Here Are All the Books in FRIENDS — And its Best Bookish Moments
Hello book lovers — how you doin’? On my millionth rewatch of Friends, I took on a project for no good reason except a lot of curiosity and a little old-school obsession with the show: I dedicated myself to figuring out every book the friends read throughout all ten seasons. It was not easy. A lot of pausing, zooming in, reverse Google searching images, and trying to decipher very blurry cover images. We lost a couple unidentified books, but for the most part, we got them all: all the books on Friends!
Phoebe rarely reads, which might be why she decides to take a New School lit course at one point. Joey doesn’t read often, but when he does, it’s usually part of the plot. He also brings a bunch of children’s books into the equation. While Chandler is often glancing through books, most of them are nameless art books in the coffeehouse. Rachel might actually read the most of any character. Monica reads on and off. And — shocker — Ross favors newspapers, but when he is reading, his choices are very on theme for a slightly pretentious academic: nonfiction and classics.
It’s not a huge surprise considering the show’s general reputation for BIPOC representation, but the books included and shown on the show are not diverse. Out of the 37 books listed below, women are fairly represented, as slightly fewer than half of the books are written or cowritten by women. But only three books are written or cowritten by authors of color.
There were a couple surprises. There are zero books in season 2 of Friends, but it’s followed by what’s definitively the most bookish season of the show: season 3 is full of hints, jokes, and even has the most bookish episode of the series. In seasons 9 and 10, the books fall off steeply (maybe corresponding to the level of popularity the show had achieved). If you want to see the most book-focused episodes, check out season 3, episode 13, or season 5, episode 9. If you just want to browse, enjoy this list: all the books on Friends, assembled for you!
Season 1
Episode 9: Yertle the Turtle by Dr. Seuss
Yes, the first-ever identifiable book in the tv show is this book! Susan has been reading it to the baby in Carol’s stomach — which is what convinces Ross that he should be talking to the baby too.
Plus: Women’s Bodies, Women’s Wisdom: Creating Physical and Emotional Health and Healing by Christiane Northrup
As Ross talks to the baby, this book sits by Carol’s feet. It’s not surprising that the two iconic lesbian mothers are committed to such healing.
Episode 12: The Baby Book: Everything You Need to Know About Your Baby—from Birth to Age Two by William Sears & Martha Sears
This won’t be the last baby book we see, but it’s the first! Out of a pile of baby books, Joey reads from it to Ross.
Episode 24: Oh, The Places You’ll Go! by Dr. Seuss
Joey gifts this book to Rachel for her birthday. It’s no crystal duck or priceless brooch like Ross would have given, but as Joey says, that book has gotten him through some hard times.
Season 2: No books!
Season 3:
Episode 1: Trout: An Illustrated History by James Prosek
This is such a wild choice. Chandler is reading this art book in this episode, one of the few identifiable ones. Maybe the awkward choice is because it comes shortly before he and Ross discover that women share everything, including sex stuff, and decide to try to do the same…resulting in an awkward situation indeed.
Episode 3: One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez
Chandler is reading this one as Joey dislocates his shoulder in the background of the episode. It’s possibly the first “real” book any of the Friends are reading. This might be a quiet reference to Monica’s deep depression after her breakup with Richard: her fears that the years will add up too fast, and if she waits for another man, she’ll ultimately be unable to have a kid. Chandler will still be reading this one in season 3, episode 5 when Joey almost drills through his head.
Episode 12: Flowers of Evil by Charles Baudelaire
Monica dates a fellow waiter at her themed diner, a “romantic” who writes poetry and says he thought the Baudelaire would be good, but that the translation was “no good.’ At first, Julio seems almost comically romantic (“I could write an epic poem about this lip”), but the friends are appalled when he stops having sex with her to write a poem that’s called “The Empty Vase”, and it more or less implies Monica is shallow (“now that I’ve touched you, you’re emptier still”). Luckily, when she calls him out on it, he clarifies — it’s about all women. Well. All American women. Super. Maybe the flowers of evil could go in the vase!
