The Guardian - 1000 novels everyone must read - War and Travel

Silver Stallion by Ahn Junghyo

The mountain village of Kumsan, South Korea, is changed forever when the liberating U.N. forces set up a special encampment called Texas Town

Death of a Hero by Richard Aldington

'Death of a Hero', published in 1929 was the author's literary response to the war. He went on to publish several works of fiction. In 1942, having moved to the United States, he began to write biographies. This last work was very controversial, as it was highly critical of the man still regarded as a war hero.

Master Georgie by Beryl Bainbridge

When Master Georgie - George Hardy, surgeon and photographer - sets off from the cold squalor of Victorian Liverpool for the heat and glitter of the Bosphorus to offer his services in the Crimea, there straggles behind him a small caravan of devoted followers; Myrtle, his adoring adoptive sister; lapsed geologist Dr Potter; and photographer's assistant and sometime fire-eater Pompey Jones, all of them driven onwards through a rising tide of death and disease by a shared and mysterious guilt. Combining a breathtaking eye for beauty with a visceral understanding of mortality, Beryl Bainbridge exposes her enigmatic hero as tenderly and unsparingly as she reveals the filth and misery of war, and creates a novel of luminous depth and extraordinary intensity.

Darkness Falls From The Air by Nigel Balchin

Darkness Falls from tlieAiris the classic novel of the London Blitz, capturing the chaos and absurdity of life during the bombardment. The laconic and cynical civil servant. Bill Sarratt, struggles against dusty bureaucracy at the Ministry by day and. after sundown, against the absurd infidelity of his wife Marcia. In Sarratt's opinion, her literary poseur lover Stephen is a third-rate ham-actor of a man and the affair will burn itself out if only he doesn't force the issue. With an ostentatious lack of concern, the trio wine and dine expensively, occasionally sauntering out into the blitz with cheerful remarks about the shattered night-life of the West End; 'Air raids always seem to make people get tight'. But beneath the false insouciance lies the real strain of a war that has firmly wrapped them all in its embrace. Wit may crackle at the same pace as buildings burn, but personal tragedy constantly lurks somewhere appallingly close at hand. 'A writer of genius' JohnBetjeman 'Prose barer than Hemingway's' Andrew Sinclair

Empire Of The Sun by J. G. Ballard

The classic, award-winning novel, made famous by Steven Spielberg's film, tells of a young boy's struggle to survive World War II in China.Jim is separated from his parents in a world at war. To survive, he must find a strength greater than all the events that surround him.Shanghai, 1941 -- a city aflame from the fateful torch of Pearl Harbor. In streets full of chaos and corpses, a young British boy searches in vain for his parents. Imprisoned in a Japanese concentration camp, he is witness to the fierce white flash of Nagasaki, as the bomb bellows the end of the war...and the dawn of a blighted world.Ballard's enduring novel of war and deprivation, internment camps and death marches, and starvation and survival is an honest coming-of-age tale set in a world thrown utterly out of joint.

Regeneration by Pat Barker

The opening salvo in the trilogy of novels about the young men who fought in the First World War, the third of which - The Ghost Road - won the 1995 Man Booker Prize. An extremely powerful novel, Regeneration is a vivid evocation of the agony of the Front as well as a powerful anthem for doomed youth.

A Long Long Way by Sebastian Barry

One of the most vivid and realised characters of recent fiction, Willie Dunne is the innocent hero of Sebastian Barry's highly acclaimed novel. Leaving Dublin to fight for the Allied cause as a member of the Royal Dublin Fusiliers, he finds himself caught between the war playing out on foreign fields and that festering at home, waiting to erupt with the Easter Rising. Profoundly moving, intimate and epic, A Long Long Way charts and evokes a terrible coming of age, one too often written out of history.

Fair Stood the Wind for France by H. E. Bates

When John Franklin brings his plane down into Occupied France at the height of the Second World war, there are two things in his mind - the safety of his crew and his own badly injured arm. It is a stroke of unbelievable luck when the family of a French farmer risk their lives to offer the airmen protection. During the hot summer weeks that follow, the English officer and the daughter of the house are drawn inexorably to each other...

Carrie's War by Nina Bawden

Evacuated from London to Wales during World War II, Carrie and her brother are sent to live with the very strict Mr Evans. In trying to heal the breach between Mr Evans and his estranged sister, Carrie does the worst thing she ever did in her life.

The Savage Detectives by Roberto Bolano

An exhilarating, must-read novel from one of Latin America's pre-eminent writers, and author of the acclaimed masterpiece 2666

The Sheltering Sky by Paul Bowles

Port and Kit Moresbury, a sophisticated American couple, are finding it more than a little difficult to live with each other. Endeavoring to escape this predicament, they set off for North Africa intending to travel through Algeria - uncertain of exactly where they are heading, but determined to leave the modern world behind.

An Ice-cream War by William Boyd

'We will all melt like ice-cream in the sun!' - British soldier, East Africa, October 1914As millions were slaughtered on the Western Front, a ridiculous and little-reported campaign was waged in East Africa - a war they continued after the Armistice because no one told them to stop.Primarily a gripping story of the men and women swept up by the passions of love and battle, William Boyd's magnificently entertaining novel also elicits the cruel futility and tragedy of it all.'As ambitious as it is remarkable - balances on seesaws of innocence and violence, sanity and lunacy, hilarity and horror' - The Times'He has a black-edged laughter of his own - quite outstanding' - Claire Tomalin in the Sunday Times'Funny, assured and expansively told, a seriocomic romp. But it's also something maturely more - a study of people caught in the side pockets of calamity that dramatizes their plights with humour, detail and grit' - Harper's

When the Wind Blows by Raymond Briggs

Raymond Briggs's comic cartoon book depicts the effects of a nuclear attack on an elderly couple, in his usual humorous, yet macabre way.

Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino

Marco Polo conjures up cities of magical times for his host, the Chinese ruler Kublai Khan, but gradually it becomes clear that he is actually describing one city: Venice.

Auto Da Fe by Dr Elias Canetti

Iris Murdoch called Auto da F&e "one of the few great novels of the century." Peter Kien is a reclusive Sinologist living in Germany between the wars. Canetti creates the elements in Kien, and in his personal relationships, that will lead to his destruction.

One of Ours by Willa Cather

The Pulitzer Prize winning novel about a young Nebraskan looking for something to believe in. Alienated from his parents, rejected by his wife, he finds his destiny on the bloody battlefields of World War I.

