Spanish Literature Recommendations
One thing I really would have appreciated when I first started learning Spanish was a list of books originally in Spanish, graded by difficulty and grouped by theme. My goal for this page is to be that. I will add to this page as I continue to read. I’ll also make a note of if the audiobook is available.
Beginner Books
Criteria to Start: This are books I felt like I could read after the Harry Potter series fairly easily. They require completion of at least the Spanish 1K deck, and probably a couple hundred thousand words of graded readers.
Fantasy
Sendero de Guardabosques Series (España)
Reviewed: Book 5 . Books aren’t the best quality but are absolutely excellent for learning.
Audiobook for the first fifteen books. All kindle unlimited
La Ciudad de Las Bestias and its sequel (Chile/Estados Unidos)
Reviewed: I haven’t reviewed these in depth but I also can’t recommend them. Absolute orientalist crap. I talk a little bit about both of them in this blog post.
Audiobook available
Como agua para chocolate (México)
Reviewed: Not reviewed in depth, but discussed here. Short, sweet and lyrical.
Audiobook available
Memoir
Cajas de Cartón (Estados Unidos)
Reviewed: I haven’t reviewed this in depth, but I recommend highly. Memoirs of a college professor growing up as a migrant farm laborer. I discuss a little in this blog post.
Audiobook available
Nonfiction
Ikagi (España)
Reviewed: I haven’t reviewed this in depth, but I also recommend highly. Japanese philosophy of life. I talk about Ikagi a little bit in this blog post.
Audiobook available
La gran adicción: Cómo sobrevivir sin internet y no aislarse del mundo (España)
Reviewed here. Maximalist critique of internet use.
Audiobook available.
Los Cuatro Acuerdos (México)
Standard self-help spiel under the guise of “ancient toltec wisdom”/ some new-age spirituality. Not a bad idea to read if you’re into that stuff, but honestly nothing special.
Intermediate Books
Criteria to Start: These are what I would call “normal” adult books. Something you might find and read at an airport. I became comfortable with these around ~1000 hours of immersion and around 4 million words of reading.
Fantasy
Olvidado Rey Gudú (España)
Reviewed: Reviewed in depth here. Absolutely nothing like it in English. Highly recommend. Also recommend a reread at a more advanced level.
Audiobook available
General Fiction
Habana año cero (Cuba)
Part chic-lit, part noir, this short book was predictable, but painted a vivid picture of the effects of the fall of the Soviet Union on Cuba on levels both personal and political. I found out about this book through Charco Press, which is a British publisher/translator that aims to bring new Latin-American fiction to English readers.
Audiobook available
El libro negro de las horas (España)
Never have I ever read such a nerdy thriller in my life. This is a book about the criminal underworld surrounding…rare book dealers. Nothing like it that I’ve seen in English.
Audiobook available
Historical Fiction
Africanus (España)
Reviewed: Not reviewed in depth but discussed here. Generally liked Africanus, but it becomes a bit of a slog. Great for learning Roman history though. Also not available in English.
Audiobook available
Roma Soy Yo (España)
Reviewed: Not in depth, but discuss here. Recommend much more highly than Africanus, and I don’t think there’s a similar book that focuses on this phase of Caeser’s life.
Audiobook available
Maldita Roma (España)
Reviewed here. Very entertaining, but very ridiculously biased in favor of Caesar. Lots of other resources about this time in Caesar’s political career. Plan to write more on this topic soon with an angle towards the duties and pitfalls of historical fiction.
El Guerrero a la Sombra del Cerezo (España)
Reviewed: Reviewed in depth here. Really enjoyed the mystery element of the two plots of this one.
Audiobook available
El Imperio Eres Tu (España)
Reviewed: No in-depth review but I thought this was a really interesting way to do historical fiction, blending narrative and textbook-style history. Discussed more here.
La Catedral del Mar (España)
Reviewed: Not reviewed in-depth, but I really enjoyed the book and the TV series. Very graphic however. Do not recommend for kids. Discussed here.
Audiobook available
Sidi (España)
Reviewed: Review in Spanish on my Goodreads. This is a (relatively) short book about a short period in the life of the Spanish hero Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar, more commonly known as El Cid. I loved the dialogue and descriptions of the battle scenes in this book, but found the character development lacking, and some of the period specific vocabulary difficult. Pérez-Reverte also sometimes writes in the most confusing way.
Audiobook available.
Largo Petaló de Mar (Chile/US)
Reviewed in-depth here. Sprawling family saga about the Spanish Civil War, Latin American immigration, and political conflict in Chile. Very manageable in terms of vocab, but a lot of description and little dialogue.
Audiobook Available
Violeta (Chile/US)
Follows the life of Violeta del Valle from 1920 to 2020 (Spanish Flu→ COVID) across a century of tumult in an un-named South American country (which is obviously Chile from the lack of acknowledgement of the Falklands War). I found the main character to be a selfish prick, and the lack of specifics about chilean history to be frustrating, especially compared to the other Allende book on this list.
Audiobook Available
Nonfiction
No te Arrepientas (España)
Reviewed: Not reviewed in-depth, but thought was a little too preachy and perhaps too biased. However, nice counterpoint to the standard anti-colonization narratives. A little discussion here.
Audiobook available
Una Historia de España (España)
Reviewed: I haven’t reviewed this in depth, but I don’t like Perez-Reverte’s writing style and I found the jokes to fly completely over my head. I discuss more in this blog post.
Audiobook available
La Gran Aventura del Reino de Asturias (España)
Reviewed I haven’t reviewed this in depth, but this book was too filled with names and dates. I discuss more in this blog post.
No audiobook available. Kindle Unlimited.
Aprendiendo a Aprender (España)
Plenty of similar books in English (Ultralearning, Make it Stick, etc.), but this was an excellent recap for me of science-based learning strategies to help me expand my Spanish vocabulary to the education domain. Bonus points for being originally in Spanish.
Audiobook available
Science Fiction
Hijos del Dios Binario (España)
Reviewed: in depth here. Recommend highly. One of the few thrillers I have enjoyed over the past few years.
No audiobook available. Kindle Unlimited
La Invención de Morel (Argentina)
Reviewed in-depth here. Short, mysterious, and profound.
Audiobook available
Cuerpos del Verano (Argentina)
Reviewed: in depth here. Short, sweet and provocative.
Audiobook available not through Amazon.
Advanced Books
Criteria to Start: Honestly, these are the kind of books that you would struggle with in your native language, so there isn’t a set start point. I wouldn’t tackle until you’ve got at least 4 million words and some intermediate books under your belt.
Fantasy
Cuentos Completos de Jorge Luis Borges (Argentina)
Reviewed: Haven’t reviewed in depth, but one of the best things I’ve ever read. Hard as fuck though. I discuss in various blog posts here, here and here.
Audiobook available
Philosophy
La Rebelión de las Masas por José Ortega y Gasset (España)
Reviewed: Reviewed in-depth here. Was a pretty difficult read, but mainly because of the ideas, although there were numerous Spanish words I was not familiar with. A strident cultural critique of our modern society
Audiobook available
Del sentimiento trágico de la vida por Miguel de Unamuno (España)
Reviewed: Reviewed in-depth here. A difficult read, but mainly because of the quoted philosophers and references, and less so because of the Spanish. I did however, find Unamuno less straightforward than Ortega y Gasset, and thus more difficult to understand.
Audiobook available on YouTube
Poetry
Poesia Completa de Luis Garcia Montero (España)