The answer to this question is inevitably subjective, as every reader has their own preferences, favorite genres, and authors. In addition, if you cannot read Ukrainian, you need to look for which works by Ukrainian authors have been translated into languages you can read.

That said, we have made this task easier for you by identifying contemporary Ukrainian writers whose works have been translated into English and other languages. The availability of a translation is often a good indication that a work is worth reading.

Moreover, this list includes works that are especially helpful for understanding modern Ukrainians.

Oksana Zabuzhko
Fieldwork in Ukrainian Sex (1996) — one of the first feminist novels in modern Ukrainian literature;
The Museum of Abandoned Secrets (2009) — a saga novel about the choices each generation must make; it is often called the “Bible of Ukrainian postcolonialism”;
The Longest Journey (2022) — an essay on the origins of the Russian–Ukrainian war, written in the first months after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine and imbued with the author’s personal memories and reflections.

Serhiy Zhadan
Depeche Mode (2004), Voroshilovgrad (2010) — novels about young people in the 1990s, arguably the most difficult period for independent Ukraine before Russian aggression;
The Orphanage (2017) — a novel about the war in eastern Ukraine seen through the eyes of a person who still has to define their identity.

Yurii Andrukhovych
Moscoviada (1992) — a postmodern novel in which a postcolonial discourse is realized through a blend of genres and styles.

Maria Matios
Sweet Darusya (2004) — a family saga about the tragic events in the lives of Ukrainians in Bukovyna during different periods of the 20th century.

Yurii Vynnychuk
Tango of Death (2012) — a mystical story of prewar, wartime, and postwar Lviv that addresses the painful subject of the Holocaust.

Tamara Horikha Zernya
Daughter (2019) — a powerful, deeply moving novel about the events of 2014 in the Donbas.

Pavlo Kazarin
The Wild West of Eastern Europe (2021) — a collection of essays and journalism on the changes Ukraine has undergone since the annexation of Crimea and Russia’s invasion of the Donbas.

Artur Dron, Valerii Puzik, Viktoriia Amelina, Kateryna Babkina, Sofiia Andrukhovych, Anastasiia Levkova, Oksana Lutsyshyna, Yevheniia Kuznietsova, Artem Chapai, Maksym Kryvtsov, Artem Chekh, Iryna Tsilyk — these are just some of the many talented and widely loved authors whose works explore the issues most vital for Ukraine today: war, collective and individual memory, and the discovery and preservation of national, cultural, and personal identity.

The Ukrainian Book Institute continuously updates a database of translations of Ukrainian literature into other languages. You can check which works have already been translated into your native language (or one you can read) here:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1xCOhtkqN65WMMxf1oZTB3PElUXFgonp2FyBPySh3GUg/edit?gid=0#gid=0