The Atlantic put out a list of books they consider The Great American Novels. They were very careful to include black authors and Hispanic authors and Injun authors and Asian authors and women authors and black women authors.
I’ve ordered their list by the author’s birth date.
1888 - The Big Sleep Raymond Chandler 1939
1890 - Amiable With Big Teeth Claude McKay 2017 (black)
1896 - The Great Gatsby F. Scott Fitzgerald 1925
1871 - An American Tragedy Theodore Dreiser 1925
1873 - Death Comes for the Archbishop Willa Cather 1927
1874 - The Making of Americans Gertrude Stein 1925
1891 - Their Eyes Were Watching God Zora Neale Hurston 1937 (black)
1891 - Passing Nella Larsen 1929 (black)
1892 - Nightwood Djuna Barnes 1936 (lesbian)
1896 - U.S.A. John Dos Passos 1937
1896 - A Time to Be Born Dawn Powell 1942
1897 - The Sound and the Fury William Faulkner 1929
1897 - Absalom, Absalom! William Faulkner 1936
1898 - East Goes West Younghill Kang 1937 (Korean)
1899 - Lolita Vladimir Nabokov 1955
1899 - Pale Fire Vladimir Nabokov 1962
1899 - A Farewell to Arms Ernest Hemingway 1929
1899 - Charlotte’s Web E. B. White 1952
1902 - The Grapes of Wrath John Steinbeck 1939
1903 - The Day of the Locust Nathanael West 1939
1904 - In a Lonely Place Dorothy B. Hughes 1947
1905 - All the King’s Men Robert Penn Warren 1946
1908 - The Street Ann Petry 1946 (black)
1908 - Native Son Richard Wright 1940 (black)
1909 - Ask the Dust John Fante 1939
1912 - The Group Mary McCarthy 1963
1914 - Invisible Man Ralph Ellison 1952 (black)
1915 - The Adventures of Augie March, Saul Bellow 1953
1915 - The Zebra-Striped Hearse Ross Macdonald 1962
1915 - The Mountain Lion Jean Stafford 1947
1916 - The Haunting of Hill House Shirley Jackson 1959
1917 - Maud Martha, Gwendolyn Brooks 1953 (black)
1917 - A Contract With God Will Eisner 1978
1917 - The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter, Carson McCullers 1940 (lesbian)
1917 - A Summons to Memphis Peter Taylor 1986
1918 - A Wrinkle in Time, Madeleine L'Engle 1962
1919 - The Catcher in the Rye J. D. Salinger 1951
1920 - Fahrenheit 451 Ray Bradbury 1953
1921 - Deep Water Patricia Highsmith 1957
1922 - On the Road Jack Kerouac 1957
1922 - Slaughterhouse-Five Kurt Vonnegut 1969
1923 - Desperate Characters Paula Fox 1970
1923 - Catch-22 Joseph Heller 1961
1923 - No-No Boy John Okada 1957 (Japanese)
1924 - Another Country James Baldwin 1962 (black)
1924 - Giovanni’s Room James Baldwin 1956 (black)
1924 - Peyton Place, Grace Metalious 1956
1925 - A Sport and a Pastime James Salter 1967
1928 - Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? Philip K. Dick 1968
1928 - Divorcing Susan Taubes 1969
1929 - The Dispossessed Ursula K. Le Guin 1974
1931 - Beloved Toni Morrison 1987 (black)
1931 - Song of Solomon Toni Morrison 1977 (black)
1931 - Sula Toni Morrison 1973 (black)
1932 - The Bell Jar Sylvia Plath 1963
1932 - Couples John Updike 1968
1933 - Blood Meridian Cormac McCarthy 1985
1933 - The Dog of the South Charles Portis 1979
1933 - Portnoy’s Complaint Philip Roth 1969
1933 - Sabbath’s Theater Philip Roth 1995
1933 - Mating Norman Rush 1991
1934 - Play It as It Lays Joan Didion 1970
1935 - The Revolt of the Cockroach People Oscar Zeta Acosta 1973 (Hispanic)
1935 - One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest Ken Kesey 1962
1935 - The Shipping News Annie Proulx 1993
1935 - Oreo Fran Ross 1974 (black)
1936 - Underworld Don DeLillo 1997
1937 - Log of the S.S. The Mrs Unguentine Stanley Crawford 1972
