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DeutschThe most popular books in English.
What books are currently the most popular and which are the all time classics? Here we present you with a mixture of those two criteria. We update this list once a month.
Ingeborg Bachmann
This is collection of the stories written by a distinguished German author who died in 1973. Reading these stories entails abandoning the terms of one's own comfort. The author's relentless vision demands that readers allows themselves to be hypnotised, taken over by her …
Wolfgang Koeppen
"A recovered masterpiece....Remarkable as a sidelong, searing appraisal of the legacy of the Nazi years."―Publishers Weekly, starred review A masterpiece by a writer long neglected in America, The Hothouse created a literary stir when it appeared in hardcover. Evoking …
Alfred Andersch
The Father of a Murderer takes place in a classroom of the Wittelsbach Gymnasium in 1920s Munich over the course of a single Greek lesson. Head-master Himmler (the father of Heinrich Himmler) enters the classroom, apparently to observe the students' progress. However, he soon …
Hugo von Hofmannsthal
Hugo von Hoffmannsthal made his mark as a poet, as a playwright, and as the librettist for Richard Strauss’s greatest operas, but he was no less accomplished as a writer of short, strangely evocative prose works. The atmospheric stories and sketches collected here—fin-de-siècle …
Bertolt Brecht
Stories of Mr. Keuner gathers Bertolt Brecht's fictionalized comments on politics, everyday life, and exile. Written from the late 1920s till the late 1950s, Stories of Mr. Keuner is the precipitate of Brecht's experience of a world in political and cultural flux, a world of …
Len Deighton
The classic spy thriller of lethal computer-age intrigue and a maniac’s private cold war, featuring the same anonymous narrator and milieu of The IPCRESS File.The fourth of Deighton’s novels to be narrated by the unnamed employee of WOOC(P) is the thrilling story of an …
Hans Keilson
Written while Hans Keilson was in hiding during World War II, The Death of the Adversary is the self-portrait of a young man helplessly fascinated by an unnamed "adversary" whom he watches rise to power in 1930s Germany. It is a tale of horror, not only in its evocation of …
Carolyn Keene
Aunt Eloise Drew invited Nancy and her friends to Mirror Bay Bide-a-Wee cabin near Cooperstown, New York, for a visit and a chance to solve the mystery of the woman who glides across the water. Upon their arrival, Nancy becomes mixed up in a vacation hoax and is nearly arrested …
Arthur Yorinks
Al, a janitor, and his faithful dog, Eddie, live in a single room on the West Side. They eat together, they work together, they do everything together. So what's the problem?Thier room is crowded and cramped; their life is an endless struggle. Al and Eddie are practically at …
Irvin D. Yalom
Existential Psychotherapy is a nonfiction book by the American existential psychiatrist and author Irvin D. Yalom. In this book, the author offers a brief and pragmatic introduction, addressed to clinical practitioners, to European existential philosophy, as well as to …
William T. Vollmann
Rising Up and Rising Down: Some Thoughts on Violence, Freedom and Urgent Means is a seven-volume essay on the subject of violence by American author William T. Vollmann. First published by McSweeney's in November 2003, it was nominated for the National Book Critics Circle Award. …
Georg Büchner
Lenz is a novella fragment written by Georg Büchner in Strasbourg in 1836. It is based on the documentary evidence of Jean Frédéric Oberlin's diary. Jakob Michael Reinhold Lenz, a friend of Goethe, is the subject of the story. In March 1776 he met Goethe in Weimar. Later he …
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
The Sorrows of Young Werther is an epistolary and loosely autobiographical novel by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, first published in 1774; a revised edition of the novel was published in 1787. Werther was an important novel of the Sturm und Drang period in German literature, and …
Li Cunxin
At the age of eleven, Li Cunxin was one of the privileged few selected to serve in Chairman Mao's Cultural Revolution by studying at the Beijing Dance Academy. Having known bitter poverty in his rural China home, ballet would be his family's best chance for a better future. From …
Joseph Roth
Hotel Savoy is a 1924 novel by the Austrian writer Joseph Roth. Its story is set in the Hotel Savoy in Łódź, where lonely war veterans, variety dancers and others dream of better places.
Christopher Hitchens
Thomas Paine's "Rights of Man": A Biography is Christopher Hitchens's contribution to the Books That Changed the World series. Hitchens, a great admirer of Thomas Paine, covers the history of Paine's 1791 book, The Rights of Man, and analyzes its significance.
Walter Scott
Kenilworth. A Romance is a historical novel by Sir Walter Scott, first published on 8 January 1821.
Ludwig von Mises
Liberalism is an influential book by Austrian School economist and libertarian thinker Ludwig von Mises, containing economic analysis and indicting critique of socialism. It was first published in 1927 by Gustav Fischer Verlag in Jena and defending classical liberal ideology …
Oswald Spengler
The Decline of the West, or The Downfall of the Occident, is a two-volume work by Oswald Spengler, the first volume of which was published in the summer of 1918. Spengler revised this volume in 1922 and published the second volume, subtitled Perspectives of World History, in …
Bernard MC Laverty
Grace Notes is a novel by Bernard MacLaverty, first published in 1997.
Lawrence Durrell
Monsieur, published in 1974 and sub-titled The Prince of Darkness, is the first volume in Lawrence Durrell's The Avignon Quintet. As a group, the five novels narrate the lives of a group of Europeans prior to and after World War II. Monsieur begins the quincunx of novels with a …
Murray Rothbard
For a New Liberty: The Libertarian Manifesto is a 1973 book by American economist and historian Murray Rothbard. The work, which promotes anarcho-capitalism, has been credited as an influence on the New Right.
Friedrich Heinrich Karl de la Motte, Baron Fouqué
Undine is a fairy-tale novella by Friedrich de la Motte Fouqué in which Undine, a water spirit, marries a knight named Huldebrand in order to gain a soul. It is an early German romance, which has been translated into English and other languages.
Allan Massie
Tiberius is a 1991 historical novel by Scottish writer Allan Massie, about the Roman Emperor Tiberius. It is the second in the series of novels Massie wrote about the early Roman Emperors.
Garry Disher
The Dragon Man is a 1999 crime novel by the Australian author Garry Disher.
William Faulkner
A Fable is a 1954 novel written by the American author William Faulkner. He spent more than a decade and tremendous effort on it, and considered it his masterpiece when it was completed. It won the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award, but critical reviews were mixed and …
Stephen Hawking
On the Shoulders of Giants is a compilation of scientific texts edited and with commentary by the British theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking. The book was published by Running Press in 2002. The book includes texts written by Isaac Newton, Albert Einstein, Galileo Galilei, …
J. G. Ballard
Hello America is a science fiction novel by J. G. Ballard, first published in 1981. The plot follows an expedition to a North America rendered uninhabitable by an ecological disaster.
James A. Michener
The Bridge at Andau is a 1957 nonfiction book by James Michener chronicling the Hungarian Revolution of 1956. Michener was living in Austria in the 1950s. He was at the border of Austria and Hungary during the period in which a significant wave of refugees fled Hungary. The book …
Elke Heidenreich
A bold and self-serving tom cat reigns supreme both in the farmyard in Italy where he was born and later in the comfortable home in Germany to which a vacationing couple takes him and his helpless sister. A bold and self-serving tom cat reigns supreme both in the farmyard in …
Günter Grass
The Call of the Toad, published in Germany in 1992 as Unkenrufe, is a novel by Danzig-born German author Günter Grass. It describes the love story between the German widower Alexander Reschke and Alexandra Polin widowed Piatkowska. It was adapted into a 2005 film directed by …
Pierre Louys
The Songs of Bilitis is a collection of erotic, essentially lesbian, poetry by Pierre Louÿs published in Paris in 1894. The poems are in the manner of Sappho; the collection's introduction claims they were found on the walls of a tomb in Cyprus, written by a woman of Ancient …
Olaf Stapledon
Odd John: A Story Between Jest and Earnest is a 1935 science fiction novel by the British author Olaf Stapledon. The novel explores the theme of the Übermensch in the character of John Wainwright, whose supernormal human mentality inevitably leads to conflict with normal human …
Franz Kafka
The Zürau Aphorisms are 109 aphorisms of Franz Kafka, written from September 1917 to April 1918 and published by his friend Max Brod in 1931, after his death. They are selected from his writing in Zürau in West Bohemia where he stayed with his sister Ottla, suffering from …
Imre Madách
The Tragedy of Man is a play written by the Hungarian author Imre Madách. It was first published in 1861. The play is considered to be one of the major works of Hungarian literature and is one of the most often staged Hungarian plays today. Many lines have become common …
Elaine Cunningham
The Dream Spheres is a book published in 1999 that was written by Elaine Cunningham.
