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Since 1944, the goal of the Notable Books Council of the American Library Association has been to make available to the nation's readers a list of 25 very good, very readable, and at times very important fiction, nonfiction, and poetry books for the adult reader.
2007
Fiction
Bigsby, Christopher. Beautiful Dreamer
Dean, Debra. The Madonnas of Leningrad.
Desai, Kiran. The Inheritance of Loss
Doig, Ivan. The Whistling Season
Grenville, Kate. The Secret River
Khadra, Yasmina. The Attack
Lansens, Lori. The Girls
McCarthy, Cormac. The Road
Meek, James. The People’s Act of Love
Mitchell, David. Black Swan Green
Murakami, Haruki. Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman
Savage, Sam. Firman: Adventures of a Metropolitan Lowlife Nonfiction
Bechdel, Alison. Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic
Egan, Timothy. The Worst Hard Time: The Untold Story of Those Who Survived the Great American Dust Bowl
Flannery, Tim. The Weather Makers: How Man Is Changing the Climate and What It Means for Life on Earth
Greene, Melissa Fay. There Is No Me without You: One Woman’s Odyssey to Rescue Africa’s Children
Hessler, Peter. Oracle Bones: A Journey between China’s Past and Present
Horne, Jed. Breach of Faith: Hurricane Katrina and the Near Death of a Great American City
King, Ross. The Judgment of Paris: The Revolutionary Decade That Gave the World Impressionism
Kolbert, Elizabeth. Field Notes from a Catastrophe: Man, Nature, and Climate Change
Phillips, Julie. James Tiptree, Jr.: The Double Life of Alice B. Sheldon
Zoellner, Tom. The Heartless Stone: A Journey through the World of Diamonds, Deceit, and Desire Poetry
Flenniken, Kathleen. Famous
Satterlee, Thom. Burning Wyclif
Slavitt, David R. William Henry Harrison and Other Poems
2006
Fiction
Bates, Judy Fong. Midnight at the Dragon Café
Foer, Jonathan Safran. Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close
Gaitskill, Mary. Veronica
Ghosh, Amitav. The Hungry Tide
Ishiguro, Kazuo. Never Let Me Go
Iweala, Uzodinma. Beasts of No Nation
McCarthy, Cormac. No Country for Old Men
McEwan, Ian. Saturday
Murakami, Haruki. Kafka on the Shore
Robinson, Marilynne. Gilead
Urrea, Luis Alberto. The Hummingbird's Daughter
Nonfiction
Alexievich, Svetlana. Voices from Chernobyl
Anonymous. A Woman in Berlin: Eight Weeks in the Conquered City. Tr. by Philip Boehm
Bordewich, Fergus. Bound for Canaan: The Under-ground Railroad and the War for the Soul of America
Cathcart, Brian. The Fly in the Cathedral: How a Group of Cambridge Scientists Won the International Race to Split the Atom
Diamond, Jared M. Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed
Eichenwald, Kurt. Conspiracy of Fools
Lepore, Jill. New York Burning: Liberty, Slavery, and Conspiracy in Eighteenth-Century Manhattan
Moorehead, Caroline. Human Cargo: A Journey among Refugees
Packer, George. The Assassins' Gate: America in Iraq
Reiss, Tom. The Orientalist: Solving the Mystery of a Strange and Dangerous Life
Reynolds, David S. John Brown, Abolitionist: The Man Who Killed Slavery, Sparked the Civil War, and Seeded Civil Rights
Walker, Stephen. Shockwave: Count-down to Hiroshima
Walls, Jeannette. The Glass Castle Poetry
Alexander, Elizabeth. American Sublime
Dybeck, Stuart. Streets in Their Own Ink
2005
Fiction
Barnes, Julian. The Lemon Table
Christensen, Lars Saabye.The Half Brother
De Bernières, Louis. Birds without Wings
Dybek, Stuart. I Sailed with Magellan
Khadra, Yasmina. The Swallows of Kabul
Mda, Zakes. The Madonna of Excelsior
Mitchell, David. Cloud Atlas
Munro, Alice. Runaway
Niemi, Mikael. Popular Music from Vittula
Roth, Philip. The Plot against America
Wolff, Tobias. Old School
Nonfiction
Chernow, Ron. Alexander Hamilton
Ehrlich, Paul R. and Ehrlich, Anne E. One with Nineveh: Politics, Consumption, and the Human Future
Fischer, David Hackett. Washington's Crossing
Henig, Robin Marantz. Pandora's Baby: How the First Test Tube Babies Sparked the Reproductive Revolution
Hersh, Seymour M. Chain of Command: The Road from 9/11 to Abu Ghraib
Hughes, Robert. Goya
