Books Every Modern Reader Should Have Read

As voted by the Goodreads committee, these are the 100 books that every serious reader should have read so that they can truly claim to be well-informed and up to date on the western canon. So, it includes timeless classics, highbrow literature, as well as 00s and 10s commercial bestsellers. Can you guess them all?
Clues are themes, characters, symbols, settings and common associations. Some are obscure, some are obvious
Adult, young adult and children's literature/fiction is included
Many of these are parts of a series, and the name of the series will do (or the name of the particular book)
List from https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/12327.The_Goodreads_100_Fiction
Quiz by trivstar
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Last updated: April 9, 2014
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First submittedApril 5, 2014
Times taken465
Average score29.0%
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Clues
Book
Maycomb, Finch, Boo
To Kill a Mockingbird
Middle-Earth, Precious, Baggins
The Fellowship of the Ring
Hunting Hat, Phoney, Mesuem
The Catcher in the Rye
Pemberley, Courtship, Darcy
Pride and Prejudice
Winston, Rats, Doublethink
1984
Number 4 Pivet Drive, Quidditch
Harry Potter and the Sorceror's Stone
Rose, Queen Mab, Thumb Biting
Romeo and Juliet
Yorick's Skull, Disease, Ghost
Hamlet
Bertha, Red-Room, Fire and Ice
Jane Eyre
Alpha, Epsilon, Savages
Brave New World
Orcrist, Gollum, Elves
The Hobbit
The Phoenix, Guy, The Mechanical Hound
Fahrenheit 451
Mississippi River, Sawyer
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
East Egg, Green Light, Golf Scandal
The Great Gatsby
Sam I Am, Seuss, Poem
Green Eggs and Ham
Christ, The Stone Table, Turkish Delight
The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe
Harvard, The Eyes of God, Gilead
The Handmaid's Tale
Ghosts, Heathcliff, Pairs
Wuthering Heights
The Conch, Piggy, Glasses
Lord of the Flies
Umbrellas, Burn Mark, Mr March
Little Women
Raven and Writing Desk, Dormouse
Alice in Wonderland
Misselthwhaite Manor, Sickly Child, India
The Secret Garden
Puppy, Candy, Curley
Of Mice and Men
Galactic Freeway, Zaphod, 42
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Hedeby Island, Blomkvist, Nazis
The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo
Princess Alia, The Spice, Shaddam VI
Dune
Rhett, the South, Civil War
Gone with the Wind
Meg Murry, Tesseract, The Man With Red Eyes
A Wrinkle in Time
Light and Fire, Elizabeth Lavenza, Geneva
Frankenstein
Paris, The Last Supper, Neveu
The Da Vinci Code
Glass Elevator, Veruca Salt, Oompa Loompas
Charlie and The Chocolate Factory
Dresden, Pilgrim, Absurdist
Slaughterhouse-Five
French, Travel the Universe, Picture Book
The Little Prince
The Truth About Turtles, Children's Poetry, Fanciful
Where The Sidewalk Ends
Avonlea, Prince Edward Island, Redhead
Anne of Green Gables
Dashwood, Sussex, Something and Something
Sense and Sensibility
Armoured Polar Bear, Religion, Oxford
The Golden Compass
Dumas, Dantes, Serial
The Count of Monte Cristo
Latin America, Remedios x 2, Multi-Generational
One Hundred Years of Solitude
Washington, Sparkling, Dr Carlisle
Twilight
Basil, Youth, Romeo and Juliet
The Picture of Dorian Gray
Blue-Grey Eyes, Gion, Dr Crab
Memoirs of a Geisha
Inigo Montoya
The Princess Bride
Afghanistan, Tournament, Hassan
The Kite Runner
Nurse Ratched, Oregon, Mental Ward
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
Cato, Nightlock, President Snow
The Hunger Games
Helen of Troy, Poetry, Homer
The Odyssey
Shipwreck, Bengal Tiger, Three Religions
Life of Pi
Kitty, Tsarism, All Happy Families Resemble One Another
Anna Karenina
Van Helsing, Transylvania, Gothic
Dracula
World War 2, Death, Children's Book
The Book Thief
Georgia, Paternalism, Racism
The Colour Purple
Irene Adler, The Copper Beeches
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes
Ten Little Indians/ Ten Little Solider Boys, Mystery
And Then There Were None
Young Adult, Jonas, Assigned Jobs
The Giver
Frontier, Ingalls, Building the Future
Little House on the Praire
Space Warriors, Children, Aliens
Ender's Game
South of France, Manderley, Jane Eyre-esque
Rebecca
Yossarian, Bureaucratic, Doc Daneeka
Catch-22
St Petersburg, 1866, Psychological Suffering
Crime and Punishment
Javert, Prostitutes, June Rebellion
Les Misérables
Salinas, Cain and Abel
East of Eden
Bastille, Liberty Fraternity Equality or death!, Sydney
A Tale of Two Cities