Robert Girardi
Madeleine's Ghost is a well-regarded first mystery novel by Robert Girardi.
Colin Greenland
Take Back Plenty, is a novel by Colin Greenland and is the winner of both major British science fiction awards, the 1990 British SF Association award and the 1991 Arthur C. Clarke Award, as well as being a nominee for the 1992 Philip K. Dick Award for the best original paperback …
Keiji Nishitani
Religion and Nothingness is a 1961 book by the Japanese philosopher Keiji Nishitani.
Isaac Asimov
More Tales of the Black Widowers is a collection of mystery short stories by American author Isaac Asimov, featuring his fictional club of mystery solvers, the Black Widowers. It was first published in hardcover by Doubleday in October 1976, and in paperback by the Fawcett Crest …
Yasuko Aoike
Follows the adventures of a British aristocrat, who sidelines as an international art thief, and his partner, a straight-laced N.A.T.O. officer, as they travel around the world in the late 1970s.
Yasuko Aoike
Follows the adventures of a British aristocrat, who sidelines as an international art thief, and his partner, a straight-laced N.A.T.O. officer, as they travel around the world in the late 1970s.
Ruth Rendell
Put on by Cunning is a novel by British crime-writer Ruth Rendell. It was first published in 1981, and features her popular series protagonist Inspector Wexford. It is the 11th in the series. The title comes from a quotation from Shakespeare's Hamlet, Act V Scene II: "How these …
Fred Saberhagen
The Second Book of Swords is a book published in 1983, written by Fred Saberhagen.
Naoki Urasawa
20th Century Boys, Vol. 21 is a book written by Naoki Urasawa.
Poul Anderson
A Midsummer Tempest is an 1974 alternative history fantasy novel by Poul Anderson. In 1975, it was nominated for the World Fantasy Award for Best Novel and the Nebula Award for Best Novel and won the Mythopoeic Award.
Philip Palmer
Debatable Space is a 2008 science fiction novel by novelist and screenwriter Philip Palmer. The book alternates between telling the story of the main character, Lena Smith, in the form of a diary and a first-person narrative of events which take place roughly 1000 years from the …
Henning Mankell
Secrets in the Fire is a children's novel by Swedish author Henning Mankell. It was published in 1995 and was translated into English by Anne Connie Stuksrud. Secrets in the Fire was based on the true story of land mine victim Sofia Alface. The book has won the 2002 Sankei …
Geraldine McGaughrean
The Death-Defying Pepper Roux is a 2010 book by British children's author Geraldine McCaughrean.
Johann D. Wyss
The Swiss Family Robinson is a novel by Johann David Wyss, first published in 1812, about a Swiss family shipwrecked in the East Indies en route to Port Jackson, Australia.
A.D. Miller
Snowdrops is a novel by A. D. Miller which was shortlisted for the 2011 Man Booker Prize.
Cassandra Clare
Clockwork Prince is a novel written by Cassandra Clare. It is the second novel in the Infernal Devices trilogy. It is written through the perspective of the main character, Tessa Gray, who lives at the London Institute among Shadowhunters, a group of half-angel-half-human beings …
