89.14

“Norman Mailer: Ten Favorite American Novels.” The Reader’s Catalog: An Annotated Selection of More than 40,000 of the Best Books in Print in 208 Categories. Edited by Geoffrey O’Brien with Stephen Wasserstein and Helen Morris. New York: Jason Epstein/Random House. Mailer’s ten favorite American novels are in a box on page 259, one of a number of such brightener inserts in this mammoth catalog. He notes that except for Huckleberry Finn, he read the other nine in his first year of college: “Freshman year at Harvard is luminous because of these books.” They are, in his order of importance: U.S.A., Huckleberry Finn, Studs Lonigan, Look Homeward, Angel, The Grapes of Wrath, The Great Gatsby, The Sun Also Rises, Appointment in Samarra, The Postman Always Rings Twice, Moby-Dick. See 99.11, in which he lists the same books, same order. See also 99.10, 07.44, 09.4.