Great Books!

	A	B	C	D
1	Note that although the links below go to Amazon (it wasn't nearly as evil when I started this spreadsheet as it seems nowadays), I encourage you to buy books used or get them from an independent bookstore near you.
2	TITLE	AUTHOR	GENRE	NOTES

3	The Life Impossible	Matt Haig	Fiction	This novel was just what I needed to read after Trump took over. A mix of magical realism and real realism that was gripping and uplifting in the end.
4	State of Wonder	Ann Patchett	Fiction	How I loved this book! Science, drugs, indigenous people, the rainforest, relationships and more in one tremendous story.
5	All the Light We Cannot See	Anthony Doerr	Fiction	Absolutely beautiful book about two people during World War II. Haunting. I was so deeply invested in it that I could not bear for it to end and immediately began rereading it from the start upon finishing it.
6	Remarkably Bright Creatures	Shelby Van Shelt	Fiction	I volunteered at the National Zoo in DC for many years so I was bound to like this book, but it's not a prerequisit for loving this story about a brilliant cephalopod. While you're at it, watch the documentary film My Octopus Teacher.
7	Middlesex	Jeffrey Eugenides	Fiction	One of my all-time favorite books - an incredible story and beautifully written.
8	Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow	Gabrielle Zevin	Fiction	This is an excellent novel even if you have zero interest in video games like me. Incredibly well-written, you won't be able to put it down.
9	The Count of Monte Cristo	Alexandre Dumas	Fiction	I read this a looong time ago but still think it's one of the most exciting adventure stories I've ever read
10	The Poisonwood Bible	Barbara Kingsolver	Fiction	Incredible story - long and wonderful - about a family of missionaries who move to Africa and how they fall apart.
11	A Tree Grows in Brooklyn	Betty Smith	Fiction	This is THE book I read over and over as a girl. Picked it up again during a tough time a year or two ago and was rapt all over again. Still ranks among my top ten favorite books of all time.
12	Bel Canto	Ann Patchett	Fiction	She's a master story teller. Beautiful book.
13	Eligible	Curtis Sittenfeld	Fiction	A modern retelling of Pride and Prejudice that I adored. I like all Curtis Sittenfeld's books - An American Wife (story inspired by Laura Bush) and Prep were great, too.
14	Longbourn	Jo Baker	Fiction	Story of some of the servants in the Bennet household from Pride & Prejudice. As a Pride and Prejudice fan, I have read many spin-offs (most of them are not anything to write home about) but this one was beautifully written and stands on its own solidly without the Austen conceit.
15	Americanah	Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie	Fiction	What a book!!! She's a fantastically gifted writer.
16	The God of Small Things	Arundhati Roy	Fiction
17	The Story of Edgar Sawtelle	David Wroblewski	Fiction	Right up there with All the Light We Cannot See and Middlesex as one of the best books I've ever read.
18	Leaving Lucy Pear	Anna Solomon	Fiction	Loved this book by my dear friend, Anna. Brilliant bit of historical fiction with wonderful characters and a great plot.
19	Little Fires Everywhere	Celeste Ng	Fiction	Loved this book!
20	The Brothers K	David James Duncan	Fiction	This is a great book. Even for people like me who find baseball boring.
21	A Discovery of Witches	Deborah Harkness	Fiction	First of a trilogy about witches and vampires that happens to be quite erudite and well-written. This first one is great and the others are not quite as great but you'll still have to read them to find out what happens.
22	The Outlander Series	Diana Gabaldon	Fiction	I LOVED this series. Really well-written, suspenseful, enjoyable series. Don't be dissuaded by the time traveling...
23	A Man Called Ove	Fredrik Backmam	Fiction	Took me a little while to get into this but then I was hooked. And moved.
24	100 Years of Solitude	Gabriel Garcia Marquez	Fiction	These were books I loved in highschool.
25	Love in the Time of Cholera	Gabriel Garcia Marquez	Fiction	Magical realism to the max!
26	Caleb's Crossing	Geraldine Brooks	Fiction	I love historical fiction and am also fascinated with books set in Colonial times in the NE US so...
27	March	Geraldine Brooks	Fiction	The story of the dad in Little Women
28	Year of Wonders	Geraldine Brooks	Fiction	Novel about the plague - quite good.
29	Siddhartha	Hermann Hesse	Fiction	Another formative book I read in my teens that I'd probably get a lot more out of now :)
30	Atonement	Ian McKewen	Fiction	Made me sad but I loved it.
31	Daughter of Fortune	Isabel Allende	Fiction	I always enjoy her books - this was one of my favorites
32	The Lord of the Rings Trilogy	J.R. Tolkien	Fiction	Classics for a reason!
33	Pride and Prejudice	Jane Austen	Fiction	I read it over and over again. Like comfort food.
34	Manhattan Beach	Jennifer Egan	Fiction	Read this recently and got completely sucked in and now want to read everything she's written.
35	The Namesake	Jhumpa Lahiri	Fiction
36	The Fault in Our Stars	John Green	Fiction	Touching and very real.
37	Turtles All the Way Down	John Green	Fiction	Love his ability to write wonderful female characters and that his heroine struggles with mental illness.
