OUR FAVOURITE 400 BOOKS – THE RESULTS!
To commemorate the anniversary of the city’s Royal Charter, awarded by King Charles I on 13 July 1626, we asked library Members to nominate their 400 favourite books, and here is the full list.
Fiction was most popular, with the classics, local authors – including our own Chris Nickson and Frances Brody – thrillers, and crime fiction generally featuring heavily. Several titles proved very popular and had multiple nominations, and these are listed below:
The following books received fewer nominations, but still made the list. They are listed below:
| Abe, Kobo | The face of another |
| Albom, Mitch | Tuesdays with Morrie |
| Alcott, Louisa May | Little women |
| Andrew Miller | The land in winter |
| Angelou, Maya | I know why the caged bird sings |
| Anon. | A woman in Berlin |
| Atkinson, Kate | A god in ruins, Big sky, Case histories, Death at the sign of the rook, Life after life, One good turn, Transcription, and Started early, took my dog |
| Atwood, Margaret | The Handmaid’s Tale |
| Austen, Jane | Mansfield Park |
| Bailey, Catherine | Black diamonds : the rise and fall of an English dynasty |
| Ballard, J.G. | Miracles of life : Shanghai to Shepperton |
| Banner, Bernadette | Make, sew and mend : traditional techniques to sustainably maintain and refashion your clothes |
| Barbery, Muriel | The elegance of the hedgehog |
| Barnard, Robert | A fall from grace, and The graveyard position |
| Barnes, Julian | The sense of an ending |
| Barnett, David | Withered Hill |
| Bennett, Alan | A life like other people’s, Telling tales, The uncommon reader, and Untold stories |
| Blackmoor, R.D. | Lorna Doone |
| Boyd, William | Restless, Sweet caress, and The romantic |
| Brody, Frances | A medal for murder, A woman unknown, Death in the stars, Death of an avid reader, Dying in the wool, Murder in the afternoon, and Murder on a summer’s day |
| Bromfield, Louis | The rains came |
| Brontë, Emily | Wuthering Heights |
| Brooks, Sarah | A cautious traveller’s guide to the wastelands |
| Bryson, Bill | A short history of nearly everything |
| Camilleri, Andrea | Rounding the mark |
| Camilleri, Andrea | The shape of water |
| Caro, Robert A. | Working : researching, interviewing, writing |
| Carr, J.L. | A month in the country, and The Harpole report |
| Carroll, Lewis | Alice in Wonderland |
| Catling, Brian | The Vorrh |
| Cervantes | Don Quixote |
| Child, Lee | Past tense, The enemy, and The visitor |
| Christie, Agatha | Murder on the Orient Express, The murder of Roger Ackroyd, and The mysterious affair at Styles |
| Clarke, Susanna | Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell |
| Cleeves, Ann | Blue lightning, Cold earth, Dead water, Hidden depths, Raven black, Red bones, Silent voices, Telling tales, Thin air, White nights, and Wild fire |
| Cole, Babette | The smelly book |
| Collins, Wilkie | The woman in white |
| Conan-Doyle, Arthur | A study in scarlet |
| Cooper, William | Memoirs of a New Man |
| Crompton, Richmal | Family roundabout |
| De Waal, Edmund | The hare with amber eyes : a hidden inheritance |
| Diamant, Anita | The red tent |
| Dickens, Charles | A Christmas carol |
| Dimes, Francis G. | The building stone heritage of Leeds |
| Doer, Anthony | All the light we cannot see |
| Doyle, Arthur Conan | The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes |
| Drabble, Margaret | The sea lady : a late romance |
| Duggan, Alfred | Conscience of the King |
| Dunmore, Helen | Zennor in darkness |
| Dunnett, Dorothy | The game of kings |
| Durrell, Gerald | My family and other animals |
| Eliot, George | Daniel Deronda, and Middlemarch |
| Ellis, Kate | A cursed inheritance |
| Ernaux, Annie | The years |
| Evensberget, Snorre | Norway |
| Fairer, David | Captain Hazard’s game : a mystery of Queen Anne’s London, Chocolate house treason, and The devil’s cathedral : a mystery of Queen Anne’s London |
| Faulkner, William | Novels 1936-1940 |
| Fermor, Patrick Leigh | A time of gifts |
| Ferrante, Elena | My brilliant friend |
| Fitzgerald, F. Scott | Tender is the Night, and The great Gatsby |
| Fitzgerald, Penelope | The beginning of spring, The blue flower, and The bookshop |
| Follett, Ken | Pillars of the earth |
| Forster, Margaret | Keeping the world away |
| Fox, Catherine | Angels and men |
| Furlong, monica | The wise child |
| Gabaldon, Diana | Cross stitch |
| Galbraith, Robert | The cuckoo’s calling |
| Gale, Patrick | A place called winter |
| Gallico, Paul | Flowers for Mrs Harris, and The small miracle |
