Why Read Fiction?
These works have stood the test of time, impacting generations of readers. We have selected these great works either because they depict what it true, good, and beautiful in a way that captures our imaginations and cultivates our love for the true, good, and beautiful; or because they provide a powerful and clarifying analysis of the human condition. Because they capture our imaginations, good novels can be an important force in cultivating our growth as a whole person. Our lives are not transformed when we merely inform our intellects of truth. Our hearts must also be directed to love what is good, and this is encouraged when our imaginations are captured by goodness and beauty in stories, whether fiction or nonfiction.
These books may not be overtly “Christian.” Many of them reflect and contribute to the formation of a Christian worldview, but some are selected simply because they have deeply impacted our culture and help us to understand the society we live in. We try to avoid books that include gratuitous or overly graphic depictions of evil, but any true analysis of the human condition or any realistic account of redemption must reckon with the reality of evil and sin. We also recognize that readers have varying levels of sensitivity, and urge you to exercise discernment as you read.
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Title | Description | Category | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
 | Eliot, George | Classic of English literature recounts the engrossing story of a lonely and embittered old man and the orphaned child who helps him find love and hope.As a young man, Silas Marner shut himself off from the world after being wrongly accused of theft and losing the girl he loved. Much… | Classics | |
 | Endo, Shusaku | Seventeenth-century Japan: Two Portuguese Jesuit priests travel to a country hostile to their religion, where feudal lords force the faithful to publicly renounce their beliefs. Eventually captured and forced to watch their Japanese Christian brothers lay down their lives for their faith, the priests bear witness to unimaginable cruelties that… | Literature ⋅ Classics | |
 | Lewis, C.S. | The story of Eustace and Jill and the search for Prince Rilian. | Literature ⋅ Classics | |
 | Dickens, Charles | The storming of the Bastille…the death carts with their doomed human cargo…the swift drop of the guillotine blade—this is the French Revolution that Charles Dickens vividly captures in his famous work A Tale of Two Cities. With dramatic eloquence, he brings to life a time of terror and treason, a… | Literature ⋅ Classics | |
 | Lewis, C. S. | The final book in C.S. Lewis's acclaimed Space Trilogy, which includes Out of the Silent Planet and Perelandra, That Hideous Strength concludes the adventures of the matchless Dr. Ransom. Finding himself in a world of superior alien beings and scientific experiments run amok, Dr. Ransom struggles with questions of ethics… | Classics | |
 | Twain, Mark | Meet the boy who can find trouble without even looking. At school, at home, in church and outdoors, if there's mischief afoot, Tom Sawyer will be in the thick of it! 320 pages. | Literature ⋅ Classics | |
 | Dostoevsky, Fyodor | This novel was Dostoyevsky's last and finest work, telling the story of the four Karamazov brothers--each with his own distinct personality and desires. Driven by intense, uncontrollable emotions of rage and revenge, they all become involved in the brutal murder of their despicable father. Exploring the secret depths of humanity's… | Literature ⋅ Classics | |
 | Miller, Arthur | Death of a Salesman is a 1949 stage play written by American playwright Arthur Miller. The play premiered on Broadway in February 1949, running for 742 performances. It is a two-act tragedy set in the 1940s New York told through a montage of memories, dreams and arguments of the protagonist… | Literature ⋅ Classics | |
 | Doyle, Sir Arthur Conan | From the strange case of 'The Red-Headed League' to the extraordinary tale of 'The Engineer's Thumb', Sherlock Holmes and his assistant Dr Watson grapple with treachery, murder, and ingenious crimes of all kinds. But no case is too challenging for the immortal detective's unique power of deduction. | Literature ⋅ Classics | |
 | Doyle, Sir Arthur Conan | The Hound of the Baskervilles is the third of the four crime novels written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle featuring the detective Sherlock Holmes. | Literature ⋅ Classics | |
 | Hawthorne, Nathaniel | A novel which deals with a decadent New England family and Holgrave, who rents a room in their seven-gabled house. | Literature ⋅ Classics | |
 | Hugo, Victor | A gypsy girl's beauty and charm captivate a priest, a vagabond, a soldier, and a deformed bell-ringer, in a gripping tale that culminates in a riot and murder. More than simply a thrilling story, Victor Hugo's tale explores the mysteries of good and evil in the human heart and illuminates… | Literature ⋅ Classics | |
 | Orczy, Baroness | Sir Percy Blakeney lives a double life in the England of 1792: at home he is an idle fop and a leader of fashion, but abroad he is the Scarlet Pimpernel, a master of disguise who saves aristocrats from the guillotine. When the revolutionary French state seeks to unmask him… | Literature ⋅ Classics | |
 | Bunyan, John and Barret, Ethel | A John Bunyan classic allegory. Long ago, the mighty king Shaddai built universe. Universe includes the town of Mansoul, which Shaddai built for his delight. But Diabolus, an angel who had rebelled against Shaddai, sees the town as a perfect opportunity for revenge. This--Shaddai's town, Diabolus' revenge, Mansoul's downfall, and… | Books ⋅ Literature ⋅ Classics | |
 | Rawlings, Marjorie Kinnan | No novel better epitomizes the love between a child and a pet than The Yearling. When young Jody Baxter adopts and orphaned fawn he calls Flag, he makes it a part of his family and his best friend. But life in the Florida backwoods is harsh, and so, as his… | Literature ⋅ Classics | |
 | Lewis, C.S. | In this timeless tale of two mortal princesses--one beautiful and one unattractive--C.S. Lewis reworks the classical myth of Cupid and Psyche into an enduring piece of contemporary fiction. This is the story of Orual, Psyche's embittered and ugly older sister, who possessively and harmfully loves Psyche. Much to Orual's frustration… | Literature ⋅ Classics | |
 | Lee, Harper | Harper Lee’s beloved Pultizer Prize–winning classic, now in new hardcover edition in anticipation of her forthcoming second novel, Go Set a Watchman
"Shoot all the bluejays you want, if you can hit ‘em, but remember it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird."
A lawyer’s advice to his children as he defends the… | Literature ⋅ Classics | |
 | Stevenson, Robert Louis | Following the demise of bloodthirsty buccaneer Captain Flint, young Jim Hawkins finds himself with the key to a fortune. For he has discovered a map that will lead him to the fabled Treasure Island. But a host of villains, wild beasts and deadly savages stand between him and the stash… | Literature ⋅ Classics | |
 | Stevenson, Robert Louis | Following the demise of bloodthirsty buccaneer Captain Flint, young Jim Hawkins finds himself with the key to a fortune. For he has discovered a map that will lead him to the fabled Treasure Island. But a host of villains, wild beasts and deadly savages stand between him and the stash… | Literature ⋅ Classics | |
 | Stowe, Harriet Beecher | Uncle Tom, Topsy, Sambo, Simon Legree, little Eva: their names are American bywords, and all of them are characters in Harriet Beecher Stowe's remarkable novel of the pre-Civil War South. "Uncle Tom's Cabin was revolutionary in 1852 for its passionate indictment of slavery and for its presentation of Tom, "a… | Literature ⋅ Classics | |
 | Lewis, C.S. | The story of Prince Caspian's voyage in search of the lords his uncle Miraz had sent off to sea. | Literature ⋅ Classics | |
 | Tolstoy, Leo | Set in the years leading up to and culminating in Napoleon's disastrous Russian invasion, this classic novel focuses upon an entire society torn by conflict and change. Here is humanity in all its innocence and corruption, wisdom and folly, painful defeats and enduring triumphs. Here is the seemingly effortless artistry… | Classics |