1001 books list

There is a book called 1001 books you must read before you die, edited by Peter Boxall. The original book was issued in 2006. In 2008 a second edition was released which replaced almost three hundred of the original books with different ones. The 2010 book changed eleven more, and then another eleven in 2012.

Unless another edition comes out, there are 1305 of them in total, in what we’re calling The Combined List. On BookCrossing, there are quite a few of us reading from the list, and several of us set goals on a regular basis. I hope to read 1001 of the books eventually.

Total read so far: 409

1. Never let me go – Kazuo Ishiguro
2. Saturday – Ian McEwan
3. On Beauty – Zadie Smith
4. Slow man – J.M. Coetzee
5. Adjunct: an Undigest – Peter Manson
6. The sea – John Banville
7. The red queen – Margaret Drabble
8. The plot against America – Philip Roth
11. The lambs of London – Peter Ackroyd
19. The curious incident of the dog in the night-time – Mark Haddon
24. Fingersmith – Sarah Waters
26. Everything is illuminated – Jonathan Safran Foer
27. Unless – Carol Shields
28. Kafka on the shore – Haruki Murakami
29. The story of Lucy Gault – William Trevor
31. In the forest – Edna O’Brien
35. Dead air – Iain Banks
37. The book of illusions – Paul Auster
38. Gabriel’s gift – Hanif Kureishi
41. Schooling – Heather McGowan
42. Atonement – Ian McEwan
44. Don’t move – Margaret Mazzantini
45. The body artist – Don DeLillo
48. Choke – Chuck Palahniuk
49. Life of Pi – Yann Martel
52. The Devil and Miss Prym – Paulo Coelho
53. Spring flowers, Spring frost – Ismail Kadare
54. White teeth – Zadie Smith
56. Under the skin – Michael Faber
62. The human stain – Philip Roth
63. The blind assassin – Margaret Atwood
64. After the quake – Haruki Murakami
67. House of leaves – Mark Z. Danielewski
70. Timbuktu – Paul Auster
77. Disgrace – J. M. Coetzee
78. Sputnik Sweetheart – Haruki Murakami
81. Amsterdam – Ian McEwan
84. The talk of the town – Ardal O’Hanlon
85. Tipping the velvet – Sarah Waters
86. The Poisonwood Bible – Barbara Kingsolver
92. The god of small things – Arundhati Roy
93. Memoirs of a Geisha – Arthur Golden
94. Great apes – Will Self
95. Enduring love – Ian McEwan
98. The life of insects – Victor Pelevin
99. American Pastoral – Philip Roth
101. Silk – Alessandro Baricco
102. Cocaine nights – J. G. Ballard
104. Fugitive pieces – Anne Michaels
105. The Ghost Road – Pat Barker
109. Alias Grace – Margaret Atwood
110. The Unconsoled – Kazuo Ishiguro
111. Morvern Callar – Alan Warner
116. The reader – Bernhard Schlink
117. A fine balance – Rohinton Mistry
120. Mr. Vertigo – Paul Auster
125. The wind-up bird chronicle – Haruki Murakami
126. Pereira maintains – Antonio Tabucchi
129. Captain Corelli’s mandolin – Louis de Bernieres
130. Felicia’s journey – William Trevor
133. The shipping news – Annie Proulx
134. Trainspotting – Irvine Welsh
135. Birdsong – Sebastian Faulks
137. Operation Shylock – Philip Roth
138. Complicity – Iain Banks
140. What a carve up! – Jonathan Coe
141. A Suitable Boy – Vikram Seth
145. The robber bride – Margaret Atwood
147. The secret history – Donna Tartt
153. The crow road – Iain Banks
156. The English patient – Michael Ondaatje
159. Black Water – Joyce Carol Oates
162. Black dogs – Ian McEwan
163. Hideous kinky – Esther Freud
165. Wild Swans – Jung Chang
166. American Psycho – Bret Easton Ellis
