There’s a special place in literary culture for books people pretend to read. They haunt university reading lists, dinner party conversations and dating app bios. We buy them, shelve them with pride, maybe even dog-ear page one. But read them cover to cover? That’s another matter.
2. War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy
Sprawling, brilliant… and 1200 pages long. People love to say they’ve read it – but let’s be honest, they probably just watched the BBC adaptation.
