When I came across your list of teachers’ top 100 books (“Shelf assessment”, 5 April) what struck me were the notable absentees: no Evelyn Waugh, Julian Barnes or Rose Tremain. While one cannot really quarrel with Jane Austen topping the list, one still wonders how it is possible for people to apparently enjoy works as risible or, at best, as pedestrian as The Book Thief, The Time Traveller’s Wife and Birdsong (numbers 8, 13 and 16) while finding no time in their lives for Jay McInerney, Jonathan Coe and Penelope Lively, to mention just a few. Teachers need to be more adventurous.

K.G. Banks, Maidstone, Kent.