What caused the list to get started was people asking me for suggestions.  I started emailing them to friends, and found I enjoyed compiling the list, which was getting longer and longer.  No one of my friends was gong to read all this stuff, and meanwhile, the list is here.  Maybe someone else would enjoy it. 

A list like this is a compilation of personal taste.  People who know me think that I must read serious, deep stuff, but that is not the case at all.  I read for fun.  If I want intellectual exercise (or even if I don't), I have plenty of other things to do.   I think the reading is left over from the childhood desire for someone to tell me a story.  So, the books below are all fiction.  There are many genres, but they do all have something in common. 

One is that they are well written.  That means to me that the prose is clear and straightforward, free of awkwardness, contrivance, self-consciousness, or pretention.  

Second, I really do want a story.  I don't care what about, but it should be a good story.   If it is poetic, but nothing is happening, I am not interested.  If it is really a great story but you have to read 300 pages before there is any forward motion, I will never find out, because I would have quit after about 10 pages.

Third, I want some wonder, which no longer means kings and queens and magic as it did in childhood, but rather, a look into something new to me.  Several of the books interested me because they were about a time and place I knew nothing about, not superficially so, but in a way that gave a good picture of how strange and different it was.  Some of them are a look into the minds of people who are very unusual or peculiar -- I always wonder what on earth people like this can be thinking, and here is an author with an intelligent guess.    A few books qualified by being terribly funny -- that is wonder enough for me.

Finally, I want the characters to come alive, to live and breathe and seem like real people, even the totally peculiar or crazy ones.  (I don't know how authors do this.  I myself could write about the most interesting and idiosyncratic person in the world and it would have all the breath and presence of a technical manual. )

So, here is my current list of favorites.  These have changed over time, and will probably go on evolving,  so I add to the list from time to time.  Feel free to let me know what you think.  Contact me through Talk to Us.

Someone raised the question of whether this is "women's" fiction.  I do admit to being a woman, and these are my choices.  But just for fun, I did some counting.  Of the first 21 listings, with 23 recommendations, 10 have a woman as the main character,  10 a man as the main character, one has both a man and a woman, and 2 a kid.  Seems rather balanced.  Presumably additional listings will maintain that balance.

Challenge to the readers:  Write a book with the same title as the selection for "worst", but make it more worth reading.  (This is not a difficult assignment).  Perhaps we will run a contest.

3.    Pete Dexter "Paris Trout".  Totally surprising -- I never met anyone like this.

4.    Ruth Rendell "The Bridesmaid".  The word that comes to my mind about this is "Gothic", but there are no castles, innocent heroines under threat of murder (and too stupid to run away), etc.  Characters who stubbornly remain who they are instead of doing what is good for them -- a hallmark of hers.  She has written a lot of other books, all very readable.  Many of them offer a look into the minds of some very unusual people,  but in my opinion this is the best one.

5.    E.L. Doctorow "The Book of Daniel".  A cynical look at the nastier side of American government and a compassionate view of the lives it destroys.  His other work does not begin to meet the standard of this one.

6.    Margaret Atwood. "Oryx and Crake".  Very high quality science fiction.  Most of what passes for "science fictionn" nowadays is space opera or stupid fantasy, and neither about science nor very interesting.  Atwood seems to see clearly the probable result of some current trends.   She could well be right .  Her earlier book  "The Handmaid's Tale" is starting to come true.  At the time I read it I thought it couldn't happen here.  Now I think it can.  How things change in 10 years, and Thank You to all religious fanatics.

7.    Cecilia Holland "Great Maria".  A time and place no one ever heard of, but it was real.  The mores and lifestyle are quite unfamiliar, and the author explains nothing.  You can only go by what the characters say and do.  A prolific writer, her early books are all about unknown pockets of history and, as with this one, lacking any explanation.  Figure it out yourself. You wind up getting quite a perspective on our own culture.  In my opinion her more recent work is not as good.

8.    Michael Frayn "A Landing on the Sun".  Starts out in a very understated way and then unexpectedly morphs into the funniest book I have read in years. 

9. Helen Dunmore "The Siege". A young woman barely out of her teens gets saddled with a lot of problems when her mother dies, and is coping rather well.  Then Germany invades Russia, and no one can cope really.  But somehow some people do.  The history is well researched and the story is well written.   

