I just finished a fun, yet impossibly hard quiz on Facebook thanks to my friend, Ange.� In fifteen minutes you are supposed to list fifteen books that will always stick with you. How is this even possible?!� I did my best, but this was sheer book torture.� Here are the rules I received and my original list.
Rules: Don’t take too long to think about it. Fifteen books you’ve read that will always stick with you. First fifteen you can recall in no more than 15 minutes. Tag 15 friends, including me because I’m interested in seeing what books my friends choose. (To do this, go to your Notes tab on your profile page, paste rules in a new note, cast your 15 picks, and tag people in the note–upper right hand side.)
- One Hundred Years of Solitude by Marquez
- Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
- Kiss of the Spider Woman by Manuel Puig
- Like Water for Chocolate by Laura Esquival
- The World According to Garp by John Irving
- A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving
- A Widow for a Year by John Irving
- The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho
- Angela’s Ashes by Frank McCourt
- The Trial by Franz Kafka
- The Twilight Series by Stephanie Meyers {by no means fine literature, it did inspire me to start reading again and kept me on my diet during those rough first weeks.� consequently, this series will always have a special place in my heart}
- The Lord of the Flies by William Golding
- The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera
- Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand
- Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
Bonus Short Stories: The Handsomest Drowned Man in the World by Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka, and that one by Anton Chekov about the torture device.
As you can see, I couldn’t help but cheat and include some of my favorite short stories.� As you can also see, I forgot to include Umberto Eco’s The Name of the Rose, anything by David Sedaris, and a few short stories by Jorje Luis Borjes.� I am telling you, this game is impossible.� Impossible!� I imagine as more of my friends on facebook do the quiz, the more titles I will remember.
Still, this got me all excited the way only books can.� At the� beginning of summer we came up with a strong list of light and fluffy, now we need to come up with an equally strong list of hard and chewy.� Books that everyone must read, at least once, because they are a testament to the genre, or make you think, or change your life and leave you better for having read them.� I know, it’s impossible, but we are going to try.� Then we are going to make this our Fall/Winter reading list.� While everyone else is buying long cardigans and plum eye shadows, we book lovers will be cruising the libraries and book stores.
In looking at my list, I realize that I must break it down by genre or the list will stand woefully incomplete.�� Aside from the missing fiction I already mentioned, there are some nonfiction titles that deserve to be on there and, believe it or not, I do have some titles from law school I could add as well.
I’m going to list our Fall/Winter book list here for convenience.� I don’t expect I will be able to read all of them in one season since they aren’t light and fluffy.� Oh, and since the list is going to come from your suggestions, pony up!� If you decide to write your own fifteen on your blog, please link back here leave a comment so I can check out your list.
Fall/Winter Reading List {an ongoing project}
- The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath
- The Winter of Our Discontent by Steinbeck
- The House of Spirits by Isabel Allende
- Mrs. Dolloway by Virgina Woolf
- The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood
- The Brief and Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot D�az
- To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
- The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
And these are books I found on my shelf–some I don’t know how I came to own?
- The Crystal Fronteir by Carlos Fuentes
- Saturday by Ian McEwan
- To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf
- Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino
- Romeo & Juliet by William Shakespeare
- The Tempest by William Shakespeare
Hard and chewy, eh?
I can’t read ’em too tough. I’m a baby. But you should definitely pick up
1) The Brief and Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz
2) Middlesex by Jeffery Eugenides
3) The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen
which are long, complex, and probably won’t change your life but you’ll have trouble putting down and won’t feel guilty about the fact.
Okay…a few more titles that I love and will re-read again someday: East of Eden, Native Son, and The Shipping News. I’m sure I’ll think of many more before the day is over.
(The Brief and Wonderous Life is an amazing book too!!!)
I’ve read Middlesex and East of Eden, the rest I need to check out. :)
p.s. That reminds me–Oscar Wilde! How could I have forgotten Oscar Wilde?!
every once in a while i re-read “the great gatsby” and the older i get, the more i understand. it’s an easy read, but it seems to get more profound every few years (for me, anyway). and if there is one book i recommend over and over again, it’s “the death of vishnu” by manil suri. i think it’s genius but your milage may vary.
p.s. When I say hard and chewy, I don’t mean it has to be Goethe, Faust I & II. Just something that maybe requires more brain cells than I have been using lately. Ahem.
