The 30 Best Books of the Last 30 Years

The journey to reading every amazing book ever written is endless. But you get to enjoy amazing novels on this journey. That is why we will be looking at the 30 best books of the last years. Keep reading to find out what books made this list.

While scrolling on the internet, we came across a list of the 30 best fiction books and after reading the list, we knew we had to share it with our readers. No list is ever going to get it right but that isn’t always important. More than anything else, we want to come across new books to add to our reading list.

And what better way to do that than reading a list of the 30 best books of the past 30 years! These lists always provide newer books that we may have overlooked or never gotten around to read. You can check out the full list below!

The 30 Best Books of the Last 30 Years

• Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell
• Milkman by Anna Burns
• Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri
• Mason & Dixon by Thomas Pynchon
• Underworld by Don DeLillo
• All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr
• The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
• Bel Canto by Ann Patchett
• Stories of Your Life and Others by Ted Chiang
• Pachinko by Min Jin Lee
• American Pastoral by Philip Roth
• The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen
• Salvage the Bones by Jesmyn Ward
• A Visit From the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan
• Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel
• Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin
• The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz
• Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver
• Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro
• Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides
• The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead
• The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen
• Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders 
• My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante
• The Sellout by Paul Beatty
• The Overstory by Richard Powers
• The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt 
• The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay by Michael Chabon
• James by Percival Everett
• 2666 by Roberto Bolaño

A Great List

After reading the list, we have to say that it is a great list. Some novels that are on this list are beloved by critics more than readers and that is fine. These novels are always tricky because they are well-written but fail to interest some readers.

And then there are other novels such as Pachinko by Min Jin Lee and James by Percival Everett that we feel like everyone has to read. James was released in 2024 but it feels like that it will go down as a classic. And Pachinko is an incredible novel that resonates with millions of readers.

While there are some novels that we would have added (such as The Gentleman in Moscow), we know it is impossible to remember every novel and even then, choosing what makes one novel better than another is always arbitrary.

Conclusion

Don’t let that stop you from finding amazing novels to read from this list by the Los Angeles Times. Our lists will always keep you updated with must read novels and you’ll always have multiple books to choose. What did you think of this list and how many of these novels have you read? Let us know in the comments below!

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