Books are great, aren’t they? They smell so nice and don’t need any batteries to keep you engaged all the way through the story. You can find pant-soiling horrors, heart-breaking love stories, fascinating auto-biographies, countless worlds in fantasy and science fiction books, as well as books in any other genre and/or sub-genre you can imagine. Human imagination and creativity are limitless when it comes to storytelling.
Of course, some stories are much better than others, therefore selling more copies, so here are the absolute top 8 best-selling books in the world!
1. Dan Brown “The Da Vinci Code” – 80 million
Who doesn’t love a good mystery? It’s got riddles, Holy Grail, conspiracy theories and much more! Judging from the 80 million copies sold, “The Da Vinci Code” is definitely worth a read.
2. H. Rider Haggard “She: A History of Adventure” – 83 million
What would you do if you met a tribe deep in the African continent that had a white queen? Think “Lost World” meets “Indiana Jones”, but with much deeper analysis of the human psyche.
3. C.S. Lewis “The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe” – 85 million
This book is a must-read for anyone who likes fantasy and adventures. It’s even become a mandatory reading material in many high-schools! The best part is, this book is only the beginning, the first step (out of seven) to some of the most epic twists and shenanigans.
4. Cao Xueqin “Dream of the Red Chamber” – 100 million
“Dream of the Red Chamber” is one of China’s Four Great Classical Novels, with nearly 40 main characters, and over 500 minor characters. George R. R. Martin can only dream of these numbers.
5. Agatha Christie “And Then There Were None” – 100 million
Agatha Christie’s novels are all top-tier mysteries and the “And Then There Were None” is no exception. In the book, 10 people who have murdered others, are all invited to a mysterious island, where they all get killed off one-by-one. Can you guess who the killer is?
6. J.K. Rowling “Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone” – 120 million
Pretty much all the Harry Potter books are in the top-20 best-sellers of all time, but the best one is, of course, the first – “Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone“. If you combine all the Harry Potter books, you’d get the best-selling book series ever.
7. Antoine de Saint-Exupéry “The Little Prince” – 140 million
It’s bizarre how grown-ups act sometimes, and this 1943 novella, although being aimed at children, explores many adult-related themes. After all, “all grown-ups were once children… but only a few of them remember it”.
8. J.R.R. Tolkien “The Lord of the Rings” – 150 million
The Hobbit came very close, with 140 million books sold, but as it was with the Harry Potter books – there can be only one. You’ve seen the movies, probably read the books, so you know all about the orcs, elves, and the evil Sauron. In a nutshell, “Lord of the Rings” is one hell of an adventure!
