Who made this list? The Lovely Bones did not get a Pulitzer Prize, for Chrissakes! The Kite Runner???? Get real!

The list is useless if people add any old thing.

* 2008: The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz
* 2007: The Road by Cormac McCarthy
* 2006: March by Geraldine Brooks
* 2005: Gilead by Marilynne Robinson
* 2004: The Known World by Edward P. Jones
* 2003: Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides
* 2002: Empire Falls by Richard Russo
* 2001: The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon
* 2000: Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri
* 1999: The Hours by Michael Cunningham
* 1998: American Pastoral by Philip Roth
* 1997: Martin Dressler: The Tale of an American Dreamer by Steven Millhauser
* 1996: Independence Day by Richard Ford
* 1995: The Stone Diaries by Carol Shields
* 1994: The Shipping News by E. Annie Proulx
* 1993: A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain by Robert Olen Butler
* 1992: A Thousand Acres by Jane Smiley
* 1991: Rabbit At Rest by John Updike
* 1990: The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love by Oscar Hijuelos
* 1989: Breathing Lessons by Anne Tyler
* 1988: Beloved by Toni Morrison
* 1987: A Summons to Memphis by Peter Taylor
* 1986: Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry
* 1985: Foreign Affairs by Alison Lurie
* 1984: Ironweed by William Kennedy
* 1983: The Color Purple by Alice Walker
* 1982: Rabbit Is Rich by John Updike
* 1981: A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole
* 1980: The Executioner's Song by Norman Mailer
* 1979: The Stories of John Cheever by John Cheever
* 1978: Elbow Room by James Alan McPherson
* 1977: No award given
* 1976: Humboldt's Gift by Saul Bellow
* 1975: The Killer Angels by Michael Shaara
* 1974: No award given [1:]
* 1973: The Optimist's Daughter by Eudora Welty
* 1972: Angle of Repose by Wallace Stegner
* 1971: No award given
* 1970: The Collected Stories of Jean Stafford by Jean Stafford
* 1969: House Made of Dawn by N. Scott Momaday
* 1968: The Confessions of Nat Turner by William Styron
* 1967: The Fixer by Bernard Malamud
* 1966: The Collected Stories of Katherine Anne Porter by Katherine Anne Porter
* 1965: The Keepers of the House by Shirley Ann Grau
* 1964: No award given
* 1963: The Reivers by William Faulkner
* 1962: The Edge of Sadness by Edwin O'Connor
* 1961: To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
* 1960: Advise and Consent by Allen Drury
* 1959: The Travels of Jaimie McPheeters by Robert Lewis Taylor
* 1958: A Death in the Family by James Agee
* 1957: No award given
* 1956: Andersonville by MacKinlay Kantor
* 1955: A Fable by William Faulkner
* 1954: No award given
* 1953: The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway
* 1952: The Caine Mutiny by Herman Wouk
* 1951: The Town by Conrad Richter
* 1950: The Way West by A. B. Guthrie, Jr.
* 1949: Guard of Honor by James Gould Cozzens
* 1948: Tales of the South Pacific by James A. Michener

I think I got all of the non-Pulitzers, hopefully they won't be back!

I am under the impression that The Jungle Books never won a Pulitzer - that, in fact, they were never eligible for one in the first place.

You are correct, Susanna; the Pulitzer prize only started in 1948. And I believe you have to be American or writing about America to be eligible.

Miriam:

Let us all be vigilant in making sure non-Pulitzers are excised from this list when those books crop up. But in order to do that, we need to make ourselves aware of what the Pulitzer-winners are and when the Pulitzer began, for it wasn't in 1948, as you've said, but rather 1917, with the first prize to a work of fiction given in 1918. And yes: the writer must be an American, but a winning (or nominated) book's themes, while often about America, needn't be.

From 1917-1948, the award was given as the Pulitzer Prizer for Novel (rather than for fiction). Here are the winners from that time period since they're not listed above:

1947: All the King's Men by Robert Penn Warren
1946: (No Award)
1945: A Bell for Adano by John Hersey
1944: Journey in the Dark by Martin Flavin
1943: Dragon's Teeth by Upton Sinclair
1942: In This Our Life by Ellen Glasgow
1941: (No Award)
1940: The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
1939: The Yearling by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings
1938: The Late George Apley by John Phillips Marquand
1937: Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell
1936: Honey in the Horn by Harold L. Davis
1935: Now in November by Josephine Winslow Johnson
1934: Lamb in His Bosom by Caroline Miller
1933: The Store by T. S. Stribling
1932: The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck
1931: Years of Grace by Margaret Ayer Barnes
1930: Laughing Boy by Oliver Lafarge
1929: Scarlet Sister Mary by Julia Peterkin
1928: The Bridge of San Luis Rey by Thornton Wilder
1927: Early Autumn by Louis Bromfield
1926: Arrowsmith by Sinclair Lewis
1925: So Big by Edna Ferber
1924: The Able McLaughlins by Margaret Wilson
1923: One of Ours by Willa Cather
1922: Alice Adams by Booth Tarkington
1921: The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton
1920: (No Award)
1919: The Magnificent Ambersons by Booth Tarkington
1918: His Family by Ernest Poole
1917: (No Award)

this is a wonderful list to be read by book clubs and all serious readers.

Agreed, I'm actually 1/3 of the way through the list of Pulitzers. If you have the patience to put the rest of your to-read list on hold, it's an incredibly rewarding book list to work your way through!