Ever realize that as well read as you believe yourself to be, it just might not be with the right books. The
BBC has released it's Top 200 books and if you want to be humbled check off the ones on your resume. Ugh. I'm determined to knock some of these off this summer (those book I
have read are printed in bold.
1. The Lord of the Rings by J. R. R. Tolkien 2. Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
3. His Dark Materials by Philip Pullman
4. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams
5. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by J. K. Rowling
6. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
7. Winnie-the-Pooh by A. A. Milne 8. Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell
9. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by C. S. Lewis 10. Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë
11. Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
12. Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë
13. Birdsong by Sebastian Faulks
14. Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier
15. The Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger 16. The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame
17. Great Expectations by Charles Dickens
18. Little Women by Louisa May Alcott
19. Captain Corelli's Mandolin by Louis de Bernières
20. War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy
21. Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell 22. Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone by J. K. Rowling
23. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets by J. K. Rowling
24. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban by J. K. Rowling
25. The Hobbit by J. R. R. Tolkien 26. Tess of the d'Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy
27. Middlemarch by George Eliot
28. A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving
29. The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
30. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
31. The Story of Tracy Beaker by Jacqueline Wilson
32. One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez
33. The Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett
34. David Copperfield by Charles Dickens
35. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl
36. Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson
37. A Town Like Alice by Nevil Shute
38. Persuasion by Jane Austen
39. Dune by Frank Herbert
40. Emma by Jane Austen
41. Anne of Green Gables by Lucy Maud Montgomery
42. Watership Down by Richard Adams 43. The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald 44. The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas
45. Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh
46. Animal Farm by George Orwell
47. A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens
48. Far from the Madding Crowd by Thomas Hardy
49. Goodnight Mister Tom by Michelle Magorian
50. The Shell Seekers by Rosamunde Pilcher
51. The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett
52. Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck 53. The Stand by Stephen King
54. Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
55. A Suitable Boy by Vikram Seth
56. The BFG by Roald Dahl
57. Swallows and Amazons by Arthur Ransome
58. Black Beauty by Anna Sewell 59. Artemis Fowl by Eoin Colfer
60. Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky
61. Noughts & Crosses by Malorie Blackman
62. Memoirs of a Geisha by Arthur Golden
63. A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens
64. The Thorn Birds by Colleen McCullough
65. Mort by Terry Pratchett
66. The Magic Faraway Tree by Enid Blyton
67. The Magus by John Fowles
68. Good Omens by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett
69. Guards! Guards! by Terry Pratchett
70. Lord of the Flies by William Golding 71. Perfume by Patrick Süskind
72. The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists by Robert Tressell
73. Night Watch by Terry Pratchett
74. Matilda by Roald Dahl
75. Bridget Jones's Diary by Helen Fielding
76. The Secret History by Donna Tartt
77. The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins
78. Ulysses by James Joyce
79. Bleak House by Charles Dickens
80. Double Act by Jacqueline Wilson
81. The Twits by Roald Dahl
82. I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith
83. Holes by Louis Sachar
84. Gormenghast by Mervyn Peake
85. The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy
86. Vicky Angel by Jacqueline Wilson
87. Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
88. Cold Comfort Farm by Stella Gibbons
89. Magician by Raymond E. Feist
90. On the Road by Jack Kerouac 91. The Godfather by Mario Puzo
92. The Clan of the Cave Bear by Jean M. Auel
93. The Colour of Magic by Terry Pratchett
94. The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho
95. Kane and Abel by Jeffrey Archer
96. Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel García Márquez
97. Girls in Love by Jacqueline Wilson
98. The Princess Diaries by Meg Cabot
99. Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie
100. Three Men in a Boat by Jerome K. Jerome
101. Small Gods by Terry Pratchett
102. The Beach by Alex Garland 103. Dracula by Bram Stoker
104. Point Blanc by Anthony Horowitz
105. The Pickwick Papers by Charles Dickens
106. Stormbreaker by Anthony Horowitz
107. The Wasp Factory by Iain Banks
108. The Day of the Jackal by Frederick Forsyth
109. The Illustrated Mum by Jacqueline Wilson
110. Jude the Obscure by Thomas Hardy
111. The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole, Aged 13¾ by Sue Townsend
112. The Cruel Sea by Nicholas Monsarrat
113. Les Misérables by Victor Hugo
114. The Mayor of Casterbridge by Thomas Hardy
115. The Dare Game by Jacqueline Wilson
116. The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde 117. Shōgun by James Clavell
118. The Day of the Triffids by John Wyndham
119. Lola Rose by Jacqueline Wilson
120. Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray
121. The Forsyte Saga by John Galsworthy
122. House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski
123. The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver
124. Reaper Man by Terry Pratchett
125. Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging by Louise Rennison
126. The Hound of the Baskervilles by Arthur Conan Doyle 127. Possession: A Romance by A. S. Byatt
128. The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov
129. The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood
130. Danny, the Champion of the World by Roald Dahl
131. East of Eden by John Steinbeck 132. George's Marvellous Medicine by Roald Dahl
133. Wyrd Sisters by Terry Pratchett
134. The Color Purple by Alice Walker
135. Hogfather by Terry Pratchett
136. The Thirty-nine Steps by John Buchan
137. Girls in Tears by Jacqueline Wilson
138. Sleepovers by Jacqueline Wilson
139. All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque
140. Behind the Scenes at the Museum by Kate Atkinson
141. High Fidelity by Nick Hornby 142. It by Stephen King
143. James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl
144. The Green Mile by Stephen King
145. Papillon by Henri Charrière
146. Men at Arms by Terry Pratchett
147. Master and Commander by Patrick O'Brian
148. Skeleton Key by Anthony Horowitz
149. Soul Music by Terry Pratchett
150. Thief of Time by Terry Pratchett
151. The Fifth Elephant by Terry Pratchett
152. Atonement by Ian McEwan
153. Secrets by Jacqueline Wilson
154. The Silver Sword by Ian Serraillier
155. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey
156. Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad 157. Kim by Rudyard Kipling
158. Cross Stitch by Diana Gabaldon
159. Moby-Dick by Herman Melville
160. River God by Wilbur Smith
161. Sunset Song by Lewis Grassic Gibbon
162. The Shipping News by E. Annie Proulx
163. The World According to Garp by John Irving
164. Lorna Doone by R. D. Blackmore
165. Girls Out Late by Jacqueline Wilson
166. The Far Pavilions by M. M. Kaye
167. The Witches by Roald Dahl
168. Charlotte's Web by E. B. White 169. Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
170. They Used to Play on Grass by Terry Venables/ Gordon Williams
171. The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway 172. The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco
173. Sophie's World by Jostein Gaarder
174. Dustbin Baby by Jacqueline Wilson
175. Fantastic Mr. Fox by Roald Dahl
176. Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov
177. Jonathan Livingston Seagull by Richard Bach
178. The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry 179. The Suitcase Kid by Jacqueline Wilson
180. Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens
181. The Power of One by Bryce Courtenay
182. Silas Marner by George Eliot
183. American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis
184. Diary of a Nobody by George and Weedon Grossmith
185. Trainspotting by Irvine Welsh
186. Goosebumps by R. L. Stine
187. Heidi by Johanna Spyri
188. Sons and Lovers by D. H. Lawrence
189. The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera
190. Man and Boy by Tony Parsons
191. The Truth by Terry Pratchett
192. The War of the Worlds by H. G. Wells
193. The Horse Whisperer by Nicholas Evans
194. A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry
195. Witches Abroad by Terry Pratchett
196. The Once and Future King by T. H. White
197. The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle
198. Flowers in the Attic by V. C. Andrews
And somehow I've lost two titles? Hmm...It doesn't much matter. I'll never get to them anyway. I've got a lot of reading to do!