Books I Would Recomend.

Below you will find a list of the books I have read throughout my life. These aren't all the books I've read, but I think this list covers most of them.

My rating system is based on how much I enjoyed reading these particular books, rather than what impact they made on world literature or society.

A 10/10 is a book that I believe is very close to absolute perfection — a book everyone simply must read at some point in their lives. A 1/10, on the other hand, either bored me to tears or made me want to pull my hair out in frustration. A book with a rating of 5/10 is something I would consider OK: perfectly readable, but not necessarily something I would bother reading a second time.

Please bear in mind that these rankings are based on my own personal opinion, not their objective value. A book can be historically significant but still not enjoyable for me personally. I firmly believe different people can have vastly different, but equally valid, opinions about literature, so please feel free to disagree with my ratings in the comments.

Please tell me about your favorite books in the comments, or where you think I've given a book the wrong rating.

Albert Camus

The Plague  (5/10)

Andreze Sapkowski (1948-)

The Witcher

3. Blood of Elves (5/10)

Anna Frank (1929-1945)

Diary of a Young Girl (7/10)

Apuleius (124-after 170) (Wikipedia)

Metamorphosis (7/10) (The Curiosity of Human Nature in Apuleius’s Metamorphosis)

Aristophanes (446-386BC) (Wikipedia)

Plays

The Frogs (10/10)

Aristotle (384–322 BC) 

Politics (7/10) (Does Plato and Aristotle Marginalize Women and Slaves?)

Arthur Miller (1915-2005)

The Crucible (8/10)

Boubacar Boris Diop (1964-)

Murambi The Book of Bones (1/10)

Brian Jacques (1939-2011)

Redwall Series

1. Redwall (5/10)

C. L. R. James (1901-1989)

The Black Jacobins (3/10)

C. S. Lewis (1898-1963)

The Chronicles of Narnia

1. The Lion the Which and the Wardrobe (3/10)

6. The Magisian's Nephew (1/10)

Chimamada Ngozi Adichie (1977-)

Half A Yellow Sun (7/10) (Education in Half a Yellow Sun)

Chinua Achebe (1930-2013)

Things Fall Apart (8/10) (The Odyssey in Things Fall Apart)

Conn Iggulden (1971-)

Emperor Series

1. The Gates of Rome (5/10)

2. The Death of Kings (5/10)

3. The Field of Swords (5/10)

4. The Gods of War (5/10)

Cormac MacCarthy (1933-2023)

The Road (9/10)

Cyril E. Robinson (1884-1981)

History of the Roman Republic (10/10)

Daniel Dafoe (1660-1731)

Robinson Crusoe (7/10)

David Gemmell (1948-2006)

Drenai series

1. Knights of Dark Renown (6/10) (Book Review)
3. Waylander (10/10)
4. Waylander II: In the Realm of the Wolf (10/10)
5. Hero in the Shadows (9/10)
6. The First Chronicles of Druss the Legend (9/10)
7. The Legend of Deathwalker (9/10)
9. Legend (10/10)
10. The King Beyond the Gate (6/10)
11. Quest for Lost Heroes (7/10)
13. The Swords of Night and Day (7/10)

 

Rigante series

1. Sword in the Storm (8/10)
2. Midnight Falcon (7/10)

Jon Shannow

1. Wolf in Shadow (10/10)
2. The Last Guardian (10/10)
3. Bloodstone (10/10)

Douglas Adams (1952-2001)

Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy

1. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (10/10)
2. The Restaurant at the End of the Universe (10/10)
3. Life, the Universe and Everything (10/10)
4. So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish (10/10)

5. Mostly Harmless (10/10)
 

Dirk Gently

2. The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul (6/10)

Edgar Rice Burroughs (1975-1950)

John Carter of Mars (John Carter: Terrible Yet Entertaining)

1. A Princess of Mars (4/10)

2. The Gods of Mars (4/10)

3. The Warlord of Mars (4/10)

Eoin Colfer (1965-)

Artemis Fowl Series

1. Artemis Fowl (6/10)
2. The Arctic Incident (6/10)
3. The Eternity Code (6/10)
4. The Opal Deception (6/10)
5. The Lost Colony (5/10)
6. The Time Paradox (5/10)
7. The Atlantis Complex (5/10)
8. The Last Guardian (4/10)

Euripides (480-406BC) (Wikipedia)

Plays

Electra (7/10)

Frank Herbert (1920-1986)

Dune (9/10)

F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896-1940)

The Great Gatsby (10/10)

George Orwell (1903-1950)

Animal Farm (10/10)

Homer (9th or 8th century BCE?) (Wikipedia)

The Odyssey (10/10) (Manliness in Homer's Odyssey) (The Guest Host Relationship in Homer's Odyssey)

Jeff Kinney (1971-)

Diary of a Wimpy Kid

1. Diary of a Wimpy Kid (1/10)

2. Rodrick Rules (1/10)

3. The Last Straw (1/10)

4. Dog Days (1/10)

5. The Ugly Truth (1/10)

6. Cabin Fever (1/10)

Jerry B. Jenkin (1949)

Wormling Series

1. Book of the King (5/10)

2. Sword of the Wormling (5/10)

3. The Changeling (5/10)

4. Minions of Time (5/10)

5. The Authors Blood (5/10)

J.K. Rowling (1965-)

Harry Potter

1. Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (9/10)

2. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (9/10)

3. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (9/10)

