Classics Retold

Classic novels rewritten for modern audiences and introduced to new generations of readers.
Updated September 19, 2022
Unbound Librarians
Drag items up and down to your preferred order then select the "Save Order" button.
On beauty : a novel
Smith, Zadie.
Paper Book
When Howard Belsey's oldest son Jerome falls for Victoria, the stunning daughter of the right-wing Monty Kipps, both families find themselves thrown together, enacting a cultural and personal war against each other.
Loosely based on E.M. Forster's Howard's End, set in modern day U.K.
The hours
Cunningham, Michael
Paper Book
A daring, deeply affecting third novel by the author ofA Home at the End of the WorldandFlesh and Blood. InThe Hours, Michael Cunningham, widely praised as one of the most gifted writers of his generation, draws inventively on the life and work of Virginia...
Three women of different generations whose lives are interconnected by Mrs Dalloway.
Wicked : the life and times of the Wicked Witch of the West, a novel
Maguire, Gregory.
Paper Book
This is the book that started it all! The basis for the smash hit Tony Award-winning Broadway musical, Gregory Maguire's breathtaking New York Times bestseller Wicked views the land of Oz, its inhabitants, its Wizard, and the Emerald City, through a darker and greener (not rosier)...
An exploration of the characters & setting of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum.
Bridget Jones's diary : a novel
Fielding, Helen
Paper Book
'Helen Fielding is one of the funniest writers in Britain and Bridget Jones is a creation of comic genius' Nick HornbyBridget Jones's Diary was first published in 1996 and applauded by critics from Salman Rushdie to Jilly Cooper. A number one best-seller, Helen Fielding's book has sold over fifteen...
Roughly based on Jane Austen's Pride & Prejudice.
The Eyre affair
Fforde, Jasper.
Paper Book
The first book in the phenomenally successful Thursday Next series, from Number One bestselling author Jasper Fforde. 'Always ridiculous, often hilarious ... blink and you miss a vital narrative leap. There are shades of Douglas Adams, Lewis Carroll, 'Clockwork...
Set in an alternative 1985, where the protagonist pursues a master criminal through the world of Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre.
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead
Stoppard, Tom.
Paper Book
Two minor characters from Hamlet offer a novel view of the melancholy Dane.
March
Brooks, Geraldine.
Paper Book
As the North reels under a series of unexpected defeats during the dark first year of the war, one man leaves behind his family to aid the Union cause. His experiences will utterly change his marriage and challenge his most ardently held beliefs. Riveting and elegant as it is meticulously researched...
Wide Sargasso Sea
Rhys, Jean
Paper Book
Jean Rhys's reputation was made upon the publication of this passionate and heartbreaking novel, in which she brings into the light one of fiction's most mysterious characters: the madwoman in the attic from Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre. Set in the Caribbean, its heroine is Antoinette Cosway, a...
A feminist prequel to Jane Eyre

Library staff! You can create and contribute to lists. Contact your catalog administrator or log in here.