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Contents

Foreword 7 Editors’ Notes 8 Introduction: A Book Lover Speaks 9 Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe 10 Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie 12 Brick Lane by Monica Ali 14 I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou 16 Behind the Scenes at the Museum by Kate Atkinson 18 The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood 20 The Wasp Factory by Iain Banks 22 The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes 24 Light a Penny Candle by Maeve Binchy 26 Lorna Doone by R. D. Blackmore 28 Any Human Heart by William Boyd 30 The Thirty-Nine Steps by John Buchan 32 A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess 34 Top Ten British and American Classics 36 Top Ten World Classics 37 Oscar and Lucinda by Peter Carey 38 Wise Children by Angela Carter 40 2001: A Space Odyssey by Arthur C. Clarke 42 Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke 44 What a Carve Up! by Jonathan Coe 46 The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho 48 The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins 50 Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad 52 The Passage by Justin Cronin 54

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Captain Corelli’s Mandolin by Louis de Bernières 56 The Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai 58 Room by Emma Donoghue 60 House of Sand and Fog by Andre Dubus III 62 Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier 64 A Spell of Winter by Helen Dunmore 66 Top Ten Quick Reads 68 Top Ten Challenging Reads 69 Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides 70 As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner 72 Birdsong by Sebastian Faulks 74 The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald 76 A Room with a View by E. M. Forster 78 The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen 80 Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel García Márquez 82 Mary Barton by Elizabeth Gaskell 84 Cold Comfort Farm by Stella Gibbons 86 Lord of the Flies by William Golding 88 The Tin Drum by Günter Grass 90 The End of the Affair by Graham Greene 92 Top Ten Men’s Books 94 Top Ten Non-Fiction Books 95 Twenty Thousand Streets Under the Sky by Patrick Hamilton 96 The Go-Between by L. P. Hartley 98 The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne 100 Catch-22 by Joseph Heller 102 Notes on a Scandal by Zoë Heller 104 To Have and Have Not by Ernest Hemingway 106 The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini 108 Atomised by Michel Houellebecq 110

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Brave New World by Aldous Huxley 112 A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving 114 The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro 116 Top Ten Books with a Younger Perspective 118 Top Ten Humorous Reads 119 The Turn of the Screw by Henry James 120 The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd 122 The Girls by Lori Lansens 124 Lady Chatterley’s Lover by D. H. Lawrence 126 To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee 128 Small Island by Andrea Levy 130 Atonement by Ian McEwan 132 Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel 134 Life of Pi by Yann Martel 136 Liars and Saints by Maile Meloy 138 Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell 140 Beloved by Toni Morrison 142 Norwegian Wood by Haruki Murakami 144 Top Ten War Books 146 Top Ten Crime Books 147 The Sea, The Sea by Iris Murdoch 148 Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov 150 Suite Française by Irène Némirovsky 152 The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger 154 Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell 156 Bel Canto by Ann Patchett 158 The Pact by Jodi Picoult 160 Woman on the Edge of Time by Marge Piercy 162 Vernon God Little by D. B. C. Pierre 164 The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath 166 Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson 168

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The Human Stain by Philip Roth 170 The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy 172 Top Ten Gay Reads 174 Top Ten Cult Classics 175 Midnight’s Children by Salman Rushdie 176 The Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger 178 Drowning Ruth by Christina Schwarz 180 The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold 182 The Bookseller of Kabul by Asne Seierstad 184 Fortune’s Rocks by Anita Shreve 186 We Need to Talk About Kevin by Lionel Shriver 188 On Beauty by Zadie Smith 190 The Help by Kathryn Stockett 192 Sophie’s Choice by William Styron 194 Perfume by Patrick Süskind 196 The Secret History by Donna Tartt 198 The Story of Lucy Gault by William Trevor 200 Top Ten Sci-Fi Books 202 Top Ten Chilling Reads 203 Marrying the Mistress by Joanna Trollope 204 The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain 206 Rabbit, Run by John Updike 208 The Color Purple by Alice Walker 210 The Night Watch by Sarah Waters 212 Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh 214 When God Was a Rabbit by Sarah Winman 216 Mrs Dalloway by Virginia Woolf 218 The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafón 220 The Book Thief by Markus Zusak 222 Acknowledgements 224

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Things Fall Apart Chinua Achebe Published 1958 / Length 148 pages

Things Fall Apart follows the ambitions and struggles of Okonkwo, a prominent member of a pre-colonial Igbo village in what is now Nigeria, as he strives to maintain his high standing within his community in the mid- to late-nineteenth century. Okonkwo has overcome a disadvantaged childhood to become a successful man, but he seems fated to lose the status he cherishes. His blind commitment to traditional values undermines his relationship with his family, particularly his son Nwoye. He is prepared to make great sacrifices in order to preserve his position in the village, yet Okonkwo’s world is changing, as British colonial rule begins to encroach upon the Igbo way of life. Achebe portrays the colonial experience from an African perspective: the European culture promoted by the invading authorities represents a challenge to Okonkwo’s identity, one he must overcome in order to survive. Written in the late 1950s against the backdrop of Nigeria’s journey towards independence, the book raises questions about collective identity, morality and self-alienation, and constitutes the foundation of modern African literature in English.

What the critics said ‘Achebe is the conscience of African literature because he has consistently insisted on the power of storytellers to appeal to the morality and humanity of their readers and to give their life fuller meaning.’ – Simon Gikandi, Professor of Literature, in his introductory essay to the Heinemann Classics in Context edition of the novel

Discussion points G Okonkwo has been described as a classic tragic hero, but at times his actions make it difficult for the reader to identify [10] Book Club Bible CORRECTED:Layout 1 1/6/12 11:11 Page 11

with him. Why do you think Achebe makes his protagonist so morally ambiguous? G How do the characters of Ezinma, Nwoye and Ikemefuna reflect the strengths and limitations of Igbo society? G Why do you think Achebe includes descriptions of the more troubling Igbo customs, such as the abandoning of twin babies? Isn’t there a danger of alienating Western readers from the society he is depicting? G Things Fall Apart repeatedly emphasizes the importance of oral storytelling in Igbo culture. How does the telling of stories affect the way in which Achebe’s novel is narrated?

Background information G Achebe is an internationally renowned Nigerian academic who drew on his own family’s experience of colonization to write this, his first novel. The story of Okonkwo’s family is continued in No Longer at Ease (1960) and Arrow of God (1964). G The title of the novel is taken from a line of W. B. Yeats’s poem ‘The Second Coming’. G Things Fall Apart is the most widely read African novel and has been translated into fifty different languages, leading to Achebe being identified as the man who ‘invented’ modern African literature.

Suggested companion books G A Grain of Wheat by Ngugi wa Thiong’o – detailing the effects of colonization on Kenyan identity during the 1952–60 Emergency. G The Tin Drum by Günter Grass (see page 90) – exploring cultural alienation and the individual. G Baudolino by Umberto Eco – the importance of storytelling.

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