Journey to the End of the Night by Louis-Ferdinand Celine

First published in 1932, Journey to the End of the Night was immediately acclaimed as a masterpiece and a turning point in French literature. This edition contains a foreword by John Banville. Told in the first person, the novel is based on the author's own experiences during the First World War, in French colonial Africa, in the USA - where he worked for a while at the Ford factory in Detroit - and later as a young doctor in a working-class suburb in Paris. Celine's disgust with human folly, malice, greed and the chaotic state in which man has left society lies behind the bitterness that distinguishes his idiosyncratic, colloquial and visionary writing and gives it its force.

Monkey by Wu Ch'eng-en

Prince Tripitaka, a young Buddhist priest, has undertaken a dangerous quest to travel to India to retrieve sacred scriptures from a temple. On his way he finds three unruly companions who become his disciples: the greedy pig creature Pigsy, the river monster Sandy, and Monkey. The mischievous Monkey possesses certain skills that prove very handy.

Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad

Reflects the savage repressions carried out in the Congo by the Belgians in one of the largest acts of genocide committed up to that time.

Lord Jim by Joseph Conrad

An English boy in a simple town has dreams bigger than the outdoors and embarks at an early age into the sailor's life. The waters he travels reward him with the ability to explore the human spirit. This compact novel, completed in 1900, is at its baseline a book of the sea.

Nostromo by Joseph Conrad

Nostromo is the only man capable of the decisive action needed to save the silver of the San Tome mine and secure independence for Sulaco, Occidental province of the Latin American state of Costaguana. Is his integrity as unassailable as everyone believes, or will his ideals, like those which have inspired the struggling state itself, buckle under economic and political pressures? Nostromo is an extraordinary illustration of the impact of foreign commercial exploits on a young developing nation, and the problems of reconciling individual identity with a social role.

Sharpe's Eagle by Bernard Cornwell

Bold, professional, ruthless – hero and man of action “Sharpe asked three things of his men. That they fought as he did with a ruthless professionalism.That they stole only from the enemy and the dead unless they were starving. And they never got drunk without his permission." Richard Sharpe is having a difficult war. Excluded from promotion because he is always on the battlefield, up against pompous, incompetent colonels, and worst, suddenly finding himself at the head of an inexperienced company who use all twenty five drill book approved movements to load and fire their muskets. A soldier like Sharpe can't be kept down though and his promotion to Captain, when it comes, makes a dangerous enemy in the upper ranks. As Sharpe approaches bloody battle in Talavera, he knows he is fighting for his own honour and that of his men. Soldier, hero, rogue – Sharpe is the man you always want on your side. Born in poverty, he joined the army to escape jail and climbed the ranks by sheer brutal courage. He knows no other family than the regiment of the 95th Rifles whose green jacket he proudly wears.

The History of Pompey the Little: Or The Life and Adventures of a Lap-Dog by Francis Coventry

Pompey the Little, the canine narrator of this story, is a uniquely observant and witty guide to eighteenth-century culture, both high and low. In the course of the novel Pompey is passed from owner to owner, offering a panoramic vision of English and European societies in the period. Written with sparkling irony, The History of Pompey is an important example of an "it-narrative," or a narrative written from a non-human perspective; this genre allows the novelist to move between levels of society and to observe human behaviour from an outsider's perspective. The rich selection of historical documents in the appendices to this Broadview edition includes a similar narrative told by a cat, along with other writings on eighteenth-century attitudes towards animals.

The Red Badge of Courage by Stephen Crane

Although never having seen battle Stephen Crane vividly depicts the grueling intensity of the American Civil War. The story revolves around Henry Fleming, a member of the 304th regiment of the Union Army. At the start of the novel Henry is eager to show his patriotism in battle but when faced with the savagery of death he flees the frontline. Throughout the novel Henry struggles with his courage in the face of the horror of war. "The Red Badge of Courage" is a classic modern depiction of the psychological turmoil of war from the perspective of an ordinary soldier.

Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe

Inspired almost every conceivable kind of imitation, and been the subject of plays, opera, cartoons, and computer games. Praised by figures like Coleridge, Rousseau and Wordsworth, this book was cited by Karl Marx in Das Kapital to illustrate economic theory. However it is readers who have given this book its position as a tale of adventure.

Bomber by Len Deighton

"Bomber" is the story of the final mission of RAF Lancaster bomber. WF183 - call sign O - Orange, which took place one night in 1943. It is also the story of the many men and women - British and German - whose lives were irrevocably changed by that night's bombing raid. Starring Tom Baker, Frank Windsor, Samuel West, Emma Chambers and Jack Shepherd, "Bomber" is a brilliant production and a consistent bestseller in the UK.

Deliverance by James Dickey

'I don't believe I'd go there if I was you. What's the use of it?' 'Because it's there,' said Lewis. 'It's there, all right. If you git in there and can't get out, you're goin' to wish it wudn't.' A group of middle-aged friends in search of the wilderness experience that has been missing from their big-city lives go canoeing one weekend. They pack all the usual survival gear - plus a banjo and a bow and arrow - and head off. Unskilled and naive, they paddle downstream, enjoying the exercise and the gorgeous scenery. But something is in the air. There are small signs at first: their canoes hit sudden rapids, the river seems polluted with litter and bird feathers, and during the night their tent is punctured by the talons of a hunting owl. Then, the following day, after mooring their canoes by the woods, they are approached by two sinister men. One is carrying a shotgun and the other a knife...;

Three Soldiers by John Dos Passos

"Anybody know where the electricity turns on?" asked the sergeant in a good-humored voice. "Here it is." The light over the door of the barracks snapped on, revealing a rotund cheerful man with a little yellow mustache and an unlit cigarette dangling out of the corner of his mouth. Grouped about him, in overcoats and caps, the men of the company rested their packs against their knees.

South Wind by Norman Douglas

The liberating effects of temperament and temperature on the island of Nepenthe draw an Anglican bishop into an intriguing web of murder

The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas

A historical romance, The Three Musketeers tells the story of the early adventures of the young Gascon gentleman, D'Artagnan and his three friends from the regiment of the King's Musketeers - Athos, Porthos and Aramis. Under the watchful eye of their patron M. de Treville, the four defend the honour of the regiment against the guards of Cardinal Richelieu, and the honour of the queen against the machinations of the Cardinal himself as the power struggles of seventeenth century France are vividly played out in the background. But their most dangerous encounter is with the Cardinal's spy, Milady, one of literature's most memorable female villains, and Dumas employs all his fast-paced narrative skills to bring this enthralling novel to a breathtakingly gripping and dramatic conclusion.

