 1929 American English
1637 The Sportswriter Richard Ford 1986 American English
197 Howards End E. M. Forster 1910 British English
6907 Spies Michael Frayn 2002 British English
3006 Hideous Kinky Esther Freud 1992 British English
2980 The Man of Property John Galsworthy 1906 British English
1450 Mary Barton Elizabeth Gaskell 1848 British English
498 The Immoralist André Gide 1902 French French
2372 The Vatican Cellars André Gide 1914 French French
352 The Vicar of Wakefield Oliver Goldsmith 1766 British English
187 The Power and the Glory Graham Greene 1940 British English
209 Hunger Knut Hamsun 1890 Norwegian Norwegian
4308 The Shrimp And The Anemone L. P. Hartley 1944 British English
54 The Old Man and the Sea Ernest Hemingway 1952 American English
171 Steppenwolf Hermann Hesse 1927 German German
1465 Narcissus And Goldmund Hermann Hesse 1930 German German
9611 The Three Paradoxes Paul Hornschemeier 2007 American English
2327 Tom Brown's School Days Thomas Hughes 1857 British English
524 A Prayer for Owen Meany John Irving 1989 American English