Amazon.com Releases Curated List of “100 Books to Read in a Lifetime”

Selections made by Amazon.com’s editorial team. Same team that produces Best Books of the Month and the Omnivoracius blog
From Amazon.com:

The list of 100 Books to Read in a Lifetime encompasses a wide variety of fiction and nonfiction, including children’s, teen, and young adult. It is intended to span decades. “We listed the books alphabetically by title,” said [Sara] Nelson, [Editorial Director of Print and Kindle Books at Amazon.com], “because our assumption is that no book is more important than another.” The Amazon Books editorial team will audit the list regularly to make sure it stays culturally relevant.

Some fun facts about the 100 Books:

• Oldest book on the list: Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen (1813)

• Most recently published book on the list: Life After Life by Kate Atkinson (2013)

• Book on the list that inspired the most internal debate: 1984 by George Orwell

• A few books that were unanimous across the team: Little House on the Prairie by Laura Ingalls Wilder, Charlotte’s Webby E.B. White, To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, Portnoy’s Complaint by Philip Roth, Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand

• Books on the list that were our #1 Amazon Best Books of the Year: The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot

• The book each editor most wished had made the list (but didn’t): Cadillac Desert by Marc Reisner (Jon Foro); Full Catastrophe Living by Jon Kabat-Zinn (Mari Malcolm); The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams (Robin Rothman); Les Misérables by Victor Hugo (Neal Thompson); Moby Dick by Herman Melville (Chris Schluep); Pippi Longstocking by Astrid Lindgren (Sara Nelson); Where I’m Calling From by Raymond Carver (Kevin Nguyen); Wonderby R.J. Palacio (Seira Wilson)

Direct to List: 100 Books to Read in a Lifetime
Vote on the selections at GoodReads.
See Also: New York Public Library Publishes Annual List of Children’s Books to Read and Share (December 5, 2013)
See Also:Librarian Compiled! New York Public Library Releases Its List of Top 100 Great Children’s Books of the Last Century (September 30, 2013)

Filed under: Libraries, News, Public Libraries