Justine by Lawrence Durrell

'I have been thinking about the girl I met last night in the mirror: dark on the marble-ivory white: glossy black hair: deep suspiring eyes in which one's glances sink because they are nervous, curious, turned to sexual curiosity.' The tragic story of the mysterious and fascinating Justine, and those whose lives she touched in pre-war Alexandria, is told by her lover, an impoverished Irish teacher who has sought refuge across the Mediterranean in Greece. It is undoubtedly a love-story, but the real heroine of the book is its setting: Alexandria, the city 'which decrees that its women shall be the voluptuaries not of pleasure but of pain'.

The Bamboo Bed by William Eastlake

The plot revolves around Captain Clancy, who--mortally wounded while leading a charge up Ridge Red Boy--lies dying in a bamboo bed.

The Siege Of Krishnapur by J.G. Farrell

In the Spring of 1857, with India on the brink of a violent and bloody mutiny, Krishnapur is a remote town on the vast North Indian plain. For the British there, life is orderly and genteel. Then the sepoys at the nearest military cantonment rise in revolt and the British community retreats with shock into the Residency. They prepare to fight for their lives with what weapons they can muster. As food and ammunition grow short, the Residency, its defences battered by shot and shell and eroded by the rains, becomes ever more vulnerable. The Siege of Krishnapur is a modern classic of narrative excitement that also digs deep to explore some fundamental questions of civilisation and life.

Birdsong by Sebastian Faulks

Set before and during the great war, Birdsong captures the drama of that era on both a national and a personal scale. It is the story of Stephen, a young Englishman, who arrives in Amiens in 1910. His life goes through a series of traumatic experiences, from the clandestine love affair that tears apart the family with whom he lives, to the unprecedented experiences of the war itself.

Parade's End by Ford Madox Ford

Parade's End, is Ford Madox Ford's classic novel depicting the shattering effects of World War One on an aristocratic family.

The African Queen by C. S. Forester

The African Queen is an old, dirty, ugly, unreliable steamboat - not the kind of boat anyone would take down a dangerous river through the jungles of Central Africa. But Rose Sayer and Charlie Allnut do just that.Why do they do it? The First World War has just begun, and Rose has acrazy plan. She and Charlie set off down the river and come close to death many times, but they survive all dangers - except the danger of falling in love.

The Ship by C.S. Forester

'One of the most vivid accounts of a modern battle at sea ever written' Sunday Times One vital convoy can break Mussolini's stranglehold on Malta - but it is intercepted in the Mediterranean by enemy warships . . . Five light British cruisers are left to beat back the armed might of the Italian battle fleet and C.S. Forester - creator of Horatio Hornblower - takes us aboard HMS Artemis as she steams into battle against overwhelming odds. We get inside the heads of Artemis's men, from the Captain on his bridge down to the lowest engine room rating, as they struggle over one long and terrifying afternoon to do their duty. C.S. Forester brilliantly recounts life aboard a British warship during some of the darkest days of the Second World War: capturing the urgency of the blazing guns, the thunderous rupturing of deck plates, the screams of pain and the shouts of triumph.

Flashman by George MacDonald Fraser

The first instalment of the Flashman Papers sees the fag-roasting rotter from Tom Brown's Schooldays commence his military career as a reluctant secret agent in Afghanistan.

Cold Mountain by Charles Frazier

A soldier wounded in the Civil War, Inman turns his back on the carnage of the battlefield and begins the treacherous journey home to Cold Mountain, and to Ada, the woman he loved before the war began. As Inman attempts to make his way across the mountains, through the devastated landscape of a soon-to-be-defeated South, Ada struggles to make a living from the land her once-wealthy father left when he died. Neither knows if the other is still alive.

The Beach by Alex Garland

Richard, backpacking around the globe in the great tradition of cheap travel, finds himself bedding down in Khao San Road, Bangkok. But his chance to rest briefly is suddenly and irrevocably destroyed when a perfect stranger called Mister Duck is killed in the room next door. Mister Duck had a secret - now it's Richard's. Armed with a map - and a name of great mystery and legend that possesses a simple majesty: Beach - our protagonist goes in search of a traveller's dream, a place where there are lots of drugs and a tolerant society that works together to maintain a life of inner peace and tranquillity. Only a select few will make it to the blissful seclusion of the Beach (Mister Duck, for one, has died) but in the great tradition of travelling bravado, or sheer stupidity, Richard decides to give it a go . . .

To the Ends of the Earth by William Golding

A one-volume edition of this classic sequence of sea novels set in the early nineteenth century, about a voyage from England to Australia.

Asterix The Gaul by René Goscinny

Gaul was divided into three parts. No, four parts - for one small village of indomitable Gauls still held out against the Roman invaders. BOOK 1 When Getafix is kidnapped by the Romans, Asterix penetrates their camp to rescue him with hair-raising results...

The Tin Drum by Gunter Grass

To mark the 50th anniversary of the publication of this classic, a new translation of the Nobel Prize winner's story is offered, which includes a huge cast of intriguing characters, including Oskar Matzerath, the indomitable drummer; his family; Oskar's midget friends Bebra and Roswitha Raguna; and more. Reprint.

Count Belisarius by Robert Graves

The sixth century was not a peaceful time for the Roman empire. Invaders threatened on all fronties, but they grew to respect and fear the name of Belisarius, the Emperor Justinian's greatest general. This book demonstrates the author's command of an historical subject, creating a picture of a decadent era.

Life And Fate by Vasily Grossman

Suppressed by the KGB, Life and Fate is a rich and vivid account of what the Second World War meant to the Soviet Union. On its completion in 1960, Life and Fate was suppressed by the KGB. Twenty years later, the novel was smuggled out of the Soviet Union on microfilm. At the centre of this epic novel looms the battle of Stalingrad. Within a world torn apart by ideological tyranny and war, Grossman's characters must work out their destinies. Chief among these are the members of the Shaposhnikov family Lyudmila, a mother destroyed by grief for her dead son; Viktor, her scientist-husband who falls victim to anti-semitism; and Yevgenia, forced to choose between her love for the courageous tank-commander Novikov and her duty to her former husband. Life and Fate is one of the great Russian novels of the 20th century, and the richest and most vivid account there is of what the Second World War meant to the Soviet Union.

