 | After You'd Gone by Maggie O'Farrell
Buy new: £5.78 / Used from: £0.01 I loved this book so much and couldn't put it down. The ending is beautifully written - it was the first book I ever cried at.
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 | Memoirs of a Geisha by Arthur Golden
Buy new: £4.11 / Used from: £0.01 Magical. I was totally absorbed into the world Golden creates. Definitely read it before seeing the film. An eye opener to a wholly different way of life.
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 | The Woman in White (Penguin Classics) by Wilkie Collins
Buy new: £5.64 / Used from: £1.81 I read this as part of my 'wider reading' for A-Level and adored it. It's also a good 'Gothic' book for those who are interested in that genre.
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 | "Romeo and Juliet" (Arden Shakespeare: Second Series) by William Shakespeare
Buy new: £6.78 / Used from: £2.88 The obligatory Shakespeare play(!) this one is the most clichéd to add as it's the one everyone knows, but it's by far my favourite and I can quote it like it's going out of fashion!
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 | The Bloody Chamber and Other Stories by Angela Carter
Buy new: £4.76 / Used from: £2.75 Delving into the intricacies of this collection of fairytales when studying made me a big admirer of Carter's writing style. In this, she subverts fairytales - debasing and eroticising to perfection.
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 | Alias Grace by Margaret Atwood
Buy new: £5.49 / Used from: £0.01 Based on a true story, this book shows Atwoods mastery of language to the full with beautiful descriptions and real knowledge of the period she sets it in to make it thoroughly convincing.
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 | Intimacy by Hanif Kureishi
Buy new: £4.79 / Used from: £0.01 Kureishi was recommended by a friend and I can't believe I didn't discover him earlier - truly amazing author.
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 | The Reckoning: The Murder of Christopher Marlowe by Charles Nicholl
Buy new: £7.69 / Used from: £3.75 There's so much to take in, but it's one of my favourites - it details the circumstances surrounding the death of Shakespeare's contemporary Christopher Marlowe in stunning fashion.
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 | Random Family: Love, Drugs, Trouble and Coming of Age in the Bronx by Adrian Nicole LeBlanc
Buy new: £7.99 / Used from: £0.40 Took me a while to get through this. Written in the most evocative form and easy to put down without having to re-read bits when picking it up again.
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 | 1984 Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell
Buy new: £5.09 / Used from: £2.86 A worryingly accurate foreshadowing of current society. One book everyone should read.
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 | The Other Boleyn Girl by Philippa Gregory
Buy new: £4.97 / Used from: £0.01 It's hard to tell where fact meets fiction, but it's a gripping read and you really feel like you are a fly on the wall in the Tudor court.
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 | Super-Cannes by J.G. Ballard
Buy new: £4.78 / Used from: £0.01 Some deep social commentary packaged up as a page-turning thriller. Absolutely fantastic.
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 | The Five People You Meet in Heaven by Mitch Albom
Buy new: £9.04 / Used from: £1.99 Fairly short but incredibly poignant - really puts life in perspective.
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