Novels

To be great, a novel must show an old thing in a new way. It's equally disastrous to espouse tradition for its own sake as to propose novelty for the sake of novelty—only together can these elements have meaning.

Modernist and postmodernist authors are infatuated with newness as a thing in itself. They subject language to increasingly complicated gymnastic maneuvers, play with ideas rather than defending them, and generally wreak havoc on established forms. This results in novels that may or may not be aesthetically pleasing, but are surely meaningless.

If we adhere too closely to the forms of the past, however, we run the risk of shortsightedness, bigotry, and prejudice. Humans too often must be shaken from their stupor, made to see things as others see them in order to promote equality and peace and goodwill. A good novel rooted in universal ideals freshly presented can do just that.

Novels are seldom the impetus for social movements, but they often augment cultural change. As a literary form, they came into being because writers wanted a venue for espousing or exploring ideas that wasn't rooted in history or "real life." They wanted, in short, to write fiction.

Before the novel, works modern readers would view as fictional were generally considered in a different light. Either they were actual history, or they were meta-narratives, or they were religious, or they were simply narrative philosophy. The idea was to impart truth, not simply data. As writers became more concerned with the world-as-it-is and scientific understanding, they turned toward forms more consistent with the Enlightenment emphasis on knowledge-acquisition as a means to truth.

The novel was such a form. Symbolism was never abandoned wholesale (except by certain eccentric groups at various times), but a new attention was paid to detail—not just detail integral to the story or signifying something else, but detail that set the scene, that gave the reader a sense of place, mood, circumstance and character. It was this attention to detail that helped fiction emerge as a respectable genre.

For ancient and Medieval writers, the seen world and the world beyond were indistinguishable. The famed Celtic knot was intended to show the interrelatedness of all things, how each realmbled into the other and held everything in place. Pre-Enlightenment writing reflected this view, and any detail provided in a poem or narrative was intended, not to portray physical or human "realities," but to demonstrate truths consistent between realms.

When the Enlightenment came around and proclaimed scientific observation and empiricism the new guides (replacing revelation and divine authority), a new approach was needed. No longer were things primarily representative of other things, things were essentially what they were—meaning things were eseentially physical.

Description evolved to fit the new ethos, and creative literature evolved with it. The novel, prose rather than poetry, devoted to detail and incident rather than sweeping generalization, was one of the best weapons in the Enlightenment arsenal. Writers were no longer primarily concerned with affecting readers' attitudes and hearts, they wanted to change their minds. Western culture has never recovered.

Fortunately, the novel was never stagnant, and never fully enslaved by Enlightenment practitioners. Novels have diversified: there are philosophical novels, poetic novels, experimental novels, comic novels, historical novel, all of them aimed at the reader in such a way that the encounter is either devastating or uplifting, frightening or comforting, horrible and sad or fresh and beautiful.

We don't pretend to carry every important novel ever penned. We don't apologize for that....or for the fact that we carry novels at all. It's easy to look at fiction as mere escapism, much harder to engage it seriously hoping to be transformed. Our goal is to offer books (whether "classics" or not) that offer new ways of seeing, opportunities for transformation, encounters with the sublime as harrowing as they are exhilerating.