Episode 13: The Shining by Stephen King & Little Women by Louisa May Alcott
This is the single greatest bookish episode of Friends. After Rachel finds The Shining in the freezer, Joey tells her that it’s his favorite book — he reads it again and again — but that when he gets scared, he puts it in the freezer. Rachel says that the only book she’s read more than once is Little Women, so they decide to trade favorite books. (“These little women. How little are they? I mean, are they like, scary little?”)
Joey enjoys Little Women, although he’s confused about the details (Ross and Chandler have to break it to him that Jo is a girl, and Laurie a guy.) “No wonder Rachel had to read this so many times,” he grumbles. But when Joey spoils the “best part” of The Shining (despite his best attempts to “talk in code”), Rachel responds by spoiling Little Women — which is emotionally devastating. “Is that true?” Joey asks in tears. “Joey’s asking if you’ve just ruined the only book he’s ever loved that didn’t star Jack Nicholson,” Ross says, urging Rachel to take it back (which he does).
Rachel’s so jumpy reading The Shining that she threatens Monica with a potato masher. But it’s nothing compares to what Joey goes to. At the end of the episode, when he starts approaching…that part, he and Rachel make a tough decision: it’s time to put Little Women in the freezer.
Plus: Race: How Blacks and Whites Think and Feel About the American Obsession by Studs Terkel
Ross is hitting the books and showing his interest in current events with a 1992 new release and bestseller that he’s reading in the coffee shop. Particularly interesting since Friends wasn’t exactly the most diverse of shows!
Episode 13: What to Expect When You’re Expecting by Heidi Murkoff
Phoebe is preparing for triplets! In a later episode, when the friends are leaving for London, she asks Chandler to give her a hug goodbye — only to reveal it’s a trick to get him to bring her stuff before he goes, including this book.
Episode 14: The Idiot by Fyodor Dostoevsky
This one is genius. Ross is reading this book in bed when he chooses to bring up Mark, Rachel’s coworker, in bed. “I just thought of something funny I heard today,” he says, before admitting it’s that she’s hanging out with Mark, her friend, even though they aren’t working together anymore. She then says she likes having friends to enjoy the fashion industry with her. Ross insists on going instead of Mark only to fall asleep and snore, embarrassing her. I fully believe they chose this one just for the title.
Episode 22: How Stella Got Her Groove Back by Terry McMillan
Rachel is reading this book about a woman trying to get her life back after a bad break-up when she finds out that her still-freshly-ex-boyfriend Ross is bringing a date to Joey’s play, and decides she’ll need to find one too.
Plus: The Bear Went Over the Mountain by William Kotzwinkle
This book (by the author of E.T.: The Extraterrestrial) is an adult, comic story about a black bear who stumbles on a manuscript in the forest and decides to seek his fortune in Manhattan.
Episode 25: The Last Thing He Wanted by Joan Didion
Rachel is reading a book about a woman uncovering a deep, dark conspiracy when Bonnie walks up and complains about sand in her hair — and Rachel plants the seed that she should shave her head again, the small act that pushes her and Ross back together (however briefly).
Season 4
Episode 5: Anthem by Ayn Rand
Rachel is reading this gigantic white hardcover (the book is just 105 pages, so why it’s this big I’ll never know) in the coffee shop while Ross brags about a girl’s phone number he got on a napkin. When she ignores him to pretend to read, he “drops it” casually onto her. At which point Phoebe sneezes into it. This book takes her a while to finish, and she’ll be reading it in episode 11 as well.
Episode 6: The Velveteen Rabbit by Margery Williams
Chandler gets a very, very special early edition for Joey’s girlfriend, Kathy, who he definitely is not-in-love-with. And what a present — the cheapest one I could find right now is $300.
Episode 15: Like a Hole in the Head by Jen Banbury
I have questions about this one! Here it’s clearly a joke about holes, as Monica is reading it after her obsessive quest to find the use for a light switch in their apartment, and has punched dozens of holes in the walls. She’s back reading it again in episode 17 when Phoebe comes in to pitch her knife business to help support Frank and Alice’s triplets.
Episode 21: Access London by Richard Saul Wurman
Chandler is reading this, which is ironic since he spends future episodes mocking Joey for being such a tourist in London.