| Gardam, Jane | Last friends, Old Filth, and The man in the wooden hat |
| Gardner, Helen | The New Oxford Book of English Verse |
| Gibson, William | Neuromancer |
| Godward, Brian | The changing face of Leeds |
| Graham, Kenneth | The wind in the willows |
| Grass, Günter | The Tin Drum |
| Greene, Graham | Travels with my aunt |
| Griffiths, Elly | The crossing places, The ghost fields, The Janus stone, and The outcast dead |
| Grossman, George and Weedon | The diary of a nobody |
| Hamer, Marc | Seed to dust |
| Hannah, Kristin | The women |
| Hare, Bernard | Urban Grimshaw and the Shed Crew |
| Harris, Robert | An officer and a spy, Conclave, Imperium, Lustrum, Munich, The fear index, and The second sleep |
| Harrison, Tony | V |
| Harvey, Samantha | Orbital |
| Hawkins, Paula | The girl on the train |
| Hemingway, Ernest | Farewell to arms |
| Herron, Mick | Down Cemetery Road, Dead lions, London rules, Slow horses, and The last voice you hear |
| Higginbotham, Adam | Midnight in Chernobyl : the untold story of the world’s greatest nuclear disaster |
| Hill, Susan | A question of identity, Howards End is on the landing, The beacon, The betrayal of trust, The man in the picture, The pure in heart, The risk of darkness, The shadows in the street, The small hand, The various haunts of men, and The vows of silence |
| Hindle, Tom | Murder at Lake Garda |
| Holmqvist, Ninni | The Unit |
| Holt, Hazel | No cure for death |
| Hurston, Zora Neale | Their eyes were watching god |
| Irving, John | A prayer for Owen Meany |
| Jackson, Shirley | The haunting of Hill House |
| Jacobson, Howard | The Finkler question |
| James, P.D. | Death comes to Pemberley, and The lighthouse |
| James, Peter | Dead simple |
| Jenkins, Elizabeth | The tortoise and the hare |
| Gevirtz, Karen Bloom | The apothecary’s wife : the hidden history of medicine |
| Kawakami, Mieko | Breasts and Eggs |
| Kay, Guy Gavriel | Lord of emperors, and Sailing to Sarantium |
| Keegan, Claire | Small things like these |
| Kehlmann, Daniel | Measuring the world |
| Kennedy, Douglas | The moment |
| Kidd, Sue Monk | The Invention of Wings |
| King, Stephen | The girl who loved Tom Gordon, and It |
| Kingsolver, Barbara | Demon Copperhead |
| Kurkov, Andrey | Death and the penguin |
| La Plante, Lynda | Above suspicion |
| Larkin, Philip | Required writing |
| Larsson, Stieg | The girl with the dragon tattoo |
| Laurence, T.E. | The seven pillars of wisdom |
| Le Carre, John | The spy who came in from the cold, Sailing to Sarantium, A delicate truth, A most wanted man, Agent running in the field, and Our kind of traitor |
| Le Guin, Ursula | Earthsea Trilogy, and The left hand of darkness |
| Lee, Laurie | As I walked out one midsummer morning |
| Lee, Min Jin | Pachinko |
| Lennon, Ferdia | Glorious exploits |
| Leon, Donna | A sea of troubles, About face, Acqua alta, Beastly things, Blood from a stone, By its cover, Death at La Fenice, Death in a strange country, Through a glass, darkly, Doctored evidence, Drawing conclusions, Earthly remains, Suffer the little children, The girl of his dreams, The golden egg, and the temptation of forgiveness |
| Lewis, C.S. | Perelandra, and The chronicles of Narnia |
| Liptrop, Amy | The outrun |
| Lively, Penelope | Family album, How it all began, and Making it up |
| Mankell, Henning | An event in autumn |
| Manning, Olivia | Fortunes of war : Balkan and Levant trilogies |
| Mansfield, Katherine | The garden party and other stories |
| Mantel, Hilary | Bring up the bodies, Eight Months on Ghazzah Street, and Wolf Hall |
| Marquez, Gabriel Garcia | One hundred years of solitude |
| Marston, Edward | A bespoke murder |
| Master, John | Bhowani Junction |
| Maugham, W. Somerset | The painted veil |
| Maxtone Graham, Tsenda | Mr Tibbits’s Catholic school |
| May, Peter | The blackhouse, and The Lewis man |
| McCall Smith, Alexander | Blue shoes and happiness, 44 Scotland Street, and The Sunday philosophy club |
| McCarthy, Cormac | Blood meridian |
| McConaghy, Charlotte | Wild dark shore |
| McEwan, Ian | The children act, and Saturday |
| McGregor, Jon | If nobody speaks of remarkable things |
| Melville, Herman | Moby Dick |
| Mitford, Nancy | The pursuit of Love |
| Morgan, Richard | Altered carbon |
| Mortimer, John Clifford | Rumpole and the Penge bungalow murders |
| Myers, Benjamin | The offing |
| Nadel, Barbara | Darkest night |
| Nadel, Barbara | Deadly web |
| Nemirovsky, Irene | Suite Française |
| Nickson, Chris | At the dying of the year, Cold cruel winter, Gods of gold, and The broken token |