Kurlansky, Mark. 1968: The Year That Rocked the World
Lansky, Aaron. Outwitting History: How One Man Rescued a Million Books and Saved a Civilization
Moats, David. Civil Wars: A Battle for Gay Marriage
National Commission on Terrorist Attacks upon the United States. The 9/11 Commission Report: Final Report of the National Commission on Terrorists Attacks upon the United States
Philbrick, Nathaniel. Sea of Glory: America's Voyage of Discovery: The U.S. Exploring Expedition, 1838-1842
Sokolove, Michael. The Ticket Out: Darryl Strawberry and the Boys of Crenshaw
Vine, Phyllis. One Man's Castle: Clarence Darrow in Defense of the American Dream Poetry
Giovanni, Nikki. The Collected Poetry of Nikki Giovanni, 1968-1998
Kooser, Ted. Delights and Shadows
2004
Fiction
Ali, Monica, Brick Lane
Antunes, Antonio Lobo, The Inquisitor's Manual
Boyd, William, Any Human Heart
Carey, Edward, Alva and Irva:The Twins Who Saved a City
Casares, Oscar, Brownsville: Stories
Haddon, Mark, Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time
Hosseini, Khaled, The Kite Runner
Jones, Edward P., The Known World
Lethem, Jonathan, The Fortress of Solitude
Morrison, Toni, Love
O'Connor, Joseph, Star of the Sea
Packer, ZZ, Drinking Coffee Elsewhere
Saramago, Jose, The Cave
Nonfiction
Boyd, Valerie, Wrapped in Rainbows: The Life of Zora Neale Hurston
Faderman, Lillian, Naked in the Promised Land: A Memoir
Hagedorn, Ann, Beyond the River
Hays, Sharon, Flat Broke with Children: Women in the Age of Welfare Reform
Kidder, Tracy, Mountains Beyond Mountains
King, Ross, Michelangelo and the Pope's Ceiling
Krakauer, Jon, Under the Banner of Heaven
LeBlanc, Adrian Nicole, Random Family: Love, Drugs, and Coming of Age in the Bronx
Pringle, Peter, Food Inc.: Mendel to Monsanto-The Promises and Perils of the Biotech Harvest
Quammen, David, Monster of God: The Man-Eating Predator in the Jungles of History and the Mind
Taubman, William, Krushchev: The Man and His Era
Von Drehle, David, Triangle: The Fire That Changed America Poetry
Espada, Martin, Alabanza: New and Selected Poems
2003
Fiction
Auster, Paul. The Book of Illusions
Cisneros, Sandra. Caramelo
Doerr, Anthony. The Shell Collector
Labiner, Norah. Miniatures
Lustig, Arnost Lovely Green Eyes
McEwan, Ian. Atonement
McGahern, John. By the Lake
Merullo, Roland. In Revere, in Those Days
Mistry, Rohinton. Family Matters
Oe, Kenzaburo. Rouse Up, O Young Men of the New Age!
Shteyngart, Gary. The Russian Debutante's Handbook
Slouka, Mark. God's Fool
Nonfiction
Babel, Isaac. The Complete Works of Isaac Babel
Berger, John. Selected Essays
Campbell, Greg. Blood Diamonds
Caro, Robert. Master of the Senate
Gawande, Atul. Complications: A Surgeon's Notes on an Imperfect Science
Gordon, Robert. Can't Be Satisfied
Morris, Edmund. Theodore Rex
Preston, Diana. Lusitania: An Epic Tragedy
Stiles, T. J. Jesse James: Last Rebel of the Civil War
Stille, Alexander. The Future of the Past
Wilson, Edward O. The Future of Life Poetry
Dugan, Alan. Poems Seven: New and Complete Poetry
Hall, Donald. The Painted Bed
Trethewey, Natasha. Bellocq's Ophelia
2002
Fiction
Carey, Peter, True History of the Kelly Gang
Chaon, Dan, Among the Missing
Davis, Lydia, Samuel Johnson Is Indignant: Stories
Everett, Percival, Erasure: A Novel
Franzen, Jonathan, The Corrections: A Novel
Gordimer, Nadine, The Pickup: A Novel
MacLeod, Alistair, Island: The Complete Stories
Olds, Bruce, Bucking the Tiger
Sebald, W.G., Austerlitz
Suri, Manil, The Death of Vishnu
Winegardner, Mark, Crooked River Burning
Nonfiction
Arana, Marie, American Chica: Two Worlds, One Childhood
Connell, Evan, Aztec Treasure House: New and Selected Essays
Elliot, Jason, An Unexpected Light: Travels in Afghanistan
Halberstam, David, War in a Time of Peace: Bush, Clinton and the Generals
Hallinan, Joseph T., Going up the River: Travels in a Prison Nation
Hessler, Peter, River Town: Two Years on the Yangtze
Hillenbrand, Laura, Seabiscuit: an American Legend
Lerner, Barron H., The Breast Cancer Wars: Hope, Fear & the Pursuit of a Cure in Twentieth-Century America
