The stories of a satanic architect and a brooding detective cross in this shadowy novel by Peter Ackroyd.
Read moreThe Three-Arched Bridge
A monk tells a cautionary tale of construction and sacrifice in this unsettling novel by Ismail Kadare.
Read moreAmong Friends
A circle of acquaintances meet to gossip and trade barbs in this sharp novella by Ludmilla Petrushevskaya.
Read moreMission
A time-travelling messiah appears in eighties Manhattan in this satirical SF novel by Patrick Tilley.
Read moreThe Golden Gate
A group of Californian yuppies walk the treadmill of life in this virtuosic novel in verse by Vikram Seth.
Read moreThe Crow Road
A university student investigates his uncle's disappearance in this coming-of-age novel by Iain Banks.
Read moreStepping Westward
A promising English novelist embarks on a stateside journey in this wry novel by Malcolm Bradbury.
Read moreCollected Works: Literature
A roundup of the books featured in the Collected Works: Literature column in 2017, from Alias Grace to Maus.
Read moreThe House of the Spirits
Supernatural meets mundane in this sprawling novel about the fictional Trueba family by Isabel Allende.
Read moreThe Voices of Marrakesh
The sights, smells, and sounds of Morocco come to life in this vivid book of essays by Elias Canetti.
Read moreThe God of Small Things
A forbidden romance blossoms within the confines of an Indian village in this novel by Arundhati Roy.
Read moreIf on a winter's night
Stories are cut short and readers are dragged into the action in this beguiling novel by Italo Calvino.
Read moreWounds
A revolving cast of characters bare the scars of post-war London in this novel by Maureen Duffy.
Read moreAlias Grace
A Victorian media sensation convicted of murder tells her story in this historical novel by Margaret Atwood.
Read moreWonderland
A narcissistic doctor understands brain surgery but not people in this visceral novel by Joyce Carol Oates.
Read moreThe Shipping News
A dysfunctional family relocates to the craggy expanse of a Canadian island in this novel by Annie Proulx.
Read morePlay It as It Lays
A woman attempts to escape from ennui by taking to the freeway in this blistering novel by Joan Didion.
Read moreWhite Teeth
Contemporary London is depicted in all of its cultural complexities in this sprawling novel by Zadie Smith.
Read moreOrfeo
An elderly composer becomes a fugitive suspected of bioterrorism in this lively novel by Richard Powers.
Read moreMaus
The horrors of the Holocaust become a cat-and-mouse metaphor in this graphic novel by Art Spiegelman.
Read more