38	The Cider House Rules	John Irving	Fiction	Also managed to love the movie after reading the book which is rare.
39	A Prayer for Owen Meany	John Irving	Fiction	I just loved the characters and the sense of time and place so much.
40	Catch-22	Joseph Heller	Fiction	Read this in my teens - it was very formative.
41	The Help	Kathryn Stockett	Fiction	Gripping story
42	One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest	Ken Kesey	Fiction	wow! Read this as a teenager, still think about it sometimes.
43	Lonesome Dove	Larry McMurtry	Fiction	Didn't read this until I was in my mid-30's and then devoured it and the sequel. Incredible book.
44	Euphoria	Lily King	Fiction	Loosely inspired by the life of Margaret Mead and a totally gripping book.
45	Captain Corelli's Mandolin	Louis de Bernières	Fiction	Sad but beautiful
46	The Last Report on the Miracles at Little No Horse	Louise Erdrich	Fiction	I LOVE all her books though I think this one may be my favorite. I recommend reading them all.
47	The Plague of Doves	Louise Erdrich	Fiction	Also especially enjoyed this one by Louise Erdrich and read her whole series for kids (kind of like Little House on the Prairie from the point of view of the Indians) to my older son after reading Little House on the Prairie to him - we both loved them.
48	Gone With the Wind	Margaret Mitchell	Fiction	Didn't read this until my late 30's - no wonder it's a classic. What a great story!
49	The Mists of Avalon	Marion Zimmer Bradley	Fiction	I remember staying up until 4 AM to finish this. Couldn't put it down. Arthurian legends from the female perspective.
50	Winter's Tale	Mark Helprin	Fiction	Too complicated and fantastical a tale to attempt to summarize but masterfully written.
51	The Interestings	Meg Wollitzer	Fiction	Really absorbing story about a group of friends who meet at an arts summer camp in their teens and go from there.
52	The Female Persuasion	Meg Wollitzer	Fiction	Fascinating story. Kinda wonder if she's been to Omega!
53	The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay	Michael Chabon	Fiction	An epic story - read it many years ago and remember it fondly
54	The House at Tyneford	Natasha Solomons	Fiction	I love this book and am always amazed no one has heard of it. Beautifully written and a bit haunting.
55	News of the World	Paulette Jiles	Fiction	Touching book about an older gentleman tasked with transporting a 10 year old girl who'd been captured by the Kiowa back to her relations in Texas (though she does not want to go back.)
56	The Overstory	Richard Powers	Fiction	It won a Pullitzer and deserved to. What an amazing novel. So many different strands. I did not realize they were connected initially but ooooh, they are. The subject matter is depressing (ecological devastation) but what a worthy tome to read. Can take people a litlte while to get into it but stick with it - it's truly incredible.
57	A Tale for the Time Being	Ruth Ozeki	Fiction	I found this gripping and fascinating after taking a little while to get into it.
58	The Princess Bride	S. Morgenstern	Fiction	My highschool English teacher recommended this to me in 11th grade. I was skeptical that it could be as good as the movie (which I already loved) but it is even better.
59	Into the Wilderness Series	Sara Donati	Fiction	I really love this whole series although the first book is my favorite. I've read it many times. It's a sort of spin-off of the Last of the Mohicans and follows Hawkeye's adopted son's family through quite a lot of twists and turns and generations.
60	Cold Comfort Farm	Stella Gibbons	Fiction	A book I adore - it's a satirical novel making fun of all the pastoral novels that were being written in that period, I believe though I just found it charmingly funny and zany. And I also love the movie they made of it: https://amzn.to/2qf8TJa
61	Mermaid Chair	Sue Monk Kidd	Fiction	I wish her books had better covers because she's a wonderful writer and the chicklit cheesiness of them rely belies their contents.
62	The Secret Life of Bees	Sue Monk Kidd	Fiction	Same as above - no doubt you know of this one - it's a great story.
63	On Rue Tatin	Susan Hermann Loomis	Fiction	Great story of moving to France and lovingly renovating a home and building a life and a family in Normandy including lots of great recipes. My review post is here: http://www.thegardenofeating.org/2013/02/from-rue-tatin-braised-chicken-with.html
64	The Winter Sea	Susanna Kearsley	Fiction	Although I enjoy all her books, this is by far my favorite and the first one I read. Great historical fiction with an interesting reincarnation twist.
65	Drop City	T.C Boyle	Fiction	Excellent novel about a group of people who meet at a commune in northern california and end up in the bush in Alaska.
66	The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo	Taylor Jenkins Reid	Fiction	An easy yet really good read.
67	Little Big Man	Thomas Berger	Fiction	One of those rare instances where the movie is great, too
68	There There	Tommy Orange	Fiction	Really good novel from multiple narrators' points of view - all of whom are "urban Indians" living in Oakland, CA. Loved this glimpse from a Native American writer.
69	Lolita	Vladimir Nabokov	Fiction	A beautifully written classic about a deeeeeeply disturbing subject.
70	My Antonia	Willa Cather	Fiction	One of the books I loved as a young teenager. Long a classic.
71	Pachinko	Min Jin Lee	Fiction	Really engaging novel about various members of a Korean family throughout a period of time, including the Japanese occupation. Eye-opening look at racism and prejudice from the Japanese towards the Koreans they were occupying.
