Blatantly ripped off from AUGUST, April 07
BRAVE NEW WORLD Aldous Huxley
“Negative Utopia” – No more pain, no suffering, no poverty… but without the bitter, can there be the sweet?
100 YEARS OF SOLITUDE Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Ghosts, incest and the history of Colombia
MIDNIGHT’S CHILDREN Salman Rushdie
Babies switched at birth, one with supernatural powers. A Booker Prize winner.
SWANN’S WAY Marcel Proust
No plot, just a recollection of memories in four parts.
A HISTORY OF THE WORLD IN TEN AND A HALF CHAPTERS Julian Barnes
Series of intelligent and humorous short stories.
THE BONFIRE OF THE VANITIES Tom Wolfe
Class, race, politics, religion, money and media.
NINETEEN EIGHTY-FOUR George Orwell
How to exert control with disinformation, propaganda, censorship, surveillance and semantic manipulation.
FOR WHOM THE BELL TOLLS Ernest Hemingway
American fighting in Spanish Civil War falls in love, is wounded, dies.
A CLOCKWORK ORANGE Anthony Burgess
Sociopath gets temporarily brainwashed
THE CATCHER IN THE RYE JD Salinger
Angsty release from a maladjusted, intelligent teen outsider.
THE GREAT GATSBY Scott Fitzgerald
Poor guy makes good, goes over the edge, tragic ending.
ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO’S NEST Ken Kesey
Conman in cuckoo house challenges the authorities, while changing the destinies of his fellow patients.
THE DHARMA BUMS Jack Kerouac
Central character goes on search for ’something greater’ amidst confused post-war environment.
L.A. CONFIDENTIAL James Ellroy
Good cops gone bad as American dream dissolves.
DE PROFUNDIS Oscar Wilde
‘Melancholic, soulful and profound pearl of writing’. Wilde’s magnum opus.
THE PRINCE Niccolo Machiavelli
Idiots guide to building, wielding, and maintaining power.
CRIME AND PUNISHMENT Fyodor Dostoyevsky
‘Timeless tale about moral conflict, guilt and the human conscience’
THE FOUNTAINHEAD Ayn Rand
‘Don’t compromise your values to fit in with the status quo; don’t let the mob dictate what you can and can’t create; don’t regurgitate, be original; selfishness is a virtue you should embrace; material success means nothing when it results from another’s efforts.’
HELL’S ANGELS Hunter S. Thompson
Author hangs out with infamous motorcycle gang
IN COLD BLOOD Truman Capote
Excellent writing that traces the brutal slaying of a small-town family and the process of brining the killers to justice.
Go dig up a copy of AUGUST April for the full beef.
