My reading list

My reading list

Feb 21, 2023

🌿 Sprout

I put this list together on an overcast day broken by brief patches of sunlight fading in and out on the lawns. The air is strangely balmy, and I feel nostalgic for some reason. You will forgive me if that, and the weather, affects my choices. I have, however, tried to shake off recency bias and dig deep into years of reading voraciously to make accurate recommendations.

This isn't a curated Goodreads list; it's more like me writing down the names that have been caught in the cobwebs of my mind for goodness knows what reason. But I think that's a good enough reason to recommend something: This stuck with me, that's it. I usually buy my books from Champaca, Bookworm, Blossom Book House, Walking Bookfairs and surprise bookfairs that show up in convention halls.

Note: Books with * involve triggering topics explained in quite some detail. I don't recommend them any lesser for it — they are still masterclasses in storytelling.

Fiction

Standalone novels

  • Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin

  • All the Light We Cannot See, Anthony Doerr

  • A Gentleman in Moscow, Amor Towles

  • A Little Life, Hanya Yanagihara *

  • Sea of Poppies, Amitav Ghosh *

  • Midnight's Children, Salman Rushdie

  • The Song of Achilles, Madeline Miller

  • Americanah, Chimamanda Ngozie Adichie *

  • Good Omens, Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman

  • And the Mountains Echoed, Khaled Hosseini

  • The God of Small Things, Arundhati Roy *

  • Shantaram, Gregory David Roberts

  • The Overstory, Richard Powers

  • The Goldfinch, Donna Tartt *

  • The Book Thief, Markus Zusak

  • White Teeth, Zadie Smith *

Classics

The premise of 'classics' and 'canon' is heavily contested in literature. Who is it a classic for? Who is the list catering to? Who is it alienating? Short note on this forthcoming, but the long and short of it is that these are my classics.

  • Malgudi Days, R.K. Narayan

  • The Great Gatsby, F Scott Fitzgerald

  • Little Women (and the lesser-known Little Men), Louisa May Alcott

  • Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen

  • Persuasion, Jane Austen

  • Nagamandala, Girish Karnad

  • Oliver Twist, Charles Dickens

  • Demian_ Herman Hesse

  • Dracula, Bram Stoker

  • Frankenstein, Mary Shelley

Series

  • The Winternight Trilogy, Katherine Ardern

  • The Stormlight Archives, Brandon Sanderson

  • Six of Crows Duology, Leigh Bardugo

  • The Song of Ice and Fire, George R.R. Martin

  • Gentleman Bastards, Scott Lynch *

  • Shades of Magic, V.E. Schwab

  • The Earthsea Cycle, Ursula K. Le Guin

  • Wolf Hall, Hilary Mantel

  • The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams

  • The Sandman, Neil Gaiman

Backlinks to this note

Inspiration

A collection of writing and other sensory experiences that I keep returning to.