De Niro's Game by Rawi Hage

"Rawi Hage's first novel plunges readers into the timely story of two young men caught in Lebanon's civil war. Bassam and George are childhood best friends who have grown to adulthood in war-torn Beirut. Now they must choose their futures: to remain amid the Arab capital's sectarian violence or to go into exile abroad, alienated from the only existence they have known. Bassam chooses to try to leave, and he embarks on a series of petty crimes to finance his departure. Meanwhile, George builds his power in the underworld of the city and embraces a life of military service, crime for profit, killing, and drugs. Told in a distinctive voice that fuses vivid cinematic imagery and a page-turning plot with the measured strength and beauty of Arabic poetry, De Niro'sGame is an explosive portrait of life in a war zone, and a powerful meditation on what comes after."--BOOK JACKET.

King Solomon's Mines by H. Rider Haggard

Title: King Solomon's Mines.Publisher: British Library, Historical Print EditionsThe British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom. It is one of the world's largest research libraries holding over 150 million items in all known languages and formats: books, journals, newspapers, sound recordings, patents, maps, stamps, prints and much more. Its collections include around 14 million books, along with substantial additional collections of manuscripts and historical items dating back as far as 300 BC.The GENERAL HISTORICAL collection includes books from the British Library digitised by Microsoft. This varied collection includes material that gives readers a 19th century view of the world. Topics include health, education, economics, agriculture, environment, technology, culture, politics, labour and industry, mining, penal policy, and social order. ++++The below data was compiled from various identification fields in the bibliographic record of this title. This data is provided as an additional tool in helping to insure edition identification: ++++ British Library Haggard, H. Rider; 1898. 128 p.; 8 . 012624.l.4.

She: A History of Adventure by H. R. Haggard

The Slaves of Solitude by Patrick Hamilton

The central character of this novel is Miss Roach, lively and self-reproaching, a victim of solitude and lost hope and the principle object of the heartless innuendos of the thoroughly unpleasant Mr Thwaites.

Covenant with Death by John Harris

More than one million men fell at the Battle of the Somme before the terrible conflict finally withered and died in the winter mud. This fictionalized account tells the story of one voluntary battalion from its inception in 1914 to its destruction on 1st July 1916.

Enigma by Robert Harris

March 1943. The war hangs in the balance, and at Bletchley Park a brilliant young codebreaker is facing a double nightmare. The Germans have changed their U-boat Enigma code, threatening a massive Allied defeat. And as suspicion grows that there may be a spy inside Bletchley, Jericho's girlfriend, the mysterious Claire Romilly suddenly disappears.

The Good Soldier Svejk: And His Fortunes in the World War by Jaroslav Hasek

Hasek's most important work was centered around the deeply funny story of a hapless Czech soldier in the Austro-Hungarian army. Dsmissed for incompetence only to be pressed into service by the Russians in World War I.

For Whom The Bell Tolls by Ernest Hemingway

Hemingway's evocation of the pride and the tragedy of the civil war that tore Spain apart. A young American volunteer is sent to handle the dynamiting of a bridge behind the lines of Franco's army. In the mountains he find the dangers and the intense comradeship of war - and he discovers Maria.

The Prisoner of Zenda by Anthony Hope

Rudolph Rassendyll's life is interrupted by his unexpected and personal involvement in the affairs of Ruritania whilst travelling through the town of Zenda. He is shortly on the way to Streslau, the capital, where he finds himself engaged in plans to rescue the imprisoned king.

The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini

The Kite Runner of Khaled Hosseini's deeply moving fiction debut is an illiterate Afghan boy with an uncanny instinct for predicting exactly where a downed kite will land. Growing up in the city of Kabul in the early 1970s, Hassan was narrator Amir's closest friend even though the loyal 11-year-old with "a face like a Chinese doll" was the son of Amir's father's servant and a member of Afghanistan's despised Hazara minority. But in 1975, on the day of Kabul's annual kite-fighting tournament, something unspeakable happened between the two boys.Narrated by Amir, a 40-year-old novelist living in California, The Kite Runner tells the gripping story of a boyhood friendship destroyed by jealousy, fear, and the kind of ruthless evil that transcends mere politics. Running parallel to this personal narrative of loss and redemption is the story of modern Afghanistan and of Amir's equally guilt-ridden relationship with the war-torn city of his birth. The first Afghan novel to be written in English, The Kite Runner begins in the final days of King Zahir Shah's 40-year reign and traces the country's fall from a secluded oasis to a tank-strewn battlefield controlled by the Russians and then the trigger-happy Taliban. When Amir returns to Kabul to rescue Hassan's orphaned child, the personal and the political get tangled together in a plot that is as suspenseful as it is taut with feeling.The son of an Afghan diplomat whose family received political asylum in the United States in 1980, Hosseini combines the unflinching realism of a war correspondent with the satisfying emotional pull of master storytellers such as Rohinton Mistry. Like the kite that is its central image, the story line of this mesmerizing first novel occasionally dips and seems almost to dive to the ground. But Hosseini ultimately keeps everything airborne until his heartrending conclusion in an American picnic park. --Lisa Alward, Amazon.ca

A High Wind in Jamaica by Richard Hughes

Presents the story of children sent to England after a hurricane destroys their parents' Jamaican estate; after a pirate attack, the children are accidentally placed on a pirate vessel, and they adjust to life on the pirate ship.

The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia by Samuel Johnson

Rasselas and his companions leave the 'happy valley' in search of 'the choice of life'. Johnson's philosophical tale considers such things as the nature of poetry, the stability of reason, the immortality of the soul, and the pursuit of happiness. This new edition relates the novel to Johnson's life and the political and social context.

From Here to Eternity by James Jones

An epic of World War II, this novel reflects the exciting, tumultuous and brutal world inhabited by soldiers and the women they love. It portrays the consuming conflicts of a generation set afire by the passions and savagery of war.

Andersonville by MacKinlay Kantor

In 1864, thirty-three thousand Yankee prisoners of war suffer the horrors of imprisonment at the Confederate prison of Andersonville

Confederates by Thomas Keneally

Thomas Keneally's epic of the Civil War takes us into the lives of four remarkable characters in the embattled Virginia summer of 1862: a southern hospital matron who is also a Union spy, a British war journalist with access to both sides, and two foot soldiers under Stonewall Jackson.

Schindler's Ark by Thomas Keneally

In the shadow of Auschwitz, a flamboyant German industrialist grew into a living legend to the Jews of Cracow. He was a womaniser, a heavy drinker and a bon viveur, but to them he became a saviour. This is the extraordinary story of Oskar Schindler, who risked his life to protect Jews in Nazi-occupied Poland and who was transformed by the war into a man with a mission, a compassionate angel of mercy.

