She is too fond

of books

One of my favorite quotes is from Louisa May Alcott of Little Women fame.  From Work: A Story of Experience:  “She is too fond of books, and it has turned her brain.”  In my case that is most certainly true.  Another favorite author of mine is Dorothy Parker, who is known for her pithy wit, but her writing betrays what I think is great vulnerability and sensitivity—regardless of what she might have us think.  This fabulous room is one Parker and her associates made famous; it’s the Algonquin Hotel, site of the round table where their “Vicious Circle” met daily for lunch throughout the 1920s.

Reading List:  Fiction Best Sellers,

1920s to 1964

What they were reading...

Literary Hub (lithub.com) compiled a list of the fiction best sellers of the last century.  Some of these books stand the test of time and have titles we know today; others have faded into obscurity and are difficult to find.  Just like the best sellers of today, not all of them hold up well under critical review.  Even so, it’s hard to resist the opportunity these books give us to travel back in time and explore themes of a different era.

Fiction Best Sellers: The 1920s

1918

  1. The U.P. Trail by Zane Grey
  2. The Tree of Heaven by May Sinclair
  3. The Amazing Interlude by Mary Roberts Rinehart
  4. Dere Mable by Edward Streeter
  5. Oh, Money! Money! by Eleanor H. Porter
  6. Greatheart by Ethel M. Dell
  7. The Major by Ralph Connor
  8. The Pawns Count by E. Phillips Oppenheim
  9. A Daughter of the Land by Gene Stratton Porter
  10. Sonia by Stephen McKenna

Also published that year:

  • The Magnificent Ambersons by Booth Tarkington
  • My Antonia by Willa Cather

1919

  1. The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse by V. Blasco Ibanez
  2. The Arrow of Gold by Joseph Conrad
  3. The Desert of Wheat by Zane Grey
  4. Dangerous Days by Mary Roberts Rinehart
  5. The Sky Pilot in No Man’s Land by Ralph Connor
  6. The Re-Creation of Brian Kent by Harold Bell Wright
  7. Dawn by Gene Stratton Porter
  8. The Tin Soldier by Temple Bailey
  9. Christopher and Columbus by Elizabeth von Arnim
  10. In Secret by Robert W. Chambers

Also published that year:

  • Winesburg, Ohio by Sherwood Anderson

1920

  1. The Man of the Forest by Zane Grey
  2. Kindred of the Dust by Peter B. Kyne
  3. The Re-Creation of Brian Kent by Harold Bell Wright
  4. The River’s End by James Oliver Curwood
  5. A Man for the Ages by Irving Bacheller
  6. Mary-Marie by Eleanor H. Porter
  7. The Portygee by Joseph C. Lincoln
  8. The Great Impersonation by E. Phillips Oppenheim
  9. The Lamp in the Desert by Ethel M. Dell
  10. Harriet and the Piper by Kathleen Norris

Also published that year:

  • The Mysterious Affair at Styles by Agatha Christie
  • This Side of Paradise by F. Scott Fitzgerald
  • Women in Love by D. H. Lawrence
  • Main Street by Sinclair Lewis
  • The Age of Innocense by Edith Wharton

1921

  1. Main Street by Sinclair Lewis
  2. The Brimming Cup by Dorothy Canfield
  3. The Mysterious Rider by Zane Grey
  4. The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton
  5. The Valley of Silent Men by James Oliver Curwood
  6. The Sheik by Edith M. Hull
  7. A Poor Wise Man by Mary Roberts Rinehart
  8. Her Father’s Daughter by Gene Stratton Porter
  9. The Sisters-in-Law by Gertrude Atherton
  10. The Kingdom Round the Corner by Coningsby Dawson

Also published that year:

  • Crome Yellow by Aldous Huxley

1922

  1. If Winter Comes by A.S.M. Hutchinson
  2. The Sheik by Edith M. Hull
  3. Gentle Julia by Booth Tarkington
  4. iThe Head of the House of Coombe by Frances Hodgson Burnett
  5. Simon Called Peter by Robert Keable
  6. The Breaking Point by Mary Roberts Rinehart
  7. This Freedom by A.S.M. Hutchinson
  8. Maria Chapdelaine by Louis Hemon
  9. To the Last Man by Zane Grey
  10. Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis and Helen of the Old House by Harold Bell Wright (tie)

Also published that year:

  • The Beautiful and The Damned by F. Scott Fitzgerald
  • Ulysses by James Joyce
  • The Garden Party by Katherine Mansfield
  • Swann’s Way by Marcel Proust (English translation)

