It’s that time of year: lists! So here are a few wonderful books I read in 2009.
I’m listing memorable books by authors I haven’t mentioned on the blog before. I read lots of terrific books this year by authors I’ve known and loved for ages — Sue Grafton, Michael Connelly, James Lee Burke, Tess Gerritsen, Janet Evanovich, Lee Child, Jeff Abbott, Harlan Coben — but want to single out some other writers who made me want to hide out, turn off the phone, or plead with the pilot to make the flight last longer so I wouldn’t have to interrupt my reading.
Bury Me Deep, Megan Abbott
Payback, Margaret Atwood
Cryptonomicon and Anathem, Neal Stephenson
Finch, Jeff VanderMeer
How about everybody else?
lying for a living 
This year I discovered Laurie R. King: The Beekeeper’s Apprentice, A Monstrous Regiment of Women, and (currently) O Jerusalem. And I revisited Stephen King’s ‘Salem’s Lot. But of course the list is not complete without The Memory Collector!
I’ve read 56 books so far this year and still working on that. Top Ten:
1. Gunpowder by Joe Hill
2. The Graveyard Book (read by Neil Gaiman himself on his Mousecircus web site)
3. The Dirt by Motley Crue (I was afraid I was going to catch some goopy disease just by reading it.)
4. Fool by Christopher Moore
5. Infidel by Ayaan Hirsi Ali
6. The Memory Collector by Meg Gardiner
7. Hazel Court — Horror Queen by Hazel Court (the nostalgia of it was fun)
8. Dark Water — Koji Suzuki
9. Mid-life Confidential–The Rockbottom Remainders Tour America with Three Chords and an Attitude — various authors
10. Maus I and Maus II by Art Spiegelman
Some new authors I’ve tried out this year and enjoyed:
“The Cleaner” Brett Battles
“Boulevard” Stephen Jay Schwartz
“Prey” Allison Brennan
“The Strangely Beautiful Tale of Miss Percy Parker” Leanna Renee Hieber
Other books I’ve read this year:
“The Memory Collector” (of course!)
#11 & #12 in the Argeneau Vampire Series by Lynsay Sands (I love her books)
Anita Blake Series by Laurell K. Hamilton (working on the series and I’m nearing toward the end finally)
I’ve also been reading a lot more romance. I tell my husband it’s research!
Dana Jean, congratulations! You remind me of me. I, too, finished my 56th book last week, Stephan ing’s Under The Dome. Eight great days of pleasure in that.
I started the year with Dewy by Vicki Myron. This was a particularly great year for me in discovering John Connolly and Stieg Larsson. Top 10, and that’s really a rough choice to make so I will not list them in any particular order:
1)The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo (Stieg Larsson
2) Every Dead Thing (John Connolly)
3) The Memory Collector (Meg Gardiner)
4) The Girl Who PLayed With Fire (Stieg Larsson)
5) No Time For Goodbye (Linwood Barclay)
6) South Of Broad (Pat Conroy)
7) The Unscratchables (Cornelius Kane)
8) Detour (James Siegel)
9) Under The Dome (Stephen King)
10) The Last Child (John Hart)
Not to rave too much about Stieg Larsson’s Millennium Trilogy but as the third book won’t be released here until next May, I ordered it from Amazon in England and will be starting it tomorrow. Discovering Larsson is as great a feeling as when I discovered Meg Gardiner. Couldn’t get her books fast enough either.
Merry Christmas fellow bookworms.
I knnow I’m going to forget a lot of what I’ve read, but here goes:
1) Mistborn, The Well of Ascension, and The Hero of Ages by Brandon Sanderson. An excellent fantasy series.
2) Turncoat by Jim Butcher. Wizard Harry Dresden is one of fiction’s good guys.
3) Gone Tomorrow by Lee Child. The latest Reacher was a strong rebound from one of the weaker volumes in the series.
4) Ilona Andrews’ Magic Bites, Magic Burns, and Magic Strikes. Urban fantasy with a intriguing mix of mythologies and a striking moral view.
5) I’m a year behind, but my favorite thriller lately is The Dirty Secrets Club.
Ooh, I forgot about the White Queen, by Phillippa Gregory! Love her books, too!
