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Ultimate Best Books

All :: Novels

    The Magic Mountain

    The Magic Mountain

    Thomas Mann

    4.33 (6)

    Die Geschichte Hans Castorps, die wir erzählen wollen, - nicht um seinetwillen (denn der Leser wird einen einfachen, wenn auch ansprechenden jungen Mann in ihm kennenlernen), sondern um der Geschichte willen, die uns in hohem Grade erzählenswert scheint (wobei zu Hans Castorps Gunsten denn doch erinnert werden sollte, dass es seine Geschichte ist, und dass nicht jedem jede Geschichte passiert): diese Geschichte ist sehr lange her, sie ist sozusagen schon ganz mit historischem Edelrost überzogenund unbedingt in der Zeitform der tiefsten Vergangenheit vorzutragen.

    #260
    RANK
    2,325
    POINTS
    The Call of the Wild

    The Call of the Wild

    Jack London

    3.65 (20)

    Buck did not read the newspapers, or he would have known that trouble was brewing, not alone for himself, but for every tide-water dog, strong of muscle and with warm, long hair, from Puget Sound to San Diego.

    #35
    RANK
    16,219
    POINTS
    The Tin Drum

    The Tin Drum

    Günter Grass

    4.2 (5)

    Granted: I'm an inmate of a mental institution; my keeper watches me, scarcely lets me out of his sight; for there's a peephole in the door, and my keeper's eye is the shade of brown that can't see through blue-eyed types like me.

    #215
    RANK
    3,178
    POINTS
    The 42nd Parallel

    The 42nd Parallel

    John Dos Passos

    4.0 (3)

    General Mills with his gaudy uniform and spirited charger was the center for all eyes especially as his steed was extremely restless.

    #322
    RANK
    1,761
    POINTS
    Under the Volcano

    Under the Volcano

    Malcolm Lowry

    4.2 (5)

    Two mountain chains traverse the republic roughly from north to south, forming between them a number of valleys and plateaus.

    #289
    RANK
    1,970
    POINTS
    Disgrace

    Disgrace

    J. M. Coetzee

    3.29 (7)

    For a man of his age, fifty-two, divorced, he has, to his mind, solved the problem of sex rather well.

    #235
    RANK
    2,866
    POINTS
    The Diary of a Young Girl

    The Diary of a Young Girl

    Anne Frank

    4.4 (20)

    On Friday, 12th June, I woke up at six o' clock and no wonder; it was my birthday

    #21
    RANK
    22,476
    POINTS
    Bleak House

    Bleak House

    Charles Dickens

    4.63 (8)

    London. Michaelmas term lately over, and the Lord Chancellor sitting in Lincoln's Inn Hall.

    #168
    RANK
    4,535
    POINTS
    Light in August

    Light in August

    William Faulkner

    4.2 (5)

    Sitting beside the road, watching the wagon mount the hill toward her, Lena thinks, 'I have come from Alabama: a fur piece.'

    #229
    RANK
    2,971
    POINTS
    The Scarlet Letter

    The Scarlet Letter

    Nathaniel Hawthorne

    3.53 (19)

    A throng of bearded men, in sad-colored garments and gray, steeple-crowned hats, intermixed with women, some wearing hoods, and others bareheaded, was assembled in front of a wooden edifice, the door of which was heavily timbered with oak, and studded with iron spikes.

    #26
    RANK
    20,944
    POINTS