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Great list. Your sentiments on War and Peace mirror mine regarding The Count of Monte Cristo (finished it last night). It's so long yet consistently good that it automatically ranks very high for me. Infinite Jest is the only other book like that for me. Regarding W&P, I own it and will read it. But after reading and mostly disliking Anna Karenina, I'm dragging my feet. Hopefully, it's drastically more interesting than AK.

I love seeing Kafka on here, it's probably my favorite of all time. Murakami is truly a god of literature.

Finally a list that doesn't feature booktok garbage

Great list, but I hate Hemingway. Always stories about killing animals and in real life behave like a macho jerk.

I rank The Sun Also Rises higher than The Old Man and the Sea because it does for the '20s what On the Road does for the '50s - it captures the zeitgeist of a generation in a single book. Both deal with the restlessness and lostness of a postwar society. The Old Man and the Sea may be the best sea story written (after Moby Dick), and it's a great book, but I feel like the prose is starting to show Hemingway parodying himself. Also, if you haven't read In Watermelon Sugar by Richard Brautigan, you ought to give it a whirl. It can be read in an afternoon (I read it the first time sitting on the floor of a bookstore -- I couldn't put it down), and it has On the Road's energy applied to the late '60s and early '70s as dystopian fiction. Brautigan's work has been described as Mark Twain wandering into a cannabis patch. Great Murakami pick. In your later years, Anna Karenina will probably replace War and Peace as your favorite Tolstoy (War and Peace was my favorite novel of all time for more than a decade). Thanks for the recommendations. You've introduced me to a couple of writers I haven't read before.

The Old Man and the Sea is the only Hemmingway book I've been able to get through

"I know just enough Russian to get through translations of Russian literature" Anyone's who's learned a second language for a year or more knows how freaking amazing this is. I studies Russian for half a year and almost died, but speak some French and know Spanish. I read at a 5th grade level maybe. He's so humble.😂

When you mentioned Nicholas Tlaib I screamed. 😂 I listened to the entire audible version of Fooled by Randomness and Black Swan 6 years ago and retained NOTHING. (Edit: I remember something actually. He talked about living in a warzone in the past somewhere in the middle east and dealing with fear and trauma. I remember that.) It was so horrific to listen to dry, like you said. I didn't want to touch it ever again. I should have looked up secondary information about it.

There is no right or wrong here. It is just a personal list. Each one of us would have a totally different list. I do think males and females have different tastes so yes, it is a “dude’s list”. A bit disappointing he has NO female writers in there which suggests to me he needs to widen his reading more as I feel we need to challenge ourselves and move out of our comfort zone. I’m female and I read male writers. But it does interest me to see what men read and class as their best books.

I must reread War and Peace. It was SO good! 100% agree with your analysis. I did find some of his digressions irritating.

Thank you for another brilliant video. I’m late (as usual). On the opposite end of the scale I’m currently reading: “The Iron Druid Chronicles”series AND also “Empire of the Vampire” series. The first series is easy peasy, kind of a “Dresden Files” lite with a touch of Gaimen’s “American Gods”. The second, (vampire) series is unique and set in a well fleshed out, late medieval, made up world with very recognizable European equivalents. It’s so interesting. Apparently it’s based on a graphic novel set. Back to “difficult” books: I’m struggling with “The Master & His Emissary” . There’s so much information packed in there 🤦🏻‍♀️I’m having to knock the rust off some of my brain for this one. I’ll try some of your tips…THANKS! Be well!! Cheers🤘

Confederacy of dunces made me laugh out ...and grapes of wrath should be on the list.

I listened to Hitchhikers guide and had to pull over multiple times because of laughing.

42?...really?

Call of the Wild. Probably because I haven't read all of those other books on your list.

Thank you for this list, it was very interesting to see your picks. I must say, however, that I was disappointed to see not one single female author make your top ten and would really be interested in hearing why. If the answer is that you havent read very many female authors, then maybe it could be a cool video for getting into them:)

Erich Maria Remarque is 10 times better then Hemingway

You inherently cannot “disagree” with any favorites list! Haha

I have a lot of reading ahead of me! Great list

I hate Project Hail Mary to the point that I have 50 pages to finish it and I can't bring myself to pick up book from shelf and read those pages. This book is beyond dumb and childish. It reads like it was writen by 16 yo kid with no understanding how the world works. And his prose just sucks. Thanks for telling me that The Martian is even worse, now I know for sure I will not try to read it.

