Favorite Books of 2019
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This year has been a super enjoyable year of reading for me. Although there are always more on my to read list than I can get through, a few things help me keep my reading in a positive direction. One is that I put down a book if I’m not enjoying it. There are too many good books out there waiting. Sometimes I also have a slow burn book, which is a book that I read very slowly. Sort of in the background while I’m reading other books. This is helpful when you have a book that may take more thinking, or can be a more complicated book than you feel like reading all the time. I read a few pages at a time and it can take me months to finish it.
Here are a few of my favorite books this year. I try to use the library and the library book sale as my main source of books, so many times getting the newest releases are difficult, but I’ve found over the years that it’s actually a plus. Sometimes new books are over hyped, so by the time I get to them, the reviews are more balanced. I’ve added a short review from other sources as I’m terrible at writing reviews, they all end up sounding the same. Happy Reading!
Non-Fiction
Non Fiction
Barbarian Days: A Surfing Life by William Finnegan - Winner of the 2016 Pulitzer Prize for Autobiography. Included in President Obama’s 2016 Summer Reading List. “Reading this guy on the subject of waves and water is like reading Hemingway on bullfighting; William Burroughs on controlled substances; Updike on adultery. . . . a coming-of-age story, seen through the gloss resin coat of a surfboard.”—Sports Illustrated
I.M.: A Memoir by Isaac Mizrahi - “Heart-rending…[an] honest rendering of how the underdog Mizrahi, whose self-image and livelihood are alternately crushed and affirmed, moves through the many creative phases of his life.” ―The Washington Post
Educated: A Memoir by Tara Westover - “Tara Westover is living proof that some people are flat-out, boots-always-laced-up indomitable. Her new book, Educated, is a heartbreaking, heartwarming, best-in-years memoir about striding beyond the limitations of birth and environment into a better life. . . . ★★★★ out of four.”—USA Today
Inheritance by Dani Shapiro - “As compulsively readable as a mystery novel, while exploring the deeper mysteries of identity and family and truth itself... a story told with great insight and honesty and heart.” —San Francisco Chronicle
Catch & Kill by Ronan Farrow - "At the heart of every great noir is a conspiracy of evil that imbues the initial crime uncovered by the hero with a weightier resonance than was immediately obvious. So it goes with Catch and Kill."―Elizabeth Bruenig, The Washington Post
She Said by Jodi Kantor & Megan Twohey - "An instant classic of investigative journalism...‘All the President’s Men’ for the Me Too era." — Carlos Lozada, The Washington Post
Wild Game by Adrienne Brodeur - “Exquisite and harrowing . . . [WILD GAME] is so gorgeously written and deeply insightful, and with a line of narrative tension that never slacks, from the first page to the last, that it’s one you’ll likely read in a single, delicious sitting.” —New York Times Book Review
Wild by Cheryl Strayed - “Pretty much obliterated me. I was reduced, during the book’s final third, to puddle-eyed cretinism. . . . As loose and sexy and dark as an early Lucinda Williams song. It’s got a punk spirit and makes an earthy and American sound. . . . The cumulative welling up I experienced during Wild was partly a response to that too infrequent sight: that of a writer finding her voice, and sustaining it, right in front of your eyes.” —Dwight Garner, The New York Times
Fiction
Elizabeth is Missing by Emma Healey - “Part mystery, part meditation on memory, part Dickensian revelation of how apparent charity may hurt its recipients, this is altogether brilliant.” -Booklist
Magpie Murders by Anthony Horowitz - From the New York Times bestselling author of Moriarty and Trigger Mortis, this fiendishly brilliant, riveting thriller weaves a classic whodunit worthy of Agatha Christie into a chilling, ingeniously original modern-day mystery.
A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles - "If you're looking for a summer novel, this is it. Beautifully written, a story of a Russian aristocrat trapped in Moscow during the tumult of the 1930s. It brims with intelligence, erudition, and insight, an old-fashioned novel in the best sense of the term." —Fareed Zakaria, "Global Public Square," CNN
The Guernsey Literary & Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Schaffer & Annie Barrows - “A jewel . . . Poignant and keenly observed, Guernsey is a small masterpiece about love, war, and the immeasurable sustenance to be found in good books and good friends.”—People
The Dutch House by Ann Patchett - “Patchett’s splendid novel is a thoughtful, compassionate exploration of obsession and forgiveness, what people acquire, keep, lose or give away, and what they leave behind.” - Publishers Weekly
The Mother in Law by Sally Hepworth - "Behold: the book that'll make your subway ride an actual enjoyable experience! This suspenseful thriller is impossible to put down." ―Cosmo
The Passengers by John Marrs - “A fast-paced thriller that offers a discourse on morality and ethics…Marrs excels at thrilling readers by creating a real sense of tension and delivering a believable, harsh criticism of modern society through this dark and entertaining story. Driving…will never feel quite the same.”—LA Times
Instructions for a Heatwave by Maggie O’Farrell - “O’Farrell has done it again. . . . There is a deliciousness to this novel, a warmth and readability that render it unputdownable and will surely make it a hit.” —The Guardian (London)
