I’ve challenged myself to finish this list of books for 12 years, I’m still not done. But this challenge is worth the 12+ more years that it’s probably going to take me to complete it (especially if you love old classics).
Around 11 years old, my love for reading really grew. I was tired of chatting on MSN with my friends and the only thing we could say was “I’m so bored”. I didn’t have any friends who lived close by, my sisters were too cool to play with me, so I had to find a way to entertain myself. I could only play Penguin Diner for so long (remember this game? Or was that just my weird obsession??).
I picked up a super old book with a little red-headed girl on the cover – Anne of Green Gables. I watched a cartoon about her and figured the book was probably good. I was wrong, the book was amazing. I loved it so much, I felt like I was Anne’s best friend, I couldn’t stop smiling.
I always enjoyed reading, but I wouldn’t have called myself an avid reader. It was so hard for me to find a good book. I hated leaving books unfinished, so I would always force myself to read through a boring book, which didn’t make me want to pick up another. This was before during a time a time when I wouldn’t have thought to Google “Best books to read” and have thousands of blog posts come up with recommendations.
Like any other younger sibling, I went to my older sisters and asked them to recommend another book for me to read.
They both introduced me to two of my now all-time favourite authors, Isabel Allende and Gabriel Garcia Marquez. I read The House of Spirits and 100 Years of Solitude, both I consider to be must-reads, you won’t be able to put them down!! I wouldn’t stop talking about them!
My sister decided to keep me occupied and introduced me to “BBC’S The Big Read”. This was a list of 100 books that were most loved in the UK as of 2003. Sure enough, I had read a few titles on the list – maybe I’d like the rest of them too??
I became kind of obsessed and wanted to read all the books on that list, to be able to say I did it. I read some more, namely the Harry Potter books, and was convinced I’d like all the books on that list. I didn’t need to think anymore, I felt 100% sure that I would like any book on that list. Of course, I was wrong, there were bound to be a few outliers that I didn’t think were good.
My love and obsession for the books on the list would come and go, depending how busy I became with school, but I always returned to the list. As of today (Oct 2, 2021), I’m 23, 12 years since I was first introduced to the list, and I haven’t even made it half-way through , LOL.
Not to say I’ve read less than 50 books this past decade!! With this list though, I am relentless and I really want to say that I read through this list in my lifetime (hopefully it doesn’t take that long, haha).
If I haven’t lost you in the link already, below is the list of books. The coloured titles are the books I’ve already read, before today’s date:
- The Lord of the Rings, JRR Tolkien
- Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen
- His Dark Materials, Philip Pullman
- The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams
- Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, JK Rowling
- To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee
- Winnie the Pooh, AA Milne
- Nineteen Eighty-Four, George Orwell
- The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, CS Lewis
- Jane Eyre, Charlotte Brontë
- Catch-22, Joseph Heller
- Wuthering Heights, Emily Brontë
- Birdsong, Sebastian Faulks
- Rebecca, Daphne du Maurier
- The Catcher in the Rye, JD Salinger
- The Wind in the Willows, Kenneth Grahame
- Great Expectations, Charles Dickens
- Little Women, Louisa May Alcott
- Captain Corelli’s Mandolin, Louis de Bernieres
- War and Peace, Leo Tolstoy
- Gone with the Wind, Margaret Mitchell
- Harry Potter And The Philosopher’s Stone, JK Rowling
- Harry Potter And The Chamber Of Secrets, JK Rowling
- Harry Potter And The Prisoner Of Azkaban, JK Rowling
- The Hobbit, JRR Tolkien
- Tess Of The D’Urbervilles, Thomas Hardy
