Know sometimes, when you finish a book and you’re just like I am now jealous of anyone. I recommend this book because they get to read it for the first time they get to experience this masterpiece in the way that I just have. If I could wipe my brain clean and read that book again without knowing what’s going to happen, I absolutely would because I get that a lot, and I’m hoping it’s not just me, I’m even getting it with the book that I’m currently reading.

This is a lecture by Jennifer saints and I’m savoring every page of it because I already know this will be on this list eventually. But I have compiled a list of 11 books that I have this feeling towards, because, although I can’t read these again for the first time, you maybe can so this is my offering this is my gift to you keep the receipt in case you want to return.

1. Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller

Now for some books that I would sell my soul to read again for the first time, starting with book number one Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller, more like the death of my goal, not to cry today. This is so sad, it is heart-wrenching, it’s a play, but it’s also so great to read because every line is just crafted immaculately. The sentences are written so beautifully. So, symbolically, right from the opening line, Arthur miller had me in the palm of his hand, miller wrote this as a tragedy of the common man because tragedies up until this point had often focused on kings or gods or battle heroes, think Shakespeare or greek Tragedies, but in this book, we’re just focusing on a very ordinary man just doing his best for his family he’s devoted his life to his career as a salesman, but slowly begins to realize that he’s expendable he’s a completely disposable member of staff, and it’s also About the moment that his children realize that he is flawed, that he’s a real person he’s not a god amongst men, he is just mortal and a huge theme in this book is perception and self-perception.

Another huge theme is denial and a full sense of grandeur, and each character is just so intricately and intimately created. They are perfect and there are scenes in this play that I will just never forget, especially the ending they don’t just tug at the heartstrings. They yank them and in my reading every day I choose suffering so I loved this book.

2. Piranesi by Susanna Clarke

Next up, we have Piranesi by Susanna Clarke, so enchanting and mesmerizing, and, unlike anything I have ever read before the main character. Piranesi gets his name from an Italian painter who is known for his observation skills and his perceptiveness, and our character is living in this huge expansive house. It’s all a bit mysterious at first. It’s like this huge labyrinth of halls and statues day by day. Piranesi is walking around taking notes of all of his surroundings. He makes careful records of everything that goes on and everything that he sees. I know this doesn’t sound good, but trust me. The payoff is huge and we slowly start to learn that this world. That is all he knows, maybe isn’t quite what it seems.

I actively don’t want to say too much because you just have to read this for yourself and fall into it and going in not knowing too much makes the whole experience better. So I don’t want to say too much. This book is a study in solitude and the moment the second I put this book down. I was jealous of anyone else who would get to read this. For the first time, I will say that the beginning is deliberately very confusing. It’s like one of those moments where you’re like I am reading the words and I have no idea what is happening in them, but trust me please, please, please, stick with it once the fog starts to lift and things become clearer, it is spellbinding and if you Want to take my word for it.

This book won the women’s prize last year, so she’s, critically, acclaimed, and also I love it. I love her.

3. Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro

Never Let Me Go is another one of those books where you slowly start to realize that everything is not what it seems. It’s a quote, wizards of Waverly placed this is by Kazuo Ishiguro, who won the Nobel prize for literature, and rightly so. This book is a kind of dystopian sci-fi, but, like the sci-fi, is very very light and set in an alternative. 1990S England. It’s about social alienation, betrayal, and how vulnerable people in society are treated and handled by their carers, and we follow these people who are at a boarding, school and they’re, being taught about art and literature and their bodies, but not a lot about the outside world. And that’s what I’m going to say, um! This is kind of like edging you a little bit literary edging home fire by Kamila Shamsie is a book that just blew me away the first time I read it: it’s a retelling of the play Antigone, but instead centering on British Muslims.

So on one hand, we have a conservative politician, who has essentially made a career for himself as a home secretary by rejecting and denouncing his Muslim heritage and essentially scaremongering the public to stay in power, and his son gets into a relationship with a Muslim Girl now this girl immigrated to the UK after her father became radicalized as a jihadi in their homeland. So he also followed this family, who were just horrified by their father’s actions, but her twin brother then also gets caught up in the wrong crowd. And so the book covers these two families who intertwine and it’s all about intergenerational tension, especially that between children and their fathers because we have these two very different fathers who traumatize their kids in very different ways.

There’s also a kind of Romeo and Juliet forbidden love story. It’s about hostile environments created by the UK government, it’s about family and identity, it’s about radicalization and there’s a huge huge climax. It is so well written so moving on.

4. A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara

Next, we have the beast itself A Little Life. Now I made a whole reading vlog about my experience of reading this book on my second channel, in which I’ll give you a few highlights of real love. Now did I finish this book, or did this book finish me the happy year's guys the years were not happy? Hanya Yanagihara is making me care about these people and then she’s going to destroy them. It’s an emotional rollercoaster, something just happened which has devastated me. I’m a mess I feel numb. I don’t think I’ll ever recover. So, as you can see, this book hit me like Mohammed Ali there’s. a strong correlation between books that make me want to sob and books that have ended up on this list.

