Modern Library’s Top 100 Novels

Just Read
2002 – 2039 or so

Outside of all the regular CTMQ stuff, I have other goals. One of those goals is to read The Modern Library Top 100 English novels of the 20th century. If all goes well, I hope to finish the entire list around retirement age. This little scheme began in 2002 as an agreement with Hoang before she was my wife. There are actually 121 books to read, due to there being 2 trilogies, 2 tetralogies and a crazy 12 novel set that counts as one book for some reason.

I used to take the time to write a review of each book, but that ended many years ago when it felt like work to me. (Now I just write a few sentences.) The New York Times put together an archive of their original reviews of many of the books on the list, and it’s fascinating to read them now.

Here’s how Hoang and I have done year-over-year with the Top 100 list!

The Tally as of 1/31/2025:

Hoang: 69
Steve: 51

Links take you to my short reviews and our star ratings, grouped in tens.

100. The Magnificent Ambersons, Booth Tarkington
99. The Ginger Man, J.P. Donleavy
98. The Postman Always Rings Twice, James M. Cain
97. The Sheltering Sky, Paul Bowles
96. Sophie’s Choice, William Styron
95. Under the Net, Iris Murdoch
94. Wide Sargasso Sea, Jean Rhys
93. The Magus, John Fowles
92. Ironweed, William Kennedy
91. Tobacco Road, Erskine Caldwell
90. Midnight’s Children, Salman Rushdie
89. Loving, Henry Green
88. The Call of the Wild, Jack London
87. The Old Wives’ Tale, Arnold Bennett
86. Ragtime, E.L. Doctorow
85. Lord Jim, Joseph Conrad
84. The Death of the Heart, Elizabeth Bowen
83. A Bend in the River, V.S. Naipaul
82. Angle of Repose, Wallace Stegner
81. The Adventures of Augie March, Saul Bellow
80. Brideshead Revisited, Evelyn Waugh
79. A Room with a View, E.M. Forster
78. Kim, Rudyard Kipling
77. Finnegans Wake, James Joyce
76. The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, Muriel Spark
75. Scoop, Evelyn Waugh
74. A Farewell to Arms, Ernest Hemingway
73. The Day of the Locust, Nathaniel West
72. A House for Mr. Biswas, V.S. Naipaul
71. A High Wind in Jamaica, Richard Hughes
70. The Alexandra Quartet, Lawrence Durrell
     a. Justine
     b. Balthazar
     c. Mountolive
     d. Clea
69. The House of Mirth, Edith Wharton
68. Main Street, Sinclair Lewis
67. Heart of Darkness, Joseph Conrad
66. Of Human Bondage, W. Somerset Maugham
65. A Clockwork Orange, Anthony Burgess
64. A Catcher in the Rye, J.D. Salinger
63. The Wapshot Chronicle, John Cheever
62. From Here to Eternity, James Jones
61. Death Comes for the Archbishop, Wilia Cather
60. The Moviegoer, Walker Percy
59. Zulieka Dobson, Max Beerbohm
58. The Age of Innocence, Edith Wharton
57. Parade’s End (4 Books), Ford Maddox Ford
     a. Some Do Not…
     b. No More Parades
     c. A Man Could Stand Up
     d. Last Post
56. The Maltese Falcon, Dashiell Hammett
55. On the Road, Jack Kerouac
54. Light in August, William Faulkner
53. Pale Fire, Vladimir Nabokov
52. Portnoy’s Complaint, Phillip Roth
51. The Naked and the Dead, Norman Mailer
50. Tropic of Cancer, Henry Miller
49. Women in Love, D.H. Lawrence
48. The Rainbow, D.H. Lawrence
47. Nostromo, Joseph Conrad
46. The Secret Agent, Joseph Conrad
45. The Sun Also Rises, Ernest Hemingway
44. Point Counter Point, Aldous Huxley
43. A Dance to the Music of Time (12 Books), Anthony Powell
     a. A Question of Upbringing
     b. A Buyer’s Market
     c. The Acceptance World
     d. At Lady Molly’s
     e. Casanova’s Chinese Restaurant
     f. The Kindly Ones
     g. The Valley of Bones
     h. The Soldier’s Art
     i. The Military Philosophers
     j. Books Do Furnish a Room
     k. Temporary Kings
     l. Hearing Secret Harmonies
42. Deliverance, James Dickey
41. Lord of the Flies, William Golding
40. The Heart of the Matter, Graham Greene
39. Go Tell It On the Mountain, James Baldwin
38. Howards End, E.M. Forster
37. The Bridge of San Luis Rey, Thornton Wilder
36. All the King’s Men, Robert Penn Warren
35. As I Lay Dying, William Faulkner
34. A Handful of Dust, Evelyn Waugh
33. Sister Carrie, Theodore Dreiser
32. The Golden Bowl, Henry James
31. Animal Farm, George Orwell
30. The Good Soldier, Ford Maddox Ford
29. Studs Lonigan (3 Books), James T. Farrell
     a. Young Lonigan
     b. The Young Manhood of Studs Lonigan
     c. Judgment Day
28. Tender is the Night, F. Scott Fitzgerald
27. The Ambassadors, Henry James
26. The Wings of the Dove, Henry James
25. A Passage to India, E.M. Forster
24. Winesburg, Ohio, Sherwood Anderson
23. USA Trilogy, John Dos Passos
     a. The 42nd Parallel
     b. 1919
     c. The Big Money
22. Appointment in Samarra, John O’Hara
21. Henderson the Rain King, Saul Bellow
20. Native Son, Richard Wright
19. Invisible Man, Ralph Ellison
18. Slaughterhouse-Five, Kurt Vonnegut
17. The Heart is a Lonely Hunter, Carson McCullers
6. An American Tragedy, Theodore Dreiser
15. To the Lighthouse, Virginia Woolf
14. I, Claudius, Robert Graves
13. 1984, George Orwell
12. The Way of All Flesh, Samuel Butler
11. Under the Volcano, Malcolm Lowry
10. The Grapes of Wrath, John Steinbeck
9. Sons and Lovers, D.H. Lawrence
8. Darkness at Noon, Arthur Koestler
7. Catch-22, Joseph Heller
6. The Sound and the Fury, William Faulkner
5. Brave New World, Aldous Huxley
4. Lolita, Vladimir Nabokov
3. A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, James Joyce
2. The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald
1. Ulysses, James Joyce

Year-by-Year Tallies
Connecticut Books