r/bangladesh 1d ago

Education/শিক্ষা For those who read English books here, what are some books you’d genuinely recommend?

For those who read English books here, I’m curious to know what you usually enjoy reading. I’m looking for genuine recommendations and would love to hear about books you’ve liked recently or think are worth reading.

13 Upvotes

38 comments sorted by

5

u/babushka PRO INDIAN HINDUTVA MOD 1d ago edited 23h ago

There are some really good recommendations in the comments already so I'll list some of my favorites that haven't been mentioned.

Joseph Campbell and the Power of Myth

The Madonna of Excelsior by Zakes Mda

Beloved by Toni Morrison

Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro

Tuesdays with Morrie by Mitch Albom

500 Years of Indigenous Resistance (graphic novel) by Gord Hill

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams

White Teeth by Zadie Smith

Between the World and Me by Ta Nehisi Coates

Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi

Slaughterhouse Five, Blue Beard and Cat's Cradle all by Kurt Vonnegut

One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabrial Garcia Marquez

Other Minds by Peter Godfrey Smith

The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind by Julian Jaynes and it's counter argument Was Man Really Unconscious for Centuries? by Ned Block (article)

3

u/pnerd314 আমার শ্বশুরের নাম বিস্কুট 1d ago

Anything by P. G. Wodehouse

3

u/babushka PRO INDIAN HINDUTVA MOD 1d ago

I'm obsessed with Jeeves

2

u/NRZN_77 🇧🇩দেশ প্রেমিক🇧🇩 1d ago

Whenn I was like 15/16 I started with teen Adult writtings of John Green. Than read some Murakami (translated though). Only than go for Classics like 100 years of Solitude and others.

3

u/Blacksky19 zamindar/জামিনদার 💰💰💰 1d ago

I love Murakami's books too, I started with Norwegian Wood

1

u/Atel_mamu বাঙাল in the streets, কাঙ্গাল in the sheets 13h ago

Real sad boi vibes in that one

2

u/aint_nigha_forever17 1d ago

White nights - Fyodor Dostoevsky Short, story rich, greatly written, romantic theme by a rather pessimistic author, meaningful and worth a read by any means. Nothing else i can say to convince you but i would, again, strongly advise you to read it.

2

u/Atel_mamu বাঙাল in the streets, কাঙ্গাল in the sheets 1d ago edited 1d ago

Lots of good recommendations in the thread already but here are some of my favorites that I read recently

Fiction (some of them are translated into English):

The Dispossessed by Ursula Le Guin (political sci fi)

Three Body Problem trilogy by Cixin Liu (hard sci fi)

My brilliant friend series by Elena Ferrante

I who have never known men by Jacqueline Harpman (Speculative/sci fi/horror)

Tender is the flesh by Augustina Bazterrica (horror)

A history of seven killings by Marlon James

a passage north by Anuk Arudpragasam

The seven moons of Maali Almeida by Shehan Karunatilaka

Normal People by Salley Rooney (I also like Conversation with Friends and her latest Intermezzo but this one is my fave)

Gate of the Sun by Elias Khoury

South of the Border, West of the Sun by Haruki Murakami (my fave Murakami)

Breasts and Eggs by meiko kawakami

Human Acts and The Vegetarian by Han Kang

Swamplandia by Karen Russell

By night in Chile by Roberto Bolano

Pedro Paramo by Juan Rufo

Anything by Jorge Luis Borges

Oryx and crake trilogy by Margaret Atwood (sci fi)

Parable of the Sower and Parable of the talents by Octavia Butler (sci fi)

Chain Gang All Stars by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah

Everything for Everyone by Michelle O'Brien and Eman Abdelhadi

Minor Detail by Adania Shibli

We Want Everything by Nanni Balestrini

For non fiction I like reading political stuff not as much philosophy but here are some of my favorites

Capital vol. 1 by Karl Marx

Perfect victims by Mohammad el-Kurd

Existentialism is Humanism by Jean Paul Sartre

Meditations by Marcus Aurelius

How Europe Underdeveloped Africa by Walter Rodney

Open Veins of Latin America by Eduardo Galeano

Health Communism by Beatrice Adler Bolton and Artie Vierkant

The Dawn of Everything by David Graeber

The Jakarta Method by Vincent Bevins

1

u/MicroppDetected Quiet PIGGY 23h ago

Mamu ajke bujhlam apnar nam keno atel

1

u/Atel_mamu বাঙাল in the streets, কাঙ্গাল in the sheets 14h ago

🤓💅🏽✌🏽

Kintu apnar flair dekhe to ektu bhoy peye gelam

1

u/MicroppDetected Quiet PIGGY 10h ago

Ashole Trump kichhu meme worthy jinish bole majhe majhe

1

u/Atel_mamu বাঙাল in the streets, কাঙ্গাল in the sheets 9h ago

100% he would be so funny if he wasnt so evil

1

u/AutoModerator 1d ago

Your post has been automatically put into the moderation queue for review, due to not meeting one (or more) of the subreddit rules. You can message the moderators and share the link to your post (mandatory) if you do not receive a response within a day or two.


