[JaredL]

All my suggestions are Spanish authors poets and playwrights. I'm not sure if by book you are only asking for novels or if collections of plays or poems for example would be ok.

If you're ok with older stuff you should definitely read a Lope play. He wrote like a billion and they all have the same storyline. Fuenteovejuna is the standard I think. This will be pretty short.

On a similar note, if you're going to read Cervantes you should read Entremeses which is a collection of short plays.

On a similar note, if you're into history and the Reconquista you should read Cantar de Mio Cid, which is about El Cid, a legend of the reconquista. It's a long story told in verse.

Note: The above suggestions are all in the old style of Spanish which is full of words that aren't used now and loads of "vuestra merced."

A somewhat more recent play that is good is Ay Carmela, which takes place during the civil war. I'm not sure when it was originally written, it may have been back then.

Another excellent play is La Mirada del Hombre Oscuro by Ignacio del Moral. It's from sometime in the 90s and touches on the important immigration issue in Spain.

For poetry I am quite partial to the Machado brothers. Though I prefer the politics of Antonio I like Manuel's poetry better. All of the Generacion del 98 guys are fantastic and I would highly recommend a collection of poems from this group.

I'll try to think of more. As you can probably tell I got my reading list is from courses so I'm not familiar with contemporary stuff. I wouldn't very strongly recommend the novels we read (other than Don Quijote) so I left those out.