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The average American reads 12 books a year, and unfortunately, we won鈥檛 be able to read all the books in the world. Consider the amount of books published every year in this country alone, the number of books you might even want to read again. It鈥檚 taxing to imagine how finite our time with books really is. But if you鈥檝e come to this page, you most likely want to do something about it. You want to read the books that will stay with you forever. Luckily we鈥檝e got you covered. Here鈥檚 a list of 101 books to read before you die:

Books to Read Before You Die

1) Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy (1878)

鈥淗e stepped down, trying not to look long at her, as if she were the sun, yet he saw her, like the sun, even without looking.鈥�

Leo Tolstoy鈥檚 masterpiece set in 19th-century Russia pulls you into the worlds of Anna Karenina and Konstantin Levin. The classic, epic novel, once described as 鈥渇lawless鈥� by Dostoevsky, depicts the burden of individual will in the midst of unpredictable social change, politics and theology.

2) To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee (1960)

鈥淭he one thing that doesn’t abide by majority rule is a person’s conscience.鈥�

鈥檚 To Kill a Mockingbird stands the test of time by still starting conversations around race, bigotry, virtue and forgiveness across America. If you read this novel years ago, it鈥檚 worth revisiting to see why it joins the list of best books to read before you die.

3) The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien (1954)

鈥淎ll we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.鈥�

J.R.R. Tolkien left an indelible legacy in the genre of epic fantasy with his trilogy. Start with The Fellowship of the Ring if you haven鈥檛 done so already. Names like Frodo, Gandalf, Sauron and Bilbo Baggins might never leave you.

Books to Read Before You Die (Continued)

4) The Handmaid鈥檚 Tale by Margaret Atwood (1985)

鈥淚gnoring isn鈥檛 the same as ignorance, you have to work at it.鈥�

Although wrote this frightening dystopian classic set in the future, there are eerily familiar scenes that make you question our world today. A society ruled by gender discrimination, jeopardizing individual freedom. The consequences are painfully evident and ever-present from the moment you stop reading and look around.

5) Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen (1813)

鈥淭here are few people whom I really love, and still fewer of whom I think well.鈥�

Perhaps you鈥檝e seen the film and TV adaptations before you even read the book. Whether you have Colin Firth or Matthew Macfadyen forever imprinted as Mr. Darcy in your mind, reading this eternal classic of English literature is a must. Jane Austen鈥檚 19th-century story centered on the five Bennet sisters will have you reflecting on your own family, social constructs and love.

Continue down the list below to discover more books to read before you die:

6) Beloved by Toni Morrison (1987)

鈥淢e and you, we got more yesterday than anybody. We need some kind of tomorrow.鈥�

Books to Read Before You Die (Continued)

7) Dune by Frank Herbert (1965)

鈥淭he mystery of life isn’t a problem to solve, but a reality to experience.鈥�

8) Middlemarch by George Eliot (1871)

鈥淏lameless people are always the most exasperating.鈥�

9) 1984 by George Orwell (1949)

鈥淧erhaps one did not want to be loved so much as to be understood.鈥�

10) Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison (1952)

鈥淲hen I discover who I am, I鈥檒l be free.鈥�

(Continued) Books to Read Before You Die聽

11) One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garc铆a M谩rquez (1967)

鈥淚t’s enough for me to be sure that you and I exist at this moment.鈥�

12) Catch-22 by Joseph Heller (1961)

鈥淸They] agreed that it was neither possible nor necessary to educate people who never questioned anything.鈥�

13) Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood by Marjane Satrapi (2000)

鈥淚 want to be justice, love and the wrath of God all in one.鈥�

Books to Read Before You Die (Continued)

14) Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut (1969)

鈥淓verything was beautiful and nothing hurt.鈥�

15) Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese (2009)

鈥淣ot only our actions, but also our omissions, become our destiny.鈥�

16) Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri (1999)

鈥淢aladies, poorly interpreted, can鈥檛 be cured.鈥�

Books to Read Before You Die (Continued)

17)听The Autobiography of Malcolm X: As Told to Alex Haley by Malcolm X and Alex Haley (1965)

鈥淓very morning when I wake up, now, I regard it as having another borrowed day.鈥�

18) Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides (2002)

鈥淏iology gives you a brain. Life turns it into a mind.鈥�

19) Midnight鈥檚 Children by Salman Rushdie (1981)

