Top 50 Classics

From Austen to Orwell, we've rounded up the top 50 books every reader should meet at least one. Grab a preloved copy and give a classic a second life.

1 To Kill a Mockingbird

To Kill a Mockingbird

by Harper Lee

Scout Finch sees her small town's prejudice up close. Warm, brave and deeply human.

-76% $3.98

List Price $16.99

Condition - Well read

In Stock

3 Pride and Prejudice

Pride and Prejudice

by Jane Austen

Sharp, funny and swoony. Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy remain the gold standard for slow-burn romance.

-55% $3.98

List Price $9.00

Condition - Well read

In Stock

4 Nineteen Eighty-Four

Nineteen Eighty-Four

by George Orwell

Big Brother is watching. Still the most chilling and quotable warning about power ever written.

-61% $4.58

List Price $12.00

Condition - Good

In Stock

5 Jane Eyre

Jane Eyre

by Charlotte Bronte

An orphan, a brooding manor and a secret in the attic. Fierce, gripping and ahead of its time.

-40% $5.38

List Price $9.00

Condition - Good

In Stock

6 Great Expectations

Great Expectations

by Charles Dickens

Pip dreams of becoming a gentleman. Dickens at his most atmospheric, with a twist worth waiting for.

-62% $4.18

List Price $11.00

Condition - Well read

In Stock

7 Animal Farm

Animal Farm

by George Orwell

A farmyard revolution goes sour. A short, sharp fable that still lands every time.

-59% $4.90

List Price $12.00

Condition - Good

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8 Frankenstein

Frankenstein

by Mary Shelley

Written by a teenager on a rainy holiday. The original science-gone-wrong story is more moving than monstrous.

-37% $3.78

List Price $6.00

Condition - Well read

In Stock

9 The Catcher in the Rye

The Catcher in the Rye

by J D Salinger

Holden Caulfield wanders New York and refuses to grow up. The original teenage voice.

-64% $3.58

List Price $9.99

Condition - Well read

In Stock

10 Of Mice and Men

Of Mice and Men

by John Steinbeck

Two friends, one dream, one farm. A short read that stays with you for years.

-57% $5.58

List Price $13.00

Condition - Well read

In Stock

11 Brave New World

Brave New World

by Aldous Huxley

A perfectly happy society, if you ignore the catch. Eerily relevant almost a century on.

-79% $3.88

List Price $18.99

Condition - Well read

In Stock

12 Fahrenheit 451

Fahrenheit 451

by Ray Bradbury

Firemen burn books. A short, fiery warning from a book lover to book lovers.

-66% $5.68

List Price $17.00

Condition - Well read

In Stock

13 Little Women

Little Women

by Louisa May Alcott

Meg, Jo, Beth and Amy grow up. Cozy, funny and a proper tearjerker.

$11.00

List Price $11.00

Condition - New

In Stock

14 Wuthering Heights

Wuthering Heights

by Emily Bronte

Wild moors, wilder love. Heathcliff and Cathy's obsession is dark, stormy and impossible to put down.

-50% $4.46

List Price $9.00

Condition - Well read

In Stock

15 Lord of the Flies

Lord of the Flies

by William Golding

Schoolboys stranded on an island. Civilization unravels fast in this gripping modern fable.

-71% $3.68

List Price $13.00

Condition - Well read

In Stock

16 The Handmaid's Tale

The Handmaid's Tale

by Margaret Atwood

A near-future nightmare told in a quiet, urgent voice. A modern classic that still unsettles.

-72% $4.88

List Price $18.00

Condition - Well read

In Stock

17 The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

by Mark Twain

A boy, a runaway and a raft on the Mississippi. The great American road trip.

-52% $4.28

List Price $9.00

Condition - Good

In Stock

18 Moby Dick

Moby Dick

by Herman Melville

Captain Ahab's obsession with a white whale. Ambitious, strange and magnificent.

$9.99

List Price $9.99

Condition - New

In Stock

19 Beloved

Beloved

by Toni Morrison

The Joads head west in search of a better life. An American epic with a lot of heart.

-70% $5.38

List Price $18.00

Condition - Good

In Stock

20 The Grapes of Wrath

The Grapes of Wrath

by John Steinbeck

The Joads head west in search of a better life. An American epic with a lot of heart.

-67% $6.26

List Price $19.00

Condition - Good

In Stock

21 A Christmas Carol

A Christmas Carol

by Charles Dickens

Scrooge, three ghosts and a second chance. The story that practically invented Christmas.

$3.48

List Price $3.00

Condition - Well read

In Stock

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22 Dracula

Dracula

by Bram Stoker

Letters, diaries and a very old count. The vampire story all the others borrow from.

-39% $4.88

List Price $8.00

Condition - Well read

In Stock

23 The Picture of Dorian Gray

The Picture of Dorian Gray

by Oscar Wilde

A portrait that ages while its owner stays young. Wilde's wickedly witty cautionary tale.

$14.40

List Price $9.00

Condition - Very good

In Stock

24 Rebecca

Rebecca

by Daphne Du Maurier

'Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again.' A new bride, a haunted house and one unforgettable housekeeper.

-58% $8.31

List Price $19.99

Condition - Good

In Stock

25 Emma

Emma

by Jane Austen

Meddling matchmaker, mostly clueless. Austen's funniest heroine gets it gloriously wrong before she gets it right.

