The Diving-Bell and the Butterfly
Memoir offering a haunting, harrowing look inside the cruel prison of locked-in syndrome. More
The Unbearable Lightness of Being
Kundera’s postmodern masterwork; named one of the best books of 1984 (New York Times Book Review). More
Bel Canto
Patchett’s critically acclaimed novel that won the PEN/Faulkner Award and the Orange Prize for Fiction. More
Barbara Taylor Bradford
When I say I have the need to write, I do mean need. More
Shilpi Somaya Gowda
At every stage of life, since being a kid with a flashlight under the covers, reading has always been my favorite activity. More
A Woman of Substance
With her unforgettable heroine Emma Harte, Bradford popularized the rags-to-riches family saga. More
Michael Chabon
The first writer that I really fell in love with was Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, in particular his Sherlock Holmes stories, and the first story that I ever wrote was a Sherlock Holmes story. More
Lauren Weisberger
A book that influenced me and why . . . Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret by Judy Blume was incredibly influential to me as a child. More
Angela’s Ashes
The phenomenal worldwide bestseller and Pulitzer Prize winner. More
Mary Karr
I read to save my life, to take communion, to enter a community of fellow sufferers and rejoicers. More
Half of a Yellow Sun
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s masterpiece, and winner of the Orange Prize for Fiction. More
Hilary Mantel
I read out of hope and avid curiosity, and in an attempt to live in other times, and inhabit bodies that are not my own. More
The Year of Magical Thinking
Winner of the 2005 National Book Award for Nonfiction and a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. More
The Bridge of San Luis Rey
The Pulitzer Prize–winning novel of fate, tragedy, and the meaning of the human condition. More
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
An American classic called “one of the books of the century” by the New York Public Library. More
The Wapshot Chronicle
Winner of the 1958 National Book Award, it established Cheever as a major American novelist. More
Their Eyes Were Watching God
One of the most widely read and acclaimed novels in the canon of African-American literature. More
Cathy Glass
I have always been a writer. More
The Corrections
Winner of the National Book Award in 2001 and the James Tait Black Memorial Prize in 2002. More
Matt Haig
It sounds ridiculous, but reading saved my life. More
People of the Book
Winner of the Australian Book Industry Awards Book of the Year 2008. More
The Bell Jar
A haunting classic that chronicles the breakdown of a brilliant, talented, successful young woman. More
Wolf Hall
Winner of the 2009 Man Booker Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award. More
The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith
This 1972 Booker Prize–nominated novel was also made into a 1978 Australian film. More
To Kill a Mockingbird
Much-loved Pulitzer Prize–winning classic, voted by librarians across America as the best novel of the twentieth century. More
Bring Up the Bodies
Winner of the Man Booker Prize and the first to win as a sequel. More
Jane Eyre
Brontë’s masterpiece of Gothic romance; a milestone title in the history of British feminist literature. More