1937 - The Crying of Lot 49 Thomas Pynchon 1966
1938 - Speedboat Renata Adler 1976
1938 - Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret Judy Blume 1970
1938 - Blonde Joyce Carol Oates 2000
1938 - Mumbo Jumbo Ishmael Reed 1972 (black)
1939 - The Salt Eaters Toni Cade Bambara 1980 (black)
1940 - Tripmaster Monkey Maxine Hong Kingston 1989 (Chinese)
1940 - Winter in the Blood James Welch 1974
1942 - Little, Big: Or, the Fairies’ Parliament John Crowley 1981
1943 - Housekeeping Marilynne Robinson 1980
1944 - Dancer From the Dance Andrew Holleran 1978
1944 - The Quick and the Dead Joy Williams 2000
1945 - Geek Love Katherine Dunn 1989
1947 - Dawn Octavia E. Butler 1987 (black)
1947 - Kindred Octavia E. Butler 1979 (black)
1947 - The Stand Stephen King 1978
1948 - Oxherding Tale Charles Johnson 1982 (black)
1948 - Ceremony Leslie Marmon Silko 1977 (Injun)
1949 - Bastard Out of Carolina Dorothy Allison 1992
1949 - Stone Butch Blues Leslie Feinberg 1993 (lesbian)
1949 - Dogeaters Jessica Hagedorn 1990
1949 - Corregidora Gayl Jones 1975 (black)
1950 - How the García Girls Lost Their Accents Julia Alvarez 1991
1951 - I Hotel Karen Tei Yamashita 2010 (Japanese)
1952 - Machine Dreams Jayne Anne Phillips 1984
1953 - So Far From God Ana Castillo 1993 (Hispanic)
1953 - Watchmen Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons 1986
1954 - Caramelo Sandra Cisneros 2004
1954 - The Round House Louise Erdrich 2012
1954 - Veronica Mary Gaitskill 2005
1954 - Under the Feet of Jesus Helena María Viramontes 1995
1955 - I Love Dick, Chris Kraus 1997
1956 - Erasure Percival Everett 2001 (black)
1957 - The Last Samurai Helen DeWitt 2000
1957 - Perma Red Debra Magpie Earling 2002 (Injun)
1958 - Lincoln in the Bardo George Saunders 2017
1959 - I, the Divine Rabih Alameddine 2001
1959 - The Corrections Jonathan Franzen 2001
1962 - The Sellout Paul Beatty 2015
1962 - A Visit From the Goon Squad Jennifer Egan 2010
1962 - Infinite Jest David Foster Wallace 1996
1963 - The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay Michael Chabon 2000
1963 - The Secret History Donna Tartt 1992
1964 - American Psycho Bret Easton Ellis 1991
1965 - Native Speaker Chang-rae Lee 1995 (Korean)
1966 - House of Leaves Mark Z. Danielewski 2000
1967 - The Love Songs of W. E. B. Du Bois Honorée Fanonne Jeffers 2021 (black)
1967 - The Namesake Jhumpa Lahiri 2003 (subcontinental Indian)
1968 - The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao Junot Díaz 2007 (Hispanic)
1969 - The Intuitionist Colson Whitehead 1999 (black)
1970 - A Brief History of Seven Killings Marlon James 2014 (black)
1971 - Family Life Akhil Sharma 2014 (subcontinental Indian)
1971 - The Sympathizer Viet Thanh Nguyen 2015 (Vietnamese)
1972 - The Fifth Season N. K. (Nora Keita) Jemisin 2015 (black)
1972 - The Russian Debutante’s Handbook Gary Shteyngart 2002
1975 - Open City Teju Cole 2011 (black)
1977 - Americanah Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie 2013 (black)
1977 - Salvage the Bones Jesmyn Ward 2011 (black)
1978 - Fates and Furies Lauren Groff 2015
1978 - Nothing to See Here Kevin Wilson 2019
1979 - Nevada Imogen Binnie 2013
1980 - The Old Drift Namwali Serpell 2019 (black)
1982 - There There Tommy Orange 2018 (Injun)
1983 - Lost Children Archive Valeria Luiselli 2019 (Mexican)
1983 - Severance Ling Ma 2018 (Chinese)
1982- No One Is Talking About This Patricia Lockwood 2021
1985 - Biography of X Catherine Lacey 2023
1989 - Sabrina Nick Drnaso 2018 (comic book artist)