1898 C.K. Shorter List of Best 100 Novels

In 1898, an editor named Clement K. Shorter made a list of the 100 best novels (with a limit of one book per author).
Updated September 19, 2022
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Pride and Prejudice
Jane Austen
Paper Book
When Elizabeth Bennet first meets eligible bachelor Fitzwilliam Darcy, she thinks him arrogant and conceited; he is indifferent to her good looks and lively mind. When she later discovers that Darcy has involved himself in the troubled relationship between his friend Bingley and her beloved sister...
Jane Eyre
Charlotte Brontë
Paper Book
Introduction by Diane Johnson Commentary by G. K. Chesterton, Virginia Woolf, Elizabeth Rigby, George Saintsbury, and Anthony Trollope Nominated as one of America's best-loved novels by PBS'sThe Great American Read Initially published under...
The Scarlet Letter
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Paper Book
Hester Prynne is a beautiful young woman. She is also an outcast. In the eyes of her neighbours she has committed an unforgivable sin. Everyone knows that her little daughter Pearl is the product of an illicit affair but no one knows the identity of Pearl's father. Hester's refusal to name him...
The Woman in White
Wilkie Collins
Paper Book
Wilkie Collins's classic thriller took the world by storm on its first appearance in 1859, with everything from dances to perfumes to dresses named in honor of the "woman in white."  The novel's continuing fascination stems in part from a distinctive blend of melodrama, comedy, and realism;...
David Copperfield
Charles Dickens
Paper Book
David Copperfield (1849-50) was Dickens's favorite novel: 'Of all my books', he wrote, 'I like it the best.' Strikingly autobiographical in its childhood scenes, it relates David's history from birth to young manhood, and the host of characters he meets on his journey of self-knowledge: Mr Micawber,...
Uncle Tom's Cabin
Harriet Beecher Stowe
Paper Book
Uncle Tom's Cabin, by Harriet Beecher Stowe, is part of the Barnes & Noble Classics series, which offers quality editions at affordable prices to the student and the...
Candide
Voltaire
Paper Book
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Les Misérables
Victor Hugo
Paper Book
An abridged edition of Victor Hugo's masterful novel of nineteeth century Parisian lifeLes Misérables is a magnificent, sweeping story of revolution, love and the will to survive, set amidst the poverty stricken streets of nineteenth-century Paris Escaped convict Jean Valjean...
Vanity Fair
William Makepeace Thackeray
Paper Book
A panoramic satire of English society during the Napoleonic Wars, Vanity Fair is William Makepeace Thackeray's masterpiece. At its center is one of the most unforgettable characters in nineteenth-century literature: the enthralling Becky Sharp, a charmingly ruthless social climber who is...
Silas Marner
George Eliot
Paper Book
Eliot's penetrating portrayal of a miser who learns to love an orphaned and abandoned child, this novel is a cherished masterwork and a moving story of redemption by the one of the Victorian era's most accomplished novelists.
The Three Musketeers
Alexandre Dumas
CD
Alexandre Dumas classic novel of camaraderie which brought us the resounding cry: All for one and one for all The young and headstrong D Artagnan, having proven his bravery by dueling with each, becomes a friend of Athos, Porthos, and Aramis, members of the King s Musketeers. At the urging of...
The Last of the Mohicans
James Fenimore Cooper
Paper Book
The Scottish Chiefs
Jane Porter
Paper Book
For nearly a century, Scribner has exemplified the very best in publishing by pairing classic texts with the illustrative giants of the time, such as N. C. Wyeth and Maxfield Parrish. With the same commitment to the high standards established by the series' founders, Atheneum Books for Young Readers...

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