For Whom the Bell Tolls by Ernest Hemingway – Hemingway reported on the ground during the bloody Spanish Civil War; that, plus his dense, tight prose make for one of the best novels about a young man at war, and in love, ever. $13

Casino Royale by Ian Fleming – The genesis of Bond, 1953’s Casino Royale casts the world’s most famous spy in a darker, more nuanced light than the films that would follow. For further reading, head straight to From Russia With Love before circling back to take in the whole series. $9

The Killing Joke by Alan Moore and Brian Bolland – Controversial, dark and dense, this won’t take you an hour to read, but it will stick with you like a scar. As the Joker attempts to prove that the line between sane and insane is just “one bad day,” we see the clear similarities between the Caped Crusader and his greatest foe. The book, which has been accepted as the Joker’s true origin story, is being made into an animated feature. $10

To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee – Go Set a Watchman made news for Lee in all the wrong ways. But the reason readers were so up in arms about the book was because To Kill a Mockingbird’s setting, themes and characters are iconic. Yes, it’s a middle-school assignment. But read as an adult, it’s even more rewarding. $11

Cat’s Cradle by Kurt Vonnegut – Vonnegut’s fourth novel, Cat’s Cradle deals with how people relate to technology (especially weapons of war), and the public’s ideas of free will in a modern society.

$10

2666 by Roberto Bolaño – Released one year after the author’s death, this epic 900-page novel, in typical Bolaño style, has multiple storylines and explores societal decay in the 20th century. $15

My Struggle by Karl Ove Knausgård – A six-book autobiographical series centering around family and relationships, My Struggle explores the conflict of the a man’s simplest needs versus his desire to create lasting works. $10+ per book

Under the Volcano by Malcolm Lowry – Full of references to other works of literature, this book is set in Quauhnahuac, Mexico in 1938, and explores the basic struggles of one man (an alcoholic former British Consul) on the Day of the Dead. $12

Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace – Wallace sets his finger directly on the pulse of the modern condition, and the results are equal parts harrowing and redeeming. This is an intense and beautiful look at the world we live in, from one of our most honest and big-hearted voices. $12

One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez – Few novels have reinvigorated readers’ imaginations as much as this book. Marquez will remind you why you read: to be delighted and to believe in a world more wonderful than what we see. $10

The Stranger by Albert Camus – Camus, the French absurdist and existentialist (though he shunned the latter term), creates a vibrant and haunted life in the midst of Algerian sunshine and sand. Don’t expect satisfaction, but enjoy the wanderings and inexplicable actions of Meursault — a man who lives only in the moment, and suffers because of it. $8

War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy – A vast tome that anyone interested in Russian writers should view as a must — and also simply one of the most influential novels in the history of modern literature. The book is incredible in its transcendence of genres: Tolstoy said that it was “not a novel, even less is it a poem, and still less a historical chronicle”. $12

The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas – Perhaps the best revenge novel ever written. If you’re gonna do it, do it in style. Fantastic storytelling and adventure that makes you want to be Edmond Dantès, at least in the latter half of the book. $24

Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy – McCarthy’s masterpiece, a dark western that causes a thoughtful man to consider Manifest Destiny’s implications. $9

Johnny Got His Gun by Dalton Trumbo – You don’t have to be for or against war to be hit hard by this book. A horribly wounded soldier lays in a hospital room, unable to speak or see. What takes place after will make you think… hard. $13

White Noise by Don DeLillo – A professor of Hitler Studies. An airborne toxic event. Drug addition. A weird and funny meditation on media saturation and consumerism by an author who’s been called the “chief shaman of the paranoid school of American fiction”. $11

The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway – Hemingway’s first and finest novel. It’s a roman a clef about post-WWI expats in Paris, bullfighting in Spain and women — with a cameo by the hefty Count Mippipopolous, a Greek who really likes his Champagne. $10

When All the World Was Young by Ferrol Sams – Sams’ final novel in the Peter Osborne Jr. trilogy of Americana is arguably his best. Set in 1942, the book follows Osborne as he disembarks the safety net of medical school in rural Georgia to enlist in the military — heeding the call of Uncle Sam and his own soul and contemplating the outcome of the World War. It’s like an epic story of wisdom and wit handed down by your grandfather over a campfire. $13

Dune by Frank Herbert – Major accolades like being the best selling science fiction novel of all time, a Hugo Award winner and the inaugural Nebula award winner for best novel speak to the impact of Dune in hindsight. But it wasn’t an easy sell initially. A little over a decade before Star Wars, Herbert created an immersive fictional world that was still encumbered by serious real-world struggles surrounding limited resources, classicism and oppression. Nearly 50 years later, its core themes seem more relevant than ever in world occupied by global terrorism and the squabble over fossil fuels. $11

