Antoine de Saint-Exupéry Books in Order
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry was an aviator who wrote, not a writer who flew: he carried the mail across the Sahara and the Andes for Aéropostale in the 1920s and 1930s, crashed in the desert, and turned it into books. In 1944 he took off from Corsica on a reconnaissance flight and never came back; his P-38 was found off Marseille in 2000. The Little Prince (1943), written in wartime New York exile, became one of the most translated books on earth - but the shelf around it is the aviation writing, and it is some of the finest prose of the century (1929–1948).
Where to start
The Little Prince (1943), the door. Wind, Sand and Stars (1939) immediately after - it is the masterpiece for adult readers.
The complete list
Tick the boxes off as you read, or for the bookshelf.
| Year | Title | Series / type | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1929 | Southern Mail | debut — the Sahara night mail | |
| 1931 | Night Flight | the Andes — first fame | |
| 1939 | Wind, Sand and Stars | the memoir — start here | |
| 1942 | Flight to Arras | the war memoir | |
| 1943 | The Little Prince | the fable — written in New York | |
| 1943 | Letter to a Hostage | essay | |
| 1948 | Citadelle | posthumous — the unfinished citadel | |
| 1953 | Wartime Writings: 1939-1944 | posthumous notebooks |
Does the reading order matter?
Read the flying shelf in the order he flew it: Southern Mail (1929), the night-mail novel over the Sahara; Night Flight (1931), the Andes and the first fame; Wind, Sand and Stars (1939), the Lyons crash, the desert, the book that won the Académie française's grand prize and is his best; Flight to Arras (1942), the war memoir of a hopeless reconnaissance mission. The Little Prince (1943) stands apart - a fable written for grown-ups in a country occupied, and the only book on the shelf most readers know. After his death: Letter to a Hostage (1943) is a short essay; Citadelle (1948), the unfinished fortress of aphorisms he worked on for years, is the completist's book; Wartime Writings (1953) publishes the notebooks. One note on the Prince: it was published in English and French in New York in 1943, a year before he vanished, and the two languages came out essentially together
Which one is the best?
The Little Prince (1943), the essential one; Wind, Sand and Stars (1939), the writer's masterpiece; Night Flight (1931).
Covered in depth here
An 8-question quiz, reading time, club questions and verified quotes for The Little Prince.
Related guides
Readers finishing this shelf usually want the map next door: Jane Austen books in order, Paulo Coelho books in order, Lewis Carroll books in order. Every guide follows the same format — the shelf, the entry point, the honest answer about order.
Make it a project
Pick a session size and let the days accumulate — at the pace our reading speed test measures, most shelves above clear in a few weeks of half-hours. Every guide on the books in order shelf follows this same format, and when a book lands, its 8-question quiz is waiting on the original book quiz.
Frequently asked questions
What order should you read Antoine de Saint-Exupéry books in?
Fly the aviation shelf 1929-1942 in order; The Little Prince stands apart.
Where should I start with Antoine de Saint-Exupéry?
The Little Prince (1943); then Wind, Sand and Stars (1939).
How many Antoine de Saint-Exupéry books are there?
Five books published in his lifetime and two posthumous, from Southern Mail (1929) to Citadelle (1948) - with The Little Prince translated into several hundred languages and dialects, among the most translated books in the world. As of October 2026 this list is current.
What was Antoine de Saint-Exupéry's first book?
Southern Mail (1929) — the first row of the list above.