-49% $4.58

List Price $9.00

Condition - Well read

In Stock

26 Catch-22

Catch-22

by Joseph Heller

War is absurd, and so is the rulebook. Dark, circular and laugh-out-loud funny.

-83% $3.28

List Price $19.99

Condition - Well read

In Stock

27 Slaughterhouse-Five

Slaughterhouse-Five

by Kurt Vonnegut

Billy Pilgrim comes unstuck in time. Funny, sad and gloriously odd. So it goes.

-59% $4.48

List Price $10.99

Condition - Well read

In Stock

28 Their Eyes Were Watching God

Their Eyes Were Watching God

by Zora Neale Hurston

Janie's journey to finding her own voice. Lyrical, bold and unforgettable.

-81% $3.38

List Price $17.99

Condition - Well read

In Stock

29 Invisible Man

Invisible Man

by Ralph Ellison

A young man no one will see. Angry, inventive and essential American reading.

-70% $7.78

List Price $26.00

Condition - Very good

In Stock

30 The Old Man and the Sea

The Old Man and the Sea

by Ernest Hemingway

One old fisherman, one giant marlin. Hemingway's spare, stirring masterpiece, easily read in a sitting.

-70% $4.38

List Price $15.00

Condition - Well read

In Stock

31 The Scarlet Letter

The Scarlet Letter

by Nathaniel Hawthorne

A woman branded for her secret in Puritan Boston. Short, severe and surprisingly gripping.

-41% $3.49

List Price $6.00

Condition - Well read

In Stock

32 A Tale of Two Cities

A Tale of Two Cities

by Charles Dickens

London, Paris and revolution. Opens with the most famous first line in fiction and doesn't let up.

-39% $4.88

List Price $8.00

Condition - Good

In Stock

33 Crime and Punishment

Crime and Punishment

by Fyodor Dostoevsky

A desperate student commits murder and can't escape his conscience. A psychological thriller before the term existed.

-53% $8.88

List Price $19.00

Condition - Good

In Stock

34 Anna Karenina

Anna Karenina

by Leo Tolstoy

Passion, society and consequences in imperial Russia. Tolstoy's great love story and its brilliant opening line.

$16.49

Condition - Well read

In Stock

35 The Count of Monte Cristo

The Count of Monte Cristo

by Alexandre Dumas

Betrayed, imprisoned, escaped, enriched. The best revenge story ever told.

-1% $31.59

List Price $32.00

Condition - New

In Stock

36 Les Les Miserables

Les Les Miserables

by Victor Hugo

Redemption, revolution and one very long chase. A big book with an even bigger heart.

-57% $5.08

List Price $11.99

Condition - Good

In Stock

37 Middlemarch

Middlemarch

by George Eliot

A whole town, dozens of lives, one sweeping masterpiece. Big, wise and worth the commitment.

-36% $7.68

List Price $12.00

Condition - Good

In Stock

38 Tess of the D'Urbervilles

Tess of the D'Urbervilles

by Thomas Hardy

A young woman, a cruel society and a devastating slide. Hardy at his most beautiful and bleak.

-55% $4.88

List Price $11.00

Condition - Good

In Stock

39 East of Eden

East of Eden

by John Steinbeck

Two families, two brothers, a Cain and Abel story set in California. Steinbeck's own favorite.

-0% $19.89

List Price $20.00

Condition - New

In Stock

40 Persuasion

Persuasion

by Jane Austen

Second chances, eight years too late. Austen's quietest and most moving love story.

-18% $5.68

List Price $7.00

Condition - Very good

In Stock

41 Mrs Dalloway

Mrs Dalloway

by Virginia Woolf

One day in London, one party, a whole life in a head. Beautiful and surprisingly easy to fall into.

-66% $3.68

List Price $10.99

Condition - Well read

In Stock

43 Heart of Darkness

Heart of Darkness

by Joseph Conrad

A river journey into the unknown. Short, dense and haunting.

$3.38

Condition - Good

In Stock

44 The Stranger

The Stranger

by Albert Camus

A man who doesn't cry at his mother's funeral. Cool, spare and quietly disturbing.

-61% $6.88

List Price $18.00

Condition - Good

In Stock

45 The Metamorphosis

The Metamorphosis

by Kafka

Gregor wakes up as a giant insect. Nightmarish, darkly funny and over in an afternoon.

Sold out
46 One Hundred Years of Solitude

One Hundred Years of Solitude

by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Seven generations of one family and a town called Macondo. Dazzling, strange and unforgettable.

-73% $5.08

List Price $18.99

Condition - Good

In Stock

47 Things Fall Apart

Things Fall Apart

by Chinua Achebe

A proud village and the arrival of colonialism. The most-read African novel ever.

-80% $3.08

List Price $16.00

Condition - Well read

In Stock

48 The Bell Jar

The Bell Jar

by Sylvia Plath

A brilliant young woman unravels. Honest, sharp and still hugely influential.

-59% $8.98

List Price $21.99

Condition - Good

In Stock

49 Wide Sargasso Sea

Wide Sargasso Sea

by Jean Rhys

The story of the madwoman in Jane Eyre's attic, told by her. Short, lush and haunting.

-70% $4.38

List Price $14.95

Condition - Good

In Stock

50 The Master and Margarita

The Master and Margarita

by Mikhail Bulgakov

The Devil visits Moscow with a talking cat. Wild, funny and utterly original.

-37% $11.28

List Price $18.00

Condition - Good

In Stock