Snow Flower and the Secret Fan by Lisa See – faboosh.
Great post! You know, of course, that there isn’t much that gets me excited like books, either.
I’m sure we’ve all read To Kill a Mockingbird, but if you haven’t read it recently it deserves re-reading. I echo what ren wrote about The Great Gatsby about TKAM.
I just read Ceremony by Leslie Marmon Silko, and it must be added to any hard and chewy list. It’s about the Native American experience after WWII and I thought it was absolutely amazing.
I know you hardly need one more blog thing in your life, but I can’t resist the chance to plug LibraryThing. It’s a great way to organize your lists like this, as well as a place to connect with other readers. I like it much better than GoodReads.
P.S. Junot Diaz’s short stories are wonderful, too. And my change-your-life short story is “The Boys” by Rick Moody. Incredible!
Well, I’ll have to check out this blog! And YES–TKAM should be on everyone’s list. Another book I can’t believe I forgot. I’m putting it up TKAM and The Great Gatsby as a re-read.
I am STRUGGLING through 100 Years of Solitude and keep going back to my Lisa Scottoline books which are well-written and EASY to read. I’m just not a fan of “wordy” writers which is why I love John Irving (old JI). But I will persevere.
In the meantime, i’m totally going to blog my list. I love to read others’ book lists. Thanks, Jules!
Jen–I agree. You have to be in the right frame of mind for most Latin American literature, because it *is* flowery prose. The translations to English don’t always go over well. I loved, loved, loved Love in the Time of Cholera when I was 19, but when I tried to reread it two months ago, I couldn’t get past the first couple of chapters. You really can’t force hard and chewy if you’re not in the mood. :)
Your book suggestions are always great, so I can’t wait to read what ya’ got!
This is a great post!
I don’t do well when anything is too heavy. Case in point: I promised myself I’d read Jane Eyre this summer. I made it through Part One, and when I got to Part Two a great struggle ensued. No way was I going to make my way through that. Back the book went to the library. But just last weekend, I rented Jane Eyre on DVD and it was absolutely wonderful – wonderful I tell you!
Now I’m off to check out this LibraryThing – thing. And I’ll do a post on my own reading list. One of the books that changed my life, though, was Night by Eli Wiesel.
does Don’t Let the Pigeon Stay Up Late! count? :) These suggestions are great. I have books waiting but haven’t made time for them. I have been spending my lunch hour with email, etc. Today I will get outside with The Collected Stories of Dorothy Parker that I picked up at a local used bookstore. Too excited! I will be checking back for more titles. Thanks!
i JUST read The Winter of our Discontent, and really loved it. i also only very recently (in the last year) read To Kill a Mockingbird. again, LOVED it. my upcoming reads are: The Scarlet Letter (Hawthorne), In Dubious Battle (Steinbeck), and something by John Updike.
What about anything Toni Morrison? Gender, community, race – pretty intense stuff, but handled through really engaging stories. The Bluest Eye (read it in high school, so it’s not too “hard and chewey”) and Jazz are my personal favorites. Also, is it total blasphemy to say that I can take or leave Beloved?? And Paradise – just, no.
Roni–No, “But the Pigeon Finds a Hot Dog” should be on anyone’s must read list. :)
I, too, have piles of books waiting for me. During the holidays, Borders and Barnes and Noble always puts their classic on sale. I can never resist picking up one or two. Or three or four…I think I should at least read a few from there before I buy more or go to the library.
Hallie–I’ve read almost all of Toni Morrison’s titles. And, I have to say, I agree on your assessment of Beloved and Paradise. Meh.
