Top 100 Books

bold those you have read

Italicize those you we intend to read

Underline the books you LOVE

(American top 100)

1. Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen


2. The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien


3. Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte


4. Harry Potter series - JK Rowling*


5. To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee**


6. The Bible***


7. Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte


8. Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell


9. His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman


10. Great Expectations - Charles Dickens


11. Little Women - Louisa M Alcott


12. Tess of the D’Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy


13. Catch 22 - Joseph Heller


14. Complete Works of Shakespeare****


15. Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier


16. The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien


17. Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks


18. Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger


19. The Time Traveler’s Wife - Audrey Niffenegger


20. Middlemarch - George Eliot


21. Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell


22. The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald


23. Bleak House - Charles Dickens


24. War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy


25. The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams


26. Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh


27. Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky


28. Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck


29. Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll


30. The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame


31. Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy


32. David Copperfield - Charles Dickens


33. Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis*****


34. Emma - Jane Austen


35. Persuasion - Jane Austen


36. The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis*****


37. The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini


38. Captain Corelli’s Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres


39. Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden


40. Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne


41. Animal Farm - George Orwell


42. The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown


43. One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez


44. A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving


45. The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins


46. Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery


47. Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy


48. The Handmaid’s Tale - Margaret Atwood


49. Lord of the Flies - William Golding


50. Atonement - Ian McEwan


51. Life of Pi - Yann Martel


52. Dune - Frank Herbert


53. Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons


54. Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen


55. A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth


56. The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon


57. A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens


58. Brave New World - Aldous Huxley


59. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon


60. Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez


61. Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck


62. Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov


63. The Secret History - Donna Tartt


64. The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold


65. Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas


66. On The Road - Jack Kerouac


67. Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy


68. Bridget Jones’s Diary - Helen Fielding


69. Midnight’s Children - Salman Rushdie


70. Moby Dick - Herman Melville


71. Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens


72. Dracula - Bram Stoker


73. The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett


74. Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson


75. Ulysses - James Joyce


76. The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath


77. Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome


78. Germinal - Emile Zola


79. Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray


80. Possession - AS Byatt


81. A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens


82. Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell


83. The Color Purple - Alice Walker


84. The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro


85. Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert


86. A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry


87. Charlotte’s Web - EB White


88. The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom


89. Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle


90. The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton


91. Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad


92. The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery


93. The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks


94. Watership Down - Richard Adams


95. A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole


96. A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute


97. The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas


98. Hamlet - William Shakespeare


99. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl


100. Les Miserables - Victor Hugo

According to the BBC Poll, the 100 greatest books:

1. The Lord of the Rings, JRR Tolkien


2. Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen


3. His Dark Materials, Philip Pullman


4. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams


5. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, JK Rowling


6. To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee


7. Winnie the Pooh, AA Milne


8. Nineteen Eighty-Four, George Orwell


9. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, CS Lewis


10. Jane Eyre, Charlotte Brontë


11. Catch-22, Joseph Heller


12. Wuthering Heights, Emily Brontë


13. Birdsong, Sebastian Faulks


14. Rebecca, Daphne du Maurier


15. The Catcher in the Rye, JD Salinger


16. The Wind in the Willows, Kenneth Grahame


17. Great Expectations, Charles Dickens


18. Little Women, Louisa May Alcott


19. Captain Corelli's Mandolin, Louis de Bernieres


20. War and Peace, Leo Tolstoy


21. Gone with the Wind, Margaret Mitchell


22. Harry Potter And The Philosopher's Stone, JK Rowling


23. Harry Potter And The Chamber Of Secrets, JK Rowling


24. Harry Potter And The Prisoner Of Azkaban, JK Rowling


25. The Hobbit, JRR Tolkien


26. Tess Of The D'Urbervilles, Thomas Hardy


27. Middlemarch, George Eliot


28. A Prayer For Owen Meany, John Irving


29. The Grapes Of Wrath, John Steinbeck


30. Alice's Adventures In Wonderland, Lewis Carroll


31. The Story Of Tracy Beaker, Jacqueline Wilson


32. One Hundred Years Of Solitude, Gabriel García Márquez


33. The Pillars Of The Earth, Ken Follett


34. David Copperfield, Charles Dickens


35. Charlie And The Chocolate Factory, Roald Dahl


36. Treasure Island, Robert Louis Stevenson


37. A Town Like Alice, Nevil Shute


38. Persuasion, Jane Austen


39. Dune, Frank Herbert


40. Emma, Jane Austen


41. Anne Of Green Gables, LM Montgomery


42. Watership Down, Richard Adams


43. The Great Gatsby, F Scott Fitzgerald


44. The Count Of Monte Cristo, Alexandre Dumas


45. Brideshead Revisited, Evelyn Waugh


46. Animal Farm, George Orwell


47. A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens


48. Far From The Madding Crowd, Thomas Hardy


49. Goodnight Mister Tom, Michelle Magorian


50. The Shell Seekers, Rosamunde Pilcher


51. The Secret Garden, Frances Hodgson Burnett


52. Of Mice And Men, John Steinbeck


53. The Stand, Stephen King


54. Anna Karenina, Leo Tolstoy


55. A Suitable Boy, Vikram Seth


56. The BFG, Roald Dahl


57. Swallows And Amazons, Arthur Ransome


58. Black Beauty, Anna Sewell


59. Artemis Fowl, Eoin Colfer


60. Crime And Punishment, Fyodor Dostoyevsky


61. Noughts And Crosses, Malorie Blackman


62. Memoirs Of A Geisha, Arthur Golden


63. A Tale Of Two Cities, Charles Dickens


64. The Thorn Birds, Colleen McCollough


65. Mort, Terry Pratchett


66. The Magic Faraway Tree, Enid Blyton


67. The Magus, John Fowles


68. Good Omens, Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman


69. Guards! Guards!, Terry Pratchett


70. Lord Of The Flies, William Golding


71. Perfume, Patrick Süskind


72. The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists, Robert Tressell


73. Night Watch, Terry Pratchett


74. Matilda, Roald Dahl


75. Bridget Jones's Diary, Helen Fielding


76. The Secret History, Donna Tartt


77. The Woman In White, Wilkie Collins


78. Ulysses, James Joyce


79. Bleak House, Charles Dickens


80. Double Act, Jacqueline Wilson


81. The Twits, Roald Dahl


82. I Capture The Castle, Dodie Smith


83. Holes, Louis Sachar


84. Gormenghast, Mervyn Peake


85. The God Of Small Things, Arundhati Roy


86. Vicky Angel, Jacqueline Wilson


87. Brave New World, Aldous Huxley


88. Cold Comfort Farm, Stella Gibbons


89. Magician, Raymond E Feist


90. On The Road, Jack Kerouac


91. The Godfather, Mario Puzo


92. The Clan Of The Cave Bear, Jean M Auel


93. The Colour Of Magic, Terry Pratchett


94. The Alchemist, Paulo Coelho


95. Katherine, Anya Seton


96. Kane And Abel, Jeffrey Archer


97. Love In The Time Of Cholera, Gabriel García Márquez


98. Girls In Love, Jacqueline Wilson


99. The Princess Diaries, Meg Cabot


100. Midnight's Children, Salman Rushdie

Hannibal - Thomas Harris

Well, I had to read this again after finishing Silence of the Lambs and it was just as good, if not better, than the first time.

The plot is interesting, and doesn't always take you where you expect it to. The most interesting thing for me was how I felt about the ending. If you've seen the film and not read the book then you will not understand, as the ending has been "hollywooded" (changed beyond recognition)

The book has a satisfactory and slightly creepy ending, but it is one I was happy to settle with. The ending of the film was not so.

Overall, excellent!

The Silence of the Lambs - Thomas Harris

OK, so I broke my golden rule with this one: Always watch the film After you read the book.

Despite that, the book was excellent. It eases you in to the feeling of tension, and then carries your through with such velocity that you get caught up in the story in a way which you don't expect. I find myself feeling much more for both Dr Lecter and for Clarice. Excellent stuff.

Despite having read Hannibal by the same author, I will be reading it again to see all the things I missed through not having read tSotL beforehand.

