The top 50 must-reads

11 April 2012
The Weekender

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A list of the top 50 "must-read" contemporary books was published today - with no room for Harry Potter. Best-sellers such as Captain Corelli's Mandolin, High Fidelity and even Jilly Cooper bonkbuster Riders are all included. Here's the top 50 must-reads...

1 A Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
2 A Prayer for Owen Meany - John Irving
3 A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
4 American Pastoral - Philip Roth
5 Atonement - Ian McEwan
6 Being Dead - Jim Crace
7 Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks
8 Captain Corelli's Mandolin - Louis de Bernieres
9 Cloudstreet - Tim Winton
10 Disgrace - JM Coetzee
11 Enduring Love - Ian McEwan
12 Faith Singer - Rosie Scott
13 Fingersmith - Sarah Waters
14 Fred and Edie - Jill Dawson
15 Fugitive Pieces - Anne Michaels
16 Girl With A Pearl Earring - Tracy Chevalier
17 Grace Notes - Bernard MacLaverty
18 High Fidelity - Nick Hornby
19 His Dark Materials Trilogy - Philip Pullman
20 Hotel World - Ali Smith
21 Middlesex - Jeffrey Eugenides
22 Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie
23 Misery - Stephen King
24 Miss Smilla's Feeling For Snow - Peter Hoeg
25 Money - Martin Amis
26 Music and Silence - Rose Tremain
27 Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit - Jeanette Winterson
28 Riders - Jilly Cooper
29 Slaughterhouse-five - Kurt Vonnegut
30 The Blind Assassin - Margaret Atwood
31 The Corrections - Jonathan Franzen
32 The Golden Notebook - Doris Lessing
33 The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood
34 The House of Spirits - Isabelle Allende
35 The Name of the Rose - Umberto Eco
36 The Passion - Jeanette Winterson
37 The Poisonwood Bible - Barbara Kingsolver
38 The Rabbit Books - John Updike
39 The Regeneration Trilogy - Pat Barker
40 The Secret History - Donna Tartt
41 The Shipping News - E Annie Proulx
42 The Tin Drum - Gunter Grass
43 The Wind Up Bird Chronicle - Haruki Murakami
44 The Women's Room - Marilyn French
45 Tracey Beaker - Jacqueline Wilson
46 Trainspotting - Irvine Welsh
47 Unless - Carol Shields
48 What A Carve-Up - Jonathan Coe
49 What I Loved - Siti Hustvedt
50 White Teeth - Zadie Smith

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