Roni–I read The Scarlet Letter, but I will have to put it on the reread list. I would like to read something by Updike as well. Gosh, there is so much that I need to still read. O_O
I love seeing what other people are reading! If you’re looking for complex, but also wildly funny at times, try just about anything from Tom Robbins (I love Skinny Legs and All). Also love Anne Tyler’s The Accidental Tourist, Phillip Roth (American Pastoral and Portnoy’s Complaint), Donna Tartt’s The Secret History, and Catch-22 is one of my all-time faves.
Oscar Wao and Saturday were great books, and I second the vote for The Secret History and anything by Zadie Smith or Curtis Sittenfeld.
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen, I could read it a million times. The Picture of Dorian Grey by Oscar Wilde, scared the crap out of me, but I loved it. Anything by Kurt Vonnegut but especially loved Breakfast of Champions and The Slaughterhouse Five. Brave New World by Aldous Huxley, heard they are making this into a feature film. I hope they don’t mess it up. Catch-22 by Joseph Heller, it will either drive you insane and you’ll love it or it will drive you insane and you’ll hate it. If you love books but get overwhelmed by indecision at the bookstore or library I would definitely suggest joining goodreads.com. You can track and rate all the books you have read, are reading, and want to read as well as check out other people’s reviews and reading suggestions. I have found it to be very helpful in choosing new books to read and rediscovering books I enjoyed in the past.
Second The Secret History. I always forget about that one :-)
I had one more book idea last night. This one isn’t hard and chewy at all, but it’s probably my favorite story of all time (and, therefore, strange that it didn’t dawn on me to mention it until last night): The Little Prince. My dad read it to me when I was very young, and then I read it again when I was, like, 15 (but in French this time…yikes) and again when I finished high school, and then when I finished college, and then right before I got married. It’s one book that has always stayed with me and has a really lovely message.
I realize this comment is a little overdue, but I had so much fun with this! Coming up with 15 books was mind-boggling… what to keep, what to leave off?? I kept going back to the books of my teenage years: The Diary of Anne Frank, The Great Gatsby, The Scarlet Letter… I forgot what good reading years those were! Now I’m planning a trip to the library to check out the books on others’ lists. (Also, have you considered adding some of Flannery O’Connor’s work to your list? I love her!)
Annie–I am off to check out your books!
I’m always looking for books to read so thanks for all these suggestions!
i’m currently reading the English Patient and i absolutly love it.
on the other end i’m about burn Whuthering Heights that i find extremally boring.
xxx
me again. if you want to add two really good and beatifully written french books to your reading list (i hope the translations are good):
Hunting & Gathering by Anna Gavalda (they made a movie from the book with Audrey Tautou.pretty good but nowhere near the book)
The house of Scorta by Laurent Gaude (i gave it as a present to 8 or 9 people so far.)
Well, I did what I never thought I’d do – I made a list of what I’m PLANNING to read. Crazy-talk I tell ya. Thanks for inspiring me to actually read what’s been lounging about on my bookshelves!
Hi – just a lurker here, but since I’ve read most of the books on your list, I figured we must have similar taste. Just wanted to recommend a few of my recent favs that I didn’t see on your list. Rebecca by Daphne Du Marier, and The Book Thief by Markus Zusak. You also might like The Road by Cormac McCarthy and Atonement by Ian McEwan.
I, too, am a lurker, but I love your blog/s. And I just can’t help but add my two cents. Here’s the list of books I think everyone should read:
The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien (A collection of connected short stories, they’re heartbreakingly poignant and have stayed with me in the 10+ years since I first read it)
The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay by Michael Chabon (Abso-lutely-freaking-fantastic work of Literature. Even if you think “Ew! Comic books!” I’d still recommend it)
A Collection of Beauties at the Height of Their Popularity by Whitney Otto (I think Otto’s an under appreciated (Interconnected stories about a group of women navigating through their youth in a melting pot society. At times, a bit fluffy in substance, but ripe with lyrical prose and art)
Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri (Another collection of short stories. Written largely from the prospective of first generation Indian Americans and Indians that are breaking free from traditional cultural confines, I think the stories have something profound to say to anyone who has ever felt like a foreigner, regardless their geography).
Cities of the Interior by Anias Nin (Haughty, but oh-so-satisfying high-brow erotica. It’s actually a collection of 5 novellas)