| Nobbs, David | Pratt of the Argus |
| Norek, Oliver | The winter warriors |
| O’Connor, Flannery | Wise blood |
| O’Connor, Joseph | Star of the sea |
| O’Farrell, Maggie | Hamnet, Instructions for a heatwave, The hand that first held mine, The marriage portrait, and The vanishing act of Esme Lennox |
| Orwell, George | Animal Farm |
| Osman, Richard | The bullet that missed, The last devil to die, The man who died twice, The Thursday Murder Club, and We solve murders |
| Pearson, Fiona | Joan Eardley : National Galleries of Scotland Edinburgh, 2007 |
| Penny, Louise | Still life |
| Perry, Sarah | Enlightenment |
| Philips, Caryl | A view of the empire at sunset |
| Pinero, Claudia | A little luck |
| Plath, Sylvia | The bell jar |
| Powers, Richard | The overstory |
| Pratchett, Terry | Going Postal, Hogfather, and Mort |
| Proulx, Annie | The shipping news |
| Pym, Barbara | A glass of blessings, And Excellent women |
| Raisman, Geoffrey | The undark sky : a story of four poor brothers |
| Rand, Ayn | The fountainhead |
| Rankin, Ian | A heart full of headstones, In a house of lies, Mortal causes, Saints of the shadow bible, Standing in another man’s grave, The complaints, and The impossible dead |
| Remarque, Erich Maria | All quiet on the Western Front |
| Rendell, Ruth | End in tears |
| Richler, Mordecai | Solomon Gursky was here |
| Rimington, Stella | At risk, Dead line, Illegal action, Secret asset, and The Geneva trap |
| Robertson, James | To be continued |
| Robinson, Marilynne | Gilead |
| Robinson, Peter | Abattoir blues, All the colours of darkness, Before the poison, Careless love, Children of the revolution, Dead right, Innocent graves, Many rivers to cross, Not dark yet, Past reason hated, Piece of my heart, Playing with fire, Sleeping in the ground, Standing in the shadows, Watching the dark, When the music’s over |
| Roffe, Monique | The mermaid of black conch |
| Ross, L.J. | Holy Island |
| Rushdie, Salman | Midnight’s children |
| Rutherford Edward | Sarum |
| Ryan, Donal | The spinning Heart |
| Saint-Exupéry, Antoine de | The little prince |
| Sansom, C.J. | Dark fire, Dissolution, Dominion, Heartstone, Lamentation, Revelation, Tombland, and Winter in Madrid |
| Sayers, Dorothy L. | Gaudy Night |
| Scott, Paul | Staying on |
| Seth, Vikram | An Equal Music |
| Shelley, Mary | Frankenstein |
| Shriver, Lionel | The motion of a body through space |
| Simenon, Georges | Maigret in New York |
| Spector, T.D. | Food for life : the new science of eating well |
| Spufford, Francis | Golden Hill |
| Steinbeck, John | East of Eden, and travels with Charley |
| Stephenson, Neal | Anathem |
| Sterne, Lawrence | Tristram Shandy |
| Stibbe, Nina | Man at the helm |
| Strout, Elizabeth | My name is Lucy Barton, and Olive Kitteridge |
| Susann, Jacqueline | Valley of the dolls |
| Suskind, Patrick | Perfume |
| Sykes, Christopher Simon | The big house : the story of a country house and its family |
| Szerb, Antal | Journey by moonlight |
| Tartt, Donna | Secret history |
| Tey, Josephine | The singing sands |
| Thiong’o, Ngugi wa | A grain of wheat |
| Thornton, David | Great Leeds stories |
| Tóibín, Colm | Brooklyn, Nora Webster, and The south |
| Tokarczuk, Olga | Drive your plow over the bones of the dead |
| Tolkien, J.R.R. | Lord of the Rings |
| Tomalin, Claire | Thomas Hardy : the time-torn man |
| Tomasi di Lampedusa, Giuseppe | The leopard |
| Toole, J.K. | A confederacy of dunces |
| Torrey, Peters | Detransition baby |
| Tremain, Rose | The darkness of Wallis Simpson, and Trespass |
| Trollope, Joanna | City of friends, and the other family |
| Tuchman, Barbara | A distant mirror |
| Tyler, Anne | A spool of blue thread, The beginner’s goodbye, Dinner at the homasick restaurant, Vinegar girl, and Clock dance |
| Vine, Barbara | The child’s child |
| Vonnegut, Kurt | Slaughterhouse 5 |
| Wainwright, Martin | True North |
| Waterhouse, Keith | City Lights: a street life, and There is a happy land |
| Watson, Nigel | Arnold Ziff : the making of a great Yorkshireman |
| Waugh, Evelyn | Scoop : a novel |
| Whipple, Dorothy | High wages |
| Whitehead, Colson | The Nickel boys |
| Wodehouse, P.G. | The clicking of Cuthbert |
| Wolfe, Gene | The book of the new sun : shadow and claw |
| Wolfe, Tom | A man in full |
| Woolf, Virginia | Mrs Dalloway |
| Wrathmell, Susan | Leeds |
| Zephaniah, Benjamin | The life and rhymes of Benjamin Zephaniah : the autobiography |
| Zola, Emile | L’Assommoir, and The ladies delight |
| Zusak, Marcus | The book thief |