1923

  1. Black Oxen by Gertrude Atherton
  2. His Children’s Children by Arthur Train
  3. The Enchanted April by Elizabeth von Arnim
  4. Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis
  5. The Dim Lantern by Temple Bailey
  6. This Freedom by A.S.M. Hutchinson
  7. The Mine with the Iron Door by Harold Bell Wright
  8. The Wanderer of the Wasteland by Zane Grey
  9. The Sea-Hawk by Rafael Sabatin
  10. The Breaking Point by Mary Roberts Rinehart

Also published that year:

  • Cane by Jean Toomer

1924

  1. So Big by Edna Ferber
  2. The Plastic Age by Percy Marks
  3. The Little French Girl by Anne Douglas Sedgwick
  4. The Heirs Apparent by Philip Gibbs
  5. A Gentleman of Courage by James Oliver Curwood
  6. The Call of the Canyon by Zane Grey
  7. The Midlander by Booth Tarkington
  8. The Coast of Folly by Coningsby Dawson
  9. Mistress Wilding by Rafael Sabatini
  10. The Homemaker by Dorothy Canfield Fisher

Also published that year:

  • A Passage to India by E.M. Forster
  • The Magic Mountain by Thomas Mann
  • Billy Budd, Sailor by Herman Melville (published posthumously)

1925

  1. Soundings by A. Hamilton Gibbs
  2. The Constant Nymph by Margaret Kennedy
  3. The Keeper of the Bees by Gene Stratton Porter
  4. Glorious Apollo by E. Barrington
  5. The Green Hat by Michael Arlen
  6. The Little French Girl by Anne Douglas Sedgwick
  7. Arrowsmith by Sinclair Lewis
  8. The Perennial Bachelor by Anne Parrish
  9. The Carolinian by Rafael Sabatin
  10. One Increasing Purpose by A.S.M. Hutchinson

Also published that year:

  • An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser
  • The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
  • Gentlemen Prefer Blondes by Anita Loos
  • Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf

1926

  1. The Private Life of Helen of Troy by John Erskine
  2. Gentlemen Prefer Blondes by Anita Loos
  3. Sorrell and Son by Warwick Deeping
  4. The Hounds of Spring by Sylvia Thompson
  5. Beau Sabreur by P.C. Wren
  6. The Silver Spoon by John Galsworthy
  7. Beau Geste by P.C. Wren
  8. Show Boat by Edna Ferber
  9. After Noon by Susan Ertz
  10. The Blue Window by Temple Bailey

Also published that year:

  • The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway

1927

  1. Elmer Gantry by Sinclair Lewis
  2. The Plutocrat by Booth Tarkington
  3. Doomsday by Warwick Deeping
  4. Sorrell and Son by Warwick Deeping
  5. Jalna by Mazo de la Roche
  6. Lost Ecstasy by Mary Roberts Rinehart
  7. Twilight Sleep by Edith Wharton
  8. Tomorrow Morning by Anne Parrish
  9. The Old Countess by Anne Douglas Sedgwick
  10. A Good Woman by Louis Bromfield

Also published that year:

  • Death Comes for the Archbishop by Willa Cather
  • The Bridge of San Luis Rey by Thornton Wilder
  • To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf

1928

  1. The Bridge of San Luis Rey by Thornton Wilder
  2. Wintersmoon by Hugh Walpole
  3. Swan Song by John Galsworthy
  4. The Greene Murder Case by S.S. Van Dine
  5. Bad Girl by Vina Delmar
  6. Claire Ambler by Booth Tarkington
  7. Old Pybus by Warwick Deeping
  8. All Kneeling by Anne Parrish
  9. Jalna by Mazo de la Roche
  10. The Strange Case of Miss Annie Spragg by Louis Bromfield

Also published that year:

  • Point Counter Point by Aldous Huxley
  • Parade’s End by Ford Madox Ford
  • Decline and Fall by Evelyn Waugh
  • Orlando by Virginia Woolf

1929

  1. All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque
  2. Dodsworth by Sinclair Lewis
  3. Dark Hunter by Anne Douglas Sedgwick
  4. The Bishop Murder Case by S.S. Van Dine
  5. Peder Victorious by O.E. Rolvaag
  6. Mamba’s Daughters by DuBose Heyward
  7. The Galaxy by Susan Ertz
  8. Scarlet Sister Mary by Julia Peterkin
  9. Joseph and His Brethren by H.W. Freeman

Also published that year:

  • The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner
  • Living by Henry Green
  • Red Harvest by Dashiell Hammett
  • A Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway
  • A High Wind in Jamaica by Richard Hughes
  • Passing Nella Larsen
  • Look Homeward, Angel by Thomas Wolfe

