List :: Books of the Century by Waterstone

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  #31

  Lolita

  by Vladimir Nabokov

  (35 Reviews)

  Overall Rank: 5

  856 points

  "Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. Lo-lee-ta: the tip of the tongue taking a trip of three steps down the palette to tap, at three, on the teeth."

  

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• 

  #32

  The Wasp Factory

  by Iain Banks

  (7 Reviews)

  Overall Rank: 273

  77 points

  "I had been making the rounds of the Sacrifice Poles the day we heard my brother had escaped."

  

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• 

  #33

  In Search of Lost Time

  by Marcel Proust

  (7 Reviews)

  Overall Rank: 25

  455 points

  "For a long time, I would go to bed early. [Fr., Longtemps, je me suis couche de bonne heure.]"

  

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• 

  #34

  Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

  by Roald Dahl

  (16 Reviews)

  Overall Rank: 144

  135 points

  "These two very old people are the father and mother of Mr Bucket."

  

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• 

  #35

  Of Mice and Men

  by John Steinbeck

  (37 Reviews)

  Overall Rank: 36

  349 points

  "A few miles south of Soledad, the Salinas River drops in close to the hillside bank and runs deep and green."

  

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• 

  #36

  Beloved

  by Toni Morrison

  (14 Reviews)

  Overall Rank: 8

  719 points

  "124 was spiteful. Full of baby's venom. The women in the house knew it and so did the children."

  

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  #37

  Possession

  by A.S. Byatt

  (6 Reviews)

  Overall Rank: 135

  142 points

  "The book was thick and black and covered with dust."

  

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  #38

  Heart of Darkness

  by Joseph Conrad

  (17 Reviews)

  Overall Rank: 32

  382 points

  "The Nellie, a cruising yawl, swung to her anchor without a flutter of the sails, and was at rest. The flood had made, the wind was nearly calm, and being bound down the river, the only thing for it..."

  

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• 

  #39

  A Passage to India

  by E. M. Forster

  (8 Reviews)

  Overall Rank: 24

  469 points

  "Except for the Marabar caves--and they are twenty miles off--the city of Chrandrapore presents nothing extraordinary."

  

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• 

  #40

  Watership Down

  by Richard Adams

  (11 Reviews)

  Overall Rank: 82

  225 points

  "The primroses were over."

  

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