I read Artemis and then The Martian after your recommendation of Project Hail Mary. I could see Weir stretching his character building muscles in Artemis, as you might have predicted. It's a good read, I enjoyed it, but for this reader's time, it's a distant third. For my money, Weir's at his best when he focuses on setting up a death trap and then finding a creative way to escape. I can't think of a single book where this is done to greater effect than in The Martian. There must be 8 or 10 distinct death traps crammed into those 400 some odd pages. I got hooked every time. It's funny, I know you weren't as thrilled by The Martian, but I would never have read it had it not been for your channel. Always appreciate hearing your recommendations, and criticisms, of books.

Interesting choices. 100% agree that War and Peace belongs on any Top 10. Not too familiar with some of the other picks.

When I saw The Hobbit in the list, I stopped at once.' Soooo childish.

Excellent list. Pylop is an architect...but nothing he designs ever gets built. He is a "paper architect " which makes him a polar opposite to Daisy/Hana. Its a brillant GN

Before I watched your video I thought to myself ''Please .. No J R R Tolkien'' but then you got me back by saying Anthony Bourdain Kitchen Confential (I also have his Les Halles cookbook and anyone who can get the word fcuk into a recipe is alright by me) and I also agree with Hemmingway The Old Man and the Sea .. Tolstoy War and Peace and Douglas Adams The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy (as well as The Restaurant at the End of the Universe Life the Universe and Everything and So Long and Thanks For All the Fish)

1.-saber para que lees el libro, Cuál es el objetivo? 2.-lectura superficial: entender cuál es el punto principal, cómo se ejecuta, cómo es el final, sin tomar apuntes. Cuando termines no tendrás los detalles pero si las bases cuál las cuales podrás seguir adelante. 3.-en tu segunda lectura del libro haz tu investigación acerca de los detalles de los que te perdiste la primera vez y esta vez no se arruinará el “flow” de la lectura pues ya sabes lo que se encuentra en el libro. Recordatorio: No hay nadie apurándote, tienes todo el tiempo para aprender y comprender el libro que estás leyendo.

I've read Jack Kerouac's Dharma Bums, but didn't finish On the Road. I've read José Saramago's All the Names (love love loved it!), but didn't finish Blindness. I've read DFW's Infinite Jest, every footnote of which was super yummy, but I chose to skim the novel's gaming & tennis passages. I've read most of Faulkner's short works, but didn't finish As I Lie Dying or Absalom, Absalom. I've read four of Pynchon's major novels, but when I hit the coprophagia section of Gravity's Rainbow, I stopped reading & didn't come back. I'm a huge Don DeLillo fan, but only read half of Underworld & Cosmopolis. =shrug= ______________________ Thanks for the great job, Adam, of breaking down the diffs between reading to learn stuff vs. reading to grow, primary vs. secondary sources ("When in doubt, go meta" is a credo of mine), superficial vs. deep reading. And for telling your listeners to give up their guilt. Guilt is nothing but poison. ______________________ Curious that you would ask, "What are some of the books that defeated you?" Because I would never frame the question that way. I don't think of life as analogous to battle. Books and writers can't defeat me, because reading is not combat. As T. S. Eliot says, ... what there is to conquer By strength and submission, has already been discovered Once or twice, or several times, by men whom one cannot hope To emulate-but there is no competition- There is only the fight to recover what has been lost And found and lost again and again: and now, under conditions That seem unpropitious. But perhaps neither gain nor loss. For us, there is only the trying. The rest is not our business.

Thank you!

Great list, lots I’ve never heard of. I’m currently working my way through Murakami, loving it so far.

When you hold the book up stop moving your arms around it's annoying!!!!! and hold it up for the length you're going to talk about it.

