Product Description

Want to become a classic novel buff, or expand your reading of some of the finest novels ever published? With 100 of the best titles fully reviewed and a further 500 recommended, you'll quickly set out on a journey of discovery.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #13575 in Books
• Published on: 2006-10-31
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 192 pages

About the Author
Nick Rennison is a bookseller, editor and freelance writer. He reviews new titles for Waterstones Books Quarterly, and is the author of the Bloomsbury Good Reading Guide.

Customer Reviews

Fabulous Little Book!
This book is a fantastic little resources, giving details of many of the best classics written over the years, up to the 1950's (I think that's when he decided not to count them as classics any more - which is fair).

The descriptions of the books are concise and well-written and make the book sound interesting without giving away too many spoilers. There are a number of books I now want to read that I hadn't even considered before.

I will definitely consider buying further books by this author.

It's the quality of the content that counts
I'm writing this review as a rejoinder to the one that complains about the size of the book, the paper quality etc. I'd like to point out that because of the way bibliographic databases are compiled these days, the reference to 320 pages is an error that the bookseller (amazon) should rectify - projected page lengths from publishers' original estimates are perpetuated by Neilsen Bookdata (who compile 'Books In Print') and this data is fed automatically to booksellers' databases and not rectified.

On to the content. Yes, this is the kind of book that is left on shop counters to attract interest and make the publisher, the author, the bookseller money. All professionally issued books are published to make money. Some of them are also published to enlighten and inform readers, something this book definitely does. I may be biased, as I know the author, but I can confirm that he knows his stuff and is probably the most widely-read and well-read person I've ever met (I've worked for 25 years in bookselling myself, so I feel equal to judging him).

The book is brief (we're talking quality not quantity of words here), but packed with facts, is accurrate and provides a great overview of classic novels at a cheaper price than any other book (which is why it is short- a longer book on the same subject would be more expensive), and with lots of authority. The introduction in particular is pleasantly terse and gently sardonic in its questioning of what a classic is and why we should (or shouldn't) respect it.

Yes, there are plenty of bad books on counters, but when it comes to the quality of the writing - in my view the most important thing - you can't go wrong here.

Don't bother with this "lightweight" guide
I bought this book via Amazon. The paper and the cover quality are bad. The book has only 174 numbered pages - and not 320 as shown above. It is one of those pocket-sized editions, that publishers design for the shelfs next to the cash desk, so that one buys it on impulse.

If want to get some guidance on what classic novel to read, it is better to invest more money and go for the "1001 books you must read ..." edition.