170. Regeneration – Pat Barker
173. Wise Children – Angela Carter
176. Vineland – Thomas Pynchon
179. The music of chance – Paul Auster
183. Possession – A. S. Byatt
184. The Buddha of suburbia – Hanif Kureishi
187. Sexing the cherry – Jeanette Winterson
188. Moon Palace – Paul Auster
190. Remains of the day – Kazuo Ishiguro
195. Like water from chocolate – Laura Esquivel
196. A prayer for Owen Meany – John Irving
199. Cat’s eye – Margaret Atwood
207. The player of games – Iain Banks
209. The long dark teatime of the soul – Douglas Adams
210. Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective agency – Douglas Adams
213. The black dahlia – James Ellroy
214. The passion – Jeanette Winterson
215. The Pigeon – Patrick Suskind
216. The Child in time – Ian McEwan
217. Cigarettes – Harry Mathews
218. Bonfire of the vanities – Tom Wolfe
219. The New York trilogy – Paul Auster
223. Beloved – Toni Morrison
227. Watchmen – Alan Moore & Dave Gibbons
228. The Old Devils – Kingsley Amis
230. An artist of the floating world – Kazuo Ishiguro
232. Foe – J. M. Coetzee
236. Love in the time of cholera – Gabriel Garcia Marquez
237. Oranges are not the only fruit – Jeanette Winterson
238. The cider house rules – John Irving
240. Less Than Zero – Bret Easton Ellis
242. The handmaid’s tale – Margaret Atwood
243. Perfume – Patrick Suskind
245. White noise – Don DeLillo
247. Hawksmoor – Peter Ackroyd
253. Empire of the sun – J. G. Ballard
254. The wasp factory – Iain Banks
255. Nights at the circus – Angela Carter
256. The unbearable lightness of being – Milan Kundera
257. Blood and guts in high school – Kathy Acker
258. Neuromancer – William Gibson
259. Flaubert’s parrot – Julian Barnes
268. The piano teacher – Elfriede Jelinek
272. The color purple – Alice Walker
274. A pale view of hills – Kazuo Ishiguro
275. Schindler’s ark – Thomas Keneally
283. The comfort of strangers – Ian McEwan
286. Broken April – Ismail Kadare
287. Waiting for the barbarians – J. M. Coetzee
288. Midnight’s children – Salman Rushdie
289. Rites of passage – William Golding
291. A confederacy of dunces – John Kennedy Toole
293. The name of the rose – Umberto Eco
294. The book of laughter and forgetting – Milan Kundera
299. The safety net – Heinrich Boll
300. If on a winter’s night a traveler – Italo Calvino
301. The Hitchiker’s guide to the galaxy – Douglas Adams
302. The Cement garden – Ian McEwan
303. The world according to Garp – John Irving
312. The shining – Stephen King
314. Petals of blood – Ngugi wa Thiong’o
320. Interview with a vampire – Anne Rice
321. Cutter and Bone – Newton Thornburg
330. Willard and his bowling trophies – Richard Brautigan
331. High rise – J. G. Ballard
338. The lost honor of Katharina Blum – Heinrich Boll
340. Breakfast of champions – Kurt Vonnegut
341. Fear of flying – Erica Jong
343. The siege of Krishnapur – J. G. Farrell
344. The castle of crossed destinies – Italo Calvino
345. Crash – J. G. Ballard
351. The Breast – Philip Roth
352. The summer book – Tove Jansson
354. Surfacing – Margaret Atwood
358. Fear and loathing in Las Vegas – Hunter S. Thompson
359. Group portrait with lady – Heinrich Boll
367. I know why the caged bird sings – Maya Angelou
369. Troubles – J. G. Farrell
375. Slaughterhouse 5 – Kurt Vonnegut
376. The French lieutenant’s woman – John Fowles
377. The green man – Kingsley Amis
378. Portnoy’s complaint – Philip Roth