4. Harry Potter and  the Goblet of Fire (6/10)

5. Harry Potter and the Order of the Pheonix (5/10)

6. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince ( 3/10)

7. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows (1/10)

Joseph Conrad (1857-1924)

Heart of Darkness (9/10) (The “Heart of Darkness” in “Apocalypse Now”)

Julius Ceasar (100-44BC) (Wikipedia)

The Gallic Wars (5/10)

J.R.R. Tolkien (1892-1973)

1. The Hobbit (10/10) (Book Review)
2. The Fellowship of the Ring (10/10)
3. The Two Towers (10/10)

Kenneth Grahame (1859-1932)

The Wind in the Willows (9/10)

Karl Marx (1818-1883)

The Communist Manidesto (2/10)

Liu Cixin (1963-) 

The Three-Body Problem (10/10)

Livy (59BC-17AD) (Wikipedia)

History of Rome (7/10) (Was the Roman Republic a Democracy?) (Could Hannibal have Taken Rome?)

Mary Wollstonecraft (1759-1797)

Vindication of the Rights of Women (1/10)

Merritt Ruhlen (1944-2021)

The Origins of Langauge (5/10)

Merry Shelly (1797-1852)

Frankenstein (8/10)

Nathan Long

Blackhearts

1. Valnir's Bane (7/10)

2. The Broken Lance (7/10)

3. Tainted Blood (7/10)

Nick Kyme (1977-)

Honourkeeper (1/10)

Peter Tremayne (1943-)

Lan-Kern Series

2. The Destroyers of Lan-Kern (9/10)

Philip Jose Farmer (1918-2009)

Dark is the Sun (8/10)

Lord of the Trees (5/10)

Dayworld (2/10)

Philip K. Dick (1928-1982)

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep (9/10) (Android Animals in "Bladerunner" and "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep") (The Testing of Racheal in "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep" )

Philip Pullman (1946-)

His Dark Materials

Northern Lights (9/10)

Standalone Books

The Scarecrow and His Servant (9/10)

Piers Antony (1934-)

Xanth Series

4. Centaur Aisle (5/10)

5. Ogre, Ogre (6/10)

6. Night Mare (5/10)

Plato (427 – 348 BC) (Wikipedia)

Republic (10/10) (Does Plato and Aristotle Marginalize Women and Slaves?)

Plautus (254-184) (Wikipedia)

Plays

Pseudolus (8/10)

Polybius (200-118BC) (Wikipedia)

The Histories (7/10)

Rick Riordan (1964-)

Percy Jackson and the Olympians (Percy Jackson: A Great Idea, but Disappointing)

1. The Lightning Thief (6/10)
2. The Sea of Monsters(6/10)
3. The Titan's Curse (6/10)
4. The Battle of the Labyrinth (6/10)
5. The Last Olympian (6/10)

The Kain Chronicles

The Red Pyramid (3/10)

The Throne of Fire (3/10)

The Serpent's Shadow (3/10)

The Heroes of Olympus

The Last Hero (1/10)

The Son of Neptune (3/10)

Roal Dahl (1916-1990)

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (10/10)

Charlie and the Glass Elevator (10/10)

The Magic Finger (5/10)

The Fantastic Mister Fox (10/10)

Matilda (9/10)

The BFG (10/10)

Georg's Marvelous Medison (8/10)

Esio Trot (9/10)

James and The Giant Peach (8/10)

The Giraffe and the Pelly and Me (7/10)

James and the Giant Peach (8/10)

Danny the Champion of the World (5/10)

Going Solo (4/10)

Boy Tales of Childhood (4/10)

The Witches (8/10)

The Twits (7/10)

The Vicar of Nibbleswicke (6/10)

Robert Cormier (1925-2000)

After the First Death (5/10)

Saul Plaatjies (1876-1932)

Mhudi (7/10)

Sun Tzu (771-265 BC) (Wikipedia)

The Art of War (5/10)

Stephen L. Harris (1937-2019) Gloria Platzner (?)

Classical Mythology (10/10)

Sophocles (496-406BC)

Plays

Electra (6/10)

Suetonius (69-112) (Wikipedia)

The Twelve Ceasars (8/10)

Terry Pratchett (1948-2015) (Terry Pratchett is a Literary Genius)

Bromeliad Series

1. Truckers (7/10)
2. Diggers (7/10)
3. Wings (7/10)

 

Discworld Series

1. The Colour of Magic (10/10)
2. The Light Fantastic (10/10)
3. Equal Rites (7/10)
4. Mort (9/10)
5. Sourcery (9/10)
6. Wyrd Sisters (9/10)
7. Pyramids (10/10)
8. Guards! Guards! (10/10)
9. Eric (8/10)
10. Moving Pictures (10/10)
11. Reaper Man (10/10)
12. Witches Abroad (10/10)
13. Small Gods (10/10)
28. The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents (10/10)
 

Jhonny Maxwell

1. Only You Can Save Mankind (7/10)
 

Standalone Books

Strata (6/10)
Carpet People (6/10)

Tom Holt (1961-)

Flying Duch (7/10)

Faust Among Equals (5/10)

Thucydides (460-400BC) (Wikipedia)

History of the Peloponnesian War (4/10)

Virgil (70-19BC) (Wikipedia)

The Aeneid (4/10)

William Shakespeare (1564-1616)

Plays

The Tempest (4/10)

Zadie Smith (1975)

On Beuty (1/10)

Feel Free (1/10)