Recommendations based on The Decameronby Giovanni Boccaccio

* statistically, based on millions of data-points provided by fellow humans

  1. The Divine Comedy

    by Dante Alighieri
    A poetic journey through the afterlife, guided by the Roman poet Virgil.

    The Divine Comedy describes Dante's descent into Hell with Virgil as a guide; his ascent of Mount Purgatory and encounter with his dead love, Beatrice; and finally, his arrival in Heaven. Examining ... (Goodreads)

  2. The Canterbury Tales

    by Geoffrey Chaucer
    A collection of stories told by a group of pilgrims on a journey to Canterbury.

    The procession that crosses Chaucer's pages is as full of life and as richly textured as a medieval tapestry. The Knight, the Miller, the Friar, the Squire, the Prioress, the Wife of Bath, and others ... (Goodreads)

  3. The Iliad

    by Homer
    Epic tale of the Trojan War, depicting heroism and tragedy.

    Dating to the ninth century B.C., Homer’s timeless poem still vividly conveys the horror and heroism of men and gods wrestling with towering emotions and battling amidst devastation and destruction, ... (Goodreads)

  4. Don Quixote

    by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
    An aging knight's adventures and misadventures, filled with chivalry, honor, and satire.

    Don Quixote has become so entranced by reading chivalric romances that he determines to become a knight-errant himself. In the company of his faithful squire, Sancho Panza, his exploits blossom in ... (Goodreads)

  5. Inferno

    by Dante Alighieri
    An epic journey through the nine circles of Hell, guided by the Roman poet Virgil.

    Of the great poets, Dante is one of the most elusive and therefore one of the most difficult to adequately render into English verse. In the Inferno, Dante not only judges sin but strives to ... (Goodreads)

  6. The Master and Margarita

    by Mikhail Bulgakov
    A fantastical, satirical examination of Soviet life, intersecting with the supernatural.

    The novel has two settings. The first is Moscow during the 1930s, where Satan appears at Patriarch's Ponds as Professor Woland . He is accompanied by Koroviev, a grotesquely-dressed valet; Behemoth , ... (Wikipedia)

  7. Paradise Lost

    by John Milton
    Epic poem of the Fall of Man, exploring the depths of human nature and the consequences of sin.

    John Milton's Paradise Lost is one of the greatest epic poems in the English language. It tells the story of the Fall of Man, a tale of immense drama and excitement, of rebellion and treachery, of ... (Goodreads)

  8. The Aeneid

    by Virgil
    Epic tale of Aeneas and the founding of Rome, a fateful journey through the gods.

    The Aeneid – thrilling, terrifying and poignant in equal measure – has inspired centuries of artists, writers and musicians. Virgil’s epic tale tells the story of Aeneas, a Trojan hero, who flees his ... (Goodreads)

  9. The Name of the Rose

    by Umberto Eco
    A Franciscan friar investigates a series of murders in a medieval monastery, uncovering a sinister plot.

    In 1327, Franciscan friar William of Baskerville and Adso of Melk , a Benedictine novice travelling under his protection, arrive at a Benedictine monastery in Northern Italy to attend a theological ... (Wikipedia)

  10. The Red and the Black

    by Stendhal
    A young man's ambitious rise in 19th century French society, as he navigates through its politics and passions.

    In two volumes,, The Red and the Black: A Chronicle of the 19th Century, tells the story of Julien Sorel's life in France's rigid social structure restored after the disruptions of the French ... (Wikipedia)

  11. War and Peace

    by Leo Tolstoy
    Epic tale of war, peace, and love, focusing on the lives of five aristocratic families.

    The novel begins in July 1805 in Saint Petersburg , at a soirée given by Anna Pavlovna Scherer—the maid of honour and confidante to the dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna . Many of the main characters ... (Wikipedia)

  12. In Search of Lost Time

    by Marcel Proust
    An exploration of memory, identity and loss of innocence, through the narrator's journey of self-discovery.

    On the surface a traditional "Bildungsroman" describing the narrator’s journey of self-discovery, this huge and complex book is also a panoramic and richly comic portrait of France in the author’s ... (Goodreads)

  13. The Brothers Karamazov

    by Fyodor Dostoevsky
    A philosophical exploration of morality, faith, and family dynamics among a group of brothers.

    The Brothers Karamazov is a murder mystery, a courtroom drama, and an exploration of erotic rivalry in a series of triangular love affairs involving the “wicked and sentimental” Fyodor Pavlovich ... (Goodreads)

  14. Gulliver's Travels: Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World.

    by Jonathan Swift
    A fanciful journey to lands of tiny people, giant people, talking horses, and other strange creatures.

    The travel begins with a short preamble in which Lemuel Gulliver gives a brief outline of his life and history before his voyages. During his first voyage, Gulliver is washed ashore after a shipwreck ... (Wikipedia)

  15. The Trial

    by Franz Kafka
    A man is arrested and put on trial for a crime that remains unclear throughout the novel.

