This was a really good year for me, bookwise. Five of these books would never have even crossed my radar if not for RP, and I'm grateful!

(in no particular order:)

Mrs. Miniver - Jan Struther
Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
The Historian - Elizabeth Kostova
With Malice Toward Some - Margaret Halsey
Expecting Adam - Martha Beck
Middlesex - Jeffrey Eugenides
Kitchen - Banana Yoshimoto

and last but certainly not least, one YA book,

The Last of the Really Great Whangdoodles - Julie Andrews Edwards

The Last of the Really Great Whangdoodles was my favorite book growing up. I reread it last year and while it's not as magical now, of course, it's still good. Mandy, another JE book is great also.
Favorite books this year?
Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince
The Historian

Fiction:
Ghostwritten, David Mitchell
Small Island, Andrea Levy
Born Twice, Giuseppe Pontiggia
Ethan Frome, Edith Wharton
Empire of the Sun, J.G. Ballard
Never Let Me Go, Kazuo Ishiguro
The Remains of the Day, Kazuo Ishiguro
The Trial, Franz Kafka
The Towers of Trebizond, Rose Macaulay

YA:
The Friends, Kazumi Yumoto
The Spellcoats, Diana Wynne Jones

Nonfiction:
From Dawn to Decadence, Jacques Barzun
Economics in Perspective: A Critical History, John Kenneth Galbraith
Leonardo da Vinci: Flights of the Mind, Charles Nicholl
Will in the World: How Shakespeare became Shakespeare, Stephen J. Greenblatt
A Room of One's Own, Virginia Woolf
The Story of Britain, Rebecca Fraser

Venusia,

What did you think of "Will in the World: How Shakespeare became Shakespeare", Stephen J. Greenblatt? If one didn't have a good knowledge of Shakespeare's plays, do you think Greenblatt's book would help give some good background or a place to start on Shakespeare? I think Peter Ackroyd has recently published a book on Shakespeare too. It might be worth looking in to.

Adam

Arthur and George by Julian Barnes
Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro
The Sea, The Sea by Iris Murdoch
The Time-Traveller's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
Small Island by Andrea Levy

Fiction
Doyle, Roddy
-The Snapper
-The Van
-Paddy Clarke, HA, HA, HA
-A Star Called Henry

Tsukiyama, Gail
-Women of the Silk
-The Language of the Threads

Kostova, Elizabeth
-The Historian

Orwell, George
-Keep the Aspidistra Flying

Wood, Mrs. Henry
-East Lynne

Mysteries
Sedley, Kate
-The Goldsmith's Daughter
-St. John's Fern

Non-fiction
Krakauer, Jon
-Into Thin Air

Bryson, Bill
-In a Sunburned Country

Thanks to the RP-ers who recommended many of the books listed above.

PAM

In 2005 I read 12 books by Michael Connelly. They were the best!

At the top of the list: Lief Enger's "Peace Like a River".

In the running: Kostova's "The Historian" and T. Chevalier's "Lady & the Unicorn."

"Middlesex" was rather amazing, also....

I read quite a few books this year that I loved.

Waiting-- Ha Jin.
Middlesex--Jeffrey Eugenides
Jonathan Strange and Mr.Norrell--Susanna Clarke (my very favorite of the year)
Possesion--A.S.Byatt
Here Be Dragons--Sharon Kay Penman
Sacajawea--Anna Lee Waldo
A Passage to India--E.M.Foster
The Big Sky--A.B.Guthrie, Jr.
Wild Swans--Jung Chang
Katherine--Anya Seton
The Way West--A.B.Guthrie, Jr.
Never Let Me Go--Kazuo Ishiguro
The March--E.L.Doctorow
The Haunting of Hill House--Shirley Jackson (re-read)
Cry, the Beloved Country--Alan Paton

Small Island...Andrea Levy
A Prayer For Owen Meany....John Irving
The Spirit Catches You And You Fall Down...Anne Fadiman
Never Let Me Go...Kazuo Ishiguro

I'm on book #75 for the year.
Some were good:
Anthony Adverse by Herve Allen
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime
by Mark Haddon
The Kite Runner by Khaled Hasseini
Some were funny:
Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris
Some were supposed to be wonderful but didn't speak to me (they shall remain nameless).
But my absolute favorite was American Pastoral by Philip Roth. So much to think about there.