Martinez, Ruben, Crossing Over: A Mexican Family on the Migrant Trail
McCullough, David, John Adams
Schlosser, Eric, Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal
Smith, Jean Edward, Grant
Solomon, Andrew, The Noonday Demon: An Atlas of Depression Poetry
Collins, Billy, Sailing Alone around the Room: New and Selected Poems
Mueller, Melinda, What the Ice Gets: Shackleton's Antarctic Expedition 1914-1916
2001
Fiction
Atwood, Margaret, The Blind Assassin
Busch, Frederick, Don't Tell Anyone
Chabon, Michael, Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay
Coetzee, J. M., Disgrace
Crace, Jim, Being Dead
DeWitt, Helen, Last Samurai
Kalpakian, Laura, Delinquent Virgin
King, Thomas, Truth and Bright Water
Kneale, Matthew, English Passengers
Nelson, Antonya, Living to Tell
Ondaatje, Michael, Anil's Ghost
Paine, Tom, Scar Vegas
Smith, Zadie, White Teeth
Williams, Joy, The Quick and the Dead
Nonfiction
Barzun, Jacques, From Dawn to Decadence: 500 Years of Western Cultural Life, 1500 to the Present
Eggers, Dave, A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius
Fleming, Fergus, Barrow's Boys
Kaplan, Alice Yaeger, Collaborator: The Trial and Execution of Robert Brasillach
Ridley, Matt, Genome: The Autobiography of a Species in 23 Chapters
Sciolino, Elaine, Persian Mirrors: The Elusive Face of Iran
Shakespeare, Nicholas, Bruce Chatwin
Thubron, Colin, In Siberia Poetry
Heaney, Seamus, Beowulf: A New Translation
Kunitz, Stanley, Collected Poems of Stanley Kunitz
Murray, Les, Learning Human: Selected Poems
2000
Fiction
Bainbridge, Beryl. Master Georgie
Cunningham, Michael. The Hours
Cusk, Rachel. The Country Life
Doyle, Roddy. A Star Called Henry
Dubus, Andre House of Sand and Fog
Englander, Nathan. For the Relief of Unbearable Urges
Jin, Ha. Waiting
Johnston, Wayne. The Colony of Unrequited Dreams
Just, Ward. A Dangerous Friend
Lee, Chang-rae. A Gesture Life
Letham, Jonathan. Motherless Brooklyn
Reuss, Frederick. Henry of Atlantic City
Nonfiction
Belkin, Lisa. Show Me a Hero: A Tale of Murder, Suicide, Race and Redemption
Bowden, Mark. Black Hawk Down: A Story of Modern War
Dower, John. Embracing Defeat: Japan in the Wake of World War II
Greene, Brian. The Elegant Universe: Superstrings, Hidden Dimensions, and the Quest for the Ultimate Theory
Hirsch, Edward. How to Read a Poem and Fall in Love with Poetry
Klemperer, Victor. I Will Bear Witness: A Diary of the Nazi Years, 1933–1941
Kluger, Jeffrey. Journey beyond Selene: Remarkable Expeditions Past Our Moon and to the Ends of the Solar System
Orlean, Susan. The Orchid Thief: A True Story of Beauty and Obsession
Raban, Jonathan. Passage to Juneau: A Sea and Its Meanings
Remnick, David. King of the World: Muhammad Ali and the Rise of an American Hero
Rybczynski, Witold. A Clearing in the Distance: Frederick Law Olmsted and America in the Nineteenth Century
Schiff, Stacy. Vera Poetry
Heaney, Seamus. Opened Ground: Selected Poems 1966–1996
Seyburn, Patty. Diasporadic
1999
Fiction
Anderson, Scott. Triage
Anthony, Patricia. Flanders
Barrett, Andrea. The Voyage of the Narwhal
Borges, Jorge Luis. Collected Fictions
Byers, Michael. The Coast of Good Intentions
Danticat, Edwidge. The Farming of Bones
Hornby, Nick. About a Boy
McDermott, Alice. Charming Billy
Moore, Lorrie. Birds of America
Roth, Philip. I Married a Communist
Vakil, Ardashir. Beach Boy
Nonfiction
Ackroyd, Peter. The Life of Thomas More
Berg, A. Scott. Lindbergh
Branch, Taylor. Pillar of Fire: America in the King Years, 1963-65
Chernow, Ron. Titan: The Life of John D. Rockfeller
Clapp, Nicholas. The Road to Ubar: Finding the Atlantis of the Sands
Gorney, Cynthia. Articles of Faith: A Frontline History of the Abortion Wars
Hochschild, Adam. King Leopold's Ghost: A Story of Greed, Terror, and Heroism in Colonial Africa
Kinder, Gary. Ship of Gold in the Deep Blue Sea
Nasar, Sylvia. A Beautiful Mind
Suskind, Ron. A Hope in the Unseen: An American Odyssey from the Inner City to the Ivy League Poetry
Doty, Mark. Sweet Machine
Hall, Donald. Without
Hughes, Ted. Tales from Ovid
Matthews, William. After All: Last Poems
1998
Fiction
Alvarez, Julia. Yo!