Anyway, this is a story about a group of friends, a group of men who live in new york, and we follow them over the whole course of their lives. And even though it’s a big book, Hanya Yanagihara gives them the space to develop in a meaningful way. We follow their relationships, their trauma, and you know when a sentence just hits you in the pit of your stomach yeah that happens in here on, like every other page, so just be prepared for that they feel tangibly real, not a word is wasted, but just a warning that, if you do have triggers when reading books, I would highly recommend reading the trigger warning list for this book, because it’s probably going to be in there not going to lie.

5. Earthlings by Sayaka Murata

Next up we have Earthlings holy hell earthlings. This book by Sayaka Murata is so shocking, but in a good way, not shockingly bad but shockingly absurd. I experienced a visceral and physical response to it like it was making my whole body tense and cringed by how wild it is, and also quite disgusting at times, but I think that that’s a sign of amazing writing to have that response and evoke something like that in you, with just words on a page again, it’s a book where the whole point is the twists and turns and surprises. So I can’t spoil too much take a shot every time. I say that and you will be hammered, but on absolute surface value, it’s about these cousins who believe that they don’t belong in society to such an extent that they start to think of themselves.

Like aliens from another planet, whether that’s true or not, and as these aliens from society, they begin to sort of prove this to themselves by doing horrifying things that go against traditional codes and conventions and things that are morally accepted by the general mainstream of people. They want to prove that they are different from the earthlings and so do things that will shock you to your very core. I hope that tells you all that you need to know. I’m telling you without telling you this is translated from Japanese and I adore Sayaka Murata's writing. I think she’s one of the brightest literary talents that we have writing books right now and earthlings are out of this world.

6. The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde

Okay, so that’s very contemporary! Now, let’s do some classics: The Picture of Dorian Gray is one of my absolute favorites. Oscar Wilde did what needed to be done. He put in a shift with this one. Ironically, this book is about selling your soul, so very fitting for this video. It’s about fading beauty, morality, sinning about hedonism. It is a book about the painting of a guy called Dorian gray, but there’s so much more. It’s a little bit gothic a little bit philosophical, a little bit camp, and such a readable classic. I’m a big fan of this one.

7. A Good Soldier by Ford Madox

Next, we have A Good Soldier. This is set just before the first world war and we followed two couples: fun fact. It was originally titled the saddest story, but then, given the context of the war, the title was changed, so the title is kind of ironic. The original title, the saddest story, probably gives you a better insight into what goes down. But aside from that, this is essentially the ultimate unreliable narrator story, because the narrative is told to us in a non-chronological non-linear way through a series of flashbacks and it’s intentionally very misleading and also intentionally very convoluted and confusing. And our narrator is kind of depicting himself, as someone who doesn’t have any guilt in the situation, you start to realize that he might just be manipulating you as the reader. He is the original gaslighter and there’s also a little bit of adultery, which is always fun.

8. The Talented Mr. Ripley

The Talented Mr. Ripley is such an unforgettable novel, it’s all about performance and deception and also envy, and it centers around quite an elaborate crime. It simultaneously keeps you on your toes and knocks you off your feet, because you never know if the character that we’re following is going to be caught for the crime that he has committed. And you know what I kind of just enjoyed reading a book from the perspective of the villain. I think it makes a nice change. This is my joker and to give you a kind of top-line description, we essentially follow a man who becomes obsessed with an affluent man in Italy and it’s a twisted story, all about manipulation and performativity, Patricia hi smith. I bow down to you. This is genius.

9. Misery by Stephen King

Now, speaking of obsessive let’s talk about Misery by Stephen King. This is a book about a famous writer who is kidnapped by his number one fan we follow him as he’s held hostage in her house, and she forces him to write the next installment of his book series purely for her enjoyment, and she’s just a psychopath and it’s just one of those books where you are desperate to find out what is going to happen because the villain of this story just seems capable of just about anything and you can feel the fear of our narrator. So it does stretch your imagination to the extreme, keeps you right on the edge of your c, and I think this is Stephen King at his absolute best. His name speaks for himself, a king Indeed.

10. The Bread The Devil Knead by Lisa Allen

And finally, on this list, we have one of my most recent reads and that is The Bread The Devil Knead. You might have noticed that I have not shut up about this book since finishing it. I’m single-handedly running a campaign for this book to win the women’s prize this year because I love it. It has this clever wit, an unforgettable main character and it’s written in creole dialect, which does take a little while to get used to, but once you do, it elevates the story and for me, the last 100 pages of this book were just so excellent completely just knocked the wind out of me, and I read it so voraciously and it’s about a woman from Trinidad who is just in her life surrounded by violence, and you just root for her. You just want the best for this character and I loved the way that she was written, she’s, so irreverent and bold and so strong yeah. It’s such a vibrant book. I would recommend it, and so that was my list.

Thank you for reading.

Books That Should Be Re-Read