The Greatest Fiction Books Since 1950

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This list represents a comprehensive and trusted collection of the greatest books. Developed through a specialized algorithm, it brings together 759 'best of' book lists to form a definitive guide to the world's most acclaimed books. For those interested in how these books are chosen, additional details can be found on the rankings page.

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Rank Book Authors Year Country Language Actions
4 The Catcher in the Rye J. D. Salinger 1951 American English
5 One Hundred Years of Solitude Gabriel García Márquez 1967 Colombian Spanish
14 Lolita Vladimir Nabokov 1955 American English
16 To Kill a Mockingbird Harper Lee 1960 American English
17 The Lord Of The Rings J. R. R. Tolkien 1959 English English
33 Catch-22 Joseph Heller 1961 American English
34 The Master and Margarita Mikhail Bulgakov 1967 Russian Russian
36 Invisible Man Ralph Ellison 1952 American English
41 On the Road Jack Kerouac 1957 American English
49 Beloved Toni Morrison 1987 American English
52 Lord of the Flies William Golding 1954 British English
54 The Old Man and the Sea Ernest Hemingway 1952 American English
60 Things Fall Apart Chinua Achebe 1958 Nigerian English
61 The Golden Notebook Doris May Lessing 1962 British English
64 Midnight's Children Salman Rushdie 1981 Indian English
72 Pale Fire Vladimir Nabokov 1962 American English
84 Slaughterhouse-Five Kurt Vonnegut 1969 American English
91 The Tin Drum Günter Grass 1959 German German
99 The Unbearable Lightness of Being Milan Kundera 1984 Czech Czech
100 Dune Frank Herbert 1965 American English
101 Waiting for Godot Samuel Beckett 1953 Irish French
102 Charlotte's Web E. B. White 1952 American English
112 Doctor Zhivago Boris Pasternak 1957 Russian Russian
114 The Name of the Rose Umberto Eco 1980 Italian Italian
123 Memoirs of Hadrian Marguerite Yourcenar 1951 French French
124 Pedro Páramo Juan Rulfo 1955 Mexican Spanish
132 The Handmaid's Tale Margaret Atwood 1985 Canadian English
143 The Talented Mr. Ripley Patricia Highsmith 1955 American English
148 One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn 1962 Russian Russian
150 Fahrenheit 451 Ray Bradbury 1953 American English
151 Molloy Samuel Beckett 1951 Irish French
153 A Clockwork Orange Anthony Burgess 1962 British English
154 One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest Ken Kesey 1962 American English
157 The Color Purple Alice Walker 1982 American English
158 Wide Sargasso Sea Jean Rhys 1966 British English
161 The Long Goodbye Raymond Chandler 1953 American English
166 Love in the Time of Cholera Gabriel García Márquez 1985 Colombian Spanish
167 Giovanni's Room James Baldwin 1956 American English
169 The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie Muriel Spark 1961 British, Scottish English
174 Rabbit, Run John Updike 1960 American English
176 The End of the Affair Graham Greene 1951 British English
182 The Moviegoer Walker Percy 1961 American English
186 Bonjour Tristesse Francoise Sagan 1954 French French
190 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy Douglas Adams 1979 British English
193 East of Eden John Steinbeck 1952 American English
197 Blood Meridian Cormac McCarthy 1985 American English
200 The Book of Disquiet Fernando Pessoa 1982 Portuguese Portuguese
202 Invisible Cities Italo Calvino 1972 Italian Italian
203 A Confederacy of Dunces John Kennedy Toole 1980 American English
204 The Remains of the Day Kazuo Ishiguro 1989 British English
208 A Good Man Is Hard to Find Flannery O'Connor 1953 American English
214 Life and Fate Vasily Grossman 1980 Russian Russian
215 The Haunting of Hill House Shirley Jackson 1959 American English
221 White Teeth Zadie Smith 2000 British English
223 A House for Mr. Biswas V. S. Naipaul 1961 Trinidadian English
