“What are Jane Austen’s Best Books?” We looked at all of Austen’s authored bibliography and ranked them against one another to answer that very question!

We took all of the books written by Jane Austen and looked at their Goodreads, Amazon, and LibraryThing scores, ranking them against one another to see which books came out on top. The books are ranked in our list below based on which titles have the highest overall score between all 3 review sites in comparison with all of the other books by the same author. The process isn’t super scientific and in reality, most books aren’t “better” than other books as much as they are just different. That being said, we do enjoy seeing where our favorites landed, and if you aren’t familiar with the author at all, the rankings can help you see what books might be best to start with.

The full ranking chart is also included below the countdown on the bottom of the page.

Happy Scrolling!

The Top Book’s Of Jane Austen

16 ) The Watsons

Review Website Ranks:

• Goodreads: 14
• Amazon: 12
• LibraryThing: 14

The unfinished posthumous fragment The Watsons was written by Jane Austen during the period 1793 – 1795. It was not published until 1871 as part of “A Memoir of Jane Austen” by Edward Austen-Leigh. Jane Austen (16 December 1775 – 18 July 1817) was an English novelist whose works of romantic fiction, set among the landed gentry, earned her a place as one of the most widely read writers in English literature. Her realism, biting irony and social commentary as well as her acclaimed plots have gained her historical importance among scholars and critics. Austen lived her entire life as part of a close-knit family located on the lower fringes of the English landed gentry. She was educated primarily by her father and older brothers as well as through her own reading. The steadfast support of her family was critical to her development as a professional writer. From her teenage years into her thirties she experimented with various literary forms, including an epistolary novel which she then abandoned, wrote and extensively revised three major novels and began a fourth.

15 ) Juvenilia – Volume the Second

Review Website Ranks:

• Goodreads: 10
• Amazon: 13
• LibraryThing: 16

Juvenilia – Volume II Jane Austen Perhaps as early as 1787, Austen began to write poems, stories, and plays for her own and her family’s amusement. Austen later compiled “fair copies” these early works into three bound notebooks, now referred to as the “Juvenilia,” containing pieces originally written between 1787 and 1793.

14 ) Juvenilia – Volume the Third

Review Website Ranks:

• Goodreads: 7
• Amazon: 13
• LibraryThing: 15

Juvenilia – Volume III Jane Austen Perhaps as early as 1787, Austen began to write poems, stories, and plays for her own and her family’s amusement. Austen later compiled “fair copies” of these early works into three bound notebooks, now referred to as the “Juvenilia,” containing pieces originally written between 1787 and 1793.

13 ) Juvenilia – Volume the First

Review Website Ranks:

• Goodreads: 11
• Amazon: 13
• LibraryThing: 10

Perhaps as early as 1787, Austen began to write poems, stories, and plays for her own and her family’s amusement. Austen later compiled “fair copies” of these early works into three bound notebooks, now referred to as the “Juvenilia,” containing pieces originally written between 1787 and 1793.

11 ) Lady Susan

Review Website Ranks:

• Goodreads: 13
• Amazon: 9
• LibraryThing: 11

“Beautiful, flirtatious, and recently widowed, Lady Susan Vernon seeks a new and advantageous marriage for herself, and at the same time attempts to push her daughter into marriage with a man she detests. Through a series of crafty maneuvers, she fills her calendar with invitations for extended visits with unsuspecting relatives and acquaintances in pursuit of her grand plan.
As the plot unfolds, characters are revealed and the suspense builds—all through letters exchanged among Lady Susan, her family, friends, and enemies. Described by her rivals as the “”most accomplished coquette in England,”” amply endowed with “”captivating deceit,”” Susan proves to be a remarkable figure, devoid of any redeeming qualities, whose intrigues and devious machinations ultimately lead to disastrous results.
Lady Susan is a magnificently crafted (and frequently provocative) novel of Regency customs and manners, which has become a readers’ favorite among the author’s shorter works. Austen enthusiasts and students of English literature will delight in its wit and elegant expression.”

11 ) Poems

Review Website Ranks:

• Goodreads: 15
• Amazon: 13
• LibraryThing: 5

Jane Austen (16 December 1775 – 18 July 1817) was an English novelist whose works of romantic fiction, set among the landed gentry, earned her a place as one of the most widely read writers in English literature. Her realism, biting irony and social commentary as well as her acclaimed plots have gained her historical importance among scholars and critics. Austen lived her entire life as part of a close-knit family located on the lower fringes of the English landed gentry. She was educated primarily by her father and older brothers as well as through her own reading. The steadfast support of her family was critical to her development as a professional writer.

9 ) Sir Charles Grandison

Review Website Ranks:

• Goodreads: 16
• Amazon: 2
• LibraryThing: 13

First published in 1980 following the discovery of the manuscript, this is the complete text of the only surviving attempt by Jane Austen to write a full-length play. ‘Sir Charles Grandison’ is a light-hearted dramatization of scenes from Samuel Richardson’s novel, ‘The History of Sir Charles Grandison’.