10.   Martyn Bedford "Acts of Revision"    At first I doubted that the main character was crazy  -- some of what he has to say makes perfect sense.

11.   Kerry Hardie "A Winter Marriage"   Another book about people continuing to be exactly who they are, even when a small change in attitude and behavior would avoid catastrophe.

12.    Elizabeth Burns "Tilt".  A very nice woman in a very difficult situation.  We are not always the cause of our own problems. 

13.    Robert Cohen "Inspired Sleep".  Starts out like it is going to be a light boy-meets-girl, but that isn't where it is going.  Scary, thought-provoking and occasionally truly funny.  By comparison most "horror" novels seem contrived and trite.

14.  Jane Shapiro  "The Dangerous Husband".  Very, very funny -- I howled with laughter. 

15.    Laura Cunningham "Sleeping Arrangements".  Not about sex, or even boy meets girl, but a lovely memoir of growing up in a very eccentric family, and an unsentimental take on the 'innocence" of childhood..

16.   Alan Cumyn  "Losing It".  An amazingly well imagined portrayal of what it might be like to slip into Alzheimer's dementia. That's the mother.   The daughter has a son in the terrible twos, and her husband is being more of a jerk than even an average jerky husband .   Consequences of his sexual roaming are absurdly, but plausibly out of proportion to the crime; consequences of neglecting his wife when she has so much trouble are absurdly but plausibly non-existent.  I think he got about what he deserved, but for all the wrong reasons.  She deserved better.

17.    Arthur Solmssen "Alexander's Feast".  If you've been looking for a cliffhanger about merger and acquisition law, search no further.  This book really is exactly that, and a very interesting, surprising and intricate story it is.  It is also a portrait of a very complicated man.  We women rarely get this kind of look into how men think.  All Solmssen's other books are worth reading, but this one stands out.

18.  Alice Hoffman "At Risk".  I cried.  I haven't cried over a book since I was 15 years old.  Yes it's a very sad story, but it was completely free of contrivance or sentimental slush  -- unadorned tragedy is the most tragic.  It also showed how the situation affected a wide circle of people, who were all doing their best, but none of whom were entirely saintly. 

19.  Donna Tartt "The Secret History" A chilling story  of homicide.  Not a detective thriller, we know from the beginning that it happened and who did it.  But why?  How did this happen?  And if you entertain any thoughts that high intelligence implies good judgement, it is time to be disabused.

20. Isaac Bathshevis Singer "The Slave".  An early work by this prolific author, and possibly the best of his writing.  Some of his later works get self-conscious or precious, but this one is a gem.   A fine study in what "primitive" really means, and a look at a completely forgotten and truly degraded culture. 

21.  Patty Friedman "Eleanor Rushing". I was reading with great attention this story of a woman who knows what she wants and is ever so much more clever and persistent than I am in getting  it (and ever so much more self-assured too).  I am pretty dense about things, I suppose, because I was at least halfway through the book before I began to understand what was going on, yet the information was there much sooner.  Nonetheless, the second half of the book was at least as good as the first.  This is an very subtle and complex piece of writing.

22, Kate Grenville "The Idea of Perfection".  Beautifully drawn characters, and a very interesting story drawn from "ordinary" life.  Maybe no one is as ordinary as they seem.  I was introduced to Kate Grenville via "Albion's Story", which is also very well written, and quite horrifying.

23. Zoe Heller "What Was She Thinking".  If you've ever been a woman, you don't have to stretch too far to know what "she" was thinking.  This is fortunate, because the narrator tells us what happened but  never does tell us what "she" was thinking.  We find out much more about what the narrator was thinking, and I am thinking that is more interesting.

24. Caroline Leavitt "Into Thin Air".  A young woman with a doting husband and beautiful newborn vanishes; it soon becomes apparent she meant to leave.  Why would someone do this?  And what happens to her afterwards?  And what happens to those she left behind?  Intelligently imagined and very interesting to read.

25. Mark Lee "The Canal House". Romance, adventure, idealism and treachery.  The entire story hangs together beautifully, and it all seems quite real.

26. Frances Mayes "Swan".  Swan is the name of a southern town.  The death of a young mother has a profoundly bad and long lasting  effect on all the members of her family; and then things start getting weird.  A nearly perfect narrative, with one unfortunate line in the last chapter which nearly wrecks everything.  I decided to pretend that line was not there.