224 Watership Down Richard Adams 1972 British English
226 The Alexandria Quartet Lawrence Durrell 1957 British English
232 2666 Roberto Bolaño 2004 Chilean Spanish
233 The Spy Who Came in From the Cold John le Carré 1963 British English
234 The Chronicles of Narnia C. S. Lewis 1950 British English
236 Harry Potter And The Philosopher's Stone J. K. Rowling 1997 British English
237 The Corrections Jonathan Franzen 2001 American English
241 Portnoy's Complaint Philip Roth 1969 American English
242 The Godfather Mario Puzo 1969 American English
248 Atonement Ian McEwan 2001 British English
254 Gravity's Rainbow Thomas Pynchon 1973 American English
255 Disgrace J. M. Coetzee 1999 South African English
259 Naked Lunch William S. Burroughs 1959 American English
260 Song of Solomon Toni Morrison 1977 American English
262 Austerlitz W. G. Sebald 2001 German German
270 Malone Dies Samuel Beckett 1951 Irish French
272 The Devil to Pay in the Backlands Joao Guimaraes Rosa 1956 Brazilian Portuguese
274 The Stand Stephen King 1978 American English
276 Life, a User's Manual Georges Perec 1978 French French
278 A Wizard Of Earthsea Ursula K. Le Guin 1968 American English
279 The Secret History Donna Tartt 1992 American English
280 The Adventures of Augie March Saul Bellow 1953 American English
286 The Once and Future King T. H. White 1958 British English
290 The Road Cormac McCarthy 2006 American English
291 The House of the Spirits Isabel Allende 1982 Chilean Spanish
293 A Wrinkle In Time Madeleine L'Engle 1962 American English
295 Franz Kafka Franz Kafka 1971 Czech Unknown
296 The Lover Marguerite Duras 1984 French French
298 Herzog Saul Bellow 1964 American English
308 The Bluest Eye Toni Morrison 1970 American English
310 Bonfire of the Vanities Tom Wolfe 1987 American English
312 Labyrinths Jorge Luis Borges 1962 Argentinian Spanish
314 The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay Michael Chabon 2000 American English
318 If on a Winter's Night a Traveller Italo Calvino 1979 Italian Italian
320 Where the Wild Things Are Maurice Sendak 1963 American English
325 A Dance to the Music of Time Anthony Powell 1951 British English
326 The Unnamable Samuel Beckett 1953 Irish French
327 Solaris Stanislaw Lem 1961 Polish Polish
329 History Elsa Morante 1974 Italian Italian
331 Housekeeping Marilynne Robinson 1980 American English
333 Infinite Jest David Foster Wallace 1996 American English
335 The Garden of the Finzi-Continis Giorgio Bassani 1962 Italian Italian
350 The Complete Stories of Flannery O'Connor Flannery O'Connor 1971 American English
353 Go Tell it on the Mountain James Baldwin 1953 American English
354 Hopscotch Julio Cortazar 1963 Argentinian Spanish
355 The Savage Detectives Roberto Bolaño 1998 Chilean Spanish
359 The God of Small Things Arundhati Roy 1997 Indian English
360 Ada or Ardor Vladimir Nabokov 1969 American English
361 Foundation Isaac Asimov 1951 American English
362 Wise Blood Flannery O'Connor 1952 American English
363 The Left Hand Of Darkness Ursula K. Le Guin 1969 American English
364 White Noise Don DeLillo 1985 American English
368 Stranger in a Strange Land Robert A. Heinlein 1961 American English
375 Kolyma Stories Varlam Shalamov 1954 Russian Russian
380 American Pastoral Philip Roth 1997 American English
381 The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe C. S. Lewis 1950 British English
389 The Alchemist Paulo Coelho 1988 Brazilian Portuguese
392 Lucky Jim Kingsley Amis 1954 British English
396 The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao Junot Diaz 2007 Dominican English
397 Wolf Hall Hilary Mantel 2009 British English
399 His Dark Materials Philip Pullman 1995 British English
400 The Shining Stephen King 1977 American English
406 Ragtime E. L. Doctorow 1975 American English
407 The World According to Garp John Irving 1978 American English
409 My Brilliant Friend Elena Ferrante 2012 American Italian