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30 Books Every Man Should Read By 30

A countdown of the novels you need to call yourself a grown up

Books you should read before 30
Esquire

In an ascending level of importance, here are 30 must-read books – from the likes of Hemingway, Naipaul and Murakami – that every man really should have tackled by the time he’s a grown-up (and why).

Don’t be too ashamed if you haven’t made your way through each and every one of them, though. We’ll give you until the end of the week.

1

Less Than Zero - Bret Easton Ellis

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A group of narcissistic, moneyed Hollywood spawn spend their time taking drugs, drinking and shagging each other in the back of their Porches. What you wish your youth was like, basically. A tale of unbridled excess and, naturally, subsequent destruction.

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2

Me Talk Pretty One Day - David Sedaris

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Thought you had it tough? Growing up gay, Greek and with a lisp in North Carolina, USA, Sedaris tells the story of his youth through a series of hilarious essays. Worth it for the pithy one-liners alone.

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3

A House for Mr Biswas - V.S. Naipaul

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As if the fact that A House for Mr Biswas came out in 1961, when its author was only 28, isn’t remarkable enough, the ambition, humour and perceptiveness in Naipaul’s landmark novel is, frankly, mind-blowing. Based on Naipaul’s own father, Mohun Biswas is a Hindu Indian in Trinidad and Tobago, who we follow as he negotiates the slings and arrows of marriage, parenthood and human pettiness (not least his own) – and of course good old-fashioned fate – in his quest for self-determination. (Oh, and to make matters worse, Naipaul actually started writing it at 25).

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4

Norwegian Wood - Haruki Murakami

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Everyone should read at least one Murakami (several, really), and this is up there with the best. Hearing The Beatles song that this novel takes its title from, protagonist Toru dwells upon his student days in the sixties protesting against the status quo. His relationship with the beautiful but damaged Naoko is a lesson that emotional dependence is not love.

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5

One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest - Ken Kessey

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A paranoid schizophrenic, confined to an asylum, narrates a tale full of racial tension, sexual repression and confronts the treatment of the mentally ill. Ken Kesey wrote this after his experiments with LSD. It shows...

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6

Americanah - Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

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Published in 2013, when it won the National Book Critics Circle Fiction Award, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s third novel is ostensibly the tale of high school sweethearts in Nigeria whose paths diverge when they travel to America and Britain to make new lives for themselves, only to reconnect (or not?) years later. But the book’s fundamental power lies in Adichie’s pinpoint observations about racial identity in the modern age.

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7

The Picture Of Dorian Grey - Oscar Wilde

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Hedonism, vanity and the selfishness of youth are key in this book. The original cocky upstart, Wilde's precocious wit is also a valuable lesson in pissing off the powers that be.

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8

The Love Song Of J. Alfred Prufrock - T. S. Eliot

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"No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be" – there are a handful of poems every man should read whether they like poetry or not, and Eliot's stream-of-consciousness moan about the frustrations and disillusionments of modern life is emphatically one of them.

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9

The Satanic Verses - Salman Rushdie

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The book that sparked the biggest literary controversy of our time. The fatwa issued because of critical references of the Prophet Mohammed saw Rushie go into hiding for over a decade. This novel looks at a man trapped between Eastern and Western cultures, and flits between times and continents.

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10

The Secret History - Donna Tartt

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Conspiracy, secrecy and murder are a thrilling backbone of this tale of a group of elite Classics students. The theme? How we the young and insecure can be easily manipulated.

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11

Slaughterhouse Five - Kurt Vonnegut

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Vonnegut's most famous novel contains an account of when the Allies bombed Dresden, which he was caught up in as a German prisoner of war. Time-shifting also plays a part in this weird tale, which gives an insight into one of the most important events in recent history.

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12

The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao - Junot Díaz

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A second generation Dominican growing up in New Jersey, Oscar is a nerdy fat kid who loves comics and sci- fi. Unable to display the machismo expected of boys in the Latin community, he is a likeable embodiment of the misunderstood outsider. And we've all been one of those, haven't we?

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13

The Fall - Albert Camus

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A Parisian barrister recounts his fall from wealth and high regard. An advocate for the less fortunate, he nevertheless fails to do anything when he hears a woman fall to her death on a riverbank. A riveting look at that great preoccupation: how we want others to see us.

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14

My Struggle - Karl Ove Knausgaard

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You might imagine that getting through Karl Ove Knausgaard’s six-volume semi-autobiographical novels would be a struggle all of your own, but such is the Norwegian author’s much lauded style –forensically detailed, brutally honest and apparently effortless – you’ll find yourself zipping through them in no time. Life, love, sex and death: it's all here. And coffee. Lots of coffee.

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15

The Golden Notebook - Doris Lessing

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A look at Communism in the 1950s through the thoughts of Anna Wulf, a radical left- winger in post-war Britain. Read for an insight into what it's like to be the enemy in your own country.

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16

The Road - Cormac McCarthy

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In a bleak, post-apocalyptic world, a man and his son travel south to avoid the coming winter. In with the terse prose and unbearable tension is a great story of fatherhood.

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17

What We Talk About When We Talk About Love - Raymond Carver

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What are years 0-30 about if not fickle affections and brutal heartbreak? Conversations over gin are serialised in this collection of short stories that make for bleak but crucial reading.

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18

Generation X - Douglas Coupland

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Three friends trapped in dead-end "McJobs" reach adulthood in early Eighties' California. The ultimate post-graduation book about intellectualising not knowing what the hell to do with yourself.

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19

The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald

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The Great American Novel (or is it?! The debate rages on!) captures the decadence of the Twenties, while telling the story of a man who has desperately reinvented himself to win back the woman he loves. Relatable for anyone who ever obsessively chased a first love. Ring any bells?

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20

The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath

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Any young man who loved The Catcher In The Rye ought to read Plath's novel, a similar story told from a female perspective. The beautifully written semi-autobiographical tale follows a young woman on the cusp of adulthood who struggles with her mental health.

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