Outstanding video, my friend! It took many years of reading comprehension research to converge on this finding-we understand best those things for which we already have prior knowledge. Yes, this seems simple, but think of how many times we’ve been in classes where readings were assigned, we did the readings, and were shocked at how little we remembered or how many important concepts we didn’t catch. Then we felt stupid because we simply didn’t have a cognitive framework established to “hang” all that new knowledge on. My favorite subject exemplifying the importance of prior knowledge and quality instruction is stats. I took three grad courses in stats where the prof assign difficult stats books to read, didn’t have a class syllabus, and proceeded to simply ask the class if we had questions over the readings (most of us didn’t know enough about stats to ask coherent questions!) I didn’t buy the stats book because after reading the first couple of chapters a couple of times I still couldn’t make sense of the concepts. Hell, I didn’t even know the Greek letters used for population parameters! A grad committee member took pity on me and explained the concept of prior knowledge and ranted about the stupidity of how the stats courses at our university were taught. She gave me a simpler book-How to Reason with Statistics. She told me I simply didn’t have enough knowledge and experience with stats to make sense of the difficult readings. Wow! The simpler book (written in plain English) proceeded with building the notion of what type of research questions could be asked; then based on those questions what types of data could be collected; finally, which type of statistical tools could be used to analyze specific data sets to report findings and conclusions. I wouldn’t have gotten through these courses without that book. Nowadays, I could also go to the web to build my prior knowledge. And as you pointed out, this isn’t cheating, it’s what good learners do to develop cognitive frameworks for new information, Contrast the systematic building of stats knowledge through easier readings with the class prof who put up a slide entitled “The Mathematical Assumptions of Analysis of Variance,” and then asked asked, “Any questions?” Every strategy you presented in this video, Adam, has tons of research to support these strategies. Now Dude, your assignment is to look up Richard Strauss’s Also Sprach Zarathustra on CZcams and try to convince me that you never heard the introduction before!

While I agree that secondary sources can be a big help, the temptation is to get lazy. People do end up taking the commentaries/notes and never go back to the original sources. I do think that is lazy. If you can fight that tendency, then, yes, secondary sources can be useful.

I have to confess that, after 188 pages, The Brothers Karamazov defeated me. For the life of me, I couldn't tell you all of who was who, and what was going on. I feel so stupid. It's just WORDS! Sigh. I usually don't give up on books. But for some reason, and despite reading the back of the book several times, I had missed the part about a love triangle/drama. I don't think they used the term, "love triangle." But the relationships aspect. If I had seen that, I never would have started. And if it did not have that, I would have kept pushing on to the end. Romance drama is just not my thing, especially if I am already struggling with other aspects of a book. Jane Eyre has "romance", and I had no problem with it. I love that book! But it was easier to understand in general (didn't have a large cast of characters) and the romance-y aspect wasn't THE focus of the story. I feel so bad. And dumb. Maybe a different one of his works would be better for me.

Everything you said in this video was true and helpful. My goddaughter recently challenged me to read a daunting book. I chose "To The Lighthouse" by Virginia Woolf. I've tried numerous times to read it to no avail. So I read about the author's life and how she used her life experiences to write it. Then I watched CZcams videos specifically about this book and her odd writing style. It made all the difference and I finally finished it. Like you I still didn't get everything but another read thru might do the trick. Having said that, I may never be ready for War and Peace. Instead I went back to an old reliable. The latest C.J. Box novel. Lots of fun and educational in a different way. Sorry to ramble on, but great video again.

Great video. I checked the list, the picture of Dorian Gray is on my TBR, not on my book-et list, though the idea of having one sounds fun

P.s. Great video

I can’t remember if I’ve left you any recommendations (not in any order): Fair and Tender Ladies (Lee Smith), Mother Night (Kurt Vonnegut Jr), QB VII (Leon Uris), One Hundred Years of Solitude (Gabriel Garcia) Villette (Brontë) Oh, and all 18 books (so far) of *The Dresden Files* (Jim Baker)

Excellent advice for reading Tolstoy. I used to be fluent in Russian and your tips all make a lot of sense! Спасибо за это видео…позже мой друг 🤘

Check out the master and margarita by bulgakov - funny Russian

The Magic Mountain by Thomas Mann

i hope one of those murakami books is coming up

i dug Destination Morgue by Ellroy and am a Hemingway fan. agree that OM&TS is great. A Farewell to Arms also

I didn't have a chance to watch the video, but there was a typo in your thumbnail. It should read: Both are Great!

All great advice! I particularly agree with the "Invest in the Characters" part. That applies to all Tolstoy. His character writing is his greatest strength. You make me want to read it again.

What channel or Patreon channel etc. has a good group where they read books and analyze them

Have you read Dune? I’ve read a lot of books, and Dune absolutely blew me away. It’s also considered possibly the best sci-fi book of all time.

