65 books everyone should read before they die

In the collection of short stories in Interpreter of Maladies, Jhumpa Lahiri outlines the complex dynamics that exist when Indian traditionalism meets an American culture that often offers little respect for complex cultural dynamics it doesn’t understand. Each character’s story traces many of the most recognisable novel elements—longing, lust, betrayal—but they’re told in an exotic storyline that’s rich with detail and minutia.

A winner of the National Book Award for fiction, Ralph Ellison’s first novel, Invisible Man, spent an admirable 16 weeks atop the bestseller’s list. In large part, its early success is due to the relatable nature of its narrator, a young, nameless black man who has to navigate levels of American culture that are fraught with hate and bias in 1950s America. Eager for a place in time to call his own, the narrator finds that what he hopes for himself will remain elusive, just as the truth behind the events that surround him is ambiguous.

Chris Ware’s hero Jimmy Corrigan fancies himself the smartest kid on earth, but below that chutzpah is a timid, scared man who’s just looking for acceptance. A resolution seems to come when, at age 36, Corrigan has the opportunity to meet his father for the first time. What evolves is a retelling, in graphic and illustrative detail, of a lineage of Corrigan men who, like Jimmy, are paralysed by the fear or being unliked and unwanted.

You knew him for his exotic culinary-focused trips to the far reaches of the earth, but Anthony Bourdain’s career began the way of many not-so-famous chefs—working on the line of a kitchen. Behind the polished silver and pressed linen facade of the world’s best kitchens lies “wacked-out moral degenerates, dope fiends, refugees, a thuggish assortment of drunks, sneak thieves, sluts, and psychopaths,” Bourdain wrote in Kitchen Confidential. Bourdain tells all about the underbelly of fine-dining establishments in a way that makes you laugh—maybe cringe—and certainly look admiringly upon the people who put food on your plate.

If ever you doubted the power of small events, Kate Atkinson’s Life After Life will illustrate in painstakingly exquisite detail the real impact those moments can have. This novel is the story of one woman, told in two manners. Ursula Todd dies as she’s born, strangled by the umbilical cord. Ursula Todd is also born, saved by a doctor who’s able to free the umbilical cord from around her neck. Each of Ursula’s decision leads to a result, sometimes death. With each death, the story is born again with the timeless hook that draws every reader in: What next?

Life on the American frontier is often romanticised, but Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House on the Prairie offers a glimpse into what life was like for Western pioneers. After leaving behind their home in the Big Woods of Wisconsin, Laura and her family, including sister Mary, travel by covered wagon deep into the prairies of Kansas. There, they must build a home and start a new life, but just as that’s beginning; they find themselves caught up in a situation that threatens to upend their new existence.

Vladimir Nabokov’s Lolita may have first gained fame and notoriety for its infamous accounting of the protagonist’s unusual erotic predilections, but its staying power rests squarely on the breathtaking love story that belies the most controversial elements. It’s requiem about love, in all its maddening forms.

Florentino Ariza and Fermina Daza are passionately in love, but as often happens with young love, the two are split when obligations force Fermina to marry a wealthy, well-born doctor. A devastated Florentino works his way into a successful businessman, pining for the day when he can one day confess his love to Fermina again. Fifty years, nine months, and four days later, he’s able to. Gabriel Garcia Márquez’s Love in the Time of Cholera sets atop a pile of romance novels but stands alone for its magical, splendid writing, and spellbinding story of worthwhile love.

Shakespeare’s Montagues and Capulets can barely hold a handle to Louise Eldrich’s Kashpaws and Lamartines. Love Medicine, a dazzling work of storytelling that takes place on and around a North Dakota Ojibwe reservation, shares the intertwined fates of two multi-generational families. Themes of injustice, betrayal, magic, and mystique surround a beautiful story that, in the end, is all about the power of love.

Between 1942 and 1945, Viktor Frankl laboured in four Nazi death camps. His parents, brother, and pregnant wife perished. Later in life, Frankl became a psychiatrist and practiced what he coined logotherapy, a theory that our lives are primarily driven by the discovery and pursuit of what we personally find meaningful in our lives. In his book Man’s Search for Meaning, Frankl shares the horrors he faced in those concentration camps, but he also shares the lessons he learned—and taught others he saw in his practice—about spiritual revival in the face of such great suffering.