鈥淲hat’s real and what’s true aren’t necessarily the same.鈥�

(Continued) Books to Read Before You Die聽

20) East of Eden by John Steinbeck (1952)

鈥淎nd now that you don’t have to be perfect, you can be good.鈥�

21)听Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi (2016)

鈥淲e believe the one who has power. He is the one who gets to write the story. So when you study history, you must ask yourself, Whose story am I missing? Whose voice was suppressed so that this voice could come forth?鈥�

22)听The Age of Innocence by Edith Warton (1920)

鈥淓ach time you happen to me all over again.鈥�

23) The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger (1951)

鈥淭he mark of the immature man is that he wants to die nobly for a cause, while the mark of the mature man is that he wants to live humbly for one.鈥�

Books to Read Before You Die (Continued)

24) The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald (1925)

鈥淎nd I like large parties. They鈥檙e so intimate. At small parties there isn鈥檛 any privacy.鈥�

25)听Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro (2005)

鈥淢emories, even your most precious ones, fade surprisingly quickly. But I don鈥檛 go along with that. The memories I value most, I don鈥檛 ever see them fading.鈥�

26)听The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat: And Other Clinical Tales by Oliver Sacks (1985)

鈥淚f we wish to know about a man, we ask ‘what is his story–his real, inmost story?鈥�

Books to Read Before You Die (Continued)

27) The Omnivore鈥檚 Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals by Michael Pollan (2006)

鈥淚magine it: Every meal would connect us to the joy of living and the wonder of nature.鈥�

28) Go Tell It on the Mountain by James Baldwin (1953)

鈥淭here are people in the world for whom “coming along” is a perpetual process, people who are destined never to arrive.鈥�

29) The Road by Cormac McCarthy (2006)

鈥淵ou forget what you want to remember, and you remember what you want to forget.鈥�

(Continued) Books to Read Before You Die聽

30) The Stranger by Albert Camus (1942)

鈥淚f something is going to happen to me, I want to be there.

31) My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante (2011)

鈥淗er quickness of mind was like a hiss, a dart, a lethal bite.鈥�

32) The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway (1926)

鈥淚 can’t stand it to think my life is going so fast and I’m not really living it.鈥�

Books to Read Before You Die (Continued)

33) Hamlet by William Shakespeare (1603)

鈥淒oubt thou the stars are fire; Doubt that the sun doth move; Doubt truth to be a liar; But never doubt I love.鈥�

34) The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion (2005)

鈥淟ife changes in the instant. The ordinary instant.鈥�

35) Little Women by Louisa May Alcott (1868)

鈥淚 am not afraid of storms, for I am learning how to sail my ship.鈥�

(Continued) Books to Read Before You Die聽

36) Atonement by Ian McEwan (2001)

鈥淚t wasn’t only wickedness and scheming that made people unhappy, it was confusion and misunderstanding; above all, it was the failure to grasp the simple truth that other people are as real as you.鈥�

37) Wuthering Heights by Emily Bront毛 (1847)

鈥淪he burned too bright for this world.鈥�

38) Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston (1937)

鈥淭here are years that ask questions and years that answer.鈥�

39) Brave New World by Aldous Huxley (1932)

鈥淲ords can be like X-rays if you use them properly 鈥� they鈥檒l go through anything. You read and you鈥檙e pierced.鈥�

Books to Read Before You Die (Continued)

40) The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini (2003)

鈥淔or you, a thousand times over.鈥�

41) Bel Canto by Ann Patchett (2001)

鈥淚t makes you wonder. All the brilliant things we might have done with our lives if only we suspected we knew how.鈥�

42) Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bront毛 (1847)

鈥淚 am no bird; and no net ensnares me: I am a free human being with an independent will.鈥�

(Continued) Books to Read Before You Die聽

43) Moby Dick by Herman Melville (1851)

鈥淚 know not all that may be coming, but be it what it will, I’ll go to it laughing.鈥�

44) Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier (1938)

鈥淚f only there could be an invention that bottled up a memory, like scent. And it never faded, and it never got stale. And then, when one wanted it, the bottle could be uncorked, and it would be like living the moment all over again.鈥�

45) Life of Pi by Yann Martel (2001)