    On the morning of his thirtieth birthday, Josef K., the chief cashier of a bank, is unexpectedly arrested by two unidentified agents from an unspecified agency for an unspecified crime. Josef is not ... (Wikipedia)

  16. The Three Musketeers

    by Alexandre Dumas
    An adventurous tale of friendship, courage, and battle in 17th century France.

    In 1625 France, d'Artagnan leaves his family in Gascony and travels to Paris to join the Musketeers of the Guard . At a house in Meung-sur-Loire , an older man derides d'Artagnan's horse. Insulted, ... (Wikipedia)

  17. Robinson Crusoe

    by Daniel Defoe
    A shipwrecked sailor's struggle to survive on an isolated island, and his eventual redemption.

    Crusoe (the family name corrupted from the German name "Kreutznaer") set sail from Kingston upon Hull on a sea voyage in August 1651, against the wishes of his parents, who wanted him to pursue a ... (Wikipedia)

  18. Metamorphoses

    by Ovid
    A collection of tales of transformation, featuring gods and mortals.

    Prized through the ages for its splendor and its savage, sophisticated wit, The Metamorphoses is a masterpiece of Western culture–the first attempt to link all the Greek myths, before and after ... (Goodreads)

  19. All Quiet on the Western Front

    by Erich Maria Remarque
    A soldier's harrowing experience of the horrors of war.

    The book tells the story of Paul Bäumer, who belongs to a group of German soldiers on the Western Front during World War I . The patriotic speeches of his teacher Kantorek had led the whole class to ... (Wikipedia)

  20. Fathers and Sons

    by Ivan Turgenev
    A story of generational divide, exploring the differences between fathers and sons.

    Arkady Kirsanov has just graduated from the University of Petersburg . He returns with a friend, Bazarov, to his father's modest estate in an outlying province of Russia. His father, Nikolay, gladly ... (Wikipedia)

  21. Beowulf

    by Unknown
    Epic poem recounting the heroic deeds of a legendary Scandinavian warrior.

    Beowulf is a major epic of Anglo-Saxon literature, probably composed between the first half of the seventh century and the end of the first millennium. The poem was inspired by Germanic and ... (Goodreads)

  22. Othello

    by William Shakespeare
    A tale of jealousy, manipulation, and tragedy, as one man's descent into madness leads to disastrous consequences.

    In Othello, Shakespeare creates a powerful drama of a marriage that begins with fascination (between the exotic Moor Othello and the Venetian lady Desdemona), with elopement, and with intense mutual ... (Goodreads)

  23. The Sound and the Fury

    by William Faulkner
    Tragic story of the decline of a southern family, exploring the human condition.

    The first section of the novel is narrated by Benjamin "Benjy" Compson, a source of shame to the family due to his diminished mental capacity; the only characters who show genuine care for him are ... (Wikipedia)

  24. Buddenbrooks: The Decline of a Family

    by Thomas Mann
    A story of a family's decline, tracing four generations of a wealthy German family.

    In 1835, the wealthy and respected Buddenbrooks, a family of grain merchants, invite their friends and relatives to dinner in their new home in Lübeck , Germany . The family consists of patriarch ... (Wikipedia)

  25. The Portrait of a Lady

    by Henry James
    A young woman's journey of self-discovery, standing up to society's expectations.

    Isabel Archer, from Albany, New York , is invited by her maternal aunt, Lydia Touchett, to visit Lydia's rich husband, Daniel, at his estate near London, following the death of Isabel's father. ... (Wikipedia)

  26. Ulysses

    by James Joyce
    Epic narrative following a day in the life of an Irishman living in Dublin.

    It is 8 a.m. Buck Mulligan , a boisterous medical student, calls Stephen Dedalus (a young writer encountered as the principal subject of, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, ) up to the roof of ... (Wikipedia)

  27. The Oresteia: Agamemnon, The Libation Bearers, The Eumenides

    by Aeschylus
    Tragedy of a cursed family and their struggle to find the truth and justice.

    Alternate cover edition can be found, here,, here,, here,, here, In the Oresteia—the only trilogy in Greek drama which survives from antiquity—Aeschylus took as his subject the bloody chain of murder ... (Goodreads)

  28. Les Fleurs du Mal

    by Charles Baudelaire
    Collection of poems exploring the beauty and depravity of human nature.

    Charles Baudelaire's 1857 masterwork was scandalous in its day for its portrayals of sex, same-sex love, death, the corrupting and oppressive power of the modern city and lost innocence, Les Fleurs ... (Goodreads)

  29. Mrs. Dalloway

    by Virginia Woolf
    A day in the life of a high-society woman, delving into her inner thoughts and feelings.

    Clarissa Dalloway goes around London in the morning, getting ready to host a party that evening. The nice day reminds her of her youth spent in the countryside in Bourton and makes her wonder about ... (Wikipedia)

  30. Hunger

    by Knut Hamsun
    The story of a man's battle against poverty and his descent into near-madness.

    The novel's first-person protagonist, an unnamed vagrant with intellectual leanings, probably in his late twenties, wanders the streets of Norway's capital, Kristiania ( Oslo ), in pursuit of ... (Wikipedia)