Boxall's 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die discussion

Reading from the complete list, have no illusions of getting close to completing the list but will post my progress here and make short comments as I go.

Below are the first 44 I have read, from there on I will post in order as I read them.

1. The Great Gatsby
2. Sense and Sensibility
3. Animal Farm
4. Alice in Wonderland
5. Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There
6. Aesop's Fables
7. Robinson Crusoe
8. Pride and Prejudice
9. Emma
10. Mansfield Park
11. Persuassion
12. Northanger Abbey
13. A Christmas Carol
14. Bleak House
15. Great Expectations
16. 1984
17. The Hound of the Baskervilles
18. The Murder of Roger Ackroyd
19. Brave New World
20. The Hobbit
21. Of Mice and Men
22. Coming Up for Air
23. The Catcher in the Rye
24. Lord of the Flies
25. Things Fall Apart
26. To Kill a Mockingbird
27. A Clockwork Orange
28. One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich
29. The Bell Jar
30. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
31. Cancer Ward
32. The Wasp Factory
33. The Sea
34. Chess Story
35. 1Q84
36. The Picture of Dorian Gray
37. A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing
38. The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle
39. The Shining
40. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time
41. Gulliver's Travels: Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World.
42. Around the World in Eighty Days
43. Night Boat to Tangier
44. On The Black Hill

45. Clarissa

Have been reading and listening to this book for almost 4 months. I read and listened to a combination of the e-book from the Delphi Complete Works of Samuel Richardson and the 3 volume Naxos Audiobooks set, which was wonderfully read with a whole cast of actors.



Think I'm going to order a physical copy as I hope to re-read it one day.

A Christmas Carol (re-read)

This time listening to the Hugh Grant reading on Audible.

46. The Yellow Wallpaper



Followed up the immense Clarissa with the shortest story on the list, read on Kindle.

47. Kitchen



Read on Kindle. Found this quite frustrating and looked up reviews afterwards to see what all the fuss was about and become doubly frustrated as in a lot of reviews there wasn't much discussion of the book itself but rather about Japanese authors in general, how Seven Samurai is a great film (??) or about how the author grew up in a household of progressive politics. A lot of reviews mentioned that the novel deals with 'loss', 'love' and 'transgender issues' but didn't really expand on the points beyond that.

Not going to give up on the it, a few reviews slammed the English translation so I'm going to download it in Spanish on my Kindle to re-read in future and see if I can connect with/understand better a different version of the novel.

48. The Count of Monte Cristo



First list book of 2023. It was engaging from the first page and didn't really let up.

49. Crome Yellow



Read on my phone from the Delphi Complete Works of Aldous Huxley (Illustrated). I liked it well enough, there isn't much plot, the book is more blunt in its projections of Huxley's philosophies and ideas than say, Brave New World, but it's readable enough especially once about halfway in. I will read more Huxley from this compilation.

Neglected this list and only read 3 more in 2023.

50. Antic Hay


51. Troubles


52. The Siege Of Krishnapur


Currently reading Singpore Grip, 3rd part of Farrell's Empire trilogy, enjoying it as much as the other two.

Finally finished 53. The Singapore Grip