List Modern Library’s 100 novels 20th C
- #20BooksOfSummer
- It is time to get back some serious ‘classic reading’.
- I have chosen the Modern Library’s List of top 100 novels 20th C.
- I’ve read a few of these books but want to try to complete the list.
- I will check off each book as I progress.
READ: 28/100
1. Ulysses by James Joyce – READ
2. The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
3. A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by James Joyce
4. Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov – READ
5. Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
6. The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner – READ
7. Catch-22 by Joseph Heller – READ
8. Darkness at Noon by Arthur Koestler
9. Sons and Lovers by D.H. Lawrence
10. The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck – READ
11. Under the Volcano by Malcolm Lowry – READ
12. The Way of All Flesh by Samuel Butler
13. 1984 by George Orwell
14. I, Claudius by Robert Graves
15. To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf
16. An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser
17. The Heart is a Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers
18. Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut
19. Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison – READ
20. Native Son by Richard Wright
21. Henderson the Rain King by Saul Bellow
22. Appointment in Samarra by John O’Hara – READ
23. U.S.A. (trilogy) by John Dos Passos
24. Winesburg, Ohio by Sherwood Anderson
25. A Passage to India by E.M. Forster
26. The Wings of the Dove by Henry James
27. The Ambassadors by Henry James
28. Tender is the Night by F. Scott Fitzgerald
29. The Studs Lonigan Trilogy by James T. Farrell
30. The Good Solidier by Ford Madox Ford
31. Animal Farm by George Orwell – READ
32. The Golden Bowl by Henry James
33. Sister Carrie by Theodore Dreiser
34. A Handful of Dust by Evelyn Waugh
35. As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner
36. All the King’s Men by Robert Penn Warren – READ
37. The Bridge of San Luis Rey by Thornton Wilder – READ
38. Howards End by E.M. Forster – READ
39. Go Tell It on the Mountain by James Baldwin (review HERE) – READ
40. The Heart of the Matter by Graham Greene – READ
41. Lord of the Flies by William Golding – READ
42. Deliverance by James Dickey
43. A Dance to the Music of Time (series) by Anthony Powell
44. Point Counter Point by Aldous Huxley
45. The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway
46. The Secret Agent by Joseph Conrad
47. Nostromo by Joseph Conrad – READ
48. The Rainbow by D.H. Lawrence
49. Women in Love by D.H. Lawrence
50. Tropic of Cancerby Henry Miller
51. The Naked and the Dead by Norman Mailer
52. Portnoy’s Complaint by Philip Roth – READ
53. Pale Fire by Vladimir Nabokov
54. Light in August by William Faulkner
55. On the Road by Jack Kerouac
56. The Maltese Falcon by Dashiell Hammett
57. Parade’s End by Ford Madox Ford
58. The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton – READ
59. Zuleika Dobson by Max Beerbohm
60. The Moviegoer by Walker Percy
61. Death Comes for the Archbishop by Willa Cather
62. From Here to Eternity by James Jones
63. The Wapshot Chronicles by John Cheever – READ
64. The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger – READ
65. A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess
66. Of Human Bondage by W. Somerset Maugham – READ
67. Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad
68. Main Street by Sinclair Lewis – READ
69. The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton – READ
70. The Alexandria Quartet by Lawrence Durell
71. A High Wind in Jamaica by Richard Hughes
72. A House for Mr. Biswasby V.S. Naipaul
73. The Day of the Locustby Nathanael West
74. A Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway
75. Scoop by Evelyn Waugh
76. The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie by Muriel Spark
77. Finnegans Wake by James Joyce
78. Kim by Rudyard Kipling
79. A Room With a View by E.M. Forster – READ
80. Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh
81. The Adventures of Augie March by Saul Bellow
82. Angle of Repose by Wallace Stegner
83. A Bend in the River by V.S. Naipaul – READ
84. The Death of the Heart by Elizabeth Bowen
85. Lord Jim by Joseph Conrad – READ
86. Ragtime by E.L. Doctorow
87. The Old Wives Tale by Arnold Bennett
88. The Call of the Wild by Jack London
89. Loving by Henry Green
90. Midnight’s Children by Salman Rushdie
91. Tobacco Road by Erskine Caldwell
92. Ironweed by William Kennedy
93. The Magus by John Fowles
94. Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys – READ
95. Under the Net by Iris Murdoch
96. Sophie’s Choice by William Styron – READ
97. The Sheltering Sky by Paul Bowles
98. The Postman Always Rings Twice by James M. Cain
99. The Ginger Man by J.P. Donleavy
100. The Magnificent Ambersons by Booth Tarkington – READ
NancyElin 
Some great books to look forward to here Nancy – midnight’s children, angle of repose, brideshead revisited, a passage to India – some of my all time favourites.
I also have the Alexandria quartet on my TBR – maybe we should do a readalong some time in the future ?
That would be fun….sometimes I need a push. I want to put more feelings/insights into reviews of these books. Your ‘Exit West’ was great…and I still must read your last post. The book about Fabienne Verdier really opened up my eyes….and mind. Do take the time to look at that review and clikc on the link to watch the ‘creative process’ as she makes her art. Merveilleux!
That is an interesting list, Nancy. There is one here I have had for a long time but not yet read: The Moviegoer.
Do you recommend The Age of Innocence and The House of Mirth equally or do you prefer one over the other?
I loved both books…Age of Innocence and House of Mirth.
But must admit Age of Innocence …took my breath away. I’d start with that one!
Moviegover: I had never heard of this book!
Well it’s quite a list – and some of those you haven’t read are among my favourites! Wonder where you plan to start?!!
Start with the only book of the 100 on my Kindle: ‘Go Tell It On The Mountain’ (J. Baldwin).