Albert Camus, The Stranger, translated by Matthew Ward, Vintage Books, 1989.

An ordinary man is drawn into a senseless murder. Camus explores the use of the stranger archetype.

Fyodor Dostoyevsky, The Possessed, translated by David Magarshack, Penguin USA, 1954.

First published in 1871, this is Dostoyevsky's first major novel. Thematically, it concerns politics, atheism, and murder.

Franz Kafka, The Trial, Schocken Books, 1998.

In this novel, Joseph K. is faced with imprisonment, but never informed of his crime. The story explores the psychology of bureaucracy and its impact on the human condition.

Jean Paul Sartre, The Age of Reason, Vintage Books, 1992.

Famous for his theories of existentialism, Sartre examines freedom and responsibility in his philosophical treatise.

Richard Wright, Native Son, Harper Perennial Library, 1993.

A crime novel influenced by Dostoyevsky, Wright debates psychological theories in this story of a young man charged with a crime.