Fiction Best Sellers: The 1930s

1930

  1. Cimarron by Edna Ferber
  2. Exile by Warwick Deeping
  3. The Woman of Andros by Thornton Wilder
  4. Years of Grace by Margaret Ayer Barnes
  5. Angel Pavement by J.B. Pristley
  6. The Door by Mary Roberts Rinehart
  7. Rogue Herries by Hugh Walpole
  8. Chances by A. Hamilton Gibbs
  9. Young Man of Manhattan by Katharine Brush
  10. Twenty-Four Hours by Louis Bromfield

Also published that year:

  • The 42nd Parallel by John Dos Passos
  • As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner
  • The Maltese Falcon by Dashiell Hammett

1931

  1. The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck
  2. Shadows on the Rock by Willa Cather
  3. A White Bird Flying Bess Streeter Aldrich
  4. Grand Hotel by Vicki Baum
  5. Years of Grace by Margaret Ayer Barnes
  6. The Road Back Erich Maria Remarque
  7. The Bridge of Desire by Warwick Deeping
  8. Back Street by Fannie Hurst
  9. Finch’s Fortune by Mazo de la Roche
  10. Maid in Waiting by John Galsworthy

Also published that year:

  • The Waves by Virginia Woolf

1932

  1. The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck
  2. The Fountain by Charles Morgan
  3. Sons by Pearl S. Buck
  4. Magnolia Street by Louis Golding
  5. The Sheltered Life by Ellen Glasgow
  6. Old Wine and New by Warwick Deeping
  7. Mary’s Neck by Booth Tarkington
  8. Magnificent Obsession by Lloyd C. Douglas
  9. Inheritance by Phillis Bentley
  10. Three Loves by A.J. Cronin

Also published that year:

  • 1919 by John Dos Passos
  • Light in August by William Faulkner
  • Cold Comfort Farm by Stella Gibbons
  • Brave New World by Aldous Huxley

1933

  1. Anthony Adverse by Hervey Allen
  2. As the Earth Turns by Gladys Hasty Carroll
  3. Ann Vickers by Sinclair Lewis
  4. Magnificent Obsession by Lloyd C. Douglas
  5. One More River by John Galsworthy
  6. Forgive Us Our Trespasses by Lloyd C. Douglas
  7. The Master of Jalna by Mazo de la Roche
  8. Miss Bishop by Bess Streeter Aldrich
  9. The Farm by Louis Bromfield
  10. Little Man, What Now? by Hans Fallada

Also published that year:

  • Miss Lonelyhearts by Nathanael West

1934

  1. Anthony Adverse by Hervey Allen
  2. Lamb in his Bosom by Caroline Miller
  3. So Red the Rose by Stark Young
  4. Good-Bye, Mr. Chips by James Hilton
  5. Within This Present by Margaret Ayer Barnes
  6. Work of Art by Sinclair Lewis
  7. Private Worlds by Phyllis Bottome
  8. Mary Peters by Mary Ellen Chase
  9. Oil for the Lamps of China by Alice Tisdale Hobart
  10. Seven Gothic Tales by Isak Dinesen

Also published that year:

  •  The Postman Always Rings Twice by James M. Cain
  • Tender is the Night by F. Scott Fitzgerald
  • I, Claudius by Robert Graves
  • Tropic of Cancer by Henry Miller
  • Appointment in Samarra by John O’Hara
  • Call it Sleep by Henry Roth
  • A Handful of Dust by Evelyn Waugh

1935

  1. Green Light by Lloyd C. Douglas
  2. Vein of Iron by Ellen Glasgow
  3. Of Time and the River by Thomas Wolfe
  4. Time Out of Mind by Rachel Field
  5. Good-Bye, Mr. Chips by James Hilton
  6. The Forty Days of Musa Dagh by Franz Werfel
  7. Heaven’s My Destination by Thornton Wilder
  8. Lost Horizon by James Hilton
  9. Come and Get It by Edna Ferber
  10. Europa by Robert Briffault

Also published that year:

  • It Can’t Happen Here by Sinclair Lewis
  • Gaudy Night by Dorothy L. Sayers
  • Tortilla Flat by John Steinbeck

1936

  1. Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell
  2. The Last Puritan by George Santayana
  3. Sparkenbroke by Charles Morgan
  4. Drums Along the Mohawk by Walter D. Edmonds
  5. It Can’t Happen Here by Sinclair Lewis
  6. White Banners by Lloyd C. Douglas
  7. The Hurricane by Charles Hordhoff and James Norman Hall
  8. The Thinking Reed by Rebecca West
  9. The Doctor by Mary Roberts Rinehart
  10. Eyeless in Gaza by Aldous Huxley

