The Guardian's Top Books of the 2000s
The world was rocked by terrorism, climate change became an emergency, celebrity culture moved from our TVs to our bookshelves, and a boy wizard held millions spellbound. Love them or hate them, these are the 50 books that defined the decade. List published in 2009.
- 1
White Teeth
Zadie Smith · 2000 · 17 lists
- 2
No Logo
Naomi Klein · 1999 · 2 lists
- 3
The Tipping Point
Malcolm Gladwell · 2000 · 6 lists
- 4
A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius
Dave Eggers · 2000 · 5 lists
- 5
The Amber Spyglass
Philip Pullman · 2000 · 3 lists
- 6
How to Be a Domestic Goddess
Nigella Lawson · 2000 · 1 list
- 7
Experience
Martin Amis · 2000 · 2 lists
- 8
The Corrections
Jonathan Franzen · 2001 · 16 lists
- 9
Atonement
Ian McEwan · 2001 · 18 lists
- 10
Austerlitz
W.G. Sebald · 2001 · 11 lists
- 11
A Life's Work
Rachel Cusk · 2001 · 1 list
- 12
Nickel and Dimed
Barbara Ehrenreich · 2001 · 4 lists
- 13
London Orbital
Iain Sinclair · 2002 · 2 lists
- 14
Fingersmith
Sarah Waters · 2002 · 6 lists
- 15
Persepolis
Marjane Satrapi · 2000 · 4 lists
- 16
The Da Vinci Code
Dan Brown · 2003 · 8 lists
- 17
Landing Light
Don Paterson · 2003 · 1 list
- 18
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time
Mark Haddon · 2003 · 8 lists
- 19
The Kite Runner
Khaled Hosseini · 2003 · 6 lists
- 20
Eats, Shoots and Leaves
Lynne Truss · 2006 · 3 lists
- 21
The 9/11 Commission Report
9/11 Commission · 2004 · 3 lists
- 22
Small Island
Andrea Levy · 2004 · 6 lists
- 23
The Line of Beauty
Alan Hollinghurst · 2004 · 6 lists
- 24
Cloud Atlas
David Mitchell · 2004 · 7 lists
- 25
Being Jordan
Katie Price · 2004 · 1 list
- 26
Earth
Richard Fortey · 2004 · 1 list
- 27
Freakonomics
Steven D. Levitt · 2005 · 4 lists
- 28
Untold Stories
Alan Bennett · 2005 · 1 list
- 29
The Year of Magical Thinking
Joan Didion · 2005 · 9 lists
- 30
- 31
Saturday
Ian McEwan · 1996 · 4 lists
- 32
The God Delusion
Richard Dawkins · 2006 · 2 lists
- 33
The Road
Cormac McCarthy · 2006 · 14 lists
- 34
The Looming Tower
Lawrence Wright · 2006 · 6 lists
- 35
The Weather Makers
Tim Flannery · 2005 · 1 list
- 36
The Revenge of Gaia
James Lovelock · 2006 · 1 list
- 37
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows
J.K. Rowling · 2007 · 6 lists
- 38
The Suspicions of Mr Whicher
Kate Summerscale · 2008 · 1 list
- 39
The Blair Years
Alastair Campbell · 2007 · 1 list
- 40
Half of a Yellow Sun
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie · 2006 · 9 lists
- 41
The Reluctant Fundamentalist
Mohsin Hamid · 2007 · 2 lists
- 42
The Audacity of Hope
Barack Obama · 2006 · 1 list
- 43
Change We Can Believe In
Barack Obama · 2008 · 1 list
- 44
Dreams from My Father
Barack Obama · 1995 · 3 lists
- 45
The Rest is Noise
Alex Ross · 2007 · 3 lists
- 46
Netherland
Joseph O'Neill · 2008 · 4 lists
- 47
The Forever War
Dexter Filkins · 2008 · 3 lists
- 48
Home
Marilynne Robinson · 2010 · 4 lists
- 49
The Age Of Wonder
Richard Holmes · 2008 · 3 lists
- 50
Wolf Hall
Hilary Mantel · 2009 · 12 lists
- 51
2666
Roberto Bolaño · 2004 · 12 lists
- 52
Brooklyn
Colm Tóibín · 1943 · 4 lists