STACKED: What’s on Adam Ross' Shelf

I thought what I would do is start with some of the books that really got me interested in writing in the first place, so we’re gonna start it with Calvino's Invisible Cities.

So another writer who really lit me up when I was young, which was a long time ago, is Saul Bellow... There was a long period of time when I was a completist in my reading, where I would read one book by an author... then I’d read my way through their entire body of work, which is something I did with Bellow.

I have the entire collection of Frank Herbert's Dune series. I read these for the first time when I was 13... this was the first set of books that set me dreaming in a way that made me think I might want to do something like this. If you haven’t read Frank Herbert’s Dune series and have only seen the movie, go back and read them—they’re just as spectacular as you've heard.

Lori Moore continues to put out some of the most vital and remarkable fiction in the country. I like to think of her as our American version of Nabokov because she has that level of stylistic play and uproarious humor. She writes about people who are both tragic and funny all at once. I think reading her entire body of work would make you a smarter person.

So, talking about vital women in American fiction… These beautiful, tight little novels are full of heartbreak, humor, and beauty.

This is one of those memoirs… It's tragic and powerful… This is a book about men [Ward] was close to in her life, whom she lost to various kinds of violence and social decay. She has one of those voices that throbs with life in every sentence and is a writer of remarkable lyricism.

If you read Mister Peanut, my first novel, you’ll know the character was obsessed with Hitchcock… If you want an education in film, you’ve got to read Hitchcock by Truffaut. This is François Truffaut's extensive interviews with Alfred Hitchcock. It is the coolest book… You’ll read this book, and you’ll never look at film the same way again because you'll understand the language and syntax of film and the frame itself.

If you’re a student of literature, a student of the sentence, or an aspiring writer, On Being Blue is one of those books passed around in graduate school like something illegal. You’ll never look at the sentence the same way again.

I got to read this book before most people and knew it was gonna be a volcanic bestseller… It's a work of nonfiction by someone who, to me, is one of the most original stylists in the country and who is able to go to dark, passionate places and troubling gray areas as a woman writing about women and relationships that is just kind of unmatched.

It’s about the history of the founding of Australia. It contains multitudes—like 15 novels in one. It’s about the human cost and suffering required to found a continent. I don’t even know what to say about this book, except it was given to me as a gift by a dear friend who has sadly passed away, and it’s the book I give most often as a gift.