10 Best American Novelists Ranked

Novels are such a staple in America that it’s hard to imagine a world without them. Although the first novel was written hundreds and hundreds of years ago, they grew in popularity towards the end of the eighteenth century, and in the beginning of the nineteenth century.

And while America has its fair share of great novelists from the 1800s, some of our greatest took the pen to paper in the following century and stood on the shoulders of giants to create truly groundbreaking works that would change the course of literature forever.

Without further ado, here are the 10 best American novelists ranked.

1. Mark Twaine

Mark Twaine was so great that he influenced virtually every writer that came after him. His book, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn was arguably THE “Great American Novel”. However, his predecessors crafted works that were pretty good, and perhaps even rivaled Huck for that saught after title. 

Twaine was an adventurer, an independent thinker, and a man who lived a vastly interesting life during a time of great advent. He never really did manage to maintain a fortune, though, and despite his amazing success, he struggled with money until his dying days. 

“Go to Heaven for the climate, Hell for the company.” – Mark Twain

2. Ernest Hemingway

It’s hard to imagine a writer being as famous as Hemingway was today. JK Rowling might come close, but nobody has the fame attached to persona the way Hemingway did. He didn’t just write about interesting things – he lived them. And his work was deeply personal. Luckily, he had such a great and diverse life that it complimented his deeply personal writing style. 

Hemingway has written many great works, but the best of his novels are The Sun Also Rises (written when Hemingway was only 27), The Old Man and the Sea, and A Farewell to Arms.

“There is nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed.” – Ernest Hemingway

3. F. Scott Fitsgerald

Hemingway and Fitsgerald had a friendly rivalry that lasted throughout their lives together. Both were immensely talented writers and lived in Paris back when it was cheaper for young writers to live in Paris than in their own home countries. 

Both writers were in a race to write the “Great American Novel” (assuming it hadn’t already been written by Twaine). Unfortunately for Hemingway, Fitsgerald got there first. His novel,  The Great Gatsby, is arguably the greatest American novel ever written. 

“So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.” ― F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby

4. Flannery O’Connor

Flannery O’Connor never lived to be terribly old, but her works rank up there with the best of them. Perhaps her best book, Wise Blood, is somewhat dystopian, although not in the way we think of it today. It tells the story of an America that is very strange, foreign and yet too familiar.

Underlying all of O’Connor’s works is not only a sense of darkness, but also a strange story of salvation, spirituality and faith.

“He had a look of composed dissatisfaction, as if he understood life thoroughly.” ― Flannery O'Connor, A Good Man is Hard to Find and Other Stories

5. JD Salinger

Salinger showed immense talent as a writer, and his book, The Catcher in the Rye pretty much inspired every story about a young adult that you have ever read today. And yet, no matter how many angsty movies, television shows or novels are published about disenfranchised youths, none does it better than Salinger’s story about Holden Caufield. 

Salinger didn’t write a lot, however. In part to get away from the fame he received from his most famous novel, Salinger spent the remainder of his life as a recluse. 

Besides The Catcher in the Rye, it’s worthwhile reading his short stories as well as his novella, Franny and Zoey.

“I'm quite illiterate, but I read a lot. ”― J.D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye

6. John Steinbeck

A lot of great writers have some tie with or love for California. Steinnbeck, however, takes this love affair to a whole new level. Born in California, Steinbeck writes about the lands he knew well in the Salinas valley, depicting a very different world than that which you might see there today. 

Steinbeck’s greatest works are probably Of Mice and Men and The Grapes of Wrath. 

Dear Pat,
You came upon me carving some kind of little figure out of wood and you said, “Why don’t you make something for me?”
I asked you what you wanted, and you said, “A box.”
“What for?”
“To put things in.”
“What kind of things?”
“Whatever you have,” you said.
Well, here’s your box. Nearly everything I have is in it, and it is not full. Pain and excitement are in it, and feeling good or bad and evil thoughts and good thoughts- the pleasure of design and some despair and the indescribable joy of creation.
And on top of these are all the gratitude and love I have for you.
And still the box is not full." – John Steinbeck, East of Eden.

7. Jack London

Another writer who lived as great a life as he wrote about, London was an avid adventurer and drinker. The latter is what led to his early death after amassing an immense wealth from his writings. 

London is probably best known for his work Call of the Wild. However another of his lesser known works that is well worth a read is the semi autobiographical book Martin Eden – the story of a young man who makes the incredible leap from laborer to acclaimed writer. 

“He was a man without a past, whose future was the imminent grave and whose present was a bitter fever of living.” ― Jack London, Martin Eden

8. Jack Kerouac

If Mark Twain is the guy to blame for writing the first ever road trip novel, Jack Kerouac is the guy to blame for bringing it back to life for a whole new era. Jack Kerouac’s most famous book, On the Road, is about a couple of crazy kids looking for God on the open roads of America. It is one of the greatest books in American literature, and should be read by any literary enthusiast.

“Nothing behind me, everything ahead of me, as is ever so on the road.” ― Jack Kerouac, On the Road

9. Harper Lee

To Kill a Mockingbird has shown up on everyone’s school reading list at some point. And there’s a reason for it. It is one of the best books ever written by an American author. The novel was so good, in fact, that Harper Lee never wrote another. That is, until much, much later in life.

“You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view... Until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it.”
― Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird

10. Nathaniel Hawthorne

Nathaniel Hawthorne may have been an early American novelist, and being so in many ways far removed from the other writers on this list – however that does not exclude his influence. One book in particular, The Scarlett Letter, ranks highly as one of the greatest novels to ever come out of America’s fine literary history of novel writing.

“She had not known the weight until she felt the freedom.” ― Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Scarlet Letter