Plot: Young heroine's picaresque travels, a kind of sexual pinball machine that lights up academia, gardeners, the medical profession, mystics and bohemians.

Why it's on the list: First published by Olympia in 1958, the authors hiding behind a pseudonym, this comic classic featured an impossibly innocent heroine willing to give herself to anyone or anything in need, including Buddha. A newspaper poll once asked Americans if they had to choose just one -- an orgasm or a chuckle -- which would they prefer? Ecstasy or comic relief? Why not both? Candy proved that even a satire on sex could be sexy.

Excerpt: It was extremely awkward, for the young girl's shift had been forced well above her waist and her shapely bare limbs now were locked about the holy man's loins. She struggled to free herself, but this only succeeded in agitating her precious and open honeypot against the man's secret parts -- which were now awakening after so many years and slowly breaking through the rotten old loincloth that swaddled them! Good Gosh, thought Candy, when she realized what was happening, and in fact, felt the holy man's taut member ease an inch or two into her tight little lamb-pit. She quickly turned her head to see behind her and to determine what was pinioning them there. And she saw that a part of the huge Buddha had just missed them by inches, and was pressing firmly against her back; it seemed to be balanced in a precarious way and in danger of slipping -- and, even as she thought this, she saw that it was in fact slipping, forward, and against her; it was a section of her beloved Buddha's face -- the nose! And a truly incredible thing was happening -- it was slipping into Candy's marvelous derriere! "Good Grief!" said the girl, half aloud, trying to move forward a little -- which merely had the effect of securely embedding the holy man's member deeply into her ever-sweetening pudding pie.