1,000 Books to Read Before You Die: A Life-Changing List

The ultimate literary bucket list. The Washington Post
If theres a heaven just for readers, this is it. O, The Oprah Magazine

Celebrate the pleasure of reading and the thrill of discovering new titles in an extraordinary book thats as compulsively readable, entertaining, surprising, and enlightening as the 1,000-plus titles it recommends.

Covering fiction, poetry, science and science fiction, memoir, travel writing, biography, childrens books, history, and more,1,000 Books to Read Before You Dieranges across cultures and through time to offer an eclectic collection of works that each deserve to come with the recommendation, You have to read this. But its not a proscriptive list of the great worksrather, its a celebration of the glorious mosaic that is our literary heritage.

Flip it open to any page and be transfixed by a fresh take on a very favorite book. Or come across a title you always meant to read and never got around to. Or, like browsing in the best kind of bookshop, stumble on a completely unknown author and work, and feel that tingle of discovery. There are classics, of course, and unexpected treasures, too. Lists to help pick and choose, like Offbeat Escapes, or A Long Climb, but What a View. And its alphabetical arrangement by author assures that surprises await on almost every turn of the page, with Cormac McCarthy andThe Roadnext to Robert McCloskey andMake Way for Ducklings,Alice Walker next to Izaac Walton.

There are nuts and bolts, toobest editions to read, other books by the author, if you like this, youll like that recommendations , and an interesting endnote of adaptations where appropriate. Add it all up, and in fact there are more than six thousand titles by nearly four thousand authors mentioneda life-changing list for a lifetime of reading.

948 pages later, you still want more! THE WASHINGTON POST