Alice was beginning to get very tired of sitting by her sister on the riverbank, and of having nothing to do: once or twice she had peeped into the book her sister was reading, but it had no pictures or conversations in it, 'and what is the use of a book', thought Alice, 'without pictures or conversation?' Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, by Lewis Carroll.

Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way. Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy.

It was a queer, sultry summer, the summer they electrocuted the Rosenbergs, and I didn't know what I was doing in New York. The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath.

124 was spiteful. Beloved by Toni Morrison.

First the colors. The Book Thief by Markus Zusak.

The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents. The Call of Cthulhu, by H. P. Lovecraft.

If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you'll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don't feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth. The Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger.

Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show. David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens.

Midway upon the journey of our life, I found myself within a forest dark, for the straightforward pathway had been lost. The Divine Comedy, The Inferno by Dante Alighieri.

In the week before their departure to Arrakis, when all the final scurrying about had reached a nearly unbearable frenzy, an old crone came to visit the mother of the boy, Paul. Dune, by Frank Herbert.

Emma Woodhouse, handsome, clever, and rich, with a comfortable home and happy disposition, seemed to unite some of the best blessings of existence; and had lived nearly twenty-one years in the world with very little to distress or vex her. Emma by Jane Austen.

It was a pleasure to burn. Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury.

During the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless day in the autumn of the year, when the clouds hung oppressively low in the heavens, I had been passing alone, on horseback, through a singularly dreary tract of country; and at length found myself, as the shades of the evening drew on, within view of the melancholy House of Usher. The Fall of the House of Usher by Edgar Allan Poe.

His name was Gaal Dornick and he was just a country boy who had never seen Trantor before. Foundation by Isaac Asimov.

Marley was dead, to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that. A Christmas Carol, by Charles Dickens.

Perhaps the sentiments contained in the following pages, are not yet sufficiently fashionable to procure them general favour; a long habit of not thinking a thing wrong gives it a superficial appearance of being right, and raises at first a formidable outcry in defence of custom. Common Sense by Thomas Paine.

The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there. The Go-Between by L. P. Hartley.

There was a hand in the darkness, and it held a knife. The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman.

In my younger and more vulnerable years my father gave me some advice I've been turning over in my mind ever since. Whenever you feel like criticising any one, he told me, just remember that all the people in this world haven't had the advantages that you've had. The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald.

Mr and Mrs Dursley, of number four, Privet Drive, were proud to say that they were perfectly normal, thank you very much. Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone by J.K. Rowling.

Harry Potter was a very unusual boy in many ways. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban by J.K. Rowling.

In the land of Ingary where such things as seven-league boots and cloaks of invisibility really exist, it is quite a misfortune to be born the eldest of the three. Everyone knows you are the one who will fail first, and worst, if the three of you set out to seek your fortunes. Howl's Moving Castle, by Diana Wynne Jones.

When I wake up, the other side of the bed is cold. The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

There was no possibility of taking a walk that day. Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte.

Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. Lo-lee-ta: the tip of the tongue taking a trip of three steps down the palate to tap, at three, on the teeth. Lo. Lee. Ta. Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov.

When Mr. Bilbo Baggins of Bag End announced that he would shortly be celebrating his eleventy-first birthday with a party of special magnificence, there was much talk and excitement in Hobbiton. The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien.

In an old house in Paris that was covered with vines lived twelve little girls in two straight lines. Madeline by Ludwig Bemelmans.

As Gregor Samsa awoke from a night of uneasy dreaming, he found himself transformed in his bed into a gigantic insect. The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka.

Mrs. Dalloway said she would buy the flowers herself. Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf.

The night before he went to London, Richard Mayhew was not enjoying himself. Neverwhere, by Neil Gaiman.

I am a sick man… I am a spiteful man. I am an unpleasant man. I think my liver is diseased. Notes from Underground by Fyodor Dostoevsky.

He was an old man who fished alone in a skiff in the Gulf Stream and he had gone eighty-four days now without taking a fish. The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway.

Many years later, as he faced the firing squad, Colonel Aureliano Buendía was to remember that distant afternoon when his father took him to discover ice. One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez.

As summer wheat came ripe, so did I, born at home, on the kitchen floor. Out of the Dust by Karen Hesse.

Of Man's first disobedience, and the fruit Of that forbidden tree whose mortal taste Brought death into the world, and all our woe, With loss of Eden, till one greater Man Restore us, and regain the blissful Seat Paradise Lost by John Milton.

All children, except one, grow up. Peter Pan by J. M. Barrie.

First of all, it was October, a rare month for boys. Something Wicked This Way Comes by Ray Bradbury.

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way - in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only. A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens.

True! - nervous - very, very nervous I had been and am; but why will you say that I am mad? The Tell-Tale Heart, by Edgar Allan Poe.

One thing was certain, that the white kitten had nothing to do with it: -- it was the black kitten's fault entirely. For the white kitten had been having its face washed by the old cat for the last quarter of an hour (and bearing it pretty well, considering); so you see that it couldn't have had any hand in the mischief. Through the Looking Glass, by Lewis Carroll.

When he was nearly thirteen, my brother Jem got his arm badly broken at the elbow. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee.

Someone must have slandered Josef K., for one morning, without having done anything truly wrong, he was arrested. The Trial by Franz Kafka.

Behind every man now alive stand thirty ghosts, for that is the ratio by which the dead outnumber the living.2001: A Space Odyssey by Arthur C. Clarke.

Not every 13-year-old girl is accused of murder, brought to trial, and found guilty. The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle by Avi.

Dog carcass in alley this morning, tire tread on burst stomach. This city is afraid of me. I have seen its true face. Watchmen by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons.