1,000 Books To Read Before You Die: A Life-Changing List

Between 1986 and 2006, Mustich put together an eagerly awaited mail-order catalog, A Common Reader, that every three weeks highlighted notable titles old and new. Now the author has drawn on his lifelong passion and knowledge, creating this compilation of 1,000 must-reads. Not a list of classics or "great books," this is instead a wide-ranging selection of literary and nonfiction classics as well as best sellers, popular mysteries, sf, romances, and YA and children's books. As Mustich planned, his work is "expansive in its tastes, encompassing revered classics and commercial favorites, flights of escapist entertainment and enlightening erudition…novels of imaginative reach and histories with intellectual grasp." Discursive annotations of each book range from 300 to 500 words, with longer entries on some authors (from Margaret Wise Brown to Henry James, Herman Melville, William Shakespeare, and others).