Reading the States: Illinois

State: ILLINOIS

Fiction:

- The Time Traveler's Wife* by Audrey Niffenegger

- The Jungle* by Upton Sinclair

- The House on Mango Street* by Sandra Cisneros

- The Actual by Saul Bellow

- Sister Carrie by Theodore Dreiser

- Twenty Years at Hull House by Jane Addams

- Native Son* by Richard Wright

- If You Eat, You Never Die: Chicago Tales by Tony Romano

- Then We Came to the End by Joshua Ferris

- The Coast of Chicago by Stuart Dybek

- Crossing California by Adam Langer

- Spoon River Anthology by Edgar Lee Masters

- The Book of Ruth* by Jane Hamilton

- Across Five Aprils by Irene Hunt

- Dandelion Wine* by Ray Bradbury

- Road to Perdition by Max Allan Collins,

- So Long, See You Tomorrow by William Maxwell

- Catch by Will Leitch

- Divergent* (series) by Veronica Roth

- Something Wicked This Way Comes* by Ray Bradbury

- The Adventures of Augie March by Saul Bellow

- Letting Go by Philip Roth

- Endless Love by Scott Spencer

- The Death of the Detective by Mark Smith
- Maud Martha by Gwendolyne Brooks
- Pioneer Girl by Bich Minh Nguyen

Nonfiction:

- The Devil in the White City* by Erik Larson

- Chicago Tavern: A Goat, A Curse, and the American Dream, by Rick Kogan

- Boss: Richard J. Daley of Chicago by Mike Royko

- Never a City So Real: A Walk in Chicago by Alex Kotlowitz

- Cahokia by Timothy R. Pauketat

- The Girls of Murder City* by Douglas Perry
- Moanin' at Midnight by James Segrest and Mark Hoffman 
- Chicago: City on the Make by Nelson Algren

Authors Known for Writing about the State:

- Carl Sandburg

- Jim Butcher (The Dresden Files)

- Michael Harvey

Authors Who Lived Here:

- Ray Bradbury

- Saul Bellow

- Diane Ackerman

- Stephen E. Ambrose

- Dave Eggers

- William Goldman

- Ronald Reagan

- Elizabeth Berg

- Sara Paretsky
- Barack Obama

Great Bookstores:

Anderson’s Bookstore

Bookworks

Myopic Books

Sandmeyer’s Bookstore

Literary Places to Visit:
Carl Sandburg Historic Site
American Writers Museum

*Books I've Read

Photo by moi.