Interesting that you imply Marcel Proust's masterpiece is off-putting because of how long it is. It always amazes me how many people gobble up every novel in a series-not just trilogies, but series that are 5, 7, 10 books long. I have friends who have Kindle subscriptions on Amazon set to automatically download the next book out from their favorite authors, who already have 25 or more books out. But mention In Search of Lost Time, and they're like "What a tome! Way too long!" As for War and Peace, I reread it with great pleasure every five years or so. I don't think of such books as needing patience to consume, because when immersed in them, I'm always so impatient to turn the page. =grin= By the way, I admire your wanting to read it in French. I've read passages en français, but to read the whole thing from one end to the other, I chose translations-of which I've read two different ones. I do read a lot of poetry in French, German & Spanish (editions with facing pages in translation are the best), but that's because poetry is so dependent on perfection of the language. And poems are short. I hope soon to learn enough Russian to be able to read the poems of Anna Ahkmatova & others: the glimmers I get of how wonderful Russian poetry must be, from reading translations, are spurring me on. Speaking of Russian, a couple of Dostoevsky books to add to your TBR pile if you haven't read them yet: When I listed my favorite poets to you earlier, I inexplicably omitted Wallace Stevens. Wallace Stevens is my favorite recommendation for people who are bright & well-read, but unfamiliar with modern poetry. He's one of those poets, like William Butler Yeats, where not every poem will hit for you at one particular moment in time, but the ones that do hit will burn themselves into your brain & seem to define a whole era of your life. There's a reason Stevens gets quoted a lot in popular movies. Stevens & Yeats both have œuvres that are super high quality & also quite variable in style. And when I mentioned favorite short story writers, I left off Franz Kafka. DUH! He's one I'd say who didn't write a single mediocre story, & his sense of humor is much underrated. The Metamorphosis is funny AF. A fave Kafka you might check out quickly is "The Burrow." Joyce Carol Oates is also a very good short story writer: she's so prolific, her Greatest Hits are crème de la crème. Glad you got past Lolita's subject matter to how well-crafted & witty it is. Lolita is hands down my favorite road trip novel: Nabokov's outsider view of Americana, especially small motels in the midwest, is sweeeet. I've read pretty much all of Nabokov, who's a pre-eminent prose stylist, but my favorite work of his isn't fiction, it's his memoir: Speak, Memory. All I have to do is *think* of Speak, Memory to want to read it all over again. I haven't seen all your vids, so I don't know if you've mentioned these, but in case you haven't read these authors, do go for them: -Malcolm Lowry's Under the Volcano (always my top choice when people ask me for a stellar novel they may not have heard of) -all of Italo Calvino, especially Invisible Cities & Cosmicomics -N. K. Jemison's Broken Earth trilogy, widely considered to be the sine qua non of 21st century science fiction, the way that Isaac Asimov was in the 1970s -Middlemarch by George Eliot -Virginia Woolf, especially To the Lighthouse, Mrs. Dalloway & The Waves You've probably read some Cormac McCarthy (I've read every word he wrote & feel SO lucky to have him in my life) but here's one of his that doesn't get mentioned enough: Child of God. It's quite short & very, very funny. Do you read crime fiction? Elmore Leonard is an amazing writer, a unique stylist whose mark on the field is unparalleled. Michael McConnelly's Harry Bosch series is another top-notch read. (The Amazon TV series didn't do it justice.) Also the Swedish police procedurals by Maj Sjöwall and Per Wahlöö. Another genre I love is horror or dark lit: Thomas Ligotti, Robert Aickman, Caitlin R. Kiernan, H. P. Lovecraft, Angela Carter, Clive Barker's Books of Blood & Damnation Game. Doris Lessing's The Fifth Child, Alan Moore's graphic novel From Hell, & many more. Stephen King, who's obviously not just a horror writer, tends to be underrated as a prose stylist, because people either only know the movies based on his books, or only know his first 10 or so books. He doesn't credit for how much *better* a writer he's become in his later years: he's recently written quite a few brilliant short stories & novellas & has won the prestigious O. Henry Award for best short fiction. (His shorts appear in the New Yorker.) Recent long fiction of his that's very good indeed: the Finders Keepers trilogy & Billy Summers. I love Billy Summers so much, I've already read it three times, even though it only came out in 2021. I'm enjoying your videos more than most bookish CZcamsrs, because you strike me as having good taste. The only thing that's disappointed me so far is that you have yet to mention a book I haven't read. But I'll keep watching you in the hope of discovering a new gem. Here's a suggestion: read some of your favorite passages aloud to us. I always enjoy hearing what sections of their favorite books people especially enjoyed. Happy reading...

Interesting! This sounds like a book you read to write a thesis; however I’m intrigued and I’d love to challenge myself with it…