379. The Godfather – Mario Puzo
384. Myra Breckinridge – Gore Vidal
390. Do Androids dream of electric sheep? – Philip K. Dick
393. In watermelon sugar – Richard Brautigan
394. A kestrel for a knave – Barry Hines
396. Chocky – John Wyndham
399. 100 years of solitude – Gabriel Garcia Marquez
400. The master and Margarita – Mikhail Bulgakov
408. In cold blood – Truman Capote
409. The Magus – John Fowles
411. Wide Sargasso sea – Jean Rhys
416. August is a wicked month – Edna O’Brien
424. The ravishing of Lol Stein – Marguerite Duras
425. Herzog – Saul Bellow
427. Cat’s Cradle – Kurt Vonnegut
428. The Graduate – Charles Webb
431. The Girls of Slender Means – Muriel Spark
433. The bell jar – Sylvia Plath
435. The collector – John Fowles
436. One flew over the cuckoo’s nest – Ken Kesey
437. A clockwork orange – Anthony Burgess
439. The drowned world – J. G. Ballard
442. Girl with green eyes – Edna O’ Brien
444. Stranger in a strange land – Robert Heinlein
445. Franny and Zooey – J. D. Salinger
450. The prime of Miss Jean Brodie – Muriel Spark
451. Catch-22 – Joseph Heller
455. The country girls – Edna O’Brien
456. To kill a mockingbird – Harper Lee
457. Rabbit run – John Updike
463. Absolute beginners – Colin MacInnes
464. Memento Mori – Muriel Spark
467. Breakfast at Tiffany’s – Truman Capote
470. A town like Alice – Nevil Shute
472. Things fall apart – Chinua Achebe
474. Mrs Harris goes to Paris – Paul Gallico
477. The once and future king – T.H. White
478. The Bell – Iris Murdoch
481. The midwich cuckoos – John Wyndham
482. Blue of noon – Georges Bataille
484. On the road – Jack Kerouac
486. Doctor Zhivago – Boris Pasternak
487. The wonderful O – James Thurber
490. The lonely Londoners – Sam Selvon
494. Lord of the rings – J.R.R. Tolkien
495. The talented Mr. Ripley – Patricia Highsmith
496. Lolita – Vladimir Nabokov
508. Lord of the flies – William Golding
511. The long goodbye – Raymond Chandler
518. Casino Royale – Ian Fleming
521. The old man and the sea – Ernest Hemingway
526. The day of the triffids – John Wyndham
527. Foundation – Isaac Asimov
529. The catcher in the rye – J. D. Salinger
532. The end of the affair – Graham Greene
535. The third man – Graham Greene
536. The 13 clocks – James Thurber
537. Gormenghast – Mervyn Peake
539. I, Robot – Isaac Asimov
545. Kingdom of this world – Alejo Carpentier
547. Nineteen Eighty-four – George Orwell
551. The Heart of the Matter – Graham Greene
557. Under the volcano – Malcolm Lowry
561. Titus Groan – Mervyn Peake
563. Brideshead revisited – Evelyn Waugh
564. Animal Farm – George Orwell
565. Cannery Row – John Steinbeck
574. The little prince – Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
577. Embers – Sandor Marai
586. Farewell my lovely – Raymond Chandler
587. For whom the bell tolls – Ernest Hemingway
589. The power and the glory – Graham Greene
592. The grapes of wrath – John Steinbeck
595. Coming up for air – George Orwell
599. The big sleep – Raymond Chandler
603. Rebecca – Daphne du Maurier
608. Of mice and men – John Steinbeck
609. Their eyes were watching God – Zora Neale Hurston
610. The Hobbit – J.R.R. Tolkien
614. Out of Africa – Isak Dinesen
615. To have and have not – Ernest Hemingway
619. Gone with the wind – Margaret Mitchell
620. Keep the aspidistra flying – George Orwell
623. At the mountains of madness – H. P. Lovecraft
624. They shoot horses, don’t they? – Horace McCoy