FICTION:
River of Earth by James Still
Scriblerus by Alexander Pope

NONFICTION:
1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus by Charles C. Mann
Kiki's Paris: Artist and Lovers 1900-1930 by Billy Kluver
The Longest Night: The Bombing of London on May 10, 1941 by Gavin Mortimer
Madame Bovary's Ovaries: A Darwinian Look at Literature by David P. Barash and Nanelle R. Barash
No Voice from the Hall: Early Memories of a Country House Snooper by John Harris
The Orientalist: Solving the Mystery of a Strange and Dangerous Life by Tom Reiss
Our Mother's War: American Women at Home and at the Front During World War II by Emily Yellin

Adam,
Well I don't know that much about Shakespeare beyond his most popular plays and I thought it was a good introduction to his world. Apparently there is very little known about Shakespeare (as compared with, for example, Christopher Marlowe), so most of his biographies are full of rampant speculations. I also read The Man behind the Genius, by Anthony Holden, and it was also speculative but drily written and rather boring. The lively narrative is a strength of the Greenblatt book. However, I didn't really believe in his approach of finding biographical elements in his plays.

I'm assuming these are books we read in 2005, not necessarily books published this year? My favourites from the last 12 months:
Fiction
Barbara Kingsolver  The Poisonwood Bible
Andrea Levy  Small Island
Jon McGregor  If nobody speaks of remarkable things
Art
Wendy Steiner  The Trouble with Beauty
Children's
Gennifer Choldenko  Al Capone Does My Shirts
Karen Wallace  Climbing a Monkey Puzzle Tree

And here are mine:

The Time Traveller's Wife - Audrey Niffenegger (9/10)
Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell (9/10)
The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini (9/10)
Middlesex - Jeffrey Eugenides (8/10)
Harry Potter & The Half-Blood Prince - J.K. Rowling (9/10)
To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee (10/10)
We Need to Talk About Kevin - Lionel Shriver (9/10)
The Historian  Elizabeth Kostova (9/10)

Best fiction book I've read so far in 2005:

One Day The Ice Will Reveal All Its Dead by Clare Dudman (known as Wegener's Jigsaw in the UK) -- This book deserves a wider readership than I suspect it has so far.

Best NF book I've read so far in 2005:

The Zanzibar Chest by Aidan Hartley. Utterly riveting and unputdownable. It was emotionally draining but absolutely powerful and unforgettable.

Here Be Dragons
Prince of Darkness
Alas, Babylon
Middlesex
The entire Sister Fidelma series by Peter Tremayne

The Pursuit of Love
Love in a Cold Climate
The Blessing
Don't Tell Alfred all by Nancy Mitford, as well as a biography of the Mitford sisters

Here's one more (non-fiction):

"Rising Tide" (the great Mississippi flood of 1927 and how it changed American) by John Barry.

The Riders by Tim Winton
The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway
Old School by Tobias Wolff
Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad
The Hours by Michael Cunningham
Joe Cinque's Consolation by Helen Garner
The Faith of the Writer by Joyce Carol Oates
Letter to a Young Poet by Rainer Maria Rilke
Surrender by Sonya Hartnett
Mrs Dalloway by Virginia Woolf

Adam

Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
A history of the industrial age, from birth to death, told in interconnecting novellas of individuals who try, more or less successfully to negotiate it.

Middlesex - Jeffrey Eugenides
A coming of sexual-maturity novel laced with both Greek and the new American myth.

Small Island - Andrea Levy
A novel about identity. Who we think we are, how others see us, how tough times change us, and who we finally become.