Episode 24: Like a Hole in the Head by Jen Banbury
Remember, from before? It’s now in the hands of the passenger who Rachel keeps bothering with her story, at least until Hugh Laurie cuts in to tell her off. Someone from the show definitely knew this author, as she’s also named the fictional “renowned playwright” who wrote the wild play that Joey stars in throughout season 3.
Season 5
Episode 7: Practical Intuition in Love: Let Your Intuition Guide You to the Love of Your Life by Laura Day
Just before Rachel starts over-analyzing the behavior of the attractive neighbor Danny, Monica is reading this in the coffeehouse.
Episode 9: Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë & Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë
Rachel agrees to take a course at the New School with Phoebe. But it doesn’t go to plan. Rachel doesn’t bother to read the book and then steals Phoebe’s analysis. So when she doesn’t read Jane Eyre either, Phoebe takes her revenge by feeding her false information. “The book is so ahead of its time,” Rachel says confidently to the professor. “Feminism, yes, but also, the robots.”
Episode 17: To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
Monica is reading it in the apartment as Phoebe says goodbye to her cop boyfriend…the cop boyfriend who will later shoot a singing bird in their apartment window, ending their relationship in seconds.
Episode 22: The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho
Ross is reading this classic about interconnectedness and destiny, and famously about manifesting, as Joey wonders if his new movie will be his big break or not.
Season 6
Episode 2: Like a Hole in the Head by Jen Banbury
It’s back! Rachel is reading this on the couch before Monica tells her that Chandler and her moving in together will mean Rachel has to move out.
Episode 12: Blue Dog Man by George Rodrigue and Tom Brokaw
Chandler is reading this just before they find out that Joey is working at Central Perk, while one of the amazing artworks by Rodrigue hangs behind him. His paintings, and this book, appear many more times throughout the series.
Episode 13: The Art of Happiness: A Handbook for Living by the Dalai Lama and Howard C. Cutler
Rachel reads this book of wisdom about how every motion of our life is toward happiness just before Jill, her sister, comes in to talk to her about whether she can go on a date with Ross. Was she choosing happiness when she sabotaged Jill and Ross? Quite possibly.
Plus: Rebuilding the Indian: A Memoir by Fed Haefele
In this memoir, an expectant dad restores a motorcycle, seeking the meaning of life — meanwhile, Chandler reads it while fending off the advances of sick Monica, who is determined to seduce him to prove she isn’t sick.
Episode 14: Chicken Soup for the Soul: 101 Stories To Open the Heart and Rekindle the Spirit edited by Jack Canfield and Mark Victor Hansen
After the friends discover that Chandler doesn’t cry at sad movie endings, old childhood photos, or anything else (seemingly), they declare him “dead inside.” Monica catches Chandler reading Chicken Soup for the Soul, and he tries to hide it (by sliding it under the couch, but it slides right out the other side). Bonus: it definitely has a vintage Border’s sticker on the back.
Episode 25: A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers
Richard is reading this right before Monica shows up after Chandler’s bungled fake-out. Such a shocker that he’s a contemporary fiction reader — I bet he reads through all the New York Times best books of the year. I wonder if he used it to help get him through his grief when she rejected him for the final time?
Season 7
Episode 15: Beethoven’s Hair: An Extraordinary Historical Odyssey and a Scientific Mystery Solved by Russell Martin
Ross is reading this in the coffeehouse when Monica and Chandler tell him that he can not, in fact, play his bagpipes at their wedding. Because they hate them. Classic Ross to start trying to get back into music by diving into some intense musical history nonfiction…
Episode 16: To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
Rachel reads this before Ross comes in to confront her about Ben’s practical jokes. Maybe not a coincidence that in this episode, Rachel accidentally teaches Ben the annoying game where you repeat everything the other person’s saying. And that later in the episode, she has to try and figure out how to get him to stop!
Season 8
Episode 5: What to Expect When You’re Expecting by Heidi Murkoff
Rachel is reading this when Joey comes in and tells her that Cash is cute — and interested. Unfortunately, this book didn’t warn Rachel that some guys aren’t down to date a pregnant woman — or that it would make Ross hella jealous.
