The Heart is a Lonely Hunter
by Carson McCullers
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When she was only twenty-three, Carson McCullers's first novel created a literary sensation. She was very special, one of America's superlative writers who conjures up a vision of existence as terrible as it is real, who takes us on shattering voyages into the depths of the spiritual isolation that underlies the human condition. Read more...

Invisible Man
by Ralph Ellison
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Invisible Man is a milestone in American literature, a book that has continued to engage readers since its appearance in 1952. A first novel by an unknown writer, it remained on the bestseller list for sixteen weeks, won the National Book Award for fiction, and established Ralph Ellison as one of the key writers of the century. The nameless narrator of the novel describes growing up in a black community in the South, attending a Negro college from which he is expelled, moving to New York and becoming the chief spokesman of the Harlem branch of "the Brotherhood," and retreating amid violence and confusion to the basement lair of the Invisible Man he imagines himself to be. Read more...

The First Circle
by Aleksandr I. Solzheni︠t︡syn
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The First Circle of Dante's Hell stands here as a metaphor for certain scientific research centers in Soviet Russia, operating within special prisons and staffed by political prisoners who are also scientists. Set in 1949, a period of political repression, this novel follows the fortunes of several different people who live in such a center.

The Jungle
by Upton Sinclair
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Describes the conditions of the Chicago stockyards through the eyes of a young immigrant struggling in America. Read more...