9 ) Sanditon

Review Website Ranks:

• Goodreads: 12
• Amazon: 10
• LibraryThing: 9

Smart, beautiful and desperate for a husband, Charlotte Heywood must escape the clutches of two impossible suitors in order to claim the heart of a charming and fickle young man, in a story originally left unfinished at the author’s death.

8 ) Northanger Abbey

Review Website Ranks:

• Goodreads: 9
• Amazon: 4
• LibraryThing: 8

Seventeen-year-old Catherine Morland excitedly accepts an offer to accompany family friends on a trip to Bath. There, Catherine makes new acquaintances who invite her to Northanger Abbey, and she encounters a world she’d only glimpsed in the pages of her beloved gothic novels. Through Catherine’s eyes, the Abbey is full of mystery, suspense, and adventure; and she is the heroine at the center of it all. As her imagination begins to run wild, she imperils her summer, her new friendships, and her burgeoning relationship with the charming Henry Tilney.

7 ) Mansfield Park

Review Website Ranks:

• Goodreads: 8
• Amazon: 4
• LibraryThing: 7

Taken from the poverty of her parents’ home in Portsmouth, Fanny Price is brought up with her rich cousins at Mansfield Park, acutely aware of her humble rank and with her cousin Edmund as her sole ally. During her uncle’s absence in Antigua, the Crawford’s arrive in the neighbourhood bringing with them the glamour of London life and a reckless taste for flirtation. Mansfield Park is considered Jane Austen’s first mature work and, with its quiet heroine and subtle examination of social position and moral integrity, one of her most profound.

6 ) Letters

Review Website Ranks:

• Goodreads: 3
• Amazon: 11
• LibraryThing: 3

Jane Austen’s letters afford a unique insight into the daily life of the novelist: intimate and gossipy, observant and informative–they read much like the novels themselves. They bring alive her family and friends, her surroundings and contemporary events with a freshness unparalleled in modern biographies. Above all we recognize the unmistakable voice of the author of such novels as Pride and Prejudice and Sense and Sensibility. We see the shift in her writing from witty and amusing descriptions of the social life of town and country, to a thoughtful and constructive tone while writing about the business of literary composition.

5 ) Emma

Review Website Ranks:

• Goodreads: 6
• Amazon: 4
• LibraryThing: 5

“The culmination of Jane Austen’s genius, a sparkling comedy of love and marriage
Beautiful, clever, rich—and single—Emma Woodhouse is perfectly content with her life and sees no need for either love or marriage. Nothing, however, delights her more than interfering in the romantic lives of others. But when she ignores the warnings of her good friend Mr. Knightley and attempts to arrange a suitable match for her protegee Harriet Smith, her carefully laid plans soon unravel and have consequences that she never expected. With its imperfect but charming heroine and its witty and subtle exploration of relationships, Emma is often seen as Jane Austen’s most flawless work.”

4 ) Prayers

Review Website Ranks:

• Goodreads: 1
• Amazon: 1
• LibraryThing: 12

You know Jane Austen as the beloved author of Pride and Prejudice, Emma, and other witty, insightful novels of the early nineteenth century. Now come to know her as a woman of unexpected spiritual depth. Jane Austen wrote beautiful, heartfelt prayers for use during her family’s evening devotions. Each one reveals her gratitude for God’s blessings and her pursuit of a holy life—expressions of a woman whose heart was profoundly moved by faith.

3 ) Sense and Sensibility

Review Website Ranks:

• Goodreads: 5
• Amazon: 4
• LibraryThing: 4

Marianne Dashwood wears her heart on her sleeve, and when she falls in love with the dashing but unsuitable John Willoughby she ignores her sister Elinor’s warning that her impulsive behaviour leaves her open to gossip and innuendo. Meanwhile Elinor, always sensitive to social convention, is struggling to conceal her own romantic disappointment, even from those closest to her. Through their parallel experience of love – and its threatened loss – the sisters learn that sense must mix with sensibility if they are to find personal happiness in a society where status and money govern the rules of love.

2 ) Persuasion

Review Website Ranks:

• Goodreads: 4
• Amazon: 4
• LibraryThing: 2

Anne Elliot seems to have given up on present happiness and has resigned herself to living off her memories. More than seven years earlier she complied with duty: persuaded to view the match as imprudent and improper, she broke off her engagement to a naval captain with neither fortune, ancestry, nor prospects. However, when peacetime arrives and brings the Navy home, and Anne encounters Captain Wentworth once more, she starts to believe in second chances.

1 ) Pride and Prejudice

Review Website Ranks:

• Goodreads: 2
• Amazon: 2
• LibraryThing: 1

When Elizabeth Bennet first meets eligible bachelor, Fitzwilliam Darcy, she thinks him arrogant and conceited; he is indifferent to her good looks and lively mind. When she later discovers that Darcy has involved himself in the troubled relationship between his friend Bingley and her beloved sister Jane, she is determined to dislike him more than ever. In the sparkling comedy of manners that follows, Jane Austen shows the folly of judging by first impressions and superbly evokes the friendships, gossip and snobberies of provincial middle-class life.

Jane Austen’s Best Books

Jane Austen Review Website Bibliography Rankings