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14 Best Contemporary Books of All Time


Our goal: Find the best Contemporary books according to the internet (not just one random person's opinion).

    Here's what we did:
  1. Type "best contemporary books" into our search engine and study the top 4+ pages.
  2. Add only the books mentioned 2+ times.
  3. Rank the results neatly for you here! 😊
    (It was a lot of work. But hey! That's why we're here, right?)

(Updated 2024)

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Last Updated: Monday 1 Jan, 2024

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  1. MOST RECOMMENDED!
    1
    A Little Life

    A Little Life

    Hanya Yanagihara

  2. 2
    White Teeth
  3. 3
    Normal People
  4. 4
    Little Fires Everywhere
  5. 5
    Americanah

    Americanah

    Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

  6. 6
    The Secret History
  7. 7
    Never Let Me Go

    Never Let Me Go

    Kazuo Ishiguro

  8. 8
    Gilead

    Gilead

    Gilead, Book 1

    Marilynne Robinson

  9. 9
    Visitation

    Visitation

    Jenny Erpenbeck

  10. 13
    A Visit from the Goon Squad
  11. 14
    A Man Called Ove

FAQ

  • How was this Contemporary books list created?

    We searched for 'best Contemporary books', found the top 5 articles, took every book mentioned in 2+ articles, and averaged their rankings.

  • How many Contemporary books are in this list?

    There are 14 books in this list.

  • Why did you create this Contemporary books list?

    We wanted to gather the most accurate list of Contemporary books on the internet.

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