Review by C. Hollis Crossman
C. Hollis Crossman used to be a child. Now he's a husband and father who loves church, good food, and weird stuff. He might be a mythical creature, but he's definitely not a centaur. Read more of his reviews here.
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122 Items found Print
Active Filters: 20th & 21st Century Literature, 11th grade (Ages 16-17), Used Books & Materials
1984
by George Orwell
from Harcourt
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$17.00 $11.00 (5 in stock)
Adventures of Robin Hood
Reader's Digest World's Best Reading
by Paul Creswick, illustrated by N. C. Wyeth
1991 Edition from Reader's Digest
for 6th-12th grade
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$8.00 (3 in stock)
Appointment with Death
A Hercule Poirot Mystery #19
by Agatha Christie
1975 Printing from Dell Publishing
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$2.00 (1 in stock)
At Bertram's Hotel
A Miss Marple Mystery #10
by Agatha Christie
from Dodd, Mead & Co.
for 9th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
$6.00 (1 in stock)
Atlas Shrugged
by Ayn Rand
Reprint from Plume Books
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$12.00 (1 in stock)
Atlas Shrugged
by Ayn Rand
Centennial from Plume Books
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$12.00 (1 in stock)
Atonement
by Ian McEwan
Reprint Edition from Anchor Books
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$4.50 (1 in stock)
Beau Geste
by Percival Christopher Wren
from Reader's Digest
for 11th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$9.00 (1 in stock)
Beejum Book
by Alice O. Howell
Revised
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$9.00 (1 in stock)
Blue at the Mizzen
Aubrey/Maturin #20
by Patrick O'Brian
from W. W. Norton and Co.
Nautical Fiction for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$7.50 (1 in stock)
Blue Shoes and Happiness
No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency #7
by Alexander McCall Smith
Edition from Anchor Books
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$6.50 (2 in stock)
Bridges of Madison County
by Robert James Waller
First. from Warner Books
for 11th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$5.00 (1 in stock)
Caine Mutiny
by Herman Wouk
from Doubleday & Company
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$12.00 (1 in stock)
Caine Mutiny
by Herman Wouk, illustrated by John Thompson
from Reader's Digest
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$12.00 (1 in stock)
Catch-22
by Joseph Heller
from Simon & Schuster Macmillan
for 11th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$9.50 (1 in stock)
Chosen
by Chaim Potok
from Ballantine Books
Realistic Fiction for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$9.00 (1 in stock)
Commodore
Aubrey/Maturin #17
by Patrick O'Brian
from W. W. Norton and Co.
Nautical Fiction for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$4.50 (1 in stock)
Common Life
Mitford Series Book 6
by Jan Karon
from Penguin Classics
for 11th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$4.00 (1 in stock)
Cry, the Beloved Country
by Alan Paton
5th edition from Charles Scribner's Sons
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$6.00 (1 in stock)
Cry, the Beloved Country
by Alan Paton
from Charles Scribner's Sons
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$17.00 $6.00 (1 in stock)
Dubliners
Dover Thrift Editions
by James Joyce
from Dover Publications
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$7.00 $4.00 (1 in stock)
Enchantress of Florence
by Salman Rushdie
Reprint from Anchor Books
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$6.50 (1 in stock)
Endless Knot
by Stephen Lawhead
1st edition from Chariot Victor Publishing
for 9th-12th grade
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$10.00 (1 in stock)
Ethan Frome
Dover Thrift Editions
by Edith Wharton
from Dover Publications
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$5.00 $1.00 (1 in stock)
Ethan Frome
by Edith Wharton
from Popular Publishing
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$4.00 (1 in stock)
Far Lands
by James Norman Hall
from Little, Brown & Company
for 8th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
$6.00 (1 in stock)
Five Red Herrings & Murder Must Advertise
A Lord Peter Mystery, Book 6 & Book 8
by Dorothy Sayers
from Nelson Doubleday, Inc.
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$8.00 (1 in stock)
Flames of Rome
by Paul L. Maier
2nd edition from Kregel Publications
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$8.00 (1 in stock)
For Whom the Bell Tolls
by Ernest Hemingway
from Charles Scribner's Sons
Realistic Fiction for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$8.00 (1 in stock)
For Whom the Bell Tolls
by Ernest Hemingway
from Charles Scribner's Sons
Realistic Fiction for 10th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
$6.00 (1 in stock)
Fortune of War
Aubrey/Maturin #6
by Patrick O'Brian
from W. W. Norton and Co.
Nautical Fiction for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$6.50 (1 in stock)
Full Cupboard of Life
No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency #5
by Alexander McCall Smith
from Anchor Books
