Off the top of my head:
The Horse Soldiers
The Cypresses Believe in God
Soldier Ask Not
And Quiet Flows the Don
Lest Darkness Fall
Spartacus
I, Claudius
The Source
The Caine Mutiny
The Screwtape Letters
Give us your pics in the comboxes. I would note that there were many, many novels that came close to making my personal top ten, and I found that interesting as the vast bulk of my reading is non fiction, and always has been, and much of my fiction reading tends to ephemeral genre reading, especially science fiction. A really good novel stays with you, and frequently has an impact on you that the reader may not be completely aware of, except in retrospect.
the barchester chronicles, pride and prejudice, emma, persuasion, c.s. lewis space trilogy, c.p. snow’s strangers & brothers, dorothy sayers–jill patton walsh, lord peter wimsey, read and reread. What! all English locale
Kipling’s Kim, Waugh’s Brideshead Revisited, Pride and Prejudice, LOTR, Brothers Karamazov and Crime and Punishment, Patrick O’Brian’s ‘Aubrey/Maturin’ novels, Robinson Crusoe, any of Wodehouse’s ‘Jeeves and Wooster’ novels, and Sophia House by Michael O’Brien.
And yes Bob, I too give Dorothy Sayers an enthusiastic thumbs-up for her ‘Lord Peter Whimsey’ novels. She also did a translation of Dante’s Divine Comedy that has been held in very high regard for decades now, which I plan to start this year…
I forgot LOTR (read every Christmas season), but that’s not really a novel…epic??
Have to confess I never could plow all the way through Karamazov or War and Peace (although I did sit through the latter in operatic form, the Prokofiev work). Love most of the rest listed above. How about something different? I have read multiple times the original Dragonriders of Pern trilogy by Anne McCaffrey. Some of the others in what became an inter-generational series (taken up by the author’s son) are entertaining, too, but not on the level of the original three stories, IMO. The only other books I have read more than twice are the Hobbit and the LOTR. I am not highly entertained reading fiction about human reality. I get enough of that just by being aware every day, and by reading history, which I do enjoy, I suppose because usually I already know how the story ends. 😁
Stranger in a Strange Land would be on the list
LOTR
1984
Crime and Punishment
Eugene Onegin
Lewis’s space trilogy
Full Disclosure (a political thriller by William Safire)
On The Road
probably miscellaneous science fiction and fantasy
Oh – Slaughterhouse Five
LoTR/Hobbit
To Kill a Mockingbird
All Quiet on the Western Front
Godric
Ivanhoe
These will always be near the top, the next few might change given how I feel at the moment.
Of Mice and Men
Wuthering Heights
Heart of Darkness
Dracula (particularly JHJ1)
Oliver Twist
Pinky, Dave G. To continue war and the military, The Red Badge of Courage, The Caine Mutiny and an alternate view: For Whom the Bell Tolls.
Frank, one of my saddest days was when I had to admit that I’d lost track of the characters and narrative halfway through War and Peace and I was just going through the motions. As for The Brothers Karamazov, I have to endorse Tchaikovsky’s assessment: “This is becoming intolerable. All of the characters are insane.” Still, totally worth it.
I’m not going to put on airs. I tried to think what sticks with me and what I’m inclined to loan to others.
The Great Divorce & Screwtape Letters
LotR
Narnia (Silver Chair if I had to pick one)
The High Crusade
Star Trek: Federation
Yeah I’ll say it. A simple genre book still had something meaningful to say about life.
“Still, totally worth it.”
I guess it can’t hurt to try again. Encouragement accepted, Pinky.
Brothers Karamazov
Space Trilogy
Laurus
Bleak House
Til We Have Faces
Don Quixote
Name of the Rose
Scarlet Letter
Hound of the Baskervilles
The Martian
Waverly
Old Mortality
Guy Mannering
LOTR
Lost Illusions (Balzac)
Brothers K
Something Wicked This Way Comes (Bradbury)