27.  Ann-Marie MacDonald "The Way the Crow Flies".  A long and very complex story about a "normal" family -- maybe the most normal family in the world.  Very well crafted and very well written.  Fascinating, frightening and infuriating.  A number of short essays on the origins of the U.S. space program are scattered throughout the book.  The information in them is tangential to the book, and I can't agree at all with the conclusions she draws.  I think the book would be stronger without these distractions.  The story stands quite well on its own.

28.  Nancy Rawles "My Jim".  We all know slavery is a terrible thing -- but maybe we don't know just how terrible.  Find out here.  And read about abiding love, and absolute decency.

29.  Anne Roiphe "If You Knew Me" .  A boy meets girl which is not cute, coy, simplistic, or trite.  Charming and very real.

30.  Charles Powers "In the Memory of the Forest".  Set in a small village in post-Soviet Poland, the book tells a very good story, draws numerous characters both admirable and otherwise with respect and without condescension, provides a clear picture of the difficulties both of the Soviet approach and of attempting a transition to a market based economy, and beautifully evokes the natural scenery of the area.  Very fine writing.

31.  Mary McGarry Morris "The Lost Mother".  A nasty story, told in deceptively simple language, of bad people trampling all over others who are powerless.  Her book "A Dangerous Woman" is also beautifully written and very touching. 

32.  Alan Furst "The Polish Officer".  An  interesting and multi-layered account of a forgotten corner of World War II.  Several other books by Furst , all fascinating,  explore other forgotten areas of WW II.   If you think you are too cynical now, maybe you shouldn't read these; Furst slips in some pretty shocking facts.   I promise you will be more cynical when you are done.

33. Joyce Carol Oates "Foxfire".  A very unusual teenage girl, who succeeds better than most at serious rebellion.  It resonated with me, the failed teenage rebel, and showed me what I suppose I always knew: that what is arrayed against you is massive, endemic and overwhelming.  Oates is a very prolific writer, and most of her books are worth reading.  This one was upsetting, perhaps because of its connection to my own life and failures.

34.  Kim Edwards "The Memory Keeper's Daughter".  Finely written book about families, children, and how a serious lie grows roots and branches and works its way into the fabric of life -- the liar's life and that of everyone connected to him; and how such a lie poisons everything.  We are all supposed to know this, but this book makes us feel it in a very personal way. 

35.  Elizabeth Benedict "The Practice of Deceit". Definitely a page turner.  A good attempt to depict a pathological personality.  Perhaps the most important points are how credible these people seem, and also how much damage they cause.

36.  Paul Watkins "The Forger"  Beautiful creative writing, plenty of suspense,  well researched and with unusual characters who are understandable and believable.  The plot holds together without any inconsistencies or stupid, irrelevant digressions.  We're talking about art forgery here, not check forgery.

37.  Nick Hornby "A Long Way Down".  That's from the roof of a high building.  Four people with nothing in common except that they considered the short route down wind up getting together, but they are not warm, wonderful, or special in any way.  A very real look at how much we need other people, how bad we can be with other people, and how it is worthwhile anyway. Along the way it is also quite a funny book..   

38.  Barry Unsworth "Sacred Hunger".   A story of greed, capitalism and humanity.  Although the writing is simple, this is a very deep book, full of people being human beings, neither fully good nor bad,  not living up to anyone's ideals and theories; and full of opposing viewpoints, each with their merits.   Fascinating reading, and full of things to think about.  An amazing book.  You could try also "The Rage of the Vulture", which is very interesting, although not as strong a book in my opinion.  . Turkey in 1908 is not well known here.  This indepth portrait of the place and time illuminates a lot about the current Muslim world.  The main character, a British military attache has an unusual history. 

39. Lois-Ann Yamanaka "Behold the Many".  Most books have some "lyrical" passages which are  self-conscious and clumsy attempts at more "picturesque" writing, and serve mainly to interrupt the flow of the narrative.  Here is a book where the lyricism is intrinsic and fundamental to moving the story forward. Gorgeous and terrible.  A masterpiece of fine writing.

40.  Calvin Trillin "Tepper Isn't Going Out".  Laugh out loud book about parking in New York City.  The joys of legal parking and being an ordinary person are hilariously explored.