Your Favorite Books Read in 2021

[Dazrin]

I know this is early but December is generally a slow reading month for me and many others so we may as well get a head start.

So, please take some time to review your 2021 Challenge List, your GoodReads Year in Books, or your book diary. Then let us know what books we should add to our 2022 reading plans and decide what threads to lurk on in the Deals forum.

First, what were the best books you read this year?

• Is there a book that you have been thinking about since March?
• A book you couldn't put down or have re-read three times just this year?
• What books have you added to your "I'm going to re-read this" list?
• What books did you tell your friends "you have to read this"?
• Did you have a favorite book club selection?

Second, do you have any favorite books from 2021 that you can recommend?

• Did any of these guys get something right? Goodreads, NY Times, Chicago Tribune
• Are there any contenders for your favorite literary/genre/other award?
• What debut author is now on your must buy list?

Third, what books are on your "I cant wait!" lists for 2022?

• Are any of your favorite authors publishing something new next year that we should look for?
• Which authors have you followed in 2021 that spent their lockdown time writing 3 more novels than you were expecting?
• Most anticipated lists: Ask, Buzzfeed, Bookshop

If you find it hard to remember what books you really enjoyed this year, issybird suggested making a "best of <year>" category at Goodreads (or wherever you track your reading) so you have it for next year.

Here are some links so you can see some of our past favorites: 2020, 2019, 2018, 2017, 2016, 2015, 2014, 2013, 2012

[Dazrin]

Since I asked, here are my favorites from 2021 so far. Items published in 2021 in red.

I was pleasantly surprised by A Wizard's Guide to Defensive Baking by T. Kingfisher. A charming YA story that was a lot of fun to read. My daughters loved it too.

I caught up on the Penric and Desdemona series by Lois McMaster Bujold, reading the latest 4 books, books 8 through 11 in published order:

• Physicians of Vilnoc
• Masquerade in Lodi
• The Assassins of Thasalon
• Knot of Shadows

I really love these books as testified by my pocketbook, they account for almost half my spending this year.

I also caught up with what Murderbot's been up to. The first few got a lot of critical attention (and awards) and all of them are vey good. I started with a reread of the first 4 books (just as good the second time) and then read the first novel in the series, Network Effect, followed by the most recent book published this year, Fugitive Telemetry. Martha Wells really hit a home run with Murderbot.

I also enjoyed Andy Weir's Project Hail Mary, I still prefer The Martian but this was very good too and better than Artemis.

As for upcoming books, I really haven't looked too much yet, I'm not much of a reading planner. I do know Brandon Sanderson has a couple coming out next year that I will want to read including The Lost Metal which concludes the Wax and Wayne series in his Mistborn setting.

[Uncle Robin]

I have thirteen books tagged with "my top reads of 2021" at The Storygraph, and I don't think there will be any additions to that list in the next 3 weeks or so. Of those 13 the standouts were, in no particular order:

Pathfinders: The Golden Age of Arabic Science - Jim Al-Khalili - a refreshing read in an ever more Islamophobic world.

Gallows Court - Martin Edwards. A very enjoyable Golden Age style mystery with a complex (anti)heroine


The Cuckoo's Egg - Clifford Stoll. My only 5-star rating of 2021, and one I owe to Mobileread forums, since I learned of it here. MR for the win!

I'm not sure what I'm looking forward to in 2022, perhaps book 3 in Martin Edwards' Rachel Savernake series

[issybird]

Until Goodreads is back up, I can’t begin to grapple with these!

[astrangerhere]

First, what were the best books you read this year?
Answered in the order they were read, no other rankings.

• Prague Winter: A Personal Story of Remembrance and War, 1937-1948 by Madeline Albright (best nonfiction)
• "The Enchanted Bluff" by Willa Cather (best short story)
• Paper Girls omnibus trilogy by Brian K. Vaughn (best comic/graphic novel collection)
• The Waves by Virginia Woolf (best classic literature)
• The Chosen and the Beautiful by Nghi Vo (best genre fiction)
• ???? Not sure yet(best modern novel)

Second, do you have any favorite books from 2021 that you can recommend?

• Ada Palmer's Terra Ignota - the science fiction tetralogy finished off this year and I am 98% certain that the last book will be my book of the year. These books are not for everyone, but they are the best science fiction I can recommend to philosophy lovers.
• The Chosen and the Beautiful is a great re-telling of Gatsby with a heap of magical realism.
• Paper Girls is an excellent comic series that is set in the late 80s and was a helluva lot of fun.