Also published that year:

  • Nightwood by Djuna Barnes
  • Absalom! Absalom! by William Faulkner

1937

  1. Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell
  2. Northwest Passage by Kenneth Roberts
  3. The Citadel by A.J. Fronin
  4. And So-Victoria by Vaughan Wilkins
  5. Drums Along the Mohawk by Walter D. Edmonds
  6. The Years by Virginia Woolf
  7. Theatre by W. Somerset Maugham
  8. Of Mice and Men  by John Steinbeck
  9. The Rains Came by Louis Bromfield
  10. We Are Not Alone by James Hilton

Also published that year:

  • U.S.A. by John Dos Passos
  • their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston
  • The Metamorphosis (English translation) by Franz Kafka
  • The Trial (English translation) by Franz Kafka
  • The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien

1938

  1. The Yearling by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings
  2. The Citadel by A.J. Cronin
  3. My Son, My Son! by Howard Spring
  4. Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier
  5. Northwest Passage by Kenneth Roberts
  6. All This, and Heaven Too by Rachel Field
  7. The Rains Came by Louis Bromfield
  8. And Tell of Time by Laura Krey
  9. The Mortal Storm by Phyllis Bottome
  10. Action at Aquila by Hervey Allen

Also published that year:

  • Scoop by Evelyn Waugh

1939

  1. The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
  2. All This, and Heaven Too by Rachel Field
  3. Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier
  4. Wickford Point by John Marquard
  5. Escape by Ethel Vance
  6. Disputed Passage by Lloyd C. Douglas
  7. The Yearling by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings
  8. The Tree of Liberty by Elizabeth Page
  9. The Nazarene by Sholem Asch
  10. Kitty Foyle by Christopher Morley

Also published that year:

  • The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler
  • Finnegans Wake by James Joyce
  • At Swim-Two-Birds by Flann O’Brien
  • Good Morning, Midnight by Jean Rhys
  • Johnny Got His Gun by Dalton Trumbo
  • The Day of the Locust by Nathanael West
  • The Sword in the Stone by T.H. White

Fiction Best Sellers: The 1940s

1940

  1. How Green Was My Valley by Richard Llewellyn
  2. Kitty Foyle by Christopher Morley
  3. Mrs. Miniver by Jan Struther
  4. For Whom the Bell Tolls by Ernest Hemingway
  5. The Nazarene by Sholem Asch
  6. Stars on the Sea by F. van Wyck Mason
  7. Oliver Wiswell by Kenneth Roberts
  8. The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
  9. Night in Bombay by Louis Bromfield
  10. The Family by Nina Fedorova

Also published that year:

  • Darkness at Noon by Arthur Koestler
  • The Heart is a Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers
  • The Man Who Loved Children by Christina Stead
  • Native Son by Richard Wright

1941

  1. The Keys of the Kingdom by A.J. Cronin
  2. Random Harvest by James Hilton
  3. This Above All by Eric Knight
  4. The Sun is my Undoing by Marguerite Steen
  5. Form Whom the Bell Tolls by Ernest Hemingway
  6. Oliver Wiswell by Kenneth Roberts
  7. H.M. Pulham, Esquire by John P. Marquand
  8. Mr. and Mrs. Cugat by Isabel Scott Rorick
  9. Saratoga Trunk by Edna Ferber
  10. Windswept by Mary Ellen Chase

Also published that year:

  • Mildred Pierce by James M. Cain
  • The Real Life of Sebastian Knight by Vladimir Nabokov

1942

  1. The Song of Bernadette by Franz Werfel
  2. The Moon is Down by John Steinbeck
  3. Dragon Seed by Pearl S. Buck
  4. And Now Tomorrow by Rachel Field
  5. Drivin’ Woman by Elizabeth Pickett
  6. Windswept by Mary Ellen Chase
  7. The Robe by Lloyd C. Douglas
  8. The Sun in My Undoing by Marguerite Steen
  9. Kings Row by Henry Bellamann
  10. The Keys of the Kingdom by A.J. Cronin

Also published that year:

  • Go Down, Moses by William Faulkner
  • The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis
  • The Company She Keeps by Mary McCarthy

1943

  1. The Robe by Lloyd C. Douglas
  2. The Valley of Decision by Marcia Davenport
  3. So Little Time by John P. Marquand
  4. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith
  5. The Human Comedy by William Saroyan
  6. Mrs. Parkington by Louis Bromfield
  7. The Apostle by Sholem Asch
  8. Hungry Hill by Daphne du Maurier
  9. The Forest and the Fort by Hervey Allen
  10. The Song of Bernadette by Franz Werfel