Day by A. L. Kennedy

Alfred Day wanted his war. In its turmoil he found his proper purpose as the tail-gunner in a Lancaster bomber; he found the wild, dark fellowship of his crew, and - most extraordinary of all - he found Joyce, a woman to love. But that's all gone - the war took it away.

On the Road by Jack Kerouac

Follows the counterculture escapades of members of the Beat generation as they seek pleasure and meaning while traveling coast to coast. As he travels across 1950s America, aspiring writer Sal Paradise chronicles his escapades with the charismatic Dean Moriarty. Sal admires Dean's passion for experiencing as much as possible of life and his wild flights of poetic fancy.

Darkness at Noon by Arthur Koestler

Rubashov, previously a key figure in the regime, finds the tables turned on him when he is arrested and tried for treason. His reflections on his previous life and his experiences in prison form the heart of this moving and thought-provoking masterpiece.

The Painted Bird by Jerzy Kosinski

When the war separates a youth from his parents, he begins a terrible odyssey of suffering as he wanders from village to village.

If Not Now, When? by Primo Levi

Reveals the extraordinary lives of the Russian, Polish and Jewish partisans trapped behind enemy lines during the Second World War. Wracked by fear, hunger and fierce rivalries, they link up, fall apart, struggle to stay alive and to sabotage the efforts of the all-powerful German army.

The Call of the Wild by Jack London

Published in 1903, this title is London's most-read book, and it is generally considered one of his best works. The protagonist is a dog. Several films based on this novel have been produced.

The Guns of Navarone by Alistair MacLean

The classic World War II thriller from the acclaimed master of action and suspense. Twelve hundred British soldiers isolated on the small island of Kheros off the Turkish coast, waiting to die. Twelve hundred lives in jeopardy, lives that could be saved if only the guns could be silenced. The guns of Navarone, vigilant, savage and catastrophically accurate. Navarone itself, grim bastion of narrow straits manned by a mixed garrison of Germans and Italians, an apparently impregnable iron fortress. To Captain Keith Mallory, skllled saboteur, trained mountaineer, fell the task of leading the small party detailed to scale the vast, impossible precipice of Navarone and to blow up the guns. The Guns of Navarone is the story of that mission, the tale of a calculated risk taken in the time of war…

All the Pretty Horses by Cormac McCarthy

All the Pretty Horses, the first novel of the Border Trilogy, published in 1992, was an international bestseller, winning both the National Book Award and the National Book Critics Circle Award. It tells the tale of John Grady Cole, who at sixteen finds himself the last bewildered survivor of generations of Texas ranchers, cut off from the only life he ever imagined. With two companions, he sets off for Mexico on a sometimes idyllic, sometimes comic journey to a place where dreams are paid for in blood. In 2012 Picador celebrates its 40th anniversary. During that time we have published many prize-winning and bestselling authors including Bret Easton Ellis and Cormac McCarthy, Alice Sebold and Helen Fielding, Graham Swift and Alan Hollinghurst. Years later, Picador continue to bring readers the very best contemporary fiction, non-fiction and poetry from across the globe. Discover more at picador.com/40

Blood Meridian: or The Evening Redness in the West by Cormac McCarthy

Blood Meridian is an epic novel of the violence and depravity that attended America’s westward expansion, brilliantly subverting the conventions of the Western novel and the mythology of the Wild West. Based on historical events that took place on the Texas–Mexico border in the 1850s, it traces the fortunes of the Kid, a fourteen-year-old Tennesseean who stumbles into a nightmarish world where Indians are being murdered and the market for their scalps is thriving. ‘Cormac McCarthy’s violent lyric masterpiece, Blood Meridian acquires an amoral, apocalyptic dimension through the Miltonic grandeur of the language . . . It is a barbarously poetic odyssey through a hell without purpose’ Irish Times ‘McCarthy’s achievement is to establish a new mythology which is as potent and vivid as that of the movies, yet one which has absolutely the opposite effect . . . He is a great writer’ Independent ‘A bloody and starkly beautiful tale’ Stephen Amidon, Sunday Times

The Mark of Zorro by Johnston McCulley

In a reprint of the original, the champion of freedom rides the highways with a mask upon his face and a rapier at his side, turning the languid Don Diego into Senor Zorro, deadly marksman and master swordsman

Lonesome Dove by Larry Mcmurtry

It begins in the office of The Hat Creek Cattle Company of the Rio Grande. It ends as a journey into the heart of every adventurer who ever lived . . . From the author of The Last Picture Showand Texasville here is Larry McMurtry's Pulitzer Prize winning masterpiece. A powerful, triumphant portrayal of the American West as it really was. More than a love story, more than an adventure, Lonesome Dove is an epic: a monumental novel which embraces the spirit of the last defiant wilderness of America. Legend and fact, heroes and outlaws, whores and ladies, Indians and settlers Lonesome Doveis the central, enduring American experience dramatically recreated in a magnificent story of heroism and love; of honour, loyalty and betrayal.

The Naked and the Dead by Norman Mailer

Based on Mailer’s own experience of military service in the Philippines during World War Two, ‘The Naked and the Dead’ is a graphically truthful and shattering portrayal of ordinary men in battle. First published in 1949, as America was still basking in the glories of the Allied victory, it altered forever the popular perception of warfare. Focusing on the experiences of a fourteen-man platoon stationed on a Japanese-held island in the South Pacific during World War II, and written in a journalistic style, it tells the moving story of the soldiers' struggle to retain a sense of dignity amidst the horror of warfare, and to find a source of meaning in their lives amisdst the sounds and fury of battle.

La Condition Humaine by Andre Malraux

Fortunes of War: The Balkan Trilogy by Olivia Manning

The Fortunes of War is a teeming, complex, and rich novel, alive with the uncertainty and adventure of civilian life during wartime. Olivia Manning has filled the pages of this epic work with vivid characters who, over the course of nearly a thousand pages, tell the larger story of Europe during the trauma of the Second World War. Harriet and Guy Pringle are young newlyweds when they arrive in Bucharest from England, eager to experience life in that cosmopolitan city. It is the autumn of 1939, only a few weeks after Germany’s invasion of Poland, and nobody thinks the war will go on for very long–though troop movements and treaties are the only topic of conversation. By the time the Pringles realize that they are in the middle of a worldwide conflict, it is too late to return home. The only thing to do is to join the great mass of displaced people–White Russians, journalists, attaches, and con artists–and move east to Athens. Manning’s mastery of the long form allows her to expand both outward and inward, tackling complexities of world politics and interpersonal relationships with equal panache.