Atwood, Margaret. Alias Grace
Choy, Wayson. The Jade Peony
Deane, Seamus.Reading in the Dark
Frazier, Charles. Cold Mountain
Garcia, Cristina. Aguero Sisters
Murakami, Haruki.The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle
Perota, Tom.The Wishbones
Smith, Lee. News of the Spirit
Stollman, Aryeh Lev.The Far Euphrates
Yamanaka, Lois-Ann.Blu's Hanging
Nonfiction
Alvarez, Walter. T. Rex and the Crater of Doom
Bragg, Rick. All Over But the Shoutin'
Ehrenreich, Barbara. Blood Rites: Origins & History of the Passions of War
Figes, Orlando. A People's Tragedy: A History of the Russian Revolution
Fouts, Roger & with Stephen Tukel Mills. Next of Kin: What Chimpanzees Have Taught Me About Who We Are
Fraser, Kennedy. Ornament and Silence: Essays on Women's Lives
Junger, Sebastian. The Perfect Storm: A True Story of Men Against the Sea
Krakauer, Jon. Iinto Thin Air: A Personal Account of the Mt. Everest Disaster
Maier, Pauline. American Scripture: Making the Declaration of Independence
Raban, Jonathan. Bad Land: An American Romance
Solomon, Deborah. Utopia Parkway: The Life and Work of Joseph Cornell
Winchester, Simon. The River at the Center of the World: A Journey Up the Yangtze and Back in Chinese Time Poetry
Lindsay, Sarah. Primate Behavior
Piercy, Marge.What Are Big Girls Made Of?
Walcott, Derek.The Bounty
1997
Fiction
Atkinson, Kate. Behind the Scenes at the Museum
Barrett, Andrea. Ship Fever: Stories
Diaz, Junot. Drown
Doyle, Roddy. The Woman Who Walked into Doors
Iida, Deborah. Middle Son
Mistry, Rohinton. A Fine Balance
Robinson, Roxana. Asking for Love and Other Stories
Selvadurai, Shyam. Funny Boy
Swift, Graham. Last Orders
Tevor, William. After Rain
Wolff, Tobias. The Night in Questions
Nonfiction
Ambrose, Stephen. Undaunted Courage: Meriwether Lewis, Thomas Jefferson, and the Opening of the American West
Denby, David. Great Books: My Adventure with Homer, Rousseau, Woolf, and other Indestructible Writers of the Western World
D'Orso, Michael. Like Judgement Day: The Ruin and Redemption of a Town Called Rosewood
Luker, Kristin. Dubious Conceptions
Manguel, Alberto.A History of Reading
McBride, James. The Color of Water: A Black Man's Tribute to His White Mother
McCourt, Frank. Angela's Ashes
Miller, Judith. God Has Ninety-Nine Names: Reporting From a Militant Middle East
Page, Clarence. Showing My Color: Impolite Essays on Race and Identity
Painter, Nell Irvin. Sojourner Truth: A Life, a Symbol
Quammen, David. The Song of the Dodo
Sobol, Dava. Longitude: The True Story of a Lone Genius Who Solved the Greatest Scientific Problem of His Time Poetry
Heaney, Seamus. The Spirit Level
Hicok, Bob. The Legend of Light
Kenyon, Jane. Otherwise
1996
Fiction
The First Man, by Albert Camus
The Point, by Charles D'Ambrosio
The Paperboy, by Pete Dexter
The Unconsoled, by Kazuo Ishiguro
Native Speaker, by Chang-Rae Lee
All the Days and Nights, by William Maxwell
Snow Angels, by Stewart O'Nan
The Body Is Water, by Julie Schumacher
Eveless Eden, by Marianne Wiggins
Nonfiction
Paula, by Isabel Allende
Nine Parts of Desire, by Geraldine Brooks
Salvation on Sand Mountain, by Dennis Covington
Lincoln, by David Herbert Donald
Terrible Honesty, by Ann Douglas
The Last Shot, by Darcy Frey
Sarajevo Daily, by Tom Gjelten
Moving Violations, by John Hockenberry
Liars' Club, by Mary Karr
