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
2731 Lost Souls Poppy Z. Brite 1992 American English
871 Wieland Charles Brockden Brown 1798 American English
2494 Rogue Moon Algis Budrys 1960 American English
34 The Master and Margarita Mikhail Bulgakov 1967 Russian Russian
4308 Vril Edward Bulwer-Lytton 1871 British English
153 A Clockwork Orange Anthony Burgess 1962 British English
6087 The End Of The World News Anthony Burgess 1982 British English
951 A Princess Of Mars Edgar Rice Burroughs 1912 American English
259 Naked Lunch William S. Burroughs 1959 American English
513 Kindred Octavia E. Butler 1979 American English
728 Erewhon Samuel Butler 1872 British English
429 The Baron in the Trees Italo Calvino 1957 Italian Italian
5129 The Influence Ramsey Campbell 1988 British English
35 Alice's Adventures in Wonderland Lewis Carroll 1865 British English
547 Through the Looking Glass Lewis Carroll 1871 British English
628 Nights At The Circus Angela Carter 1984 British English
2059 The Passion Of New Eve Angela Carter 1977 British English
314 The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay Michael Chabon 2000 American English
444 The Man Who Was Thursday G. K. Chesterton 1908 British English
1776 Childhood's End Arthur C. Clarke 1953 British English
1585 Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell Susanna Clarke 2004 British English
5428 Hello Summer, Goodbye Michael G. Coney 1975 British English
6361 Girlfriend In A Coma Douglas Coupland 1998 Canadian English
607 House of Leaves Mark Z. Danielewski 2000 American English
7721 Pig Tales Marie Darrieussecq 1996 French French
2431 The Einstein Intersection Samuel R. Delany 1967 American English
528 Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? Philip K. Dick 1968 American English
2132 The Man in the High Castle Philip K. Dick 1962 American English
3308 Camp Concentration Thomas M. Disch 1968 American English
1217 Foucault's Pendulum Umberto Eco 1988 Italian Italian
3082 Under the Skin Michel Faber 2000 British English
442 The Magus John Fowles 1965 British English
2192 American Gods Neil Gaiman 2001 British English
2587 Red Shift Alan Garner 1973 British English
893 Neuromancer William Gibson 1984 American, Canadian English
887 Herland Charlotte Perkins Gilman 1915 American English
52 Lord of the Flies William Golding 1954 British English
2432 The Forever War Joe Haldeman 1974 American English
5929 Light M. John Harrison 2002 British English
601 The House of the Seven Gables Nathaniel Hawthorne 1851 American English
368 Stranger in a Strange Land Robert A. Heinlein 1961 American English
100 Dune Frank Herbert 1965 American English
348 The Glass Bead Game Hermann Hesse 1943 German German
2017 Riddley Walker Russell Hoban 1980 British English
258 The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner James Hogg 1824 Scottish English
657 The Elementary Particles Michel Houellebecq 1998 French French
50 Brave New World Aldous Huxley 1932 British English
1554 The Unconsoled Kazuo Ishiguro 1995 British English
215 The Haunting of Hill House Shirley Jackson 1959 American English
1451 The Children of Men P. D. James 1992 British English
4308 After London; Or, Wild England Richard Jefferies 1885 British English
6760 Bold As Love Gwyneth Jones 2001 British English
21 The Trial Franz Kafka 1925 Czech German
711 Flowers for Algernon Daniel Keyes 1959 American English
400 The Shining Stephen King 1977 American English
4308 The Victorian Chaise Longue Marghanita Laski 1953 British English
542 Uncle Silas Sheridan Le Fanu 1864 Irish English
278 A Wizard Of Earthsea Ursula K. Le Guin 1968 American English
363 The Left Hand Of Darkness Ursula K. Le Guin 1969 American English
327 Solaris Stanislaw Lem 1961 Polish Polish
2083 The Memoirs of a Survivor Doris May Lessing 1974 British English
234 The Chronicles of Narnia C. S. Lewis 1950 British English
476 The Monk Matthew Lewis 1796 British English
769 A Voyage To Arcturus David Lindsay 1920 Scottish English
8324 The Night Sessions Ken MacLeod 2008 Scottish English
9123 Beyond Black Hilary Mantel 2005 British English
5737 Only Forward Michael Marshall Smith 1994 British English
777 I Am Legend Richard Matheson 1954 American English
378 Melmoth the Wanderer Charles Robert Maturin 1820 British English
2356 The Butcher Boy Patrick McCabe 1992 Irish English
290 The Road Cormac McCarthy 2006 American English
9611 Ascent Jed Mercurio 2007 British English
5760 The Scar China Miéville 2002 British English
4542 Ingenious Pain Andrew Miller 1997 British English
1323 A Canticle for Leibowitz Walter M. Miller 1960 American English
427 Cloud Atlas David Mitchell 2004 British English
3884 Mother London Michael Moorcock 1988 British English
980 News from Nowhere William Morris 1890 British English
49 Beloved Toni Morrison 1987 American English
473 The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle Haruki Murakami 1994 Japanese Japanese
360 Ada or Ardor Vladimir Nabokov 1969 American English
1675 The Time Traveler's Wife Audrey Niffenegger 2003 American English
2237 Ringworld Larry Niven 1970 American English
4590 Vurt Jeff Noon 1993 British English
494 The Third Policeman Flann O'Brien 1967 Irish English
1505 The Famished Road Ben Okri 1991 Nigerian English
6 Nineteen Eighty Four George Orwell 1949 British English
2084 Fight Club Chuck Palahniuk 1996 American English
1574 Nightmare Abbey Thomas Love Peacock 1818 British English
629 Titus Groan Mervyn Peake 1946 British English
2444 The Space Merchants Frederik Pohl, C. M. Kornbluth 1952 American English
768 A Glastonbury Romance John Cowper Powys 1932 British English
1626 The Colour of Magic Terry Pratchett 1983 British English
4826 The Prestige Christopher Priest 1995 British English
399 His Dark Materials Philip Pullman 1995 British English
145 Gargantua and Pantagruel Francois Rabelais 1532 French French
731 The Mysteries of Udolpho Ann Radcliffe 1794 British English
6616 Revelation Space Alastair Reynolds 2000 British English
6907 The Years of Rice and Salt Kim Stanley Robinson 2002 American English
236 Harry Potter And The Philosopher's Stone J. K. Rowling 1997 British English
534 Satanic Verses Salman Rushdie 1988 British English
2974 The Female Man Joanna Russ 1975 American English
6461 Air Geoff Ryman 2005 British English
44 The Little Prince Antoine de Saint-Exupéry 1943 French French
994 Blindness José Saramago 1995 Portuguese Portuguese
8238 How The Dead Live Will Self 2000 British English
39 Frankenstein Mary Shelley 1818 British English
2469 Hyperion Dan Simmons 1989 American English
1399 Star Maker Olaf Stapledon 1937 British English
1597 Snow Crash Neal Stephenson 1992 American English
218 The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde Robert Louis Stevenson 1886 British English
53 Dracula Bram Stoker 1897 British English
5749 The Insult Rupert Thomson 1996 British English
146 The Hobbit J. R. R. Tolkien 1937 British English
17 The Lord Of The Rings J. R. R. Tolkien 1959 English English
712 A Connecticut Yankee In King Arthur's Court Mark Twain 1889 American English
793 The Sirens of Titan Kurt Vonnegut 1959 American English
346 The Castle of Otranto Horace Walpole 1764 British English
482 Jakob Von Gunten Robert Walser 1909 Swiss German
647 Lolly Willowes Sylvia Townsend Warner 1926 British English