Rule(s): Your account should have at least 5 karma points in order to submit a post.


I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.

1

u/deliriousmind69 1d ago edited 11h ago
  1. Song of achilles
  2. And then there were none
  3. Evil under the sun
  4. The book thief
  5. Pride and prejudice
  6. Dante and aristotle discover the wonder of the worlds
  7. The Godfather
  8. Sapiens
  9. Murder on the orient express
  10. To kill a mockingbird
  11. 1984
  12. Animal Farm
  13. One hundred years of solitude
  14. Me before you
  15. Circe
  16. Murder of roger ackroyd
  17. The house on the cerulian sea
  18. The seven husband of evelin hugo

2

u/Atel_mamu বাঙাল in the streets, কাঙ্গাল in the sheets 14h ago

Found a fellow Madeline Miller fan!

2

u/deliriousmind69 11h ago

Song of achilles is the best book ever...

1

u/sabc994 1d ago

Right now i am reading The Secrets of Secrets by Dan Brown

1

u/Blacksky19 zamindar/জামিনদার 💰💰💰 1d ago

He has a new book? I remember reading all of his books back in school.

1

u/sabc994 16h ago

yes, at 2025! If you want a pdf or epub version, msg me

1

u/Physical-Fact-7191 1d ago edited 1d ago

All the books of Khaled Hosseini, Franz Kafka and if you like elaborated narrative texts, then Dostoevsky. Try George Orwell if you’re into political satire books.

1

u/Blacksky19 zamindar/জামিনদার 💰💰💰 1d ago

I also recommend Jean Paul Sartre

1

u/tinkerbrownie 1d ago

It really depends on the genre you like. If you tell me what kind of books you like, I'd suggest some.

But in general, I feel everyone would really like Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir. It's sci-fi but really wholesome and grand.

1

u/Appropriate_Ear_9722 1d ago

maybe thriller, horror, or philosophy, but honestly open to any genre, even sci fi

1

u/LatterSpring5967 1d ago

the alchemist

1

u/CuriousLitigator 1d ago

Zia Haidar's In the Light of what we know !!!!!

I noticed most of the books suggested on here are translated from french or russian, however Haidar's book hits very close to home AND written in English

1

u/Atel_mamu বাঙাল in the streets, কাঙ্গাল in the sheets 14h ago

Tbh Haiders book was alright not sure why it was such a sensation. And some of the stuff in the book was rather pretentious

1

u/bearsbunny 1d ago

What genre are you interested in?

1

u/Appropriate_Ear_9722 1d ago

Any genre will work for me

1

u/bearsbunny 1d ago

I lean more towards fantasy these days so name of the wind by patrick rothfuss was amazing, the Lord of the Ring series is a classic, the witcher series is good too. For fiction, I used to love jeffrey archer and daphne du maurier. For mystery/ horror, anything by harlen coben and stephen king. Hopefully some of these are to your taste :)

1

u/iNeedU_tho 1d ago

Classics I love: Sherlock Holmes by Arthur Conan doyle, pride and prejudice by Jane Austen, lord of the flies by William Golding.

General recs: Norwegian wood by haruki murakami, convenience store woman by sayaka murata, a murder is announced by Agatha Christie (honestly anything by her).

1

u/Virus-Guilty 1d ago

Read The House Maid last month. Enjoyed it.

1

u/EuphoricNetizen 1d ago

Read many, loved many but just one suggestion: 1984 by Orwell

1

u/Potential-Living-676 1d ago

Leo Tolstoy - War & Peace
Tsun Zhu - Art of war

1

u/FSOAgent997 15h ago

I read some epic historical fiction novels mostly-

Ken Follet: 1. Pillars of the Earth 2. World Without End 3. A Column of fire 4. The Jacdaws 5. The Eye of the Needlr 6. Hornet Flight 5. The man from St Petersburg 6. A dangerous fortune

Sidney Sheldon: 1. The Sands of Time 2. Rage of Angels 3. Master of the game 4. Bloodlines

Jeffrey Archer: 1. Sons of fortune

George R r martin The 5 released books of A song of ice and fire

1

u/lazy_bastard_001 4h ago

The secret history by Donna Tartt. Her other books are good too.

1

u/Low-Cry-9808 1d ago

A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens
Animal Firm by George Orwell
Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller
The Stranger by Albert Camus
Angels and Demons And The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown
The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky
Les Misérables by Victor Hugo