- Middlemarch, George Eliot
- A Prayer For Owen Meany, John Irving
- The Grapes Of Wrath, John Steinbeck
- Alice’s Adventures In Wonderland, Lewis Carroll
- The Story Of Tracy Beaker, Jacqueline Wilson
- One Hundred Years Of Solitude, Gabriel García Márquez
- The Pillars Of The Earth, Ken Follett
- David Copperfield, Charles Dickens
- Charlie And The Chocolate Factory, Roald Dahl
- Treasure Island, Robert Louis Stevenson
- A Town Like Alice, Nevil Shute
- Persuasion, Jane Austen
- Dune, Frank Herbert
- Emma, Jane Austen
- Anne Of Green Gables, LM Montgomery
- Watership Down, Richard Adams
- The Great Gatsby, F Scott Fitzgerald
- The Count Of Monte Cristo, Alexandre Dumas
- Brideshead Revisited, Evelyn Waugh
- Animal Farm, George Orwell
- A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens
- Far From The Madding Crowd, Thomas Hardy
- Goodnight Mister Tom, Michelle Magorian
- The Shell Seekers, Rosamunde Pilcher
- The Secret Garden, Frances Hodgson Burnett
- Of Mice And Men, John Steinbeck
- The Stand, Stephen King
- Anna Karenina, Leo Tolstoy
- A Suitable Boy, Vikram Seth
- The BFG, Roald Dahl
- Swallows And Amazons, Arthur Ransome
- Black Beauty, Anna Sewell
- Artemis Fowl, Eoin Colfer
- Crime And Punishment, Fyodor Dostoyevsky
- Noughts And Crosses, Malorie Blackman
- Memoirs Of A Geisha, Arthur Golden
- A Tale Of Two Cities, Charles Dickens
- The Thorn Birds, Colleen McCollough
- Mort, Terry Pratchett
- The Magic Faraway Tree, Enid Blyton
- The Magus, John Fowles
- Good Omens, Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman
- Guards! Guards!, Terry Pratchett
- Lord Of The Flies, William Golding
- Perfume, Patrick Süskind
- The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists, Robert Tressell
- Night Watch, Terry Pratchett
- Matilda, Roald Dahl
- Bridget Jones’s Diary, Helen Fielding
- The Secret History, Donna Tartt
- The Woman In White, Wilkie Collins
- Ulysses, James Joyce
- Bleak House, Charles Dickens
- Double Act, Jacqueline Wilson
- The Twits, Roald Dahl
- I Capture The Castle, Dodie Smith
- Holes, Louis Sachar
- Gormenghast, Mervyn Peake
- The God Of Small Things, Arundhati Roy
- Vicky Angel, Jacqueline Wilson
- Brave New World, Aldous Huxley
- Cold Comfort Farm, Stella Gibbons
- Magician, Raymond E Feist
- On The Road, Jack Kerouac
- The Godfather, Mario Puzo
- The Clan Of The Cave Bear, Jean M Auel
- The Colour Of Magic, Terry Pratchett
- The Alchemist, Paulo Coelho
- Katherine, Anya Seton
- Kane And Abel, Jeffrey Archer
- Love In The Time Of Cholera, Gabriel García Márquez
- Girls In Love, Jacqueline Wilson
- The Princess Diaries, Meg Cabot
- Midnight’s Children, Salman Rushdie
As of October 2021, I’m at 29/100 books read, a little over a quarter of the way. I found some good book deals, and I have purchased a few to be able to leisurely read at home:
- Jane Eyre, Charlotte Brontë
- Wuthering Heights, Emily Brontë
- Rebecca, Daphne du Maurier
- Tess Of The D’Urbervilles, Thomas Hardy
- Persuasion, Jane Austen
- The Clan Of The Cave Bear, Jean M Auel
After finishing these, I would have read 35 books on this list! The most I’ve moved in a couple of years, oops. Because I bought these books, I read their summaries to make sure I’d most likely enjoy reading them. I’ve been working on eliminating the annoying habit of feeling like I NEED to finish a book I’ve started. I remember reading somewhere that there are far too many good books in the world, to waste your time reading a boring one. I try to live by this now.
If you’ve already read some of the books on this list, you should join me and give some other books a try! However, don’t take this competitively and try to finish this list as fast as possible. Reading is about enjoying your time, and learning new things, don’t make it a chore or you’ll become miserable and completely miss the magic.
Also, don’t limit yourself to only the books on this list, there are so many more great books, and even more published every day, indulge in whatever book is capturing your attention, and always know you have this list to fall back on during a lull.
i like 🙂