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$6.50 (1 in stock)
Full Cupboard of Life
No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency #5
by Alexander McCall Smith
1st edition from Pantheon Books
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$6.00 (1 in stock)
Gods and Generals
by Jeff Shaara
from Ballantine Books
Historical Fiction for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$8.99 $5.00 (1 in stock)
Golden Ocean
by Patrick O'Brian
from W. W. Norton and Co.
Nautical Fiction for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$7.50 (1 in stock)
Good Husband of Zebra Drive
No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency #8
by Alexander McCall Smith
from Anchor Books
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$6.50 (2 in stock)
Great Divorce
by C.S. Lewis
for 11th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$2.50 (1 in stock)
Great Lion of God
by Taylor Caldwell
Book Club from Doubleday & Company
for 10th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
$6.00 (1 in stock)
Grendel
by John Gardner
from Vintage Classics
for 11th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$12.95 $8.00 (1 in stock)
Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society
by Mary Ann Shaffer
from Sun Dial Press
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$17.00 $9.00 (1 in stock)
H. M. S. Surprise
Aubrey/Maturin #3
by Patrick O'Brian
from W. W. Norton and Co.
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$7.50 (1 in stock)
Home to Holly Springs
by Jan Karon
1st edition from Viking Press
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$4.00 (1 in stock)
House on Mango Street
by Sandra Cisneros
from Vintage Classics
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$11.95 $4.00 (1 in stock)
Imperial Woman
by Pearl S. Buck
Book Club Edition from The John Day Company
for 10th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
$7.00 (1 in stock)
In the Company of Cheerful Ladies
No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency #6
by Alexander McCall Smith
from Anchor Books
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$6.50 (1 in stock)
In the Company of Cheerful Ladies
No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency #6
by Alexander McCall Smith
First American Edition from Pantheon Books
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$8.00 (1 in stock)
In This Mountain
Mitford Years Book 7
by Jan Karon
from Viking Press
for 11th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$5.00 (1 in stock)
Invisible Man
by Ralph Ellison
from Quality Paperback Book Club
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$8.00 (1 in stock)
Jungle, The
Norton Critical Editions
by Upton Sinclair
Norton Critical Edition from W. W. Norton and Co.
Social Commentary for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$15.00 (1 in stock)
Kalahari Typing School for Men
No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency #4
by Alexander Mccall Smith
1st Anchor Books Edition from Anchor Books
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$6.50 (1 in stock)
Killer Angels
by Michael Shaara
from Ballantine Books
Historical Fiction for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$6.00 (1 in stock)
Kite Runner
by Khaled Hosseini
from Riverhead Books
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$16.00 $10.00 (1 in stock)
Life of Pi
by Yann Martel
from Harvest Books
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$7.00 (1 in stock)
Life of Pi
by Yann Martel
from Canon Gate
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$7.00 (1 in stock)
Light in the Window
Mitford Series Book 2
by Jan Karon
from Penguin Putnam
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$4.00 (1 in stock)
Little Prince
by Antoine De Saint-Exupery
from Harvest House
Fantasy for 3rd-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$6.00 (2 in stock)
Little Prince
by Antoine De Saint-Exupery
from Harcourt
Fantasy for 3rd-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$7.50 (2 in stock)
Little Prince - Russian language edition
by Antoine De Saint-Exupery
from Eksmodetstvo
Fantasy for 3rd-Adult
in Russian (Location: FL-GEN)
$6.00 (1 in stock)
Lord of the Flies
by William Golding
from Riverhead Books
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$6.50 (1 in stock)
Lost Horizon
by James Hilton
1st Perennial Edition from Harper Perennial
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$7.50 (1 in stock)
Lost in a Good Book
Thursday Next Book 2
by Jasper Fforde
First American Edition from Viking Press
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$9.00 (1 in stock)
Middlesex
by Jeffrey Eugenides
Reprint from Picador
for 11th-Adult
Pulitzer Prize Winner
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$6.00 (1 in stock)
Miracle at Speedy Motors
No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency #9
by Alexander Mccall Smith
Reprint from Anchor Books
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$6.50 (1 in stock)
Moon and Sixpence
Modern Library
by W. Somerset Maugham
from Heritage Press
for 10th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
$25.00 (1 in stock)
Morbid Taste for Bones
Brother Cadfael
by Ellis Peters
from Mysterious Press
