A Bucket List of Books (1,500 Novels, Biographies, Essays, Memoirs, Plays, Science, Science Fiction and Sports Books). Updated to 2021

Most lists of "essential books" are flawed in some manner. They are either too short ("top 50 books for men", or too old (no books from the last 50 years). Other book lists fail to include essays, plays, rock and roll memoirs, science books, and science fiction. Other lists fall short in providing a true world view. I tried to get a solid sampling from every genre and from most countries. This list was created by taking the best of 15 lists. I then added several years of recommended books from the The Week, and foreign language recommended books. I then added my favorites to the list if they were not already there. Enjoy!

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....And Ladies of the Club

Helen Hooven Santmeyer

Interpreter of Maladies

Jhumpa Lahiri

11/22/63

Stephen King

1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus

Charles C. Mann

1493

Charles C. Mann

1776

David McCullough

1919

John Dos Passos

1984

George Orwell

2001: A Space Odyssey

Arthur C. Clarke

2010: Odyssey Two

Arthur C. Clarke

2666

Roberto Bolano

The 42nd Parallel

The 9/11 Commission Report

National Commission on Terrorist Attacks

About a Boy by Nick Hornby

About Three Bricks Shy... and the Load Filled Up

Roy Blount Jr.

The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian

Sherman Alexie

Acceptance

Jeff Vandermeer

The Accidental Billionaires

The Accidental Tourist

Anne Tyler

The Adventures and Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

The Adventures of Augie March

Saul Bellow

Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

Mark Twain

The Adventures of Tom Sawyer

Mark Twain

Advise and Consent

Allen Drury

Aeneid

Virgil

The Age of Innocence

Edith Wharton

The Age of Reason

Thomas Paine

The Age of Wonder

Richard Holmes

Agent Running in the Field

John Le Carré

The Agony and the Ecstasy

Stone, Irving

The Alchemist

Paulo Coelho

The Alchemy of Stone

Ekaterina Sedia

Alexander Hamilton

Ron Chernow

Alias Grace

Margaret Atwood

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

Lewis Carroll

All Clear

Connie Willis

All Creatures Great and Small

James Herriot

All the King's Men

Robert Penn Warren

All the Light We Cannot See

Anthony Doerr

All the President's Men

Carl Bernstein

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