Are you looking for the best English books to read?
You’re are at the right place!
On this page, you’ll find suggestions for excellent English books (and a few helpful reading tips).
Table of Contents:
- The Cheapest Way to Buy English Books
- Famous Novels in English to Read
- Best English Nonfiction Books to Read
- Should You Read Free Stuff on the Web?
- How to Understand What You Read
The Cheapest Way to Buy English Books
English books can be expensive.
In my country, they’re 30% – 60% more expensive than local books.
So if you want to save money, I recommend buying digital books from Amazon.com (instead of physical books from your local bookstore).
The prices of physical books range from $5 to $25. (It’s rare to find them cheaper than that because of printing and distribution costs.)
However, if you examine the prices of digital books on Amazon, they usually range from $0 to $15.
In fact, there are plenty of great books that are free or dirt cheap!
This is possible because digital books don’t have printing, distribution, or storage costs. (Technically they do, but the costs are negligible.)
Digital books are convenient. You can read them on your phone using Amazon’s Kindle app.
This reading app is optimized to give you the best reading experience possible. There are no ads or other distractions, and you can enlarge the text so it’s easy on the eyes.
And if you see a word you don’t know, you can long-press on that word and the meaning will show up instantly. (This is such a convenient and time-saving feature.)
If you’re not sure about buying a particular book, you can request a free sample. If you read the sample and don’t like it, you don’t have to buy.
If you have never read digital books on Kindle app before, give it a try. (You can start by reading free samples or free books.) You may not want to go back to reading physical books again.
Did you know that Amazon is the world’s largest bookstore? Unlike traditional bookstores where the number of books is limited by physical space, there are millions of digital books on Amazon!
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Famous Novels in English to Read
Reading novels is awesome; you get to be immersed in an imaginative world.
Novels have a wide range of words that describe places, objects, characters, emotions, actions, etc. So reading fiction can improve your vocabulary like nothing else.
Dudley looked a lot like Uncle Vernon. He had a large pink face, not much neck, small, watery blue eyes, and thick blond hair that lay smoothly on his thick, fat head.
Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone
Fiction also contains a lot of “dialogue” (conversations between characters). Which means you get to learn vocabulary that people use in spoken English.
Here are the novels that I recommend:
- Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone (Fantasy) — The first book of the magical Harry Potter series. I’ve reread these books so many times. The first two books are easy to read and perfect for novice readers, whereas the later books are more mature and suitable for intermediates.)
- Angel and Demon & The Da Vinci Code (mystery thriller) — The first two books of the controversial Robert Langdon series. There are more novels in the series but I didn’t like them much. (I feel like the author kept using the same plot structure.) But these first two kept me up all night!
- Ender’s Game (sci-fi) — This novel is about a genius boy who is recruited into a battle school where he has to undergo military training to become the commander of a war against aliens. If you like a story where the main character is highly intelligent, you’ll love this book.
I know this is a short list. (Sorry about that.) I’ve read more titles but these are the only ones I couldn’t put down.
That said, the Harry Potter series has 7 books total (most of which are very long). Reading this series alone is more than enough to keep you busy for a long time.
Best English Nonfiction Books to Read
The best nonfiction books “for you” are ones based on your interests.
If you’re interested in being healthy, read fitness books. If you want to invest your money, read investing books. If you’re passionate about learning history, read history books.
That said, if you’re not sure what books are worth reading, here are some excellent books everyone should read:
- The Compound Effect — Every day, we all have to make many decisions like whether to read a book or browse social media, whether to learn English or play games. These decisions will determine your success or failure. This book will help you make better decisions. It will teach you the importance of every choice you make no matter how small it seems.
- Mini Habits: Smaller Habits, Bigger Results — To improve your English, you need to develop some good habits like listening, reading, and practicing English. This book will teach you how to develop these habits.
- Mindset: The New Psychology of Success — According to this book, there are two types of people: 1) people with “a fixed mindset” who believe their abilities can’t be changed and 2) people with “a growth mindset” who think that abilities can be improved. Your success in life depends on which mindset you have.
- The Success Principles — This book will teach you how to succeed at anything you set your mind to do (such as improving your English). Many of the ideas in this book are truly powerful and life changing. Definitely a good read.
- Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic Future — A biography of Elon Musk, one of the world’s most influential persons today. This guy achieved feats that many thought impossible. A truly admirable person.
Reminder: if you’re not sure about a particular book, you can download a sample first.
Should You Read Free Stuff on The Web?
Other than books, there are other types of reading material:
- Blogs/websites (online articles)
- Forums
- News apps
- English reading apps (for English students)
The advantage of these materials is that, unlike books, they’re completely free.
However, I highly recommend that you stick with books.
The main reason is that these types of reading material contain advertisements and other distracting elements (like pop-ups). So it’s hard to stay focused.
When you read something to improve your English, you should be in a state of full concentration. These distractions will prevent you from entering that state.
Also, in terms of quality, books are the best material to read. When you read a book, you’re reading a piece of work that someone spent months or even years writing.
Online reading materials, on the other hand, tend to be written in a matter of hours. They’re rather disposable and don’t provide as much value.
How to Understand What You Read
Some English books can be difficult to understand.
Here are some useful tips for better reading comprehension:
Tip #1: Read a book that suits your English level
Before picking a book, always read a sample to see whether it’s too difficult for you.
If you buy digital books on Amazon, you can download a sample of every book for free. Or if you don’t have an Amazon account, you can google “excerpt [book name]” for sample text from the book.
Different books have different levels of vocabulary and writing style. Classic books written a long time ago tend to be difficult to understand, so try to avoid them if you’re a novice reader.
Tip #2: Read novels that have been made into movies
Novels can be challenging to understand.
If you’ve tried to read a novel before, you probably found it difficult to imagine the places, people, and other things described in the novel.
A way to overcome this challenge is to watch the film adaptation of a novel first.
This way, when reading the novel, it will be easier to follow the plot and visualize the things in the novel.
Tip #3: Read a book is your native language first, then read the English version.
If you own the translated version of a particular book, then buy and read the English version as well.
Having both versions is useful. If you have don’t understand a passage in the English version, you can consult the translated version for the meaning of that passage.
I know applying this advice costs money. You have to buy (or borrow) two versions of the same book. But you won’t believe how much you will learn using this method.
If you use this strategy with books with a lot of difficult words and passages, your vocabulary and reading skills will improve by leaps and bounds!
Tip #4: Use Google Image Search
When reading a book, you often come across words that represent physical objects:
- a waistcoat
- a plaid sweater
- the hull of a ship
- a courtyard
If you read the meanings of these words and still have trouble visualizing the objects, you can search Google for images of the objects.
As the old saying goes, a picture is worth a thousand words.
