Library of America

Library of America names 112 books, every one listed here. The most approachable of them is Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret by Judy Blume (difficulty 25/100, about 1.5 hours); the hardest is The Recognitions by William Gaddis (85/100).

• A Fable by William Faulkner (1955) — difficulty 75/100, about 20 hours
• A House Divided by Pearl S. Buck (1935) — difficulty 38/100, about 7.8 hours
• A Skeleton Key to Finnegans Wake by Joseph Campbell (1944) — difficulty 68/100, about 15 hours
• Absalom, Absalom! by William Faulkner (1936) — difficulty 79/100, about 18 hours
• Always Coming Home by Ursula K Le Guin (1985) — difficulty 57/100, about 14 hours
• Andersonville by MacKinlay Kantor (1956) — difficulty 46/100, about 12 hours
• Angle of Repose by Wallace Stegner (1972) — difficulty 52/100, about 14 hours
• Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret by Judy Blume (1970) — difficulty 25/100, about 1.5 hours
• Arrowsmith by Sinclair Lewis (1925) — difficulty 45/100, about 11 hours
• Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis (1922) — difficulty 45/100, about 7.9 hours
• Beloved by Toni Morrison (1988) — difficulty 58/100, about 7.5 hours
• Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy (1985) — difficulty 70/100, about 13 hours
• Cannery Row by John Steinbeck (1945) — difficulty 44/100, about 3.2 hours
• Death Comes for the Archbishop by Willa Cather (1927) — difficulty 45/100, about 4.5 hours
• Dog Soldiers by Robert Stone (1975) — difficulty 54/100, about 7.5 hours
• East of Eden by John Steinbeck (1952) — difficulty 49/100, about 16 hours
• Elbow Room by James Alan McPherson (1978) — difficulty 53/100, about 4.6 hours
• Elmer Gantry by Sinclair Lewis (1927) — difficulty 40/100, about 9.3 hours
• Enemies, A Love Story by Isaac Bashevis Singer (1966) — difficulty 51/100, about 5.2 hours
• For Whom the Bell Tolls by Ernest Hemingway (1940) — difficulty 48/100, about 12 hours
• Foreign Affairs by Alison Lurie (1985) — difficulty 51/100, about 4.9 hours
• Four Quartets by T. S. Eliot (1943) — difficulty 75/100, about 51 min
• Go Down, Moses by William Faulkner (1942) — difficulty 60/100, about 9.1 hours
• Going After Cacciato by Tim O'Brien (1979) — difficulty 65/100, about 8.7 hours
• Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell (1936) — difficulty 45/100, about 27 hours
• Goodbye, Columbus by Philip Roth (1960) — difficulty 56/100, about 5.8 hours
• Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon (1973) — difficulty 84/100, about 52 hours
• Guard of Honor by James Gould Cozzens (1949) — difficulty 69/100, about 24 hours
• Herzog by Saul Bellow (1965) — difficulty 56/100, about 9.8 hours
• House Made of Dawn by N. Scott Momaday (1969) — difficulty 61/100, about 5.6 hours
• Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson (1980) — difficulty 58/100, about 4.7 hours
• How German Is It by Walter Abish (1981) — difficulty 62/100, about 5.4 hours
• Humboldt's Gift by Saul Bellow (1976) — difficulty 60/100, about 15 hours
• Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison (1953) — difficulty 75/100, about 22 hours
• Ironweed by William Kennedy (1984) — difficulty 57/100, about 5.1 hours
• Light in August by William Faulkner (1932) — difficulty 65/100, about 14 hours
• Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry (1986) — difficulty 51/100, about 23 hours
• Long Day's Journey into Night by Eugene O'Neill (1956) — difficulty 53/100, about 4.6 hours
• Main Street by Sinclair Lewis (1920) — difficulty 52/100, about 11 hours
• Martin Eden by Jack London (1909) — difficulty 65/100, about 13 hours
• Moby-Dick by Herman Melville (1851) — difficulty 71/100, about 26 hours
• Mourning Becomes Electra by Eugene O'Neill (1931) — difficulty 57/100, about 4.4 hours
• Mr. Sammler's Planet by Saul Bellow (1971) — difficulty 60/100, about 7.8 hours
• Murder in the Cathedral by T. S. Eliot (1935) — difficulty 57/100, about 1.7 hours
• Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs (1959) — difficulty 84/100, about 11 hours
• Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck (1937) — difficulty 34/100, about 1.7 hours
• On the Road by Jack Kerouac (1957) — difficulty 54/100, about 8.1 hours
• One of Ours by Willa Cather (1923) — difficulty 46/100, about 8.2 hours
• Paris Trout by Pete Dexter (1988) — difficulty 52/100, about 5.6 hours
• Pasmore by David Storey (1972) — difficulty 52/100, about 3.4 hours
• Picture Palace by Paul Theroux (1978) — difficulty 55/100, about 6.3 hours
• Plains Song by Wright Morris (1981) — difficulty 55/100, about 4.6 hours
• Portnoy's Complaint by Philip Roth (1969) — difficulty 57/100, about 5.4 hours
• Rabbit Is Rich by John Updike (1982) — difficulty 57/100, about 13 hours
• Rabbit, Run by John Updike (1960) — difficulty 56/100, about 7.5 hours
• Ragtime by E.L. Doctorow (1975) — difficulty 71/100, about 8.9 hours
• Red Harvest by Dashiell Hammett (1929) — difficulty 56/100, about 4.5 hours
• Revolutionary Road by Richard Yates (1961) — difficulty 70/100, about 11 hours
• Sanctuary by William Faulkner (1931) — difficulty 64/100, about 7.4 hours
• Saville by David Storey (1976) — difficulty 54/100, about 14 hours
• Seize the Day by Saul Bellow (1956) — difficulty 57/100, about 2.9 hours