Amazing Grace, by Jonathan Kozol
The Dying of the Trees, by Charles Little
The End of Education, by Neil Postman
Walt Whitman's America, by David Reynolds Poetry
Atlantis, by Mark Doty
The Collected Poems of Langston Hughes, by Langston Hughes
Passing Through, by Stanley Kunitz
1995
Fiction
In the Time of the Butterflies, by Julia Alvarez
The Birthday Boys, by Beryl Bainbridge
Souls Raised from the Dead, by Doris Betts
The End of Vandalism, by Tom Drury
Scar Tissue, by Michael Ignatieff
Ancestral Truths, by Sara Maitland
Open Secrets, by Alice Munro
The Bird Artist, by Howard Norman
In the Lake of the Woods, by Tim O'Brien
The Collected Stories, by Grace Paley
The Grass Dancer, by Susan Power
The Cage, by Audrey Schulman
Nonfiction
Warriors Don't Cry, by Melba P. Beals
A Man on the Moon, by Andrew Chaikin
Train Go Sorry, by Leah Hager Cohen
Colored People, by Henry L. Gates
Shot in the Heart, by Mikal Gilmore
No Ordinary Time, by Doris K. Goodwin
Out of Silence, by Russell Martin
How We Die, by Sherwin B. Nuland
A Whole New Life, by Reynolds Price
The Beak of the Finch, by Jonathan Weiner
9 Highland Road, by Michael Winerip
In Pharaoh's Army, by Tobias Wolff Poetry
The Ghost Trio: Poems, by Linda Bierds
A Silence Opens, by Amy Clampitt
1994
Fiction
In Troubled Waters, by Beverly Coyle
The Virgin Suicides, by Jeffrey Eugenides
A Lesson Before Dying, by Ernest Gaines
The Pugilist at Rest, by Thom Jones
Judge on Trial, by Ivan Klima
Here's Your Hat, What's Your Hurry?, by Elizabeth McCracken
Remembering Babylon, by David Malouf
Wolf Whistle, by Lewis Nordan
The Shipping News, by E. Annie Proulx
Nobody's Fool, by Richard Russo
Montana, 1948, by Larry Watson
Nonfiction
Before Night Falls, by Reinaldo Arenas
The Warburgs, by Ron Chernow
Having Our Say, by Sarah Louise Delany and A. Elizabeth Delany
Balkan Express, by Slavenka Drakulic
Balkan Ghosts, by Robert D. Kaplan
Girl, Interrupted, by Susanna Kaysen
Martyrs' Day, by Michael Kelly
Preparing for the Twenty-First Century, by Paul Kennedy
This Little Light of Mine, by Kay Mills
Dead Man Walking, by Helen Prejean
Lenin's Tomb, by David Remnick
The Last Panda, by George B. Schaller
United States: Essays, 1952–1992, by Gore Vidal
Poetry
If It Be Not I, by Mona Van Duyn 1993
Fiction
Leviathan, by Paul Auster
Before and After, by Rosellen Brown
A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain, by Robert Olen Butler
The Brothers K, by David James Duncan
Turtle Moon, by Alice Hoffman
Let the Dead Bury Their Dead and Other Stories, by Randall Kenan
All the Pretty Horses, by Cormac McCarthy
Billie Dyer and Other Stories, by William Maxwell
Small Spaces Between Emergencies, by Alison Moore
Jazz, by Toni Morrison
Bailey's Cafe, by Gloria Naylor
The English Patient, by Michael Ondaatje
A Thousand Acres, by Jane Smiley Nonfiction
Eleanor Roosevelt, by Blanche Wiesen Cook
The Meadow, by James Galvin
Who Will Tell the People, by William B. Greider
Young Men and Fire, by Norman MacLean
Truman, by David McCullough
Talking to High Monks in the Snow, by Lydia Yuri Minatoya
Becoming a Man: Half a Life Story, by Paul Monette
Technopoly, by Neil Postman
Down from Troy, by Richard Selzer
Going Back to Bisbee, by Richard Shelton
Lincoln at Gettysburg, by Garry Wills Poetry
Words Like Fate and Pain, by Karen Fiser
Moon Crossing Bridge, by Tess Gallagher |