629. The house in Paris – Elizabeth Bowen
631. Burmese days – George Orwell
632. The nine tailors – Dorothy L Sayers
634. Novel with cocaine – M. Ageyev
635. The postman always rings twice – James M. Cain
638. Tender is the night – F. Scott Fitzgerald
639. Thank you Jeeves – P. G. Wodehouse
642. Murder must advertise – Dorothy L Sayers
643. The autobiography of Alice B. Toklas – Gertrude Stein
647. Sunset song – Lewis Grassic Gibbon
649. Brave new world – Aldous Huxley
650. Cold comfort farm – Stella Gibbons
652. The thin man – Dashiell Hammett
654. The Waves – Virginia Woolf
655. The glass key – Dashiell Hammett
656. Cakes and ale – W. Somerset Maugham
659. Vile bodies – Evelyn Waugh
660. The Maltese falcon – Dashiell Hammett
662. Passing – Nella Larson
663. A farewell to arms – Ernest Hemingway
664. Red harvest – Dashiell Hammett
676. Lady Chatterley’s lover – D.H. Lawrence
667. All quiet on the Western front – Erich Maria Remarque
669. The last September – Elizabeth Bowen
672. Les enfants terrible – Jean Cocteau
674. Story of the eye – Georges Bataille
681. Quicksand – Nella Larson
687. Tarka the otter – Henry Williamson
689. Fiesta: The sun also rises – Ernest Hemingway
695. The murder of Roger Ackroyd – Agatha Christie
699. The great gatsby – F. Scott Fitzgerald
707. We – Eugene Zamiatin
717. Siddhartha – Herman Hesse
725. Crome yellow – Aldous Huxley
743. The thirty-nine steps – John Buchan
748. The ragged trousered philanthropists – Robert Tressell
749. Sons and lovers – D. H. Lawrence
750. Death in Venice – Thomas Mann
752. Ethan Frome – Edith Wharton
757. Martin Eden – Jack London
758. Strait is the gate – Andre Gide
767. The Jungle – Upton Sinclair
775. The golden bowl – Henry James
778. The immoralists – Andre Gide
780. Heart of darkness – Joseph Conrad
781. The hound of the Baskervilles – Arthur Conan Doyle
783. Kim – Rudyard Kipling
789. The turn of the screw – Henry James
790. The war of the worlds – H.G. Wells
791. The invisible man – H.G. Wells
794. Dracula – Bram Stoker
796. The island of Dr. Moreau – H.G. Wells
797. The time machine – H.G. Wells
799. Jude the obscure – Thomas Hardy
801. The yellow wallpaper – Charlotte Perkins Gilman
803. Diary of a nobody – George & Weedon Goldsmith
804. The adventures of Sherlock Holmes – Arthur Conan Doyle
808. Tess of the D’Urbervilles – Thomas Hardy
809. The picture of Dorian Gray – Oscar Wilde
813. Hunger – Knut Hamsun
819. She – H. Rider Haggard
820. The strange case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde – Robert Louis Stevenson
821. The mayor of Casterbridge – Thomas Hardy
825. The adventures of Huckleberry Finn – Mark Twain
829. The death of Ivan Ilyich – Leo Tolstoy
831. Treasure Island – Robert Louis Stevenson
844. The hand of Ethelberta – Thomas Hardy
846. Far from the madding crowd – Thomas Hardy
848. Around the world in eighty days – Jules Verne
851. Erewhon – Samuel Butler
853. Middlemarch – George Eliot
854. Through the looking glass – Lewis Carroll
857. War and peace – Leo Tolstoy
862. The moonstone – Wilkie Collins
863. Little Women – Louisa May Alcott
867. Crime and punishment – Fyodor Dostoyevsky
868. Alice’s adventures in Wonderland – Lewis Carroll
872. The water babies – Charles Kingsley
873. Les Miserables – Victor Hugo
875. Silas Marner – George Eliot
876. Great Expectations – Charles Dickens
880. The woman in white – Wilkie Collins