Also published that year:

  • The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand

1944

  1. Strange Fruit by Lillian Smith
  2. The Robe by Lloyd C. Douglas
  3. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith
  4. Forever Amber by Kathleen Winsor
  5. The Razor’s Edge by W. Somerset Maugham
  6. The Green Years by A.J. Cronin
  7. Leave Her to Heaven by Ben Ames Williams
  8. Green Dolphin Street by Elizabeth Goudge
  9. A Bell for Adano by John Hersey
  10. The Apostle by Sholem Asch

Also published that year:

  • Dangling man by Saul Bellow

1945

  1. Forever Amber by Kathleen Winsor
  2. The Robe by Lloyd C. Douglas
  3. The Black Rose by Thomas B. Costain
  4. The White Tower by James Ramsey Ullman
  5. Cass Timberlane by Sinclair Lewis
  6. A Lion is in the Streets by Adria Locke Langley
  7. So Well Remembered by James Hilston
  8. Captain from Castile by Samuel Shellabarger
  9. Earth and High Heaven by Adria Locke Langley
  10. Immortal Wife by Irving Stone

Also published that year:

  • Loving by Henry Green
  • If He Hollers Let Him Go by Chester Himes
  • The Berlin Stories by Christopher Isherwood
  • The Pursuit of Love by Nancy Mitford
  • Animal Farm by George Orwell
  • Brideshead Revisited
  • Black Boy by Richard Wright

1946

  1. The King’s General by Daphne du Maurier
  2. This Side of Innocence Taylor Caldwell
  3. The River Road by Frances Parkinson Keyes
  4. The Miracle of the Bells by Russell Janney
  5. The Hucksters by Frederic Wakeman
  6. The Foxes of Harrow by Frank Yerby
  7. Arch of Triumph y Erich Maria Remarque
  8. The Black Rose by Thomas B. Costain
  9. B.F.’s Daughter by John P. Marquand
  10. The Snake Pit by Mary Jane Ward

Also published that year:

  • The Stranger (English translation) by Albert Camus
  • Hiroshima by John Hersey
  • Thieves in the Night by Arthur Koestler
  • Titus Groan by Mervyn Peake
  • All the King’s Men by Robert Penn Warren

1947

  1. The Miracle of the Bells by Russell Janney
  2. The Moneyman by Thomas B. Costain
  3. Gentleman’s Agreement by Laura Z. Hobson
  4. Lydia Bailey by Kenneth Roberts
  5. The Vixens by Frank Yerby
  6. The Wayward Bus by Johns Steinbeck
  7. House Divided by Ben Ames Williams
  8. Kingsblood Royal by Sinclair Lewis
  9. East Side, West Side by Marcia Davenport
  10. Prince of Foxes by Samuel Shellabarger

Also published that year:

  • In a Lonely Place by Dorothy B. Hughes
  • Under the Volcano by Malcolm Lowry
  • Tales of the South Pacific by James A. Michener

1948

  1. The Naked and the Dead by Norman Mailer
  2. Dinner at Antoine’s by Frances Parkinson Keyes
  3. The Bishop’s Mantle by Agnes Sligh Turnbull
  4. Tomorrow Will Be Better by Betty Smith
  5. The Golden Hawk by Frank Yerby
  6. Raintree County by Ross Lockridge Jr.
  7. Shannon’s Way by A.J. Cronin
  8. Pilgrim’s Inn by Elizabeth Goudge
  9. The Young Lions by Irwin Shaw

Also published that year:

  • The Plague (English translation) by Albert Camus
  • The Heart of the Matter by Graham Greene

1949

  1. The Egyptian by Mika Waltari
  2. The Big Fisherman by Lloyd C. Douglas
  3. Mary by Sholem Asch
  4. A Rage to Live by John O’Hara
  5. Point of No Return by John P. Marquand
  6. Dinner at Antoine’s by Frances Parkinson Keyes
  7. High Towers by Thomas B. Costain
  8. Cutlass Empire by Van Wyck Mason
  9. Pride’s Castle by Frank Yerby
  10. Father of the Bride by Edward Streeter

Also published that year:

  • The Sheltering Sky by Paul Bowles
  • Dianetics by L. Ron Hubbard
  • The Lottery and Other Stories by Shirley Jackson
  • Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell
  • Nausea (English translation) by Jean-Paul Sartre

