ESL Blogs

Following is a list of books selected by the readers of the BBC site as the best books.  I have indicated if I have read the book by writing "yes" beside it.  How many have you read?  Any favorites?

BBC Top 100

1.    The Lord of the Rings - Yes

2.    Pride and Prejudice -Yes

3.    His Dark Materials - Phillip Pullman - Yes

4.   The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams -    Yes

5.   Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire - Yes

6.   To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee – Yes

7.   Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne - Yes

8.   Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell - Yes

9.   The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - Yes

10.  Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte -Yes

11.  Catch 22 - Joseph Heller - Yes

12.  Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte -Yes

13.  Birdsong - Sebastian Faulk -  partially

14.  Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier - Yes

15.  The Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger -Yes

16.  The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame - Yes

17.  Great Expectations - Charles Dickens - Yes

18.  Little Women - Louisa M Alcott  no

19.  Captain Corelli’s Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres - No

20.  War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy - No

21.  Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell - Yes

22.  Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone - JK Rowling - Yes

23.  Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets - JK Rowling - Yes

24.  Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban - JK Rowling - Yes

25.  The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien - ; Yes

26.  Tess of the D’Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy - No

27.  Middlemarch - George Eliot - No

28.  A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving -partially

29.   Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck - Yes; one of my faves

30.   Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll - Yes

31.  The Story of Tracy Beaker - Jacqueline Wilson - Yes

32.  One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez - No

33. The Pillars of the Earth - Ken Follett - partially

34. David Copperfield - Charles Dickens - no

35. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Yes

36. Treasure Island - Robert Louis Stevenson - yes

37. A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute - Yes; it's great!

38. Persuasion - Jane Austen -Yes

39. Dune - Frank Herbert - Yes

40. Emma - Jane Austen -Yes

41. Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery - ? Maybe

42. Watership Down - Richard Adams - Yes

43. The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald - Yes

44. Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas -Yes

45.  Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh - no

46.  Animal Farm - George Orwell - Yes

47.  A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens - Yes

48.  Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy - No

49.  Goodnight Mister Tom, Michelle Magorian - no

50.  The Shell Seekers - Rosamunde Pilcher - no

51.  The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett -Yes

52.  Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck - Yes

53.  The Stand - Stephen King - Yes

54.   Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy - Not Yet

55.   A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth – No

56.   The BFG, Roald Dahl - yes

57.   Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome - No

58.   Black Beauty - Anna Sewell - Yes

59.   Artemis Fowl - Eoin Colfer - Yes

60.   Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky - Yes; should be top 10 here

61.   Noughts and Crosses - Malorie Blackman - no

62.   Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden - Yes

63.   A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens - Yes; great book

64.  The Thornbirds - Colleen McCullough - yes

65.  Mort, Terry Pratchett - Yes

66.  The Magic Faraway Tree - Enid Blyton - No

67.  The Magus - John Fowles - no

68.   Good Omens - Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman - Partially

69.  Guards! Guards! - Terry Pratchett - Yes

70.  Lord of the Flies - William Golding - Yes

71.  Perfume - Patrick Süskind - no

72.   The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists - Robert Tressel - no

73.   Night Watch - Terry Pratchett - Yes

74.   Matilda - Roald Dahl - Yes, great.

75.   Bridget Jones Diary - Helen Fielding - Yes

76.   The Secret History - Donna Tartt -No

77.   The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins - NO

78.   Ulysses - James Joyce - Started; about half finished

79.   Bleak House - Charles Dickens -No;

80.  Double Act - Jacqueline Wilson - No

81.  The Twits - Roald Dahl - Yes

82.   I Capture the Castle - Dodie Smith - no

83.   Holes - Louis Sachar - Yes, good author.

84.   Gormenghast - Mervyn Peake - No

85.   The God of Small Things - Arundhati Roy - No

86.   Vicky Angel - Jacqueline Wilson - No

87.   Brave New World - Aldous Huxley - Yes

88.   Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons - No

89.   Magician - Raymond E. Feist - Yes

90.   On The Road - Jack Kerouac - Yes

91.  The Godfather - Mario Puzo - No

92.   The Clan of the Cave Bear - Jean M. Auel - Yes and all the sequels

93.  The Colour of Magic - Terry Pratchett - Yes

94.  The Alchemist - Paulo Coelho - No

95.  Katharine - Anya Seton - No

96.  Kane and Abel - Jeffrey Archer - No

97.  Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez - No

98.  Girls in Love - Jacqueline Wilson - No

99.  The Princess Diaries - Meg Cabot - No

100. Midnight’s Children - Salman Rushdie - Yes

Several of these I had begun reading on my Kindle and my Kindle quit working :(   I haven't replaced it so I haven't finished those books.  "Ulysses" I have in hard back but haven't finished.  It is a slower read "Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man" which I did read.

You can see the BBC article here http://www.bbc.co.uk/arts/bigread/top100.shtml