Here are the Biggest Fiction Bestsellers of the Last 100 Years
(And What Everyone Read Instead)
The best-selling fiction of the year:
1. James A. Michener, The Covenant
2. Robert Ludlum, The Bourne Identity
3. Sidney Sheldon, Rage of Angels
4. Judith Krantz, Princess Daisy
5. Stephen King, Firestarter
6. Ken Follett, The Key to Rebecca
7. Belva Plain, Random Winds
8. Frederick Forsyth, The Devil’s Alternative
9. Larry Collins and Dominique Lapierre, The Fifth Horseman
10. Arnaud de Borchgrave and Robert Moss, The Spike
Also published that year:
J. M. Coetzee, Waiting for the Barbarians
Pat Conroy, The Lords of Discipline
Marilynne Robinson, Housekeeping
John Kennedy Toole, A Confederacy of Dunces
The best-selling fiction of the year:
1. James Clavell, Noble House
2. John Irving, The Hotel New Hampshire
3. Stephen King, Cujo
4. Colleen McCullough, An Indecent Obsession
5. Martin Cruz Smith, Gorky Park
6. Kit Williams, Masquerade
7. Harold Robbins, Goodbye, Janette
8. Lawrence Sanders, The Third Deadly Sin
9. Joseph Wambaugh, The Glitter Dome
10. Cynthia Freeman, No Time for Tears
Also published that year:
Donald Barthelme, Sixty Stories
Italo Calvino, If on a winter’s night a traveler (English translation)
Raymond Carver, What We Talk About When We Talk About Love
Salman Rushdie, Midnight’s Children
The best-selling fiction of the year:
1. William Kotzwinkle, E.T., the Extra-Terrestrial Storybook
2. James A. Michener, Space
3. Robert Ludlum, The Parsifal Mosaic
4. Sidney Sheldon, Master of the Game
5. Judith Krantz, Mistral’s Daughter
6. Jean M. Auel, The Valley of Horses
7. Stephen King, Different Seasons
8. John Jakes, North and South
9. Arthur C. Clarke, 2010: Odyssey Two
10. Ken Follett, The Man from St. Petersburg
Also published that year:
Rachel Ingalls, Mrs. Caliban
Thomas Keneally, Schindler’s List
W. P. Kinsella, Shoeless Joe
Alice Walker, The Color Purple
The best-selling fiction of the year:
1. James Kahn, Return of the Jedi
2. James A. Michener, Poland
3. Stephen King, Pet Sematary
4. John Le Carré, The Little Drummer Girl
5. Stephen King, Christine
6. Danielle Steel, Changes
7. Umberto Eco, The Name of the Rose
8. Stephen R. Donaldson, White Gold Wielder
9. Jackie Collins, Hollywood Wives
10. Louis L’Amour, The Lonesome Gods
Also published that year:
Marion Zimmer Bradley, The Mists of Avalon
Raymond Carver, Cathedral
Mark Helprin, Winter’s Tale
Susan Hill, The Woman in Black
The best-selling fiction of the year:
1. Stephen King and Peter Straub, The Talisman
2. Robert Ludlum, The Aquitaine Progression
3. Mario Puzo, The Sicilian
4. John Jakes, Love and War
5. Dr. Seuss, The Butter Battle Book
6. Helen Hooven Santmyer, “. . . And Ladies of the Club”
7. Frederick Forsyth, The Fourth Protocol
8. Danielle Steel, Full Circle
9. Joan Rivers, The Life and Hard Times of Heidi Abromowitz
10. Gore Vidal, Lincoln: A Novel
Also published that year:
Kathy Acker, Blood and Guts in High School
Martin Amis, Money
Sandra Cisneros, The House on Mango Street
William Gibson, Neuromancer
Jay McInerney, Bright Lights, Big City
Milan Kundera, The Unbearable Lightness of Being (English translation)
The best-selling fiction of the year:
1. Jean M. Auel, The Mammoth Hunters
2. James A. Michener, Texas
3. Garrison Keillor, Lake Wobegon Days
4. Sidney Sheldon, If Tomorrow Comes
5. Stephen King, Skeleton Crew
6. Danielle Steel, Secrets
7. Carl Sagan, Contact
8. Jackie Collins, Lucky
9. Danielle Steel, Family Album
10. Louis L’Amour, Jubal Sackett
Also published that year:
Isabel Allende, The House of the Spirits (English translation)
Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid’s Tale
Orson Scott Card, Ender’s Game
Don DeLillo, White Noise
Bret Easton Ellis, Less Than Zero
John Irving, The Cider House Rules
Cormac McCarthy, Blood Meridian
Larry McMurtry, Lonesome Dove
Lorrie Moore, Self-Help
Jeanette Winterson, Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit
The best-selling fiction of the year:
1. Stephen King, It
2. Tom Clancy, Red Storm Rising
3. James Clavell, Whirlwind
4. Robert Ludlum, The Bourne Supremacy
5. Jackie Collins, Hollywood Husbands
6. Danielle Steel, Wanderlust
7. Judith Krantz, I’ll Take Manhattan
8. Louis L’Amour, Last of the Breed
9. Pat Conroy, The Prince of Tides
10. John Le Carré, A Perfect Spy
Also published that year:
Richard Ford, The Sportswriter
Alan Moore, Watchmen
Art Spiegelman, Maus I
The best-selling fiction of the year:
1. Stephen King, The Tommyknockers
2. Tom Clancy, Patriot Games
3. Danielle Steel, Kaleidoscope
4. Stephen King, Misery
5. Garrison Keillor, Leaving Home: A Collection of Lake Wobegon Stories
6. Sidney Sheldon, Windmills of the Gods
7. Scott Turow, Presumed Innocent
8. Danielle Steel, Fine Things
9. John Jakes, Heaven and Hell
10. Stephen King, The Eyes of the Dragon
Also published that year:
Paul Auster, The New York Trilogy
James Ellroy, Black Dahlia
Toni Morrison, Beloved
Tom Wolfe, The Bonfire of the Vanities
The best-selling fiction of the year:
1. Tom Clancy, The Cardinal of the Kremlin
2. Sidney Sheldon, The Sands of Time
3. Danielle Steel, Zoya
4. Robert Ludlum, The Icarus Agenda
5. James A. Michener, Alaska
6. Judith Krantz, Till We Meet Again
7. Anne Rice, The Queen of the Damned
8. Barbara Taylor Bradford, To Be the Best
9. Richard Bach, One: A Novel
10. Leon Uris, Mitla Pass
Also published that year:
Mary Gaitskill, Bad Behavior
Gabriel García Márquez, Love in the Time of Cholera (English translation)
John Grisham, A Time to Kill
Alan Hollinghurst, The Swimming Pool Library
David Markson, Wittgenstein’s Mistress
The best-selling fiction of the year:
1. Tom Clancy, Clear and Present Danger
2. Stephen King, The Dark Half
3. Danielle Steel, Daddy
4. Danielle Steel, Star
5. James A. Michener, Caribbean
6. Salman Rushdie, The Satanic Verses
7. John Le Carré, The Russia House
8. Ken Follet, The Pillars of the Earth
9. John Jakes, California Gold
10. Mary Higgins Clark, While My Pretty One Sleeps
Also published that year:
Martin Amis, London Fields
Katherine Dunn, Geek Love
Oscar Hijuelos, The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love
Kazuo Ishiguro, The Remains of the Day
Amy Tan, The Joy Luck Club
Tobias Wolff, This Boy’s Life
