See also: 2002 in literature, other events of 2003, 2004 in literature, list of years in literature.

Events

• September 9 - Barnes & Noble, the largest American bookseller, announces that it will no longer sell downloadable electronic texts sometimes called e-books.
• Chuck Palahniuk reads his short story "Guts" to audiences while on tour to promote his novel Diary. Over 35 people faint while listening to the readings.

New books

• The Arraignment - Steve Martini
• Blue Horizon - Wilbur Smith
• The Bridge of Sighs - Olen Steinhauer
• The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time: A Novel - Mark Haddon
• Darwin's Children - Greg Bear
• The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
• The Delicate Storm - Giles Blunt
• Diary - Chuck Palahniuk
• Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom - Cory Doctorow
• Dude, Where's My Country? - Michael Moore
• Dunwich's Guide to Gemstone Sorcery - Gerina Dunwich
• L'Empire des loups - Jean-Christophe Grangé
• The Face - Dean R. Koontz
• The Five People You Meet in Heaven - Mitch Albom
• Fugitives and Refugees: A Walk in Portland, Oregon - Chuck Palahniuk
• Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix - J. K. Rowling
• Hey Nostradamus! - Douglas Coupland
• Holy Fools - Joanne Harris
• Idlewild - Nick Sagan
• Jarhead - Anthony Swofford
• Jennifer Government - Max Barry
• The Journals - Volume 1 - John Fowles
• The King of Torts - John Grisham
• The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
• - Joel C. Rosenberg
• Merchant Princes, Halifax's First Family of Finance, Ships and Steel - James Frost
• Monstrous Regiment - Terry Pratchett
• Notes on a Scandal - Zoë Heller
• Oryx and Crake - Margaret Atwood
• A Place So Foreign and Eight More - Cory Doctorow
• Pattern Recognition - William Gibson
• Politics - Adam Thirlwell
• Scarecrow - Matthew Reilly
• - David Starkey
• The Skating Pond - Deborah Joy Corey
• Something Might Happen - Julie Myerson
• The Wee Free Men - Terry Pratchett
• Wolves of the Calla - Stephen King

Births

Deaths

• February 16 - Aleksandar Tisma
• March 12 - Howard Fast
• July 16 - Carol Shields

Awards

• Giller Prize: M.G. Vassanji - The In-Between World of Vikram Lall
• See 2003 Governor General's Awards for a complete list of the winners of those awards.
• Griffin Poetry Prize: Margaret Avison, Concrete and Wild Carrot and Paul Muldoon, Moy sand and gravel
• Hugo Award: Robert J. Sawyer, Hominids
• International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award: Orhan Pamuk My Name is Red
• Newbery Medal for children's literature: Avi, Crispin: The Cross of Lead
• Nobel Prize for Literature: J. M. Coetzee
• Orange Prize for Fiction: Valerie Martin , Property
• Pulitzer Prize for Fiction: Jeffrey Eugenides, Middlesex
• Whitbread Book of The Year Award: Mark Haddon for The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time: A Novel