72	Moonglow	Michael Chabon	Fiction	A remarkably beautifully written novel that is loosely based on his own family. Like all his books, it's a wonderful cacophony of characters and happenings. I really believed it was about his grandfather but it's not :)
73	Tom Lake	Ann Patchett	Fiction	A wonderful read that's masterfully woven (part takes place during COVID lockdown) with a fun theme of connection to the play Our Town running throughout it.
74	North Woods	Daniel Mason	Fiction	This had a tiny bit of an Overstory like feeling to it while not being quite as sweeping. I enjoyed this tale about a place in the woods in MA told over time from the perspective of may different people (although parts of it were very sad because we're, you know, destroying nature...)
75	The Heaven and Earth Grocery Store	James McBride	Fiction	Gripping story/murder mystery about Chicken Hill, a poor neighborhood in Pottstown, PA where Jews and black folks live side by side, in the narrow margins left by their white neighbors. Lots of heart!
76	The Bean Trees	Barbara Kingsolver	Fiction	This was one of my mainstays as a teenager and I still love it.
77	Animal Dreams	Barbara Kingsolver	Fiction	Ditto what I wrote for the Bean Trees though I actually like this one even more.
78	The Signature of All Things	Elizabeth Gilbert	Fiction	I put this up there with All the Light We Cannot See and Edgar Sawtelle as one of the best novels I've ever read.
79	Ravencliffe - the Blythedale Series	Carol Goodman	Fiction (possibly YA)	I really enjoyed this whole series - fantasy.
80	The Witch of Blackbird Pond	Elizabeth George Speare	Fiction (YA)	Another of my favorite books as a young adult. Set in colonial New England.
81	A Little Princess	Frances Hodgson Burnett	Fiction (YA)	One of the books I read over and over again as a girl.
82	The Secret Garden	Frances Hodgson Burnett	Fiction (YA)	Loved this one and read it over and over as a kid.
83	Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret	Judy Blume	Fiction (YA)	Another of the books I read over and over again in my early teens.
84	Starry Sally J. Friedman As Herself	Judy Blume	Fiction (YA)	And another one of the books I read repeatedly when I was maybe 11 or 12. Read it to one of sons when he was maybe 9 and he loved it.
85	Deenie	Judy Blume	Fiction (YA)	Another book I read a number of times in my tweens.
86	Bridge to Terabithia	Katherine Paterson	Fiction (YA)	Another book I read and re-read as a kid. Kind of heavy but a wonderful read.
87	Anne of Green Gables Series	L.M. Montgomery	Fiction (YA)	These were a mainstay of my early teen years and I still re-read them as the comfort food of life, along with Pride and Prejudice. In these troubled times, their wholesome appeal is doubled. Filled with funny foibles and love.
88	Little House on the Prairie Series	Laura Ingalls Wilder	Fiction (YA)	I read these as an adult for the first time and loved them. Then I read them to my older son who also loved them (I think he was 6 or 7 at the time)
89	Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children Series	Ransom Riggs	Fiction (YA)	I read these as an adult and really enjoyed them - mysterious and rather creepy.
90	The Diviners Series	Libba Bray	Fiction (YA)	A great fantasy series which I think is probably technically young adult. A little on the scary side.
91	A Summer To Die	Lois Lowry	Fiction (YA)	One of my favorite books as a teenager, I read it over and over. It's sad but great.
92	The Birchbark House series	Louise Erdrich	Fiction (YA)	Read these to my son when he was 6 or 7 as a counterpoint to the Little House on the Prairie series and think they are the bomb and provide a really important perspective.
93	Harriet the Spy	Louise Fitzhugh	Fiction (YA)	A weird but great book that I read a number of times as a kid
94	Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry	Mildred D. Taylor	Fiction (YA)	Read this numerous times as a girl, about an African American girl named Cassie and her family in Mississippi.
95	Island of the Blue Dolphins	Scott O'Dell	Fiction (YA)	Another book I absolutely adored as a young adult about a young Indian girl who gets left behind on her island off the coast of California and survives for decades.
96	Long Ago In France	MFK Fisher	Memoir (food)	If you enjoy food and like France, you've kinda got to read this one.
97	Tender At The Bone	Ruth Reichl	Memoir (food)	I really enjoy all her books - she's a good writer and very honest about her upbringing and her struggles. And the food aspect is always great, too.
98	Cassandra Speaks	Elizabeth Lesser	Non-fiction	My wonderful mom-in-law's latest book. If you've ever wondered why our patriarchal society is so f-ed up, here's why. But good news, if we tell different story's (herstory and ourstory as well as history) we'll end up with different, better values and a more egalitarian society.
99	Operating Instructions: A Journal of My Son's First Year	Anne Lamott	Non-fiction	This helped me get through the first few months of my colicky older son's life - I laughed and cried
100	Plan B: Further Thoughts on Faith	Anne Lamott	Non-fiction	Really enjoyed this (and I am completely non-religious)