Remembrance of Things Past
by Marcel Proust

I recommend you put it on your Kindle in French. If you’re not going to read a classic, you might as well not read it in the original.

Moby-Dick
by Herman Melville:

A classic, plus it has the word “Dick” in the title, which is always good for a giggle.

Beowulf

“Hwæt! We Gar-Dena in gear-dagum.” The first line of Beowulf, and yeah, I have no idea either, but unless the person who finds my Kindle is my former English professor, I’m still good to wow anyone who comes across it.

Catch 22
by Joseph Heller

Anyone who finds your Kindle will be very impressed you have Catch 22 on there… but, what if they’re not very impressed? Damn.

Fight Club
by Chuck Palahniuk

The first rule of having Fight Club on your Kindle is not telling anyone why you have Fight Club on your Kindle.

The Goldfinch: A Novel
by Donna Tartt

Winner of the 2014 Pulitzer Prize. Did I mention it even says so right on its Kindle book cover? Who cares that I haven’t read it.

David Copperfield
by Charles Dickens

Sure to impress any Kindle finder who’s literate or at least into magicians.

Lolita
by Vladimir Nabokov

Nabokov’s controversial novel about an April/December romance is still really impressive stuff. Unless, of course, someone finds your Kindle near a high school playground. Then you might want to lawyer up.

The Bully Pulpit: Theodore Roosevelt,
William Howard Taft, and the Golden Age of Journalism
by Doris Kearns Goodwin

Think the title is long? The book’s 900 pages. How impressive is that?

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
by Hunter Thompson

What happens on your Kindle stays on your Kindle.

The Collected Works of Wislawa Szymborska
by Wislawa Symborska

Szymborska won 1996 Nobel Prize in Literature "for poetry with ironic precision.” And think how impressed whoever finds your Kindle will be when they can’t even pronounce her name!

The Lord of the Flies
by William Golding

Anyone who finds your Kindle will be impressed you read the book that’s the adult equivalent of Jersey Shore with less spray tan and more literary allusions.

Slouching Toward Bethlehem
by Joan Didion

The witty, acerbic, take no prisoners Joan Didion always impresses. But, with this one, we’re also reminded posture matters.

Breakfast of Champions
by Kurt Vonnegut

Must have a Vonnegut book on my Kindle. I have this one because not only is it a classic, but a reminder to whoever finds my Kindle to have a good breakfast—the most important meal of the day.

The Complete Works of William Shakespeare

To impress or not to impress? Is that really a question?

Catcher in the Rye
by JD Salinger

Cool, hip, and it spurred a generation to name their kids “Holden.” Also, still impressive to anyone who’s ever taken an English class, or had a crush on Jodie Foster.

One Hundred Years of Solitude
by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Impressive novel. Nobel Prize winner. And, exactly the amount of time one would need to read all the books on my Kindle.

The Essential Dr. Martin Luther King

Impressive in anyone’s book. The dream that people will one day not be judged by the color of their skin, but solely by the content of their Kindle.