Heather O’Neill
A book that influenced me and why: A Season in the Life of Emmanuel by Marie-Claire Blais More
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
An American classic called “one of the books of the century” by the New York Public Library. More
1903: Collins is the first to publish illustrated shilling-priced paperbacks…
Collins is the first to publish a series of illustrated, shilling-priced pocket size classics with the introduction of Collins Illustrated Pocket Classics. Included in this series are a maroon cloth-bound David Copperfield, many other Charles Dickens favorites, Sir Walter Scott’s Kenilworth, George Eliot’s Adam Bede, and Charlotte Brontë’s Shirley. More
Bleak House
Dickens’s tenth novel, often considered his finest; significantly influenced the development of mystery novels. More
Publishing Firsts: Collins Illustrated Pocket Classics
At the turn of the century, William Collins III combined innovative packaging and distribution with innovative aesthetics by creating shilling-priced illustrated paperbacks. More
People of the Book
Winner of the Australian Book Industry Awards Book of the Year 2008. More
Anne Hillerman
I read to take a mini-vacation in my own living room, to go back in history, forward in time, or to a place I love and had forgotten. More
Protectors Of Authors’ Rights
In the early 1800s, American publishers were notorious for reprinting titles from overseas at a fraction of the price, and without payment to authors. 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
The Stone Diaries
Winner of the 1993 Governor General’s Award (Canada) and the 1995 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. More
Our Town
Pulitzer Prize–winning drama; hailed by Edward Albee as “The finest play ever written by an American.” More
Susan Elizabeth Phillips
Why do I read? Seriously? I’m supposed to provide an intelligent answer? 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
Tracy Chevalier
I read because I want to know what it’s like to look at the world through someone else’s eyes, and reading is a remarkably efficient and vigorous way of doing that. More
The Thorn Birds
McCullough’s sweeping family saga of forbidden love in the Australian outback; became a bestselling phenomenon. More
Dorothea Benton Frank
You’ve asked me to tell you why I write but I think the answer might be longer than the fifty or one hundred words you’ve allotted me. More
The Golden Notebook
A feminist landmark and the best-known work by Nobel Prize winner Doris Lessing. More
Go Set a Watchman
This newly discovered novel from beloved author Harper Lee became the bestselling book of 2015. More
Jacqueline Winspear
I read because I love language, the way the joining of words and the rhythm of a story can make me laugh, cry, or take me out of my world or immerse me in the lives of others. More
Bring Up the Bodies
Winner of the Man Booker Prize and the first to win as a sequel. More
Charlotte Gray
A book that influenced me and why: Middlemarch by George Eliot. More
The 42nd Parallel
The first volume of the “brilliantly original” (Alfred Kazan) U.S.A. trilogy, a landmark of modernism. More
The Bridge of San Luis Rey
The Pulitzer Prize–winning novel of fate, tragedy, and the meaning of the human condition. More
Wolf Hall
Winner of the 2009 Man Booker Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award. More
Jane Eyre
Brontë’s masterpiece of Gothic romance; a milestone title in the history of British feminist literature. More
Two Years Before the Mast
An early landmark of adventure and travel writing, now considered one of America’s first literary classics. More
Moby-Dick
Often called the greatest American novel of all time. More