for 8th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$3.50 (1 in stock)
More Than Complete Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
by Douglas Adams
from Del Rey
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$9.00 (1 in stock)
Murder of Roger Ackroyd
A Hercule Poirot Mystery #4
by Agatha Christie
from Dodd, Mead & Co.
for 9th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
$15.00 (1 in stock)
My Cousin Rachel
by Daphne du Maurier
from Doubleday & Company
Mystery/Suspense for 9th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
$6.00 (1 in stock)
New Song
Mitford Series Book 5
by Jan Karon
from Penguin Putnam
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$4.00 (1 in stock)
Nohow On
by Samuel Beckett
from Grove Press, Inc.
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$4.50 (1 in stock)
O Pioneers
by Willa Cather
from Dover Publications
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$2.50 (1 in stock)
Old Man and the Sea
by Ernest Hemingway
from Charles Scribner's Sons
Realistic Fiction for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$1.60 (1 in stock)
One of Our Thursdays Is Missing
Thursday Next Book 6
by Jasper Fforde
from Penguin Putnam
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$16.00 $8.00 (1 in stock)
Out to Canaan
Mitford Series Book 4
by Jan Karon
from Penguin Putnam
Adult Fiction for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$4.00 (1 in stock)
Ox-Bow Incident
by Walter Van Tilburg Clark
Reissue from Modern Library
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$3.50 (1 in stock)
Passage to India
by E. M. Forster
from Harcourt
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$13.99 $9.00 (2 in stock)
Patriot
by Pearl S. Buck
from The John Day Company
for 10th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
$18.00 (1 in stock)
Penrod
by Booth Tarkington, illustrated by Gordon Grant
from Grosset & Dunlap
Realistic Fiction for 7th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
$14.00 (1 in stock)
Promise
by Chaim Potok
from Anchor Books
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$8.00 (1 in stock)
Quiet American
by Graham Greene
from Modern Library
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$6.00 (1 in stock)
Rabble in Arms
by Kenneth Roberts
from Doubleday & Company
for 10th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
$6.50 (1 in stock)
Right Attitude to Rain
by Alexander McCall Smith
from Anchor Books
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$6.50 (1 in stock)
Rumpole and the Primrose Path
by John Mortimer
from Viking Press
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$9.50 (1 in stock)
Saul Bellow: Novels 1944-1953
by Saul Bellow
from Library of America
for 11th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$10.00 (1 in stock)
Scarlet
by Stephen R. Lawhead
from Thomas Nelson Publishers
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$12.00 (1 in stock)
Screwtape Letters and Screwtape Proposes a Toast
by C.S. Lewis
Fourth American Printing from Macmillan
for 10th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
$12.00 (1 in stock)
Sea Wolf
by Jack London, illustrated by Fletcher Martin
from Easton Press
Naturalism for 10th-Adult
in Leather Bound Collectible Books (Location: VIN-LEA)
$35.00 (1 in stock)
Seabiscuit
by Laura Hillenbrand
from Ballantine Books
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$6.00 (1 in stock)
Separate Peace
by John Knowles
from Charles Scribner's Sons
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$16.00 $8.50 (4 in stock)
Shane
by Jack Schaefer
from Harcourt
for 7th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$8.99 $5.00 (1 in stock)
Shepherds Abiding
Mitford Years Book 8
by Jan Karon
from Penguin Putnam
for 11th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$4.00 (1 in stock)
So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish
Hitchhiker's Trilogy #4
by Douglas Adams
from Crown Publishers
Humorous Science Fiction for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$6.00 (1 in stock)
Song
by Calvin Miller
from InterVarsity Press
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$1.50 (1 in stock)
Space Trilogy Mass Market Box Set
by C. S. Lewis
from Macmillan
for 9th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
$18.00 (1 in stock)
Starship Troopers
by Robert Heinlein
from ACE Publishing
Science Fiction for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$19.00 $9.50 (1 in stock)
Story of Edgar Sawtelle
by David Wroblewski
from Ecco Press
Magic Realism for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$8.50 (1 in stock)
Strong Poison
A Lord Peter Mystery, Book 5
by Dorothy L. Sayers
from HarperCollins
Murder Mystery for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$4.50 (1 in stock)
Summer
by Edith Wharton
from Bantam Books
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$2.00 (1 in stock)
Tears of the Giraffe
No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency #2
by Alexander McCall Smith
ZZZ from Anchor Books
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$6.50 (1 in stock)
The Awakening
by Kate Chopin
from Bantam Books
for 11th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$2.00 (1 in stock)
12