Mothers, Daughters, San Francisco
The Joy Luck Club
Algerian Beach, Existentialism, Absurd
The Stranger
Fate and Faith, I am Doomed to Remember, Irving
A Prayer for Owen Meany
King, Virus, Anti-Technology
The Stand
Insanity, New York, Esther
The Bell Jar
Lestat, Rice, Paris
Interview with a Vampire
Dolores, Obsession, Confessions from Prison
Lolita
Post Apocalyptic, The Father, The Boy
The Road
Skeeter, Seventeen White Children, Pie
The Help
Surgeon, Contemporary Romance, Philosophy
The Unbearable Lightness of Being
Cold War, Dr Manhattan, Tales of the Black Freighter
Watchmen
Twelfth Century, Church vs State, Henry II
The Pillars of the Earth
Jack Barnes, 1920s, Bullfighting
The Sun Also Rises
Librarian, Clare, Romantic Speculative Fiction
The Time Traveler's Wife
"Soviet Life", Fantastical Realism, Satan
The Master and Margarita
Pulitzer Prize Winner, American West, Horses and Beans
Lonesome Dove
Chinese Farmer, Wang Lung, Little Fool
The Good Earth
Cancer, Genetic Manipulation, Car Crash
My Sister's Keeper
Orphan, Most Spectacular Show on Earth, Depression
Water for Elephants
Tourist Traps, Anubis, Road Trips
American Gods
1945 to 1743, Chick Lit, Scotland
Outlander
Baptist, Belgian Congo, Price
The Poisonwood Bible
North Carolina, Noah, Rain Kiss
The Notebook
Southern Romance, Florida, Janie Starks
Their Eyes Were Watching God
Bigotry, Communist Rally, "Battle Royal"
Invisible Man
Russian Literature, Industrialisation, Dmitri
The Brothers Karamazov
Netherworld, Cat, Tokyo
The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle
Baratheon, Greywind, The Hound
Game of Thrones
Slavery, Sweet Home, Baby Suggs
Beloved
Mexican Bestseller, Recipes, Family Feuds
Like Water for Chocolate
Soap, I am Jack's Complete Lack of Surprise, IKEA
Fight Club
Architecture, Love Affair, Objectivist
The Fountainhead
Celtic Lyricism, Mulligan, Human Experience/ Realism
Ulysses
Generational Struggle, Latin American, Magical Realism
The House of the Spirits
Greek-American, 'I was born twice', LGBT
Middlesex
Lovesick Ghetto Nerd, Pulitzer Prize Winning, D&D
The Brief Wondorous Life of Oscar Wao
Pulitzer Prize Winning, Indian Literature, Short Stories
Interpreter of Maladies
+1
Level 78
Apr 5, 2014
Good idea for both a list and a quiz. Please accept "Great Gatsby" for "The Great Gatsby". I don't think that Twilight, Hunger Games and Ender's Game belong on that list because all the hype around them comes from the movies - once you've seen them, you know everything to be "well informed". It's different for Lord of the Rings as the movies, as good as they are, can't capture the depth of the book. Also, who has ever read the Odyssey? The story is famous of course, but reading the whole thing is probably not considered a pleasure, neither a necessity even for avid readers.
+1
Level 25
Apr 9, 2014
Fixed. As for the books on the quiz--they were voted in by Goodreads, so they're not my choice (and I agree, certainly it would've been different if it were my choice, but I wanted to base the quiz on an official list (the list is in the instructions if you haven't already checked it out)). What the list was attempting to do was to get 100 books that are not only popular but relevant--it's trying to have it so you can hold a conversation with any 'reader', even with readers of popular young adult and children's fiction. Yes, the movies have overshadowed the books in many ways but there had to be some sort of hype, some value to the books for the movies to be made :-) (All three of those books mentioned are ultra-condensed in the movies, although I'd probably only recommend checking out The Hunger Games). Anyway, the list is definitely a matter of opinion! And hey, I've read the Odyssey! (For literature class, admittedly).
+1
Level 78
Apr 10, 2014
I realized that this quiz was based on a list, and I agree with you, it's better to base quizzes on lists than on your own opinion. Just wanted to complain a bit about the people who compiled, but still, it's a good quiz.

Did you enjoy reading the Odyssey?

+1
Level 25
Apr 10, 2014
Haha somewhat. Can't say I "enjoyed" Literature overall to be honest.
+1
Level 78
Apr 5, 2014
I've read 22 of them and guessed 34 (please add some time, I would've got more!)
+1
Level 25
Apr 9, 2014
Took it up to 15 minutes :-)
+3
Level 71
May 21, 2015
Please correct spelling on "Little House on the Prairie" - no wonder only 5% have guessed it.
+1
Level 33
Sep 1, 2015
Agree - the word "prairie" is wrongly spelled in the answer.