Inspired by this post, 100 Books Every Man Needs to Read, I tried to come up with my own 100-book list. I got up to 65, then 118, and then cut it back down to 86, then back up to 112, down to 91, and so on…. I’m at 96 now and tired of trying to decide what should go on it and what shouldn’t. I’m trying to achieve some sort of balance, I suppose — genre, history, voices, etc… but I don’t know if it’s realistic to put a limit on myself, though it’s a good question to ask: If I could read ONLY 100 books, what should they be? I may tweak pending input, or not. 🙂

THIS LIST WAS LAST UPDATED ON 08 DECEMBER 2023.

A Little Princess – Frances Hodgson Burnett
A Mother’s Rule of Life – Holly Pierlot
A Return to Modesty – Wendy Shalit
A Tale of Two Cities – Charles Dickens
A Thousand Splendid Suns – Khaled Mosseini
A Tree Grows In Brooklyn – Betty Smith
Abandonment to Divine Providence – Jean Pierre de Caussade
Adam and Eve After the Pill – Mary Eberstadt
An Introduction to the Devout Life – St. Francis de Sales
Anna Karenina – Leo Tolstoy
Anne of Green Gables (series) – Lucy Maud Montgomery
Arriving at Amen – Leah Libresco
Bakhita – Veronique Olmi
Breaking Through: Catholic Women Speak for Themselves – Helen Alvare
Brideshead Revisited – Evelyn Waugh
Building the Benedict Option – Leah Libresco Sargeant
Catherine of Siena – Sigrid Undset
Chiara Corbella Petrillo – Simone Troisi & Cristiana Paccini
Chiara Luce: A Life Lived to the Full – Michele Zanzucchi
Come Be My Light – St. Teresa of Calcutta
Covenanted Happiness – Cormac Burke
Divine Intimacy – Fr. Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalene
Eat, Fast, Feast
Emma – Jane Austen
Essays on Woman – Edith Stein (St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross)
Fire Within – Thomas Dubay
For Women Only – Shaunti Feldhahn
Getting Things Done – David Allen
God Has No Grandchildren – Leila Marie Lawler
Hold On to Your Kids – Gabor and Mate
Home Comforts – Cheryl Mendelson
In This House of Brede – Rumer Godden
Interior Castle – St. Teresa of Avila
Interior Freedom – Fr. Jacques Philippe
Introduction to the Devout Life – St. Francis de Sales
Jane Eyre – Charlotte Bronte
Jesus and the Jewish Roots of Mary – Edward Sri
Joan of Arc – Mark Twain
Joseph of Nazareth – Federico Suarez
Kristin Lavransdatter – Sigrid Undset
Left to Tell – Immaculee Ilibagiza
Life of Christ – Fulton Sheen
Life-Giving Love – Kimberly Hahn
Little Women – Louisa May Alcott
Lord of the World – Robert Hugh Benson
Love and Responsibility – St. John Paul II
Making Sense Out of Suffering – Peter Kreeft
Man and Woman He Created Them – Michael Waldstein
Married Saints and Blesseds – Ferdinand Holbock
Middlemarch – George Eliot
Mulieris Dignitatem – St. John Paul II
North and South – Elizabeth Gaskell
Nudging Conversions – Carrie Gress
Out of the Silent Planet/Perelandra/That Hideous Strength – CS Lewis
Particles of Faith – Stacy Trasancos
Persuasion – Jane Austen
Please Don’t Drink the Holy Water – Susie Lloyd
Poems and Prose – Gerard Manley Hopkins
Pride and Prejudice – Jane Austen
Searching for and Maintaining Peace – Jacques Philippe
Sense and Sensibility – Jane Austen
Simplifying Your Domestic Church – Abby Sasscer
Something Other than God – Jennifer Fulwiler
Splendor in the Ordinary – Thomas Howard
St. Monica Club – Maggie Green
The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People – Stephen Covey
The Anti-Mary Exposed – Carrie Gress
The Art of Living – Dietrich von Hildebrand (with Alice)
The Authentic Catholic Woman – Genevieve Kineke
The Benedict Option – Rod Dreher
The Betrothed – Alessandro Manzoni
The Chronicles of Narnia – CS Lewis
The Complete Stories of Flannery O’Connor – Flannery O’Connor
The Dark Night of the Soul – St. John of the Cross
The End of the Affair – Graham Greene
The Fairy Tale Novels (series) – Regina Doman
The Five Love Languages – Gary Chapman
The Fulfillment of All Desire – Ralph Martin
The Genesis of Gender – Abigail Favale
The Great Divorce – CS Lewis
The Habit of Being – Flannery O’Connor
The Hidden Power of Kindness – Fr. Lawrence Lovasik
The Hiding Place – Corrie Ten Boom
The Holy Bible – God 😀
The Imitation of Christ – Thomas a Kempis
The Lord – Romano Guardini
The Lord of the Rings – JRR Tolkien
The Marian Option – Carrie Gress
The Omnivore’s Dilemma – Michael Pollan
The Power of Silence – Cardinal Sarah
The Privilege of Being a Woman – Alice von Hildebrand
The Reed of God – Carryl Houselander
The Rights of Women – Erika Bachiochi
The Secret Diary of Elisabeth Leseur – Elisabeth Leseur
The Sinner’s Guide – Luis de Granada
The Song of Bernadette – Franz Werfel
The Spiritual Combat – Dom Lorenzo Scupoli
The Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius – St. Ignatius of Loyola
The Summa Domestica – Leila Lawler
The Story of a Soul – St. Therese of Lisieux
The World’s First Love – Fulton Sheen
The Wrinkle in Time Quintet – Madeleine L’Engle
Till We Have Faces – CS Lewis
To Kill a Mockingbird – Harper Lee
True Devotion to Mary – St. Louis de Montfort
Walking With Mary – Edward Sri
What’s Wrong With the World – GK Chesterton
Wing to Wing, Oar to Oar – Amy and Leon Kass
Written on the Heart – J Budziszewski
Wuthering Heights – Emily Bronte