One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

As Melquiades excites Buendia's father with new inventions and tales of adventure, neither can know the significance of the indecipherable manuscript that the gypsy passes into their hands. The tribulations of the Buendia household push memories of the manuscript aside. Few remember its existence and one will discover the message that it holds.

The Children of the New Forest by Captain Marryat

Orphaned when their Royalist father is killed during the Civil War, the four Beverley children are taken into hiding in a cottage in the New Forest and disguised as the grandchildren of a poor forester.

Moby-Dick by Herman Melville

When Ishmael sets sail on the whaling ship Pequod one cold Christmas Day, he has no idea of the horrors awaiting him out on the vast and merciless ocean. The ship's strange captain, Ahab, is in the grip of an obsession to hunt down the famous white whale, Moby Dick, and will stop at nothing on his quest to annihilate his nemesis.

Tales of the South Pacific by James A. Michener

Enter the exotic world of the South Pacific, meet the men and women caught up in the drama of a big war. The young Marine who falls madly in love with a beautiful Tonkinese girl. Nurse Nellie and her French planter, Emile De Becque. The soldiers, sailors, and nurses playing at war and waiting for love in a tropic paradise.

The Cruel Sea by Nicholas Monsarrat

Based on the author's own experiences, this book presents the story of the crew of HMS Compass Rose, a corvette assigned to protect convoys in World War Two. It offers descriptions of agonizing U-boat hunts. It tells of ordinary, heroic men who had to face a brutal menace which would strike without warning from the deep.

History: A Novel by Elsa Morante

HISTORY was written nearly 3 decades after Morante spent a year hiding from the Germans in remote farming villages in the mountains south of Rome. There she witnessed the full impact of the war and first formed the ambition to write an account of what history does when it reaches the realm of ordinary people struggling for life and bread. The central character in this powerful and unforgiving novel is Ida Mancuso, a schoolteacher whose husband has died and whose feckless teenage son treats the war as his playground. A German soldier on his way to North Africa rapes her and leaves her pregnant with a boy whose survival becomes Ida's passion, and her source of joy and meaning amid universal catastrophe.

Suite Francaise by Irene Nemirovsky

Set during a year that begins with France's fall to the Nazis in June 1940 and ending with Germany turning its attention to Russia, this book falls into two parts. It depicts a group of Parisians as they flee the Nazi invasion; and follows the inhabitants of a rural community under occupation who find themselves thrown together in unexpected ways.

The Sorrow Of War by Bao Ninh

Winner of The Independent Foreign Fiction Award, this "hauntingly beautiful novel, written by a North Vietnamese Army veteran, manages to humanize completely a people who up until now have usually been cast as robotic fanatics." Sunday Times

Master and Commander by Patrick O'Brian

The opening salvo of the Aubrey-Maturin epic, in which the surgeon introduces himself to the captain by driving an elbow into his ribs during a chamber music recital. Fortunately for millions of readers, the two quickly make up. Then they commence one of the great literary voyages of our century, set against an immaculately detailed backdrop of the Napoleonic wars. This is the place to start--and in all likelihood, you won't be able to stop. --Amazon.com

The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien

A sequence of stories about the Vietnam War, this book also has the unity of a novel, with recurring characters and interwoven strands of plot and theme. It aims to summarize America's involvement in Vietnam, and her coming to terms with that experience in the years that followed.

Scarlet Pimpernel by Baroness Orczy

The classic bestselling adventure story is back in a stunning new package.

Burmese Days by George Orwell

Flory, a white timber merchant, befriends Dr Veraswami, a black enthusiast for Empire. The doctor needs help. U Po Kyin, Sub-divisional Magistrate of Kyauktada, is plotting his downfall. The only thing that can save him is European patronage: membership of the hitherto all-white Club.

Zen And The Art Of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry into Values by Robert Pirsig

Tells a story of the narrator, his son Chris and their month-long motorcycle odyssey from Minnesota to California profoundly affected an entire generation.

The Valley Of Bones (Dance to the Music of Time 07) by Anthony Powell

A Dance to the Music of Time his brilliant 12-novel sequence, which chronicles the lives of over three hundred characters, is a unique evocation of life in twentieth-century England. The novels follow Nicholas Jenkins, Kenneth Widmerpool and others, as they negotiate the intellectual, cultural and social hurdles that stand between them and the "Acceptance World."

Soldier's Art (Dance to the Music of Time 08) by Anthony Powell

A Dance to the Music of Time his brilliant 12-novel sequence, which chronicles the lives of over three hundred characters, is a unique evocation of life in twentieth-century England. The novels follow Nicholas Jenkins, Kenneth Widmerpool and others, as they negotiate the intellectual, cultural and social hurdles that stand between them and the "Acceptance World."

The Military Philosophers (Dance to the Music of Time 09) by Anthony Powell

A Dance to the Music of Time his brilliant 12-novel sequence, which chronicles the lives of over three hundred characters, is a unique evocation of life in twentieth-century England. The novels follow Nicholas Jenkins, Kenneth Widmerpool and others, as they negotiate the intellectual, cultural and social hurdles that stand between them and the "Acceptance World."

Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon

Tyrone Slothrop, a GI in London in 1944, has a big problem. Whenever he gets an erection, a Blitz bomb hits. Slothrop gets excited, and then, 'a screaming comes across the sky,' heralding an angel of death, a V-2 rocket. Soon Tyrone is on the run from legions of bizarre enemies through the phantasmagoric horrors of Germany.

The Surprising Adventures of Baron Munchausen by Rudolph Erich Raspe

AT THE CITY OF LONDON, ENGLAND. We, the undersigned, as true believers in the profit, do most solemnly affirm, that all the adventures of our friend Baron Munchausen, in whatever country they may lie, are positive and simple facts. And, as we have been believed, whose adventures are tenfold more wonderful, so do we hope all true believers will give him their full faith and credence. GULLIVER. SINBAD. ALADDIN. Sworn at the Mansion House 9th Nov. last, in the absence of the Lord Mayor. JOHN (the Porter).

All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque

One by one the boys begin to fall... In 1914 a room full of German schoolboys, fresh-faced and idealistic, are goaded by their schoolmaster to troop off to the 'glorious war'. With the fire and patriotism of youth they sign up. What follows is the moving story of a young 'unknown soldier' experiencing the horror and disillusionment of life in the trenches.

