|
|
The Great American Read First of Three Parts PBS 2018 |
|
|
|
|
|
1984
by George Orwell
Portrays life in a future time when a totalitarian government watches over all citizens and directs all activities.
|
|
|
|
A separate peace
by John Knowles
A conflict of loyalties between Gene and his fearless friend, Phineas, leads to tragedy.
|
|
|
|
A tree grows in Brooklyn
by Betty Smith
Young Francie Nolan, having inherited both her father's romantic and her mother's practical nature, struggles to survive and thrive growing up in the slums of Brooklyn in the early twentieth century.
|
|
|
|
The adventures of Tom Sawyer
by Mark Twain
Chronicles the boyhood escapades and adventures of Tom Sawyer and his friend, Huckleberry Finn, as they grow up in a small town along the Mississippi River.
|
|
|
|
Another country
by James Baldwin
Eight people become entangled in a web of interpersonal relationships, doomed to become as savage and destructive as the society which oppresses them.
|
|
|
|
Atlas shrugged
by Ayn Rand
The decisions of a few industrial leaders shake the roots of capitalism and reawaken one man's awareness of himself as an heroic being.
|
|
|
|
The call of the wild
by Jack London
A young dog, abused by men and his hungry rivals on a Klondike dog team, escapes to the wilderness and joins a wolfpack
|
|
|
|
The catcher in the rye
by J. D. Salinger
A 16-year old American boy relates in his own words the experiences he goes through at school and after, and reveals with unusual candour the workings of his own mind. What does a boy in his teens think and feel about his teachers, parents, friends and acquaintances?
|
|
|
|
The count of Monte Cristo
by Alexandre Dumas
Edmund Dantès, betrayed by his enemies and unjustly convicted of aiding the exiled Napoleon, escapes after fourteen years of imprisonment in the Château d'If and embarks on a carefully crafted plot to seek his revenge.
|
|
|
|
Crime and punishment
by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
An acclaimed translator breathes fresh life into this ageless classic in a new translation, with novel insights into the linguistic richness, subtle tones and cunning humor of Dostoevsky’s magnum opus.
|
|
|
|
Don Quixote
by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
A sixteenth-century Spanish gentleman and his faithful friend set out to right the wrongs in the world.
|
|
|
|
And then there were none
by Agatha Christie
A killer stalks a group of ten total strangers on an isolated island off the Devon coast, in a suspenseful story of murder and retribution set to a sinister nursery rhyme.
|
|
|
|
Anne of green gables
by L. M. Montgomery
Anne, an eleven-year-old orphan, is sent by mistake to live with a lonely, middle-aged brother and sister on a Prince Edward Island farm and proceeds to make an indelible impression on everyone around her.
|
|
|
|
Charlotte's web
by E. B. White
Wilbur the pig is upset when he discovers that he is destined to be the farmer's Christmas dinner until his spider friend, Charlotte, decides to help him.
|
|
|
|
A prayer for Owen Meany
by John Irving
While playing baseball in the summer of 1953, Owen Meany hits a foul ball that kills his best friend's mother, and he becomes convinced that he is an instrument of God.
|
|
|
|
A Confederacy of Dunces
by John Kennedy Toole
An obese New Orleans misanthrope who constantly rebukes society, Ignatius Reilly gets a job at his mother's urging but ends up leading a workers' revolt, in a twentieth anniversary edition of the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel.
|
|
|
|
The alchemist
by Paulo Coelho
A fable about undauntingly following one's dream, listening to one's heart, and reading life's omens, features dialogue between a boy and an unnamed being.
|
|
|
|
Along came a spider
by James Patterson
Washington, D.C., police detective Alex Cross becomes caught up in a kidnapping case that may involve Gary Soneji, a teacher at an elite private school who is also a schizophrenic psychopath and serial murderer.
|
|
|
|
Americanah : a novel by Chimamanda Ngozi AdichieSeparated by respective ambitions after falling in love in occupied Nigeria, beautiful Ifemelu experiences triumph and defeat in America while exploring new concepts of race, while Obinze endures an undocumented status in London until the pair is reunited in their homeland 15 years later, where they face the toughest decisions of their lives. By the award-winning author of Half of a Yellow Sun.
|
|
|
|
Beloved
by Toni Morrison
Sethe, an escaped slave living in post-Civil War Ohio with her daughter and mother-in-law, is haunted persistently by the ghost of the dead baby girl whom she sacrificed.
|
|
|
|
Bless me, Ultima
by Rudolfo A. Anaya
Ultima, a curandera, one who cures with herbs and magic, comes to Antonio Marez's New Mexico family when he is six years old, and she helps him discover himself in the magical secrets of the pagan past.
|
|
|
|
The book thief
by Markus Zusak
Trying to make sense of the horrors of World War II, Death relates the story of Liesel--a young German girl whose book-stealing and story-telling talents help sustain her family and the Jewish man they are hiding, as well as their neighbors.
|
|
|
|
Catch-22
by Joseph Heller
A new publication of Joseph Heller's classic WWII black comedy includes a new introduction by Christopher Buckley, bonus material in the back matter and variant covers, in a novel that follows American bomber pilot Yossarian on his harrowing quest for the final mission that will free him from his military obligation.
|
|
|
|
The clan of the cave bear
by Jean M. Auel
Ayla, an injured and orphaned child adopted by a primitive tribe, carries within her the seed and hope of humankind in this epic of survival and destiny set at the dawn of prehistory.
|
|
|
|
The coldest winter ever : a novel
by Souljah
Winter Santiaga, the daughter of one of Brooklyn's most powerful drug czars, uses her own weapons--including sex and an aggressive attitude--to stay on top, after her father's empire is threatened by a drug war.
|
|
|
|
The color purple
by Alice Walker
The lives of two sisters--Nettie, a missionary in Africa, and Celie, a southern woman married to a man she hates--are revealed in a series of letters exchanged over thirty years.
|
|
|
|
The Da Vinci code
by Dan Brown
Adapted for a new generation of readers and published to coincide with the release of the film, Inferno, a young adult edition of Brown's mega best-seller follows the experiences of a Harvard religious symbology professor who, in the wake of a Louvre curator's murder, uncovers a conspiracy with ties to an ancient-world secret.
|
|
|
|
Dune : book one in the Dune chronicles
by Frank Herbert
The adventures of Paul Atreides, the son of a betrayed duke, who is given up for dead on a treacherous desert planet and adopted by its fierce, nomadic people, who help him unravel his most unexpected destiny.
|
|
|
|
Fifty shades of Grey
by E. L. James
When Anastasia Steele, a young literature student, interviews wealthy young entrepreneur Christian Grey for her campus magazine, their initial meeting introduces Anastasia to an exciting new world that will change them both forever.
|
|
|
|
|
|