883. A tale of two cities – Charles Dickens
890. Bleak house – Charles Dickens
896. Moby Dick – Herman Melville
898. David Copperfield – Charles Dickens
901. The tenant of Wildfell hall – Anne Bronte
902. Wuthering heights – Emily Bronte
903. Agnes Grey – Anne Bronte
904. Jane Eyre – Charlotte Bronte
905. Vanity Fair – William Makepeace Thackeray
906. The Count of Monte Cristo – Alexandre Dumas
909. The purloined letter – Edgar Allan Poe
911. The pit and the pendulum – Edgar Allan Poe
913. A Christmas Carol – Charles Dickens
916. The fall of the house of Usher – Edgar Allan Poe
918. Oliver Twist – Charles Dickens
919. The Nose – Nikolai Gogol
925. Last of the Mohicans – James Fenimore Cooper
931. Frankenstein – Mary Shelley
932. Northanger Abbey – Jane Austen
933. Persuasion – Jane Austen
936. Emma – Jane Austen
937. Mansfield park – Jane Austen
938. Pride and Prejudice – Jane Austen
940. Sense and Sensibility – Jane Austen
947. The monk – M. G. Lewis
953. Vathek – William Beckford
960. The sorrows of young Werther – Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
966. The castle of Otranto – Horace Walpole
975. Fanny Hill – John Cleland
982. A modest proposal – Jonathan Swift
983. Gulliver’s travels – Jonathan Swift
987. Robinson Crusoe – Daniel Defoe
988. A tale of a tub – Jonathan Swift
989. Oroonoko or, The Royal Slave – Aphra Behn
996. The thousand and one nights – Anonymous
997. The golden ass – Apuleius
1001. Aesop’s fables – Aesopus

Additions in 2008
2. Falling Man – Don DeLillo
3. The Reluctant Fundamentalist – Mohsin Hamid
4. Half of a yellow sun – Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
6. The inheritance of loss – Kiran Desai
9 Mother’s milk – Edward St. Aubyn
10. Measuring the world – Daniel Kehlmann
11. A short history of tractors in Ukranian – Marina Lewycka
13. The accidental – Ali Smith
15. 2666 – Roberto Bolano
16. Small island – Andrea Levy
21. The swarm – Frank Schatzing
28. The Successor – Ismail Kadare
29. Vernon God Little – DBC Pierre
35. Snow – Orhan Pamuk
42. I’m not scared – Niccolò Ammaniti
55. The museum of unconditional surrender – Dubravka Ugresic
112. The Twins – Tessa de Loo
125. Uncle Petros and Goldbach’s Conjecture – Apostolos Doxiadis
145. Faceless killers – Henning Mankell
164. The great Indian novel – Shashi Tharoor
183. Kitchen – Banana Yoshimoto
211. Annie John – Jamaica Kincaid
220. Blood Meridian – Cormac McCarthy
279. A dry white season – Andre Brink
316. Woman at point zero – Nawal El Saadawi
356. Seasons of migrations to the North – Tayeb Salih
407. Closely observed trains – Bohumil Hrabal
588. Pippi Longstocking – Astrid Lindgren
592. Chess – Stephan Zweig
624. The blind owl – Sadegh Hedayat
634. War with the newts – Karel Capek
739. Home and the world – Rabindranath Tagore
781. The call of the wild – Jack London
992. The life of Lazarillo of Tormes – Anonymous

Additions in 2010
1. The Children’s Book – A. S. Byatt
2. Invisible – Paul Auster
3. American Rust – Philipp Meyer
4. Cost – Roxana Robinson
5. The white tiger – Aravind Adiga
6. Home – Marilynne Robinson
8. The Gathering – Anne Enright
10. The brief wondrous life of Oscar Wao – Junot Diaz
16. The elegance of the hedgehog – Muriel Barbery

Additions in 2012
1. The sense of an ending – Julian Barnes
3. Nemesis – Philip Roth
9. There but for the – Ali Smith

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