The Crab with the Golden Claws (Adventures of Tintin) by Herge

The Adventures of Tintin

Tintin in Tibet (Adventures of Tintin) by Herge

The classic graphic novel. One day Tintin reads about a plane crash in the Himalayas. When he discovers thathis friend, Chang, was on board, Tintin travels to the crash site in hopes of a rescue.

The Castafiore Emerald (Adventures of Tintin) by Herge

The story revolves around a number of supposed thefts and a missing emerald. The opera singer Bianca Castafiore invites herself to stay at Marlinspike Hall, causing Captain Haddock to panic and have an accident the prevents him from escaping!

The Devil to Pay in the Backlands by Joao Guimaraes Rosa

Scaramouche by Rafael Sabatini

When Andre-Louis witnesses the murder of his best friend by an arrogant and privileged aristocrat, he swears to avenge his death. Forced to flee his hometown after stirring up revolutionary fervour in the citizens, he falls in with a travelling theatre company and disguises himself as the character of the wily rogue Scaramouche.

Captain Blood by Rafael Sabatini

Wrongfully arrested following the Monmouth rebellion of 1685, Peter Blood, physician and former soldier, escapes the hangman's noose only to be exiled to the tropical colonies. Sold into slavery to a cruel plantation owner, his moral fortitude and medical ability soon earn him the favour of the island's governor.

Everything is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer

A young man arrives in the Ukraine, clutching in his hand a tattered photograph. He is searching for the woman who fifty years ago saved his grandfather from the Nazis. Unfortunately, he is aided in his quest by Alex, a translator with an uncanny ability to mangle English into bizarre new forms.

The Hunters by James Salter

Captain Cleve Connell arrives in Korea with a single goal: to become an ace, one of that elite fraternity of jet pilots who have downed five MIGs. But as his fellow airmen rack up kill after kill, Cleve's luck runs bad. Other pilots question his guts. And then in one icy instant 40,000 feet above the Yalu River, his luck changes forever.

Ivanhoe by Walter Scott

Set at the time of the Norman Conquest, this novel discusses Ivanhoe's return from the Crusades to claim his inheritance and the love of Rowena and his involvement in the struggle between Richard Coeur de Lion and his Norman brother John. It is structured by a series of conflicts: Saxon versus Norman, Christian versus Jew, and men versus women.

Rings Of Saturn by W G Sebald

A Walking Tour Through The Haunted Landscapes Of The Past, In The Company Of The Exiled And The Departed.The Rings Of Saturn Begins As The Record Of A Journey On Foot Through Coastal East Anglia. From Lowestoft To Southwold To Bungay, Sebald'S Own Story Becomes The Conductor Of Evocations Of People And Cultures Past And Present: Of Chateaubriand, Thomas Browne, Swinburne And Conrad, Of Fishing Fleets, Skulls And Silkworms. The Result Is A Book Unlike Any Other In Contemporary Literature, An Intricately Patterned And Endlessly Thought-Provoking Meditation On The Transience Of All Things Human.

Austerlitz by W. G. Sebald

In 1939, five-year-old Jacques Austerlitz is sent to England on a Kindertransport and placed with foster parents. This childless couple promptly erase from the boy all knowledge of his identity and he grows up ignorant of his past. Later in life, after a career as an architectural historian, Austerlitz – having avoided all clues that might point to his origin – finds the past returning to haunt him and he is forced to explore what happened fifty years before.

Black Beauty by Anna Sewell

Anna Sewell's famous 'Autobiography of a Horse' is a Victorian and children's classic. Written to expose and prevent cruelty to horses in Victorian England, the novel's appeal as animal story, horse-care manual, protest work, feminist text and slave narrative is fully explored in this new edition.

The Young Lions by Irwin Shaw

This vivid and classic novel portrays the experiences of ordinary soldiers fighting in World War II and used the points of view from a young Nazi, a jaded American film producers, and a shy Jewish boy.

A Town Like Alice by Nevil Shute Norway

Jean Paget is just twenty years old and working in Malaya when the Japanese invasion begins. When she is captured she joins a group of other European women and children whom the Japanese force to march for miles through the jungle - an experience that leads to the deaths of many.

Maus by Art Spiegelman

The Charterhouse of Parma by Henri Stendhal

Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson

Neal Stephenson enjoys cult status among science fiction fans and techie types thanks to Snow Crash, which so completely redefined conventional notions of the high-tech future that it became a self- fulfilling prophecy. But if his cyberpunk classic was big, Cryptonomicon is huge, gargantuan,massive, not just in size but in scope and appeal. It's the hip, readable heir to Gravity's Rainbow and the Illuminatus trilogy. And it's only the first of a proposed series--for more information, read our interview with Stephenson. Cryptonomicon zooms all over the world, careening conspiratorially back and forth between two time periods- -World War II and the present. Our 1940s' heroes are the brilliant mathematician Lawrence Waterhouse, crypt analyst extraordinaire, and gung-ho, morphine-addicted marine Bobby Shaftoe. They're part of Detachment 2702, an Allied group trying to break Axis communication codes while simultaneously preventing the enemy from figuring out that their codes have been broken. Their job boils down to layer upon layer of deception. Dr. Alan Turing is also a member of 2702,and he explains the unit's strange workings to Waterhouse. "When we want to sink a convoy, we send out an observation plane first... Of course, to observe is not its real duty--we already know exactly where the convoy is. Its real duty is to be observed... Then, when we come round and sink them, the Germans will not find it suspicious." All of this secrecy resonates in the present-day story line, in which the grandchildren of the WWII heroes--inimitable programming geek Randy Waterhouse and the lovely and powerful Amy Shaftoe--team up to help create an offshore data haven in Southeast Asia and maybe uncover some gold once destined for Nazi coffers. To top off the paranoiac tone of the book, the mysterious Enoch Root, key member of Detachment 2702 and the Societas Eruditorum, pops up with an unbreakable encryption scheme left over from WWII to befuddle the 1990s protagonists with conspiratorial ties. Cryptonomicon is vintage Stephenson from start to finish: short on plot, but long on detail so precise it's exhausting. Every page has a math problem, a quotable in-joke, an amazing idea or a bit of sharp prose. Cryptonomicon is also packed with truly weird characters, funky tech, and crypto--all the crypto you'll ever need, in fact, not to mention all the computer jargon of the moment. A word to the wise: if you read this book in one sitting, you may die of information overload (and starvation). --Therese Littleton, Amazon.com

A Sentimental Journey and Other Writings by Laurence Sterne

A Sentimental Journey tells the story of Mr Yorick's travels through France and Italy and parodies contemporary travel works, most notably those by Smollett. This new edition includes a selection from The Sermons of Mr Yorick as well as The Journal to Eliza and A Political Romance, both works that shed light on the Journey.

Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson

If you love a good story, then look no further. Oxford Children's Classics bring together the most unforgettable stories ever told. They're books to treasure and return to again and again. When orphan David Balfour is betrayed by his Uncle Ebenezer, he finds himself imprisoned on the Covenant and bound for the Carolinas. But the ship hits some rocks and is wrecked. David is thrown overboard and washed up on the shore of a Scottish island. Together with fellow survivor, the wanted rebel, Alan Breck, David sets off across the treacherous highlands on a quest for justice . . . and revenge!

Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson

Stevenson's classic tale of buccaneers, a treasure map, and a hunt for buried gold introduced the character of Long John Silver and brought moral ambiguity into children's books.

Sophie's Choice by William Styron

Stingo, an inexperienced 22 year old Southerner, takes us back to the summer of 1947 and a boarding house in a leafy Brooklyn suburb. There, he meets Nathan, a fiery Jewish intellectual; and Sophie, a beautiful and fragile Polish Catholic. Ultimately, he arrives at the dark core of Sophie's past: her memories of pre-war Poland, and her choice.

Gulliver's Travels by Jonathan Swift

Jonathan Swift's classic satirical narrative was first published in 1726, seven years after Defoe's Robinson Crusoe (one of its few rivals in fame and breadth of appeal). As a parody travel-memoir it reports on extraordinary lands and societies, whose names have entered the English language: notably the minute inhabitants of Lilliput, the giants of Brobdingnag, and the Yahoos in Houyhnhnmland, where talking horses are the dominant species. It spares no vested interest from its irreverent wit, and its attack on political and financial corruption, as well as abuses in science, continue to resonate in our own times.

War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy

This epic novel is centred on Napoleon's war with Russia. It expresses Tolstoy's view that history is an inexorable process which man cannot influence. Three of the characters, Natasha Rostov, Prince Andrew Bolkonsky and Pierre Bezukhov illustrate Tolstoy's philosophy.

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain

When Huck escapes from his drunken father and the 'sivilizing' Widow Douglas with the runaway slave Jim, he embarks on a series of adventures that draw him to feuding families and the trickery of the unscrupulous 'Duke' and 'Dauphin'.

Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne

One night in the reform club, Phileas Fogg bets his companions that he can travel across the globe in just eighty days. He sets off with his valet Passepartout, and passes through exotic lands and dangerous locations, they seize whatever transportation is at hand - whether train or elephant - overcoming set-backs and racing against the clock.

Journey to the Centre of the Earth by Jules Verne

A professor leads his nephew and hired guide down a volcano in Iceland to the 'centre of the Earth'. They are involved in many adventures, encountering prehistoric animals and natural hazards, and eventually come to the surface again in southern Italy.

Williwaw by Gore Vidal

A gripping tale of men struggling against nature and themselves, Williwawwas Gore Vidal's first novel, written at nineteen when he was first mate of the U.S. Army freight supply ship stationed in the Aleutian Islands. Here he writes of a ship caught plying the lethal, frigid Arctic waters during storm season. Tensions run high among the edgy crew and uneasy passengers even before the cruel wind that gives the book its title suddenly sweeps down from the mountains. Vividly drawn characters and a compelling murder plot combine to make Williwawa classic war novel.

Candide by Francois Voltaire

Wordsworth Classics covers a huge list of beloved works of literature in English and translations. This growing series is rigorously updated, with scholarly introductions and notes added to new titles.

Slaughterhouse 5, or The Children's Crusade - A Duty-dance with Death by Kurt Vonnegut

Centring on the infamous fire-bombing of Dresden in the Second World War, Billy Pilgrim's odyssey through time reflects the journey of our own fractured lives as we search for meaning in what we are afraid to know.

Put Out More Flags by Evelyn Waugh

"Put Out More Flags" is Waugh's superb send-up of "smart" England, the bohemian crowd, as World War II approaches. Making a return appearance, Basil Seal this time insinuates himself into an odd but profitable role in the country's mobilization.

Men at Arms by Evelyn Waugh

Guy Crouchback, determined to get into the war, takes a commission in the Royal Corps of Halberdiers. His spirits high, he sees all the trimmings but none of the action. And his first campaign, an abortive affair on the West African coastline, ends with an escapade which seriously blots his Halberdier copybook.

The Island of Dr Moreau (Penguin Classics) by H.G. Wells

Adrift in a dinghy, Edward Prendick, the single survivor from the good ship Lady Vain, is rescued by a vessel carrying a profoundly unusual cargo a menagerie of savage animals.

The Machine Gunners by Robert Westall

After an air raid, a group of English children find a German machine gun and hide it from adults who are looking for it.

Voss by Patrick White

An epic physical and spiritual journey across the outback—by the only Australian writer to win the Nobel Prize. The character of Johann Voss is based on an actual nineteenth-century explorer, Ludwig Leichhardt, who attempted to cross the entire continent of Australia from east to west in 1848 but disappeared in the attempt. With visionary intensity, Patrick White imagines Voss's last journey across the desert and the waterlogged plains of central Australia. But this magisterial novel is also a love story, for the explorer is inextricably bound up with an orphaned young woman whose inner life, like his own, is at odds with the world. In language poetic and passionate yet grounded in shrewd, often comic, social observations and naturalistic portrayals of farmers, convicts, employers, servants, and aborigines, White creates both a spellbinding adventure and a myth for our time.

The Virginian by Owen Wister

"The Virginian" is Owen Wister's classic novel of the Wild West. A highly fictionalized account of the Johnson County War, a dispute in 1890's Wyoming between large cattle ranchers and smaller operators over land use. Rich with detail of the old Wild West frontier days, "The Virginian" is at its core a study of the inherent nature of man drawn out by the savagery of the wilderness.

The Caine Mutiny by Herman Wouk

A compelling psychological study of men at war.

The Debacle: (1870-71) by Émile Zola

Conservative and working-class, Jean Macquart is an experienced, middle-aged soldier in the French army, who has endured deep personal loss. When he first meets the wealthy and mercurial Maurice Levasseur, who never seems to have suffered, his hatred is immediate.