鈥淚t is true that those we meet can change us, sometimes so profoundly that we are not the same afterwards, even unto our names.鈥�

Books to Read Before You Die (Continued)

46) Frankenstein by Mary Shelley (1818)

鈥淏eware; for I am fearless, and therefore powerful.鈥�

47) The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas (1846)

鈥淚t’s necessary to have wished for death in order to know how good it is to live.鈥�

48) The Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri (1321)

鈥淚f the present world go astray, the cause is in you, in you it is to be sought.鈥�

Books to Read Before You Die (Continued)

49) Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky (1866)

鈥淚t takes something more than intelligence to act intelligently.鈥�

50) All About Love by bell hooks (1999)

鈥淏ut many of us seek community solely to escape the fear of being alone. Knowing how to be solitary is central to the art of loving. When we can be alone, we can be with others without using them as a means of escape.鈥�

51) Gilead by Marilynne Robinson (2004)

鈥淭his is an interesting planet. It deserves all the attention you can give it.

Discover the next 50 top books to read before you die

52. Giovanni鈥檚 Room by James Baldwin (1956)

53. If on a Winter鈥檚 Night a Traveler by Italo Calvino (1979)

54. The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin (1969)

(Continued) Books to Read Before You Die (Continued)

55. A People鈥檚 History of the United States by Howard Zinn (1980)

56. Where the Sidewalk Ends by Shel Silverstein (1974)

57. by Stephen King (1977)

58. Commonwealth by Ann Patchett (2016)

59. A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L鈥橢ngle (1962)

60. In Cold Blood by Truman Capote (1965)

Books to Read Before You Die (Continued)

61. The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje (1992)

62. Angela鈥檚 Ashes: A Memoir by Frank McCourt (1996)

63. A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking (1988)

64. Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury (1953)

65. The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro (1989)

66. A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers (2000)

Books to Read Before You Die (Continued)

67. Are You There, God? It鈥檚 Me, Margaret by Judy Blume (1970)

68. Charlotte鈥檚 Web by E.B. White (1952)

69. The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank (1947)

70. Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov (1955)

71. Love Medicine by Louise Eldrich (1984)

72. The Secret History by Donna Tartt (1992)

(Continued) Books to Read Before You Die聽

73. Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garc铆a M谩rquez (1985)

74. The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison (1970)

75. There There by Tommy Orange (2018)

76. The Color Purple by Alice Walker (1982)

77. Tenth of December by George Saunders (2013)

78. Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe (1958)

Books to Read Before You Die (Continued)

79. A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki (2013)

80. The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky (1880)

81. The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy (1997)

82. Pachinko by Min Jin Lee (2017) (Now a )

83. The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead (2016)

84. I Know This Much Is True by Wally Lamb (1998)

Books to Read Before You Die (Continued)

85. 2666 by Roberto Bola帽o (2008)

86. The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen (2001)

87. The Known World by Edward P. Jones (2003)

88. Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan (2020)

89. The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt (2013)

90. Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel (2009)

(Continued) Books to Read Before You Die聽

91. The Warmth of Other Suns by Isabel Wilkerson (2010)

92. by George Saunders (2017)

93. Say Nothing by Patrick Radden Keefe (2019)

94. The Last Samurai by Helen DeWitt (2000)

95. Evicted by Matthew Desmond (2016)

96. The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen (2015)

Books to Read Before You Die (Continued)

97. The Days of Abandonment by Elena Ferrante (2005)

98. Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (2013)

99. A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara (2015)

100. Shuggie Bain by Douglas Stuart (2020)

101. Erasure by Percival Everett (2001)

Top books to read before you die – Final Thoughts聽

Millions and millions of books exist around the world. It鈥檚 hard to imagine that we鈥檒l never know all of them, all of their unique characters and storylines, all of their worlds to immerse, lose, or find ourselves in. But given the time we have now, while it strikes us as infinite, why not start somewhere to invigorate your own reading journey? The list above shows 101 books to read before you die, but that鈥檚 just the tip of the iceberg. Who鈥檚 to stop you from reading as much as you can?

The real question is: what are the books you want to read while you鈥檙e still alive?

Top books to read before you die – Additional Resources聽

• 60 Best Short Stories for High School Students聽
• AP Lit Reading List聽
• 150 Good Persuasive Speech Topics聽
• Best College Guidebooks