Episode 7: The Girlfriend’s Guide to Pregnancy: Or Everything Your Doctor Won’t Tell You by Vicki Iovine
In this episode, Rachel’s reading it when Joey asks her to keep living with him when the baby comes. I’m sure the tone of the book appealed to her — including the section about how to “stay stylish” while pregnant.
Episode 7: The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho
This classic makes a return when Phoebe tries to date her twin sister’s ex-fiancé, and they quickly discover it’s too weird.
Episode 8: The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Bringing Up Baby by Kevin Osborn and Signe Larson
Rachel’s slow spiral into more and more “conversational” baby books is so enjoyable! She reads it as her dad rants on the phone, furious at her pregnancy and the fact that she and Ross aren’t getting married. She leaves the book with the phone to go to a movie with Phoebe.
Episode 9: What to Expect When You’re Expecting by Heidi Murkoff
To start the episode, Joey’s sitting in a chair reading it as Rachel gets ready. He says to Rachel: “Did you know that during pregnancy, your fingers swell up to twice their size, and never go back?” When Rachel panics and grabs the book from him, he laughs. “You fall for it every time!”
Episode 11: Will the Circle be Unbroken? Reflections on Death, Rebirth and Hunger for a Faith by Studs Terkel
Ross loves him some Studs Turkel. As a professor of paleontology, maybe Turkel gives him the kind of present-day analysis he wants. He’s reading it as Mona comes in and suggests they send out a holiday card.
Season 9
Episode 2: 365 Things Every New Mom Should Know by Linda Danis & The New Mom’s Manual: Over 800 Tips and Advice from Hundreds of Moms for Baby’s First Year by Mary Jeanne Menna
Phoebe tells Rachel it is absolutely not a good idea to wake up a sleeping baby Emma. If only she’d listened! As Emma screams, Monica and Phoebe flip furiously through these two very real baby books trying to find an easy solution (if only) to make an infant stop crying.
Season 10
Episode 4: Love You Forever by Robert Munsch
When Joey doesn’t have a present for Emma’s 1st birthday, he decides in a panic to do a dramatic reading. His improvised reading of Love You Forever brings everyone at the party to tears, and it’s the only sighting of a real-life, identifiable book in season 10!
Plus: Notable Fake Books
In season 2, episode 19, the girls become obsessed with spirtual-feminist book Be Your Own Windkeeper, an empowering book that turns them all first against men, and then against each other.
In season 7, episode 12, Chandler can’t fall asleep. He tries to read Monica’s “boring book” to fall asleep, the one with “the two women who are ice skating and wearing those hats with the flowers on it.” But then the book got interesting (“Damn you, Oprah!”). They go to talk about the book and he immediately spoils it for her (“How bummed were you when the second sister died?”), and while he tries to get out of it by claiming that was in his book, Monica quickly calls his bluff (“The second sister dies in Archie & Jughead double digest?”) I searched and searched for this ice skating women book, but came to the conclusion it doesn’t exist (if you know what it is, please let me know immediately).
Don’t forget Ross’s dissertation, which reportedly is mind-numbingly boring, and is so hidden in the back shelves of the library that students like to meet up and have sex in the stacks. But he hasn’t always been a bore! His comic book Science Boy that he wrote as a teen makes an appearance in season 9, episode 15. He lost it when a big thug (who turns out to have been teen Phoebe) mugged him. Luckily, Phoebe saved it all these years, and restores it to its author.
In season 7, episode 2, Joey finds a romance paperback under Rachel’s pillow, in which Zelda gets spicy with the chimney sweep. And we can’t forget Euphoria Unbound by Chandler’s mother, iconic romance author Nora Tyler Bing (she shows off the cover of it on late-night tv, season 1, episode 11) — or the absolutely terrible attempt at a romance novel Rachel tries to write that’s riddled with typos.
Go out and enjoy some reading — or some Friends! I promise that the books will always, always be there for you.
Want to dive into more book references from your favorite TV shows? Check out this fire analysis of all the books in Ted Lasso season 1 and season 2, dive into the official Rory Gilmore reading list, or explore the reading life of April Ludgate.
