I asked for some book recommendations a while back and Andrew sent me his list of books to read and I pulled a several titles off of it that interested me. Some my library didn’t have and I ended up reading a few including Nature’s Building Blocks and Everything That is Bad for You is Good for You that I really enjoyed.
Now I’m in need of some new reading material and this time I’m thinking classics. Since I was enrolled in the International Baccalaureate program in high school I didn’t read many of the classic high school lit books such as To Kill a Mockingbird, 1984, Catch 22, Animal Farm, Catcher in the Rye, etc. However, I really enjoyed a lot of my high school readings and would recommend many of them to anyone looking for a good book. Here’s a list of my favorites that I highly recommend if you haven’t read:
- Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe
- Ceremony by Leslie Marmon Silko
- The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison
- Pedro Paramo by Juan Rulfo
- The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
- The House of Spirits by Isabel Allende
- Love in a Time of Cholera by Gabriel García Márquez
- Chronicle of a Death Foretold by Gabriel García Márquez
We also read many other classics (As I lay Dying by William Faulkner, Shakespeare’s Hamlet, Macbeth, Othello, Romeo and Juliet, and Much Ado About Nothing, Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka, Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston, Bless Me, Ultima by Rudolfo Anaya, The Adventrues of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain, Heart of Darkness and The Secret Sharer by Joseph Conrad etc.).
So what classics did I miss out on that I should read? What’s a must read? What’s not good? Right now I’m thinking of One Hundred Yeas of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez because I’ve read Márquez’s other titles and enjoyed them. Here’s a list of other potential candidates.
Which ones are yays and which ones are nays? Which three would you recommend the most? Are there other’s I’m missing?
- Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand
- To Kill a Mockingbird by Haper Lee
- 1984 by George Orwell
- The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger
- Animal Farm by George Orwell
- Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
- Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card
- Farenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
- One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey
- Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
- Beloved by Toni Morrison
Recommendations from my solicitation (not just for classic books) on Twitter/Facebook:
-Replay by Ken Grimwood (Jake)
-Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell (Phillip)
-Vanity of Duluoz by Jack Kerouac (Kelsey)
-Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck (Yasemin)
-Jitterbug Perfume by Tom Robbins (Yasemin, “entertaining”)
-Man in the High Castle by Philip K. Dick (Yasemin)
By: audreyln on March 1, 2009
at 12:13 pm
I know I already gave you my recommendations, but I also have to comment with my yays and nays. I’ve read everything on that list except for Farenheit 451 and One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (which I own and plan on reading). Of the ones I read I would recommend all except Ayn Rand (I’m just not a fan, sorry). If there’s anything you NEED to read it is Catcher in the Rye, followed by 1984 and Animal Farm, just because they are so widely quoted/understood today (plus they’re great). If you read Ender’s Game you’re going to want to read the entire series (that’s just how that will inevitably work out). Beloved was good, too, but once again I have to say I really loved Grapes of Wrath. So there you have it.
By: Yasemin on March 1, 2009
at 12:32 pm
Ender’s Game, Fahrenheit 451, and The Great Gatsby.
I’ve read 1984 and Animal Farm before, but don’t remember them much (which makes me think they weren’t that good…or I didn’t get them). I really want to read Catch-22, but haven’t found the time yet.
By: Andrew Ferguson on March 1, 2009
at 2:24 pm
[...] Wednesday night I flew from New Orleans to Denver for the wedding (starting and finishing the book Animal Farm on the plane). On Thursday Griffin flew in and we spent time with his family. Then on [...]
By: A Week Away « Audreyln’s Blog - Acoustic Entropy on May 3, 2009
at 12:52 pm
Just finished The Catcher in the Rye. Not to impressed personally but I can see why it is classic reading for high school students. Next up: Catch 22.
By: audreyln on July 19, 2009
at 1:51 pm