Fiction Best Sellers: The 1950s

1950

  1.  The Cardinal  by Henry Morton Robinson,
  2. Joy Street by Frances Parkinson Keyes
  3. Across the River and into the Trees by Ernest Hemingway
  4. The Wall by John Hersey
  5. Star Money by Kathleen Winsor
  6. The Parasites by Daphne du Maurier
  7. Floodtide by Frank Yerby
  8. Jubilee Trail by Gwen Bristow
  9. The Adventurer by Mika Waltari
  10. The Disenchanted by Budd Schulberg

Also published that year:

  • I, Robot by Isaac Asimov
  • The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury
  • Strangers on a Train by Patricia Highsmith

1951

  1. From Here to Eternity by James Jones
  2. The Caine Mutiny by Herman Wouk
  3. Moses by Sholem Asch
  4. The Cardinal by Henry Morton Robinson
  5. A Woman Called Fancy by Frank Yerby
  6. The Cruel Sea by Nicholas Monsarrat
  7. Melville Goodwin, U.S.A. by John P. Marquand
  8. Return to Paradise by James A. Michener
  9. The Foundling by Cardinal Spellman
  10. The Wanderer by Mika Waltari

Also published that year:

  • Siddhartha (English translation) by Hermann Hesse
  • The Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger
  • The Daughter of Time by Josephine Tey

1952

  1. The Silver Chalice by Thomas B. Costain
  2. The Caine Mutiny by Herman Wouk
  3. East of Eden by John Steinbeck
  4. My Cousin Rachel by Daphne du Maurier
  5. Steamboat Gothic by Frances Parkinson Keyes
  6. Giant by Edna Ferber
  7. The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway
  8. The Gown and the Glory by Agnes Sligh Turnbull
  9. The Saracen Blade by Frank Yerby
  10. The Houses in Between by Howard Spring

Also published that year:

  • Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison
  • The Price of Salt by Patricia Highsmith
  • The Natural by Bernard Malamud
  • Wise Blood by Flannery O’Connor
  • Excellent Women by Barbara Pym
  • Player Piano by Kurt Vonnegut

1953

  1. The Robe by Lloyd C. Douglas
  2. The Silver Chalice by Thomas B. Costain
  3. Désirée by Annemarie Selinko
  4. Battle Cry by Leon M. Uris
  5. From Here to Eternity by James Jones
  6. The High and the Mighty by Ernest K. Gann
  7. Beyond This Place by A. J. Cronin
  8. Time and Time Again by James Hilton
  9. Lord Vanity by Samuel Shellabarger
  10. The Unconquered by Ben Ames Williams

Also published that year:

  • Go Tell it on the Mountain by James Baldwin
  • The Adventures of Augie March by Saul Bellow
  • Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
  • Junky by William S. Burroughs
  • The Long Goodbye by Raymond Chandler
  • Casino Royale by Ian Fleming
  • Nine Stories by J.D. Salinger

1954

  1. Not as a Stranger by Morton Thompson
  2. Mary Anne by Daphne du Maurier
  3. Love is Eternal by Irving Stone
  4. The Royal Box by Frances Parkinson Keyes
  5. The Egyptian by Mika Waltari
  6. No Time for Sergeants by Mac Hyman
  7. Sweet Thursday by John Steinbeck
  8. The View from Ponpey’s Head by Hamilton Basso
  9. Never Victorious, Never Defeated by Taylor Caldwell
  10. Benton’s Row by Frank Yerby

Also published that year:

  • Lucky Jim by Kingsley Amis
  • Lord of the Flies by William Golding
  • I Am Legend by Richard Matheson
  • Under the Net by Iris Murdoch
  • The Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R. Tolkien

1955

  1. Marjorie Morningstar by Herman Wouk
  2. Auntie Mame by Patrick Dennis
  3. Andersonville by MacKinlay Kantor
  4. Bonjour Tristesse by Francoise Sagan
  5. The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit by Sloan Wilson
  6. Something of Value by Robert Ruark
  7. Not as a Stranger by Morton Thompson
  8. No Time for Sergeants by Mac Hyman
  9. The Tontine by Thomas B. Costain
  10. Ten North Frederick by John O’Hara

Also published that year:

  • The Ginger Man by J.P. Donleavy
  • The Quiet American by Graham Greene
  • The Talented Mr. Ripley by Patricia Highsmith
  • Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov
  • A Good Man is Hard to Find and Other Stories by Flannery O’Connor

1956

  1. Don’t Go Near the Water by William Brinkley
  2. The Last Hurrah by Edwin O’Connor
  3. Peyton Place by Grace Metalious
  4. Auntie Mame by Patrick Dennis
  5. Eloise by Kay Thompson
  6. Andersonville by MacKinlay Kantor
  7. A Certain Smile by Francoise Sagan
  8. The Tribe that Lost its Head by Nicholas Monsarrat
  9. The Mandarins by Simone de Beauvoir
  10. Boon Island by Kenneth Roberts

