A Soldier of the Great War by Mark Helprin. Beautiful.

A Prayer for Owen Meany!!! I remember the time and place I finished it...need to read it again.

As a child: Anne of Green Gables series, Little House on the Prairie books, Hobbit, The Great Brain series

As a college student: The Bluest Eye, The Color Purple, Emma, Pride and Prejudice,

Approaching Middle Age: Anne of Green Gables, Hunger Games series, Harry Potter series, Remains of the Day, and more non-fiction books

Yet another vote for Grapes of Wrath. I can still remember where I was when I finished it and how the final scene left me breathless and still and on the verge of tears. Beautiful, heartbreaking. And that was 20 years ago!

Also, it's certainly not great literature, but one novel that still haunts me years later is "We Need to Talk About Kevin" by Lionel Shriver. I know they have now made it into a movie, but please try the book--I think of it more often than almost anything I've read, especially now that I am a mother myself (not that my child is like Kevin!). It's really devastating in its dramatic tension.

Angle of Repose and Crossing to Safety -- wallace stegner - beautiful and inciteful writing about relationships

Brideshead Revisited

the John Galsworthy novels - the Forsythe Saga - top notch soap opera for all of you Jane Austen fans

The Kite Runner is the best audiobook ever - read by the author. I sat in the car and sobbed at the last part.

Anything by Alice Munro.
In the Skin of the Lion, by Michael Ondaatje

This is a great thread. I compiled the list of the books mentioned here and posted on the homepage. The list is ordered by number of recommendations, I wasn't not counting just mere mentions or quoted text. I looked up some of the books online to get the titles and authors' names spelling correctly. The best couple hours I spent on the computer lately. Thank you all for the recommendations!

http://www.dcurbanmom.com/weblog/2011/07/29/dcum_books

Brother's Karamazoz.
I also love Kitchen by Banana Yoshimoto

OMG loving Temeraire book 1!

Two of my faves:
Sozaboy by Ken Saro-Wiwa
Amazing, about the Biafran war in Nigeria and told from the perspective of a naive conscript

The brief wonderous life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz
So funny and poignant

And anything by Edwige Danticat

I also loved A Fine Balance which has been mentioned a lot

The Glass Castle (Walls)

Anonymous wrote:The Power of One by Courtenay Bryce. (about a kid in Apartheid-era South Africa.)

This is my favorite too!

Because of this thread today I ordered:

Handmaid's Tale
Kite Runner
Red Tent
Toilers of the Sea
Hi Majesty's Dragon

I hope Winter's Tale is available soon! (Kindle)

Too many of these are not on kindle How do we complain?

I wish I could order owen meaney on my kindle. Unavailable. Oh well.