• Sent for You Yesterday by John Edgar Wideman (1984) — difficulty 60/100, about 4.2 hours
• Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut (1969) — difficulty 63/100, about 4.4 hours
• Soldiers in Hiding by Richard Wiley (1987) — difficulty 53/100, about 3.4 hours
• Spartina by John Casey (1989) — difficulty 41/100, about 7.6 hours
• Sula by Toni Morrison (1973) — difficulty 58/100, about 3.7 hours
• Suttree by Cormac McCarthy (1979) — difficulty 70/100, about 19 hours
• Tarantula by Bob Dylan (1971) — difficulty 67/100, about 2.8 hours
• That Night by Alice McDermott (1987) — difficulty 46/100, about 3.1 hours
• The Adventures of Augie March by Saul Bellow (1954) — difficulty 58/100, about 19 hours
• The Anatomy Lesson by Philip Roth (1983) — difficulty 79/100, about 10 hours
• The Barracks Thief by Tobias Wolff (1985) — difficulty 66/100, about 2.2 hours
• The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler (1939) — difficulty 53/100, about 4.6 hours
• The Bridge of San Luis Rey by Thornton Wilder (1927) — difficulty 54/100, about 2.3 hours
• The Caine Mutiny by Herman Wouk (1952) — difficulty 58/100, about 16 hours
• The Centaur by John Updike (1964) — difficulty 61/100, about 8 hours
• The Collected Stories of Jean Stafford by Jean Stafford (1970) — difficulty 70/100, about 19 hours
• The Collected Stories of Katherine Anne Porter by Katherine Anne Porter (1966) — difficulty 55/100, about 9.2 hours
• The Complete Stories by Flannery O'Connor (1972) — difficulty 58/100, about 16 hours
• The Confessions of Nat Turner by William Styron (1968) — difficulty 56/100, about 11 hours
• The Crying of Lot 49 by Thomas Pynchon (1966) — difficulty 68/100, about 4.7 hours
• The Day of the Locust by Nathanael West (1939) — difficulty 56/100, about 3.1 hours
• The Edge of Sadness by Edwin O'Connor (1962) — difficulty 53/100, about 8 hours
• The Executioner's Song by Norman Mailer (1980) — difficulty 55/100, about 26 hours
• The Family Moskat by Isaac Bashevis Singer (1950) — difficulty 60/100, about 19 hours
• The Fixer by Bernard Malamud (1967) — difficulty 55/100, about 7.4 hours
• The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck (1931) — difficulty 50/100, about 7.2 hours
• The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck (1939) — difficulty 55/100, about 13 hours
• The Iceman Cometh by Eugene O'Neill (1946) — difficulty 63/100, about 5.4 hours
• The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan (1989) — difficulty 70/100, about 20 hours
• The Keepers of the House by Shirley Ann Grau (1965) — difficulty 73/100, about 12 hours
• The Killer Angels by Michael Shaara (1975) — difficulty 52/100, about 7.5 hours
• The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury (1950) — difficulty 47/100, about 4.2 hours
• The Moviegoer by Walker Percy (1962) — difficulty 57/100, about 5.1 hours
• The Recognitions by William Gaddis (1955) — difficulty 85/100, about 70 hours
• The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner (1929) — difficulty 80/100, about 15 hours
• The Spectator Bird by Wallace Stegner (1977) — difficulty 72/100, about 8.1 hours
• The Stories of John Cheever by John Cheever (1979) — difficulty 61/100, about 28 hours
• The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway (1926) — difficulty 56/100, about 5 hours
• The Town by Conrad Richter (1951) — difficulty 33/100, about 4.5 hours
• The Travels of Jaimie McPheeters by Robert Lewis Taylor (1959) — difficulty 54/100, about 13 hours
• The Waters of Kronos by Conrad Richter (1961) — difficulty 59/100, about 2.9 hours
• The Winter of Our Discontent by John Steinbeck (1961) — difficulty 74/100, about 11 hours
• Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston (1937) — difficulty 63/100, about 5.3 hours
• Them by Joyce Carol Oates (1970) — difficulty 56/100, about 9.3 hours
• To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee (1961) — difficulty 42/100, about 6.3 hours
• Tortilla Flat by John Steinbeck (1935) — difficulty 51/100, about 3.8 hours
• Tropic of Cancer by Henry Miller (1934) — difficulty 63/100, about 9.4 hours
• Victory Over Japan by Ellen Gilchrist (1984) — difficulty 54/100, about 5.3 hours
• White Noise by Don DeLillo (1985) — difficulty 65/100, about 9.4 hours
• Whites by Norman Rush (1986) — difficulty 48/100, about 2.7 hours
• World's Fair by E.L. Doctorow (1986) — difficulty 53/100, about 6.9 hours

Questions

How many books are on Library of America?

112, all of them listed here with how hard each is to read and how long it takes.

Which book on Library of America is the easiest to read?

Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret by Judy Blume, difficulty 25/100, about 1.5 hours. The hardest is The Recognitions by William Gaddis, at 85/100.

How long would it take to read every book on Library of America?

About 1,157 hours for the 112 books ReadingRate measures, at 250 words a minute adjusted for each book's difficulty: 578 days at two hours a day.

Other lists: Penguin Classics Collection, Penguin Modern Classics, NYRB Classics, Everyman's Library, Biblioteca Ayacucho, Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, Heinemann African Writers Series, Oxford World's Classics, UNESCO Collection of Representative Works. All lists.