Alice in Wonderland (1862) and Through the Looking Glass (1869) by Lewis Carroll
If you have never read these books go out and buy yourself copies right now (preferably with John Tenniel's original illustrations). If you have, read them again. The wordplay, satire, humour and sheer imagination contained between their pages make them much, much more than fun bedtime reading for kids. Dickens, Beckett, Kafka and Swift all cited Lewis Carroll's work as an influence on their writing. Treatises on the human condition disguised as nonsensical whimsy, for me these are two of the greatest works ever written in the English language.

* For brief reading on the life of Lewis Carroll (real name Charles Lutwidge Dodgson) and debate on the nature of his relationship with the real Alice (Liddell) and other young girls whom he photographed, read Lewis Carroll and Alice by Stephanie Lovett Stoffel, published by Thames and Hudson/New Horizons.

The Great Gatsby (1925) by F Scott Fitzgerald
I love this book. I love the language, I love the clothes, the parties, the people, America's 'roaring twenties'. But most of all I love the fact that behind the glamour there is a rotting core, that beyond the smiles and the laughter there is pain and loneliness. This is a masterpiece.

Bee Season (2000) by Myla Goldberg
For me, this is the debut novel to beat all debut novels. What starts out as a coming-of-age tale about a girl with a talent for spelling grows into a sweeping saga of family breakdown, mysticism, mental illness and four people searching for something to give greater meaning to humble existence. Compelling characters and intriguing concepts combine with the sheer quality of the language and make for a mesmerising read. It slowly draws you into a world of obsession; one that will remain with you long after the final page has been turned. more

The Summer House, Later (1998) by Judith Hermann
Subtitled "A book about the moment before happiness", Hermann's short story collection was a literary sensation in her native Germany. I can't imagine how wonderful these words must be in German as the English translation (by Margot Bettauer Dembo) is a revelation. Hermann achieves a kind of stillness in her writing that is both rare and incredibly striking. With characters that are as ordinary as you and me, she captures the ordinariness of modern human life, celebrating it in its very mundanity and, often, loneliness. Hermann's measured eloquence lift the short story format up to a new level. more

Beloved (1987) by Toni Morrison
Nobel prize winner Toni Morrison won a Pulitzer for this powerful and important book. Regarded by many as the defining novel about black slavery in the US, it is both horrifying and beautiful in its magnificence. Dense and secretive, voices mingle in a circular narrative that will draw you in and refuse to let you go.

The Group (1954) by Mary McCarthy
McCarthy's novel focuses on the lives of eight young women after they graduate from New York's Vassar College in 1933. By following the different choices they make right up to 1940 McCarthy mirrors changes in America, both political and social. In charting the girls' individual development, she invokes debate about sex, contraception, children, careers, housework, marriage, loneliness, lesbianism, adultery… sounds like one of our bookclub nights :) The characters contain elements of McCarthy's own personality but are also thinly disguised portraits of her own 'group' at Vassar, with whom she never felt she really fit in: the digs at their small-minded attitudes and wealthy upbringings are also thinly disguised. Controversial and groundbreaking when first released, it's not the same shocker today, but Helena, Pokey, Dottie, Kay, Libby, Polly, Priss and Lakey (!) can be seen as the ancestors of Western civilisation's "modern woman". Not exactly one of my 'favourite' books, but definitely a bookclub recommendation.

Mary Anne (1954) by Daphne Du Maurier
Better known for her fiction - of which I am a fan - Du Maurier's Mary Anne is a biography of her great-great-grandmother. Mary Anne was a courtesan, the mistress of Frederick Duke of York, second son of King George III. Du Maurier effortlessly mingles fact and fiction to build a vivid portrait of a woman who would stop at nothing to get what she wanted. She's an incredible ancestor of the kind we all wish we had lurking in the family tree. Great for history buffs, but the triumph of this book is Du Maurier's page-turning reconstruction of Mary Anne's story.