35 Books (Almost) Everybody Should Read
If you’re a writer and you are familiar with the Google machine, no doubt you’ve been exposed to at least three or four hundred “Must Read” lists, usually published by either an online lit mag or even a general interest mag like New Yorker or Rolling Stone. And these lists tend to have at least one of two things in common.
1. They suck.
2. They all look the same.
It seems like all these lists also hit the same beats:
- The Great Gatsby
- Lord of the Flies
- The Old Man and the Sea
- 1984
- To Kill a Mockingbird
- Moby Dick
- I Read This in High School and Hated It
- College Requirement
- You Name It
- Etc.
- Ad Naseum
- Snoresville
- Blah, Blah, Blah
Sometimes, many of the often-mentioned authors have much better books just waiting to be discovered. (Fitzgerald’s Jazz Age short stories, for example, far outshine his Gatsy if you ask me.) Not only that, a lot of these classics are just plain dated and/or boring (yes, I’m a Literature teacher and I said that!)
So, with that in mind, I figured my list couldn’t be any worse. Now, I won’t say everybody needs to read all these because that’s too big a blanket statement, but I do think most everybody could benefit by including these tomes in your TBR pile.
I wanted to build a better list, a list that took the last 50 years into account a bit, a list that wasn’t just full of dead white guys, a list that, dare I say it, puts those other lists to shame. (Yes, I’m that vain.)
The rules and such:
- This list contains a mix of novels, short story collections, graphic novels, and creative non-fiction.
- Not only that, it also contains a mix of genres, from literary to sci-fi to pulpy action and even detective stories.
- I’ve only allowed one title per author, but in the case of close seconds, I’ve put that title in parentheses so you know just how close the race was).
Without any more ballyhoo, it’s time to throw my proverbial hat in the ring and present to you a better list of must-reads.
Let the wonderment begin. Here they are, 35 books you, yes you, need to read.
Read the full article:
https://seanhtaylor.blogspot.com/2024/07/35-books-almost-everybody-should-read.html