Also published that year:

  • Giovanni’s Room by James Baldwin
  • My Family and Other Animals by Gerald Durrell

1957

  1. By Love Possessed by James Gould Cozzens
  2. Peyton Place by Grace Metalious
  3. Compulsion by Meyer Levin
  4. Rally Round the Flag, Boys! by Max Shulman
  5. Blue Camellia by Frances Parkinson Keyes
  6. Eloise in Paris by Kay Thompson
  7. The Scapegoat by Daphne du Maurier
  8. On the Beach by Nevil Shute
  9. Below the Salt by Thomas B. Costain
  10. Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand

Also published that year:

  • The Wapshot Chronicle by John Cheever
  • On The Road by Jack Kerouac
  • The Assistant by Bernard Malamud
  • Pnin by Vladimir Nabokov

1958

  1. Doctor Zhivago by Boris Pasternak
  2. Anatomy of a Murder by Robert Traver
  3. Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov
  4. Around the World with Auntie mame by Patrick Dennis
  5. From the Terrace by John O’Hara
  6. Eloise at Christmastime by Kay Thompson
  7. Ice Palace by Edna Ferber
  8. The Winthrop Woman by Anya Seton
  9. The Enemy Camp by Jerome Weidman
  10. Victorine by Frances Parkinson Keyes

Also published that year:

  • Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe
  • Breakfast at Tiffany’s by Truman Capote
  • Our Man in Havana by Grapham Greene
  • The Dharma Bums by Jack Kerouac
  • Confessions of a Mask (English translation) by Yikio Mishima
  • Exodus by Leon Uris
  • The Once and Future King by T.H. White

1959

  1. Exodus by Leon Uris
  2. Doctor Zhivago by Boris Pasternak
  3. Hawaii by James Michener
  4. Advise and Consent by Allen Drury
  5. Lady Chatterley’s Lover by D.H. Lawrence
  6. The Ugly American by William J. Lederer and Eugene L. Burdick
  7. Dear and Glorious Physician by Taylor Caldwell
  8. Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov
  9. Mr.s ‘Arris Goes to Paris by Paul Gallico
  10. Poor No More by Robert Ruark

Also published that year:

  • Psycho by Robert Bloch
  • Naken Lunch by William S. Burroughs
  • The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson
  • A Seaparate Peace by John Knowles
  • Goobye, Columbus by Philip Roth

Fiction Best Sellers: The 1960s

1960

  1.  Advise and Consent by Allen Drury
  2. The Leopard by Giuseppe di Lampedusa
  3. Hawaii by James A. Michener
  4. The Chapman Report by Irving Wallace
  5. Ourselves to Know by John O’Hara
  6.  The Constant Image by Marcia Davenport
  7. The Lovely Ambition by Mary Ellen Chase
  8. The Listener by Taylor Caldwell
  9.  Trustee from the Toolroom by Nevil Shute
  10.  Sermons and Soda-Water by John O’ Hara

Also published that year:

  • The Sot-Weed factor by John Barth
  • The Alexandria by Lawrence Durrell
  • To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
  • The Country Girls by Edna O’Brien
  • Rabit, Run by John Updike

1961

  1. The Agony and the Ecstasy by Irving Stone
  2. Franny and Zooey by J.D. Salinger
  3. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
  4. Mila 18 by Leon Uris
  5. The Carpetbaggers by Harold Robbins
  6.  Tropic of Cancer by Henry Miller
  7. Winnie Ille Pu, (trans. Alexander Lenard) by A. A. Milne
  8. Daughter of Silence by Morris West
  9.  The Edge of Sadness by Edwin O’Connor
  10.  The Winter of Our Discontent by John Steinbeck

Also published that year:

  • Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A. Heinlein
  • Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
  • A House for Mr. Biswas by V.S. Naipaul
  • Tell Me a Riddle by Tillie Olsen
  • The Moviegoer by Walker Percy
  • The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie by Muriel Spark
  • Revolutionary Road by Richard Yates

1962

  1. Ship of Fools by Katherine Anne Porter
  2. Dearly Beloved by Anne Morrow Lindbergh
  3. A Shade of Difference by Allen Drury
  4. Youngblood Hawke by Herman Wouk
  5. Franny and Zooey by J.D. Salinger
  6. Fail-Safe by Eugene Burdick and Harvey Wheeler
  7. Seven Days in May by Fletcher Knebel and Charles W. Bailey II
  8. The Prize by Irving Wallace
  9.  The Agony and the Ecstasy by Irving Stone
  10.  The Reivers by William Faulkner

