Top 10 Tuesday 29th March

Hello and welcome back to another instalment of Top 10 Tuesday, hosted by Jana @ That Artsy Reader Girl. It features a different bookish related theme each week and this week we are talking…..

21st Century Books I Think Will Become Classics

Where The Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens

I love this book! It was one of my favourite reads of this decade for sure and I think it has a great chance to become a classic, especially if the movie does well and further cements it. It’s been on the bestseller lists for years now, pretty much without break.

My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante

I thought this whole series was wonderful but I really loved the first book. I think these are accessible for a lot of readers and it’s just a riveting story. There’s also a television adaptation but I haven’t seen that yet.

The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead

I haven’t read this yet but I do own it. I’ve heard a lot of amazing things about it, it won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and was long listed for a Booker. It twists history into speculative fiction by making the Underground Railroad an actual railroad and I feel like this just might carry forward for a long time as an important book.

A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara

Is it even Top 10 Tuesday if I don’t have this book on the list? Once again, I still haven’t read this, I’ve had it on my TBR for what feels like decades now and I added it to my 22 in 2022 pile, determined that this be the year. I know this is deeply traumatising but everyone still says it’s so good.

Beloved by Toni Morrison

I think this book will definitely achieve classic status in years to come.

The Perks Of Being A Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky

I read this a few years ago and I was well above the age it was aimed at but I still really enjoyed it and found it a very powerful story. It’s definitely the sort of book I wish had been around more when I was in my teens and going through those formative years and it’s the sort of book I hope my kids read. I definitely think it has the ability to stay relevant and stay something that people really connect with.

The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt

I wasn’t sure whether to include this one (which I haven’t read) or The Secret History (which I have). Ultimately I went with this one because of its long list of accolades and although that doesn’t necessarily make a good book it does tend to keep them on people’s radars and on study lists and bestseller lists, all things that could definitely push this one into classic territory in years to come.

Suite Française by Irène Némirovsky

This is a tragic story – this book was written by a woman born in Ukraine, who was living in Paris in WWII. She was also Jewish and she was arrested and sent to Auschwitz before her intended five part novel was finished. This is parts 1 and 2, published posthumously decades after her death in the concentration camp. This has been on my TBR for years.

The Last Migration (aka Migrations) by Charlotte McConaghy

One of my favourite books ever that I’ve read in recent times, so I certainly hope this becomes a classic. I think it’s an incredible book (and it’s being made into a movie too, which has the power to seriously push it in a big way, if it’s done right).

The Sympathiser by Viet Thang Nguyen

This has also been on my TBR for quite a while – I’ve heard so many incredible things about it. I’ve actually read a book of short stories collated by this author on refugees and that was incredible. I’m really keen to read this – it’s set in Vietnam in the 1970s and a Viet Cong sympathiser who is watching and reporting on people who are planning to flee the country.

To be honest I think it’s pretty hard to predict books that might become classics in the future. But these are some that I think could definitely get there, even though some of these here I haven’t actually read yet! I should keep this list to reflect back on one day, when I’m old & grey and see if any of my predictions panned out!