The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon is one of my favorite for language. A great story in a different time. Reminded me of some of Ayn Rand's writing. and of course Atlas Shrugged and the Fountainhead are both wonderful.

"A Thousand Splendid Suns"  by Khaled Hosseini     A very well written book.  Didn't think that I would like it, but it turned out to be quite good.

"The DaVinci Code" by Dan Brown.  Well written, main characters were somewhat likeable and the book was very thought provoking.

I also really love Possesion by AS Byatt. 

Sarah Waters has been short-listed a couple times and I'm a big fan of her novels.

I've heard amazing things about Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro but I haven't read it yet... (he has been short-listed for other books too)

Doris Lessing is popular in that crowd... as is Margaret Atwood.

I know this thread is old, but I keep checking for updates because I've actually looked up the books discussed here and they look good.

I can't wait to read Life of Pi, The Sparrow, and God of Small Things, Atonement,

I also loved Possession and the Namesake, so I wholeheartedly recommend those. But new suggestions that I haven't seen mentioned yet--I loved Barbara Kingsolver's The Poisonwood Bible; also Russell Banks's The Darling. Well, or anything Russell Banks for that matter, but the Darling was probably my favorite. Gloria Naylor's Mama Day is also an old favorite as well as anything by Jane Hamilton, but particularly Short History of a Prince.

That's all off the top of my head! :)

i liked 'middlemarch'.  i loved 'jane eyre'.  loved 'tale of two cities'.  'ethan frome' was tragic, but unforgettable.  'doctor zhivago' was good. 

I also enjoyed McEwan's Atonement  and On Chesil Beach.

May I recommend Alan Hollinghurst? He's an openly gay writer who writes novels with beautiful language (and heads up: promiscuous gay characters.) His The Line of Beauty won the Man Booker prize in 2004 -- it's about a young gay man living as a extended guest with a political family in 1980s England. I also read (and reviewed here on PBS) his first novel, The Swimming Pool Library after I enjoyed The Line of Beauty so much.

Haruki Murakami is also a fabulous master of language, who writes fantastical plots. He is very well known in Japan; his best known works might be The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, Kafka on the Shore, and Norweigan Wood. Of these three I have only read the first one. But he also writes short stories which might give you a flavor of his work.  

I second The Shadow of the Wind.

Enjoy!

I second A Thousand Splendid Suns, The Poisonwood Bible, Jane Eyre, and Ethan Frome.