10/10

The Gunslinger (Dark Tower Volume I) - Steven King

I am generally I fan of Steven King. I have thoroughly enjoyed many of his books from The Shining to The Eyes of the Dragon. I bought only the first book of the Dark Tower series because I was unsure whether it would be appealing to me. The first 10th of the book is made up of Steven King explaining his inspiration for the book and the reasons behind the new version. I did not mind this - I had a similar experience reading the uncut version of The Stand (Which, by the way, is probably one of the best King books I have read). The Gunslinger reads a little like a spaghetti western, which from the introduction was his inspiration. It is not an easy book to get into, you feel like you've started half-way through. Within the first couple of chapters there is some very descriptive writing, but I did not feel in any way attached to the characters - or even curious about what the "Dark Tower" is. As the book wore on I hoped that some of King's usual charm would shine through, that I would begin to at least like the gunslinger. I think that perhaps I was not supposed to like the gunslinger, but I do not dislike him either. The tale read a little like a travelogue. When the boy, Jake's, injuries in another place are described it made me cringe at the detail, it painted a horriffic picture in my mind. I did not feel any attachment to the boy either. The book-cover itself proclaims that the gunslinger is "one of King's most enigmatic heros". I'm sure that he is supposed to be a lot like the "man with no name" played by Clint Eastwood in a Fistfull of Dollars.
The book ends several pages before the actual end of the book. The remainder is a taster of the next book. I may read some of the taster to decide whether I will be reading the rest of the series. If The Stand had been serialised it may be that the first book there would not have been as good as the later ones. And there is more of the series yet to be published. I may be better spending my money on the more horror-based Steven King books - or perhaps even on some other authors. I will wait and see what the intro to the next book is like - TheDrawing of the Three

The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown

This book has definitely been one of the best books I have read for a long time! It was gripping from the very beginning and kept me enthralled until the last page. The plot was intelligent and kept me thinking right through the book, with twists and surprises throughout. I found both the background to the story and the characters believable. The myseteries of the code intertwined with the mystery of exactly who has targeted the murdered men. The intricacies of the plot, from the security in the Louvre to the use of historical data added to the atmosphere of the book. The main characters are likeable, and their relationship helps to make them seem real. All in all I thoroughly enjoyed this book. I will definitely be getting some more Dan Brown books for my collection.

Good Omens - Terry Pratchett, Neil Gaiman

I was a little apprehensive when beginning this book. After being disappointed with the previous book I read, I hoped that this would be good. I didn't think so though. It was slow and fussy with the characters. So much more could have been made of the angels and devils. There were things that reminded me of a couple of films I've seen (eg. Dogma) It was just generally disappointing. And I was hoping that the ending would be a little more interesting, Basically it faded out rather than ending. It had some redeeming features - the four horsemen of the apocalypse turning up on motorbikes for example. These moments certainly made it worth trawling through the book, but I still think I could have better spent my time doing other things! Like reading a book I'm interested in. Still - at least by getting to the end of the book I have managed to complete it - I hate leaving books unread!

Going Postal - Terry Pratchett

I queued in Borders on the October 8 to get my copy of Going Postal signed. This was before I had read Monstrous Regiment, the previous instalment of the Discworld series. Monstrous Regiment was excellent, and I have come to expect the same high standard from all of Terry Pratchett's books. However, Going Postal was a little disappointing. The characters were okay, particularly the main character; Moist. He was really the only character that I cared about through the book. Some of the better known characters, Corporal Carrot for example, were given minor roles, and Death appeared only once. Despite these minor missing pieces, the book was entertaining. It was also a little predictable in places. Where in The Fifth Elephant I was never sure if Vimes would survive, in this book there was never a time that I was concerned for any character's safety. I liked the golems, I liked the boy with the pins. But the book didn't really gel - it was too obvious in too many places. I really hope that Prachett hasn't run out of ideas for his Discworld, because it still has many things to offer the reader. Perhaps my enjoyment of the book was marred slightly by having read the other books so recently, when some of them are so good. It stands up in the Discworld series as being probably better than Pyramids but I may refrain from going even that far - Pyramids was an enjoyable read too. I do think that it was probably better than The Light Fantastic. I will however give Pratchett the benefit of the doubt and buy the next Discworld book - if there is one.