Third, what books are on your "I cant wait!" lists for 2022?

• I have James Rebanks' new book on my shelf and am saving it for January.
• I've likewise been saving Joan Didion's latest collection Let Me Tell You What I Mean

I'll probably edit later with some more stuff, but this was a good first pass of my spreadsheet.

[Dazrin]

Originally Posted by Uncle Robin

The Cuckoo's Egg - Clifford Stoll. My only 5-star rating of 2021, and one I owe to Mobileread forums, since I learned of it here. MR for the win!

Cliff Stoll seems like a lot of fun, it must come through in his writing. I ended up watching the Nova episode of this instead which was interesting and covered the basics well. I've also enjoyed his Numberphile episodes and really need one of his Klein bottles. I'll wait a few years before reading the book though.

Originally Posted by issybird

Until Goodreads is back up, I can’t begin to grapple with these!

See! This is why I spend all that time on my spreadsheet! (Ya, I'm sure that's it. )

[issybird]

Actually, I can answer one of the questions, as so far I’ve got only one book coming out next year on my list, Greek Myths: A New Retelling by Charlotte Higgins, another revamping of Greek mythology from the POV of the women.

It’ll be out the second week in January and I suspect I don’t have more next-year’s books on my list because I’m trying not to look - I bought so very many books this year. But no doubt that will change, because I’m weak.

[Uncle Robin]

A new answer to Third, what books are on your "I cant wait!" lists for 2022?

One of my favorite authors has finally had the first book in a long-awaited historical series released. She blogged about it when the pbook was released but at the time had no idea when the ebook would be out. ECSTATIC to see this on Amazon today, even if AWS issues mean I can't actually buy it right this very second Definitely the first book I'll be reading in 2022

[issybird]

One book I’ve been looking forward to this year, albeit it’s not of great moment, is the newest Sharpe adventure by Bernard Cornwell which hit my OverDrive account yesterday, its release day. That should be fun, although the Sharpe books are inconsistent, ranging from four-star to two-star reads for me.

[Fbone]

First, what were the best books you read this year?

The Spy School books were great fun.

Armor by John Steakley was surprisingly good. Better than I anticipated.

Sadly, most books I read were duds. My average GR rating for 2021 is 2.8

[issybird]

Originally Posted by Fbone

Sadly, most books I read were duds. My average GR rating for 2021 is 2.8

My average GR rating is way down this year, also.

[Uncle Robin]

Originally Posted by Fbone

[COLOR="DarkRed"]

Sadly, most books I read were duds. My average GR rating for 2021 is 2.8

My TSG average for 2021 so far is 3.43, helped by having 28 DNFs not dragging the average down

[issybird]

Originally Posted by Uncle Robin

My TSG average for 2021 so far is 3.43, helped by having 28 DNFs not dragging the average down

Still didn’t do the trick for me! But yes, I don’t count those against my mean, either.

That’s a lotta DNFs! . How much of a book do you have to read for it to count as a DNF? As an example, just today I jettisoned two books, but I read so very few pages that I didn’t log them. For me, a DNF tends to be a book that I fully expect to be worthwhile and keep plugging until I just can’t any longer. DNF represents a certain (poor) investment of my reading time, alas.

[Uncle Robin]

Originally Posted by issybird

Still didn’t do the trick for me! But yes, I don’t count those against my mean, either.

That’s a lotta DNFs! . How much of a book do you have to read for it to count as a DNF?

One of the nice stats at TSG is the ability to record exactly where one gave up on a book. My 28 DNFs average around 20-25% - several up to 50%, with some in the low teens. They probably represent a good chunk of the "ooh, that might be interesting" purchases I've made over the last few years, as opposed to the ones I was more confident of liking, which I do tend to finish.

[Catlady]

Best novel of the year so far is Naomi Krupitsky's The Family, about two girls who grow up in Mafia families. Though the author occasionally got a little too carried away with her prose, this was a beautifully written debut, and I will definitely be on the lookout for her next book.

Other favorite novels this year were three books with ballet settings--The Turnout by Megan Abbott, Watch Her Fall by Erin Kelly, and Astonish Me (2014) by Maggie Shipstead. Abbott and Kelly are longtime favorites, and did not disappoint. I also liked Sarah Langan's Good Neighbors and Alison Gaylin's The Collective.

I was pretty happy with most of the fiction I read this year, though the books from some of my go-to authors (including Harlan Coben, Linwood Barclay, and Peter Swanson) were letdowns.

Nonfiction later.