Kafka on the Shore - Haruki Murakami
Oedipus myth retold in modern Japan. Charmingly told, densely symbolic. My favorite of the year.

Anansi Boys - Neil Gaiman
Coming to terms with Father and creating our own separate identity. This takes a Caribbean myth and retells it in modern London and Florida

Birds of a Feather - Jaqueline Winspear
The second Maisie Dobbs mystery that is less a mystery than an examination of life in England after World War I and dealing with the loss of a generation of men.

The System of the World - Neal Stephenson
The conclusion of Stephenson's Baroque Cycle which examines the foundations of modern society and the global economy. And he does it in a classic romance of high adventure.

The Historian - Elizabeth Kostova
Another tale of discovery - a daughter who learns the story of her mother and father

Jonathan Strange and Mr.Norrell - Susanna Clarke
The rediscovery of magic and what happens when one upsets the delicate balance between the magical world and the, er, muggle world.

My favourites this year (these are in a particular order - the order I read them in *g*):

The Kite Runner - Hosseini
That High and Hidden Place - Michele Lucas
Small Island - Andrea Levy
Middlesex - Jeffery Eugenides
Q&A - Vikas Swarup
A Thread of Grace - Mary Russell
Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell

In crime, I especially enjoyed:

Live Bait - P J Tracy
Dark Fire - C S Sansom
with an honourable mention to Tracy's other two books and Mark Billingham

Historical type fiction:

City of Dreams and Shadowbrook - Beverley Swerling
A Breath of Snow and Ashes - Diana Gabaldon

Dorie Anne, Motherless Brooklyn just blew me away when I read it a year or so ago. I'm always a bit reluctant to tell people the plot because this book so transcends the story.

Frieda, is the Charles Mann book the one that suggests we have a totally wrong and inadequate view of the Mayan and Incas because disease killed off the leaders and the learned people in population centers and left only the uncultured in remote areas?

Venusia, I've had the Barzun since it was published and still haven't managed to get it read. Most history I dip in and out of. Do you recommend reading it straight through?

Astrokath, does this mean Gabaldon is back in her stride?

You have all, of course, added books to my TBR pile.

Chris, yes I thought this one was much more in the vein of the first three, and liked it much more than The Fiery Cross.

Sleeping With Schubert by Bonnie Marson The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini The Known World by Edward P. Jones Beloved by Toni Morrison

Best book by far was "Shadow of the Wind" by Carlos Ruiz Zafon. Second was "Dracula" by Bram Stoker. Third (tie) was "Moon Tiger" by Penelope Lively and "Wind in the Willows" by Kenneth Grahame. Non fiction best was "Isaac's Storm" by Erik Larsen and "Crossing Over: A Migrant Family on the Migrant Trail" by Ruben Martinez.

Hi from Magda _____________ Best Canadian book: _A Complicated Kindness_ by Miriam Toews___________ Best novel: _Kafka on the Shore_ by Haruki Murukami _____________ Honourable mention: Cloud Atlas by Mitchell, and On Beauty by Zadie Smith_________________ Best short story collection: _Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage_ by Alice Munro ______________ Best non-fiction: _Collapse_ by Jared Diamond and _The Ancestor's Tale_ by Richard Dawkins_________________ Honourable mention: Simon Winchester _Crack in the Edge of the World_ (for the amount of info he skillfully crammed into this book)____________________ Best Young Adult book: _Harry Potter and Half-Blood Prince_ by Rowling and _The Heaven Shop_ by Deborah Ellis ______________ Best graphic novel: Persepolis__________________ It's very strange without formatting.______________ Greetings to everyone

Hi Magda-Welcome back! My favorites of the year sans authors as it seems all have read them are The Historian,The Kite Runner and Shadow of the Wind. In non fiction I recently read Joan Didion's memoir-Magical Thinking-very powerful and definitely no. 1 for non-fiction.

Hi Pam- everybody I know is raving about Didion's memoir! I haven't read it and have great reservations about it. Lots of questions come to mind: isn't it too powerful, will I be able to relate, etc. In other words, I am afraid to read it :) I haven't lost anybody recently, and, frankly, anybody who counts, yet- even my grandmother is 98 and still alive. ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ By the way, I made a mistake in Murakami's, my latest favourite author, last name.

The best book i've read this year is La Sombra del Viento by spanish carlos Ruiz Zafon. I'dont know what the name is in english, because I read it in Finnish.

ullis - it's The Shadow of the Wind. I gave Joan Didion's book to my mom for Xmas, and was very happy to see that both my parents are reading it now. My father, who doesn't read, is 100 pages into it. He went to see King Kong in the afternoon on his birthday last week (my mom was working and in any case was not interested in that movie), and while he found it novel to be at the movies by himself, because he was reading that book he found himself wondering about life without my mom, and how he would feel, and I actually think this book is bringing them closer. They have been empty nesters for a year now, and there have been some rocky times as they are still learning to relate to each other without mediators........................................................................ I also gave my mom Oprah's 50th anniversary DVD, and there are some very moving interviews on that (with Nelson Mandela, for instance).

Ullis- it's The Shadow of the Wind. Many people liked it a lot. I liked it too, but wasn't enthralled by it.

ccrdmrbks, I'm glad to see there's another Nancy Mitford fan here. I read Love in a Cold Climate and The Pursuit of Love at least once a year. They never fail to cheer me up. I made it through 84 books this year, finishing the last one this afternoon. Favorites were: Fiction The Amateur Marriage, Anne Tyler Those Who Save Us, Jenna Blum The Kite Runer, Khaled Hoesseini The Longings of Women, Marge Piercy Memoires of My Melancholy Whores Gabriel Garcia Marquez On Beauty, Zadie Smith Non-Fiction Scribling the Cat: Travels With An African Soldier, Alexandra Fuller Running With Scissors, Augustin Burroughs Firday Night Lights, H.G. Bissinger What Went Wrong?: Western Impact & Middle Eastern Response, Bernard Lewis Rising Tide, John M. Berry The Promised Land, Nicholas Lemann

Favorite: 'The Dream of Scipio' by Pears. Second place: 'Pride and Prejudice' by Austen.

Some of my favorite books I read are:

My Sister's Keeper
The Kite Runner
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time
The Good Earth
Five Quarters of the Orange
The Other Boleyn Girl

Trying this again so it can be read.

Fiction

The Amateur Marriage, Anne Tyler
Those Who Save Us, Jenna Blum
The Kite Runner, Khaled Hoesseini
The Longings of Women, Marge Piercy
Memoires of My Melancholy Whores, Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Non-Fiction
Scribbling the Cat: Travels With An African Soldier, Alexandra Fuller
Running With Scissors, Augustin Burroughs
Friday Night Lights, H.G. Bissinger
What Went Wrong?: Western Impact & Middle Eastern Response, Bernard Lewis
Rising Tide, John M. Berry
The Promised Land, Nicholas Lemannion:

Hi all! I'm a newbie, sent here by a fellow reader and gardener (been on the gardenweb Az forum for a while) Looks like this is a great place to spend some time...

Fav books of last year:

Satuday Ian McEwan

American Gods Neil Gaiman

History of Love Nicole Krause (someone upthread asked about this - I had no trouble with the back and forth, but then my most enjoyable books play with time, so....Plus I could relate to this book)

Rules for Old Men Waiting Peter Pouncey (just out in Paper)

Gilead Marilyn Robinson

The March E L Doctorow

The Tatooed Map Barbara Hodgson

Love in the time of Cholera Gabriel Marquez Garcia

BTW, I just recognized a blast from the past. Martinz,is that you, from Readerville? If so, long time no see buddy!

I really enjoyed so many of the books I read last year, so it took me a while to narrow down my favourites. In no particular order...

The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon
Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood
My Sister's Keeper by Jodi Picoult (Plain Truth is another notable mention by the same author)
The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco
White Oleander by Janet Fitch
The Trial by Franz Kafka