I log all of mine on my Shelfari bookshelf, as I’m participating in the 50 book challenge for the second year. Some favourites include:
– Library of the Dead (Glenn Cooper)
– How to Kill Your Husband (Kathy Lette)
– Catchman (Chris Wooding)
– Endgame (Chris Wooding)
– Out of the Silent Planet (C.S. Lewis)
– Sex, Drugs and Cocoa Puffs (Chuck Klosterman)
The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo – Stieg Larsson
(The Girl Who Played With Fire and The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet’s Nest are in my ‘to read’ pile.
The Footprints Of God and Turning Angel – Greg Iles (Both highly recommended)
The Tin Roof Blowdown – James Lee Burke
Booked To Die – John Dunning
The Memory Collector (Thanks again Meg)
Ordinary Heroes – Scott Turow
Holiday reading. The two Larssons, Gone Tomorrow – Lee Child and The Book Thief – Markus Zusak.
I’ve read about 75 books this year, but a full third of them have been re-reads. To me, it’s like visiting old friends. Here are a few of my favorites from this year:
The Given Day – Dennis Lehane
Dexter by Design – Jeff Lindsay
The Lovers – John Connolly
The Gates – John Connolly
Olive Kitteridge – Elizabeth Strout
Under the Dome – Stephen King
Provinces of Night – William Gay
Cryptonomicon – Neal Stephenson
Shatter – Michael Robotham
Panic – Jeff Abbott
I sometimes wonder if I should spend my time exploring new authors and genres instead of re-reading so many of my favorites, but a recent re-read of Meg’s “China Lake” convinced me otherwise. Sometimes they’re even better the second time through.
I knew, knew, knew I was going to forget one!
Steampunk + Alternate History + Zombies = one of the most fun reads of the year, Boneshaker by Cherie Priest.
50 books so far this year and I am working on #51 and #52 (“The Pinball Effect” by James Burke and “The Mad Major” by Major Christopher Draper). My top ten would be the ones that have stuck with me the most this year –
Gulliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift
The Stars My Destination by Alfred Bester
Beloved by Toni Morrison
Water For Elephants by Sara Gruen
The Wind-up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami
The Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation by Joseph J. Ellis
Pride and Prejudice and Zombies by J. Austen and Seth Grahame-Smith
Girl With The Pearl Earring by Tracy Chevalier
The Android’s Dream by John Scalzi
The Reader by Bernhard Schlink
I love these lists. I have so many of the above mentioned in my TBR pile. I’ve read a number of them — my list was just a nice cross section of fun, informative, entertaining books. They kept me engaged for one reason or another.
Keep going everyone!
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Dan, thanks for reminding me. I discovered Michael Robotham this year and love his writing. I’ve been dropping very unsubtle hints for Bombproof, his latest, to be under the Christmas tree come the 25th.
Loving this. I have a built in to-read list, right here.
And I meant to mention a fabulous thriller: The Siege, Stephen White.
I don’t count, but just read and reread. These are in the order in which they occurred to me.
1.Laurie R. King’s The Language of Bees (I love the way famous literary detectives wander through her pages) necessitated a rereading of the rest of her oeuvre.
2. The Memory Collector included rereading The Dirty Secrets Club.
3. Margaret Atwood’s The Year of the Flood is a great read. Oryx and Crake is a good companion piece.
4. Nevada Barr Borderline
5. Sarah Andrews In Cold Pursuit
6. The Brain that Changes Itself
7. The Acoustic World of Early Modern England: Attending to the O-Factor–very cool book about sound, soundscapes, theatre, and language
I’m shocked to find out I’ve only read 17 books this year – will try harder next year.
My top books this year have been:
The Dirty Secrets Club by Meg Gardiner
High Society by Ben Elton
This Charming Man by Marian Keyes
Singletini by Amanda Trimble
Brown Girls by John Wesley Ireland
Perfect: Pretty Little Liars by Sara Shepard
Maybe I can squeeze a few more into the next couple of weeks to make my full list look better!
Meg, Stephen White is one of my favourite authors, he lives in Denver and I met him at the Tattered Cover there. His plots are always superb. He’s an MS sufferer and the descriptions of one of his main character’s attempts to cope with the disease are particularly poignant.
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I’ve not read as many as my voracious spouse, gargoyle, but of those I did, these were my favorites:
The Road – Cormac McCarthy
The Yiddish Policeman’s Union – Michael Chabon
Old Man’s War – John Scalzi
The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle – Haruki Murakami
Among the Thugs – Bill Buford