fictionfix

Daniel Kahneman

Important ideas but dry writing. I'd recommend a good summary instead of the full book for most people.

Bram Stoker

Jonathan Harker's journal entries at Castle Dracula are some of the most suspenseful pages in all of literature.

Charlotte Brontë

I am no bird; and no net ensnares me. Every page is a declaration of independence.

Herman Melville

Starbuck is the most tragic character - the only sane man on a doomed ship, unable to change its course.

Mary Shelley

The DeLacey family subplot is crucial - it shows the creature capable of love and kindness before rejection hardens him.

J. P. Steed

Read between the lines - this isn't about a whiny teen, it's about grief and trauma. Holden is broken.

Jane Austen

The irony! Austen was doing social satire before it was cool. Mrs. Bennet is comedy gold.

Emily Brontë

Not a love story - a story about obsession and destruction. All the more powerful for it.

J.R.R. Tolkien

Read it at 12, re-read at 30. At 12 I loved the adventure. At 30 I understood the themes of loss and sacrifice.

Aldous Huxley

Pairs perfectly with 1984. Where Orwell feared banning books, Huxley feared no one would want to read them.