The 10 Best Books I Read This Year
(In no particular order)
It’s been awhile since I’ve posted a book roundup, but I’ve continued my tear through genres and bestseller lists. I’ve read as widely as usual (over 50 books this year!), but this list is definitely more heavily weighted toward sci-fi, fantasy, and magical realism than most have been. I think maybe I’ve wanted a bit of escapism!
I continue to read primarily on my Kindle, which I can’t recommend enough. I finally convinced my mom to get one, and I gleefully helped her set it up while I was home for Christmas. The option to virtually visit the library and grab a few books is unbeatable. These days I only buy physical copies of books that I would want to re-read or share. Several of these books have qualified, but all of them are worth your time. So without further ado…
Piranesi | Susanna Clarke
It’s a shame that you can only experience a book like this for the first time once. And that’s exactly how I feel about it, because it’s so charmingly bizarre and haunting, unspooling on the page until the surreal world clicks into place and you gasp “ohhhh” right at the page.
It’s technically fantasy, because it’s otherworldly. But get your ideas about fantasy out of your mind. I love fantasy, but it’s not that. I won’t spoil it for you, but I will highly recommend it. I’ve never read anything like this book.
The Midnight Library | Matt Haig
This book tapped into a very specific neurosis of mine, which is my near-constant rumination on all the lives I have not lived.
A woman tries to kill herself. In that liminal space between life and death, she experiences the infinite paths not taken. What if she’d stuck to swimming? What if she’d married that man she dumped? What if she hadn’t gotten a cat? Wait, is she on anti-depressants in every version of her life? Beautiful, poignant, and (for me) occasionally painful. I loved it.
Anxious People | Fredrik Backman
I could not put this book down and found myself reading it late into the night (on my Kindle! In the dark!)
Someone robs a cashless bank in Sweden. That someone realizes their mistake, runs, and ends up holding an apartment of home buyers hostage. It’s a great plot premise, but it’s really just the backdrop for layers of character studies stacked on top of each other.
I loved the dark humor and the reflections on human connection. I will also admit to teary eyes in the final few chapters.
Shadow and Bone Trilogy | Leigh Bardugo
Okay, here’s a bit of fantasy! You may have seen this series premier on Netflix this year, and I’m here to remind you that books are nearly always better than the movie tv show.
I couldn’t put this series down! I read all three books as fast as my library would give them to me. I loved living in this world for a little while. It was fun to read fantasy that seemed more informed by Russia than Britain, more steampunk than medieval. I also loved that the series has real stakes; it reaches a satisfying ending that isn’t necessarily happily-ever-after.
Klara and The Sun | Kazuo Ishiguro
What a strange and charming book. It’s technically sci-fi, as it takes place in a near-future where an embodied artificial intelligence can be purchased as a friend for a child. But it’s so focused on the interior life of the AI that those futuristic elements feel like background noise.
It’s a really special story, interrogating what it means to be human while walking a fine line between futuristic and dystopian
The Vanishing Half | Brit Bennett
Black twin sisters are born in the segregated South, their skin light enough that they can pass for white. What happens when one of them decides to?
This book has such wonderfully complicated characters and a real thoughtfulness to the way past impacts future, the way our decisions spin out in unexpected ways. One of those books that made me wish for a book club, because there’s a lot to talk about here! It’s got real depth, but it’s also so compellingly written that I couldn’t put it down.
Dune | Frank Herbert
It had been several years since I first read Dune, and I re-read it this fall in anticipation of the new movie (which is excellent, by the way).
I hadn’t realized the first time around that it pre-dated Star Wars and was the first sci-fi bestseller. Herbert was well ahead of his time in the way he was thinking about everything from ecology to heroes. At its core, most of the book is about a mother-son journey, and I can’t think of another one of those I’ve read!
The series gets a little weird in the later books; this first one is by far the strongest. It’s worth a read even if you don’t want to continue on with the series.
A Court of Thorns and Roses Series | Sarah J. Mass
I loved magic and fantasy as a young adult, and it was fun to dive back into it this year. This series - a little bit Beauty and the Beast, a little bit Hades and Persephone (but fiercer and more violent than either) got my full attention this month.
Great writing, great plot twists, totally worth your time. But a note for the parents: there is definitely some 18+ content, especially in the later books.
A tv series is supposedly coming to Hulu in the near-ish future. Lucky for them, I’ve cast the whole thing in my head.
The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue | V.E. Schwab
A French woman in the eighteenth century flees her own wedding and makes a desperate wish. Her wish is heard and granted by an old and cruel god. She will live forever, but she will never be remembered, cursed to be forgotten as soon as she leaves the room, never able to leave a mark.
Centuries pass. She lives, sometimes thrives, makes do, learns the contours of her curse.
And then someone remembers her.
The pacing struggles a bit, but this book is beautifully written. It’s not quite as deep as it thinks it is, but I still had a great time reading it.
Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation | Kristin Kobes Du Mez
Du Mez is a professor of history, and this book tracing the “Moral Majority” from its conception to its current status as the base of the Trump party is careful and thorough (but not boring, I promise).
For me, it was a somewhat painful read. I was a church kid in the aughts, raised in the culture wars. As I read, I began to feel like I’d been a pawn in something that began long before I was born. I’ve watched the slow motion demolition of my faith community over the last few years and grieved it deeply. (I wrote about it here, Joey added some thoughts here, and there’s more to come later.) I’ve been at a bit of a loss, so reading a book that connects the dots into a larger historical trend was so helpful for me.
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