Also published that year:

  • The Drowned World by J.G. Ballard
  • Labyrinths by Jorge Luis Borges
  • A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess
  • We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson
  • The Thin Red Line by James Jones
  • One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey
  • A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle
  • The Golden Notebook by Doris Lessing
  • Pale Fire by Vladimir Nabokov

1963

  1. The Shoes of the Fisherman by Morris L. West
  2. The Group by Mary McCarthy
  3. Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters, and Seymour—An Introduction by J.D. Salinger
  4. Caravans by James A. Michener
  5. Elizabeth Appleton by John O’Hara
  6.  Grandmother and the Priests by Taylor Caldwell
  7. City of Night by John Rechy
  8. The Glass-Blowers by Daphne du Maurier
  9.  The Sand Pebbles by Richard McKenna
  10.  The Battle of the Villa Fiorita by Rumer Godden

Also published that year:

  • The Spy Who Came in from the Cold by John Le Carré
  • The Collector by John Fowles
  • Our Lady of the Flowers (English translation) by Jean Genet
  • The Bell Jar by Solvia Plath
  • V. by Thomas Pynchon
  • Cat’s Cradle by Kurt Vonnegut

1964

  1. The Spy Who Came in from the Cold by John Le Carré
  2. Candy by Terry Southern and Mason Hoffenberg
  3. Herzog by Saul Bellow
  4. Armageddon by Leon Uris
  5. The Man by Irving Wallace
  6. Rector of Justin by Louis Auchincloss
  7. The Martyred by Richard E. Kim
  8. You Only Live Twice by Ian Fleming
  9.  This Rough Magic by Mary Stewart
  10.  Convention by Fletcher Knebel and Charles W. Bailey II

Also published that year:

  • A Single Man by Christopher Isherwood
  • Sometimes a Great Notion by Ken Kesey
  • Last Exist to Brooklyn by Hubert Selby, Jr.

A few members of the Algonquin Round Table.  Pictured here:  Art Samuels, Harpo Marx, Charles MacArthur, Dorothy Parker, Alexander Woollcott. 

Check out the
Vintage Century

Reading Room

Sometimes in my travels I find old, worn little gift books of poetry, life lessons, and quotations.  Often these thin books were gifts from teachers to their students at the end of the school year.  Other books were given as gifts from one friend to another.  I have come to love these little books—especially those that are illustrated with pretty pictures of flowers and landscapes as well as decorative graphics.  Most of the gift books I find are in pretty poor condition, so I’m slowly trying to restore them digitally.  These little books are very quick reads.  So, if you have a moment, grab your cup of coffee, find a comfy seat, and dive in!

Download this bonus find…

This little bookmark fell out of an old gift book (available to read in the Circa 19xx Library) I purchased at an antique shop in Topeka, Kansas.  The gift book was presented to students by their teacher at the end of the school year.  Tucked inside was this bookmark, an added gift from the school district.  In fact, the superintendent’s name is printed at the bottom.  This bookmark required substantial cleanup; while the card itself was in great shape (no tears or creases), someone had written all over it.  I attempted to restore it digitally.

Do you see the half circle under the acorns near the top of the bookmark?  That’s actually a slit that enables you to secure the bookmark to the top of a page.

Date of this bookmark:  1928

 

The original, as found.
Too bad someone wrote on it!

Find your next literary escape…

National Book Award

The Pulitzer Prize

The Nobel Prize

The Man Booker Prize


The Hugo Award

Where they wrote

Where do writers find their inspiration?  Where do the stories come together?  I love exploring the private, creative spaces of creative people.  Here are two that I’ve visited in recent years:  Ernest Hemingway’s home in Key West, Florida, and Flannery O’Connor’s “Andalusia,” in Milledgeville, Georgia.

Don’t just read…annotate!

I have always loved writing in my books as I read them.  Underlining, writing notes in the margins, circling quotes I want to remember—reading is a tactile experience;  annotating is how I engage with the text, how I “collaborate” with the author.  That’s why I can’t (I just can’t!) read books on mobile devices.  I love technology, but not when it gets between me and my books!  Sometimes, though, it isn’t possible to annotate.  You can’t write in fine editions, library books, or books borrowed from friends.  The solution:  do what my Dad does:  write on your book mark!  My Dad has done this for years, and he keeps each one as an archive of his reading adventures.  You can do this, too, with Circa 19xx-style free printable book marks.

– Jennifer, Circa 19xx