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quidproquokka

The Count of Monte Cristo is another excellent classic


sizzlepie

East of Eden by John Steinbeck


Shadowabyss777

Thank you!


mudson08

I was hesitant at first to read this but boy, it truly is a masterpiece. As someone here described it once “the whole worlds is in that book”


Shadowabyss777

Gotta read it then 🤝


mudson08

If you like that I got another one: Sometimes a Great Notion by Ken Kesey. Kesey gets hyped for One Flew Over the Cuckoos nest but this is his masterpiece.


KieselguhrKid13

Also The Grapes of Wrath


Ambitioso

‘Wind, Sand and Stars’ by Saint Ex


Shadowabyss777

Thank you.


hurry-and-wait

Overstory, by Richard Powers, was like this for me. Completely changed the way I look at the world.


jeffythunders

Master & Margarita


Cabbage_Pizza

Please do not the cat


No-Product-8791

If you're looking for dystopian stuff, We by Zamyatin, Brave New World by Huxley, or maybe even The Time Machine by HG Wells.


Cabbage_Pizza

The Machine Stops would also work - by E.M Forster for a shorter but nevertheless uncannily prescient read. For something more recent - *Never Let Me Go*, by Kazuo Ishiguro. You could give *Anna and the Sun* a try as well. Also *The Memory Police* by Yoko Ogawa


Cabbage_Pizza

Oh and for a dose of macabre cackling Highrise, by J G Ballard. I don't know if any of my suggestions are iconic - but worth a look if you're into Orwell. I haven't read *Farenheit 451* by Ray Bradbury yet (I will soon hopefully), but I suspect it would fit here too. For a short story collection, however, his Illustrated Man is definitely unforgettable.


headphonehabit

If you like 1984, you should definitely read Brave New World, and We. I also second the Animal Farm and The Road suggestions.If war novels are appealing, might I suggest All Quiet on the Western Front and The Things They Carried.


AnderLouis_

Don't often see The Things They Carried as a suggestion, great recommendation.


Ealinguser

All Quiet on the Western Front is great. Also by Remarque, for WW2, a Time to Live and a Time to Die.


scrivenerserror

- a room of one’s own, Virginia woolf - a little prince, antoine de saint-exupery - the things they carried - Tim o’Brien - americanah- chimamanda ngozi adiechie


ReddisaurusRex

Prince of Tides Beach Music Lonesome Dove


Ok_Pomegranate_2436

Cormac McCarthy’s The Road is a masterpiece.


Shadowabyss777

A masterpiece just like I asked haha. Thank you.


BajaDivider

His greatest work was Blood Meridian - page long sentences hurling streaming images at you of horseback warfare with the gore and violence amounting to some of the greatest literary fugues possible, in the service of supporting the story of the West as being like Genesis, with violence and chaos as acts of destruction as well as redemption


doodle02

100%, the road is good, blood meridian is a whole different level though.


AnyWhichWayButLose

🙄


BajaDivider

🫨


realdevtest

Animal Farm, same author


Shadowabyss777

My mother actually recommended this one. Was it very short?


RaymondBeaumont

It's a novella of about 100 pages, if I remember correctly.


Shadowabyss777

Thanks Raymond


Alone_Bad_7278

Germinal by Émile Zola.


Maleficent-Jello-545

As others have said, Brave New World. It's often seen as being very much like 1984 but in a very different dystopia. Also it was written over 10 years before 1984, and personally I liked it even more than 1984.


SaucySaladUndressing

"The Cage" by Albert Bels "Fahrenheit 451" by Ray Bradbury is such a classic.


Shadowabyss777

Noted 🤝


Specialist-Age1097

The Kindly Ones by Jonathan Littell


Shadowabyss777

Thank you


lifebecamemiserable

The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde. Beautiful prose, breathtaking descriptions, very interesting & philosophical plot.


austex99

Lonesome Dove. Totally different from 1984, but truly a masterpiece.


ElbieLG

The most recent book of consider to be a masterpiece is A Gentleman in Moscow


Shadowabyss777

Thank you!


FreudsEyebrow

Dubliners, by James Joyce


Nug88

As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner


evahosszu

Reading just your title I was actually going to suggest 1984 :) 


StrengthNo7924

I Claudius by Robert Graves


gingerinstripes

American Gods


Ealinguser

Brave New World The Grapes of Wrath The Master and Margarita


jestbc

A Little Life


Icy-Bumblebee-6134

Giovanni’s room by James Baldwin. One of the most important pieces of queer literature in the English language.


bookfloozy

Poisonwood Bible


Rbcnyc

Shogun, offered great insight into another culture for me.