The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky – Dostoevsky’s last; a philosophical exploration of ethics, God, and free will. $13

The Call of The Wild by Jack London – It’s a story that will pull at the heartstrings of any dog lover. London captures Buck’s life beautifully, taking him from California to the brutal Alaskan wilderness. Survival, nature, a man’s best friend and a dog’s devotion. What else is there? $9

Matterhorn by Karl Marlantes – A novel about the horrors, humanity and depravity of the Vietnam War. Written by a soldier with a rawness and reality that’s inescapable. Not a feelgood book, by any means; it makes you want to salute anyone who’s gone through it. $10

Solo Faces by James Salter – Perhaps the best novel ever written about big wall climbing, it also is a quietly meditative study of a man’s obsession. $12

Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain – A damning indictment of the Antebellum South; as if that weren’t enough, Twain sets the humorous and moral foundations for all of American literature. Read it. $4

The Return of the Native by Thomas Hardy – The classic novel that takes place on the austere Egdon Heath. Love triangles, bad decisions, chance and destiny — plus some of the best narrative you’ll ever read. $9

Less Than Zero by Bret Easton Ellis – A raw, vicious and thoroughly damning take on the themes of confusion, angst and alienation breached by adolescent curriculum staples such as The Catcher In The Rye. Like his more popular work American Psycho, Ellis’s twisted mind is not for the faint of heart — but like a wake up call at some obscene hour, it’s worth the discomfort if sleeping through life is your problem. $9

The Foundation Trilogy by Isaac Asimov – George Santayana said “Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it”. But Asimov asks, if “Big Data” could provide an accurate picture of what’s to come, should we surrender our will and blindly follow the equation? $23

Franny and Zooey by J.D. Salinger – No family or individual is perfect, and the youngest members of Salinger’s Glass Family are no exception. $14

The Lord of the Rings Trilogy by J.R.R Tolkien – Don’t let Peter Jackson’s films lull you into skipping the books. They define a genre like Guy Fieri defines douchebags. Plus, you’ll finally get those jokes murmured by your IT staff. $21

Snow Crash by Neil Stephenson – Buzzfeed and 4chan seem like the pinnacle of digital schizophrenia, but Stephenson thinks we’re just getting started. Even if those the dreams of VR and Power Gloves promised by the 80s were a few decades too early. $10

Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card – The fate of the world rests in the hands of genius children. Some are trained since kindergarten in all things war, while others manipulate public sentiment and politics through the anonymity of the web. No wonder Mark Zuckerberg lists it as one of his two favorite books on his Facebook profile. $6

The Once and Future King by T.H. White – We all know the tale of King Arthur, but no riff on the story captures the murky nature of justice and power quite like T.H. White’s fantasy — written under the shadow of World War II. $17

The Bonfire of the Vanities by Tom Wolfe – Modern fiction can’t resist the hypocrisy of New York City in the 1980’s, but Wolfe’s first and most famous novel will always get the credit for telling it best. $13

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas by Hunter S. Thompson – The American dream, diagnosed and exposed — explored amid the raucous adventures of a man who needed some diagnosing himself. $10

A Time to Kill by John Grisham – The Firm and Pelican Brief were the popular culture breadwinners, but in the end A Time to Kill was the searing story of triumph over racism that sealed Grisham as one of the consistently best writers of modern popular fiction. $7

High Fidelity by Nick Hornby – Two love stories: man and woman, and man and music through the setting of a record shop and narrative infused with Hornby’s undeniably hilarious British humor. $10

Watership Down by Richard Adams – Few books have put together a saga of courage quite like Watership Down. Heroism, adventure, and exile. It’s all there. $12

The Rider by Tim Krabbe – The best cycling novel ever written, and one we need now more than ever to recapture what’s been lost in this classic sport. $11

U.S.A. by John Dos Passos – Dos Passos, a friend and contemporary of Hemingway, wrote this sweeping and experimental three-part novel about early 20th century America. $29

The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler – The quintessential hardboiled detective novel. $33

Deliverance by James Dickey – A guy trip, gone WAY wrong. $10

Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison – Surrealist account of being black in America — classic anti-hero palimpsest of Dostoevsky’s Underground Man. $10

All the King’s Men by Robert Penn Warren – A look at the consequences of cause and effect and the journey from idealist to corrupt “realist”. Insight for considering our current political process and those involved. $12

The Right Stuff by Tom Wolfe – A classic of the New Journalism style and the finest tale of heroism and manly derring-do ever told. $10