Best American Fiction, 1981-2006
The Book New York Times Review's editor, Sam Tanenhaus, sent out a short letter to a couple of hundred prominent writers, critics, editors and other literary sages, asking them to please identify "the single best work of American fiction published in the last 25 years."
- 1
Beloved
Toni Morrison · 1987 · 31 lists
- 2
Underworld
Don DeLillo · 1997 · 9 lists
- 3
Blood Meridian
Cormac McCarthy · 1985 · 14 lists
- 4
Rabbit At Rest
John Updike · 1990 · 6 lists
- 5
Rabbit is Rich
John Updike · 1981 · 8 lists
- 6
Rabbit Redux
John Updike · 1961 · 6 lists
- 7
Rabbit, Run
John Updike · 1960 · 12 lists
- 8
American Pastoral
Philip Roth · 1997 · 10 lists
- 9
A Confederacy of Dunces
John Kennedy Toole · 1980 · 13 lists
- 10
Housekeeping
Marilynne Robinson · 1980 · 10 lists
- 11
Winter's Tale
Mark Helprin · 1983 · 4 lists
- 12
White Noise
Don DeLillo · 1984 · 13 lists
- 13
The Counterlife
Philip Roth · 1986 · 2 lists
- 14
Libra
Don DeLillo · 1988 · 3 lists
- 15
Where I'm Calling From
Raymond Carver · 1988 · 2 lists
- 16
The Things They Carried
Tim O'Brien · 1990 · 10 lists
- 17
Mating
Norman Rush · 2006 · 2 lists
- 18
Jesus' Son
Denis Johnson · 1992 · 2 lists
- 19
Operation Shylock
Philip Roth · 1993 · 3 lists
- 20
Independence Day
Richard Ford · 1995 · 3 lists
- 21
Sabbath’s Theater
Philip Roth · 1995 · 4 lists
- 22
Cities of the Plain
Cormac McCarthy · 1998 · 1 list
- 23
The Crossing
Cormac McCarthy · 1994 · 1 list
- 24
All the Pretty Horses
Cormac McCarthy · 1992 · 5 lists
- 25
The Human Stain
Philip Roth · 2000 · 6 lists
- 26
The Plot Against America
Philip Roth · 2004 · 8 lists