Untouchable
1935 · 176 pages
One day in the life of Bakha, who cleans latrines in a small Indian town and is slapped for brushing against a high-caste man. Anand renders caste from its lowest rung.
★ 6.2
The Books canon
Sourced and shelved.
Every book chosen by hand and annotated for why it matters.
Browse all 1,178 books or filter by subject, era, place, and author.
Browse all 1,178 books or filter by subject, era, place, and author.
A Fine Balance
1995 · 603 pages
A widow takes in two tailors fleeing caste violence and a student, and under Indira Gandhi's Emergency the four become a family. Mistry lets you love them before the sterilization camps arrive.
★ 5.7
The Outsiders
1967 · 160 pages
Greasers and Socs settle their hatred with fists and knives in Tulsa, narrated by fourteen-year-old Ponyboy Curtis. Hinton wrote it at sixteen, and it is still the novel American schools hand to thirteen-year-olds.
★ 5.0
A Manual for Cleaning Women
Selected Stories
2015 · 432 pages
Berlin cleaned houses, worked emergency rooms, raised four sons, and drank. Forty-three stories out of that life, Alaska to Mexico City, written so plainly and fast you miss how much is inside them.
★ 4.8