Ethan Frome
by Edith Wharton
Published in 1911 (I finished it on April 04, 2005)
The story is fairly short, but with a very surprising ending. Avoid the movie, they mess everything up. Wharton's small novel is well done, with good depictions of the cold eastern winters. If you don't already know the ending, have fun trying to guess what happens. It's shocking, but interesting.

So many books … (you know the rest)