Laura Belgray’s favorite unputdownable fiction books of all time (in case you were googling)

Lordy, this post is so not optimized for search. I’ll do that later. For now, I wanted a handy place to send you when you share my reading taste and ask for a book recommendation.

I’ve finally nailed down my favorite genre — the sweeping, multi-decade epic novel.

I often search using the term:

“Unputdownable multi-decade epic novels like Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow, Demon Copperhead, All the Colors of the Dark, and East of Eden.”

(I like to toss the Steinbeck in there so results aren’t limited to 21st Century choices.)

Here’s my list of all-time faves that I wish I could read again for the first time, with the books that fit that search term in bold. I might be misremembering a few that aren’t bolded.  Regardless of font weight, every one of these qualifies as “unputdownable.” Or, as they now call it, a “banger.”

Buckeye — Patrick Ryan (currently reading, Jan 2026)

All the Colors of the Dark — Chris Whitaker

Great Circle — Maggie Shipstead

Astonish Me — Maggie Shipstead

The Wedding People — Alison Espach

The Guest — Emma Cline

The Bee Sting — Paul Murray

Demon Copperhead — Barbara Kingsolver

Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow — Gabrielle Zevin

Pachinko — Min Jin Lee

The Great Believers — Rebecca Makkai

The Goldfinch — Donna Tartt

The Art of Fielding — Chad Harbach

The Beautiful Ruins — Jess Walter

Where’d You Go, Bernadette — Maria Semple

This One Is Mine – Maria Semple

The Kite Runner — Khaled Hosseini

Middlesex — Jeffrey Eugenides

The Corrections — Jonathan Franzen

Fall on Your Knees — Ann-Marie MacDonald

Geek Love — Katherine Dunn

The Secret History — Donna Tartt

Look at Me — Jennifer Egan

A Visit from the Goon Squad — Jennifer Egan

I Am Charlotte Simmons — Tom Wolfe

The Bonfire of the Vanities — Tom Wolfe

People Like Us — Dominick Dunne

(and all novels by Dominick Dunne)

Little Children — Tom Perrotta

The Thorn Birds — Colleen McCullough

Roots — Alex Haley

Uncle Tom’s Cabin — Harriet Beecher Stowe

East of Eden and The Grapes of Wrath — John Steinbeck