All the Devils are Here - Louise Penny

Troubled Blood - Robert Galbraith

Unbroken - Laura Hillebrand

Those were my favorites this year.

Donna

None of my usual mystery books were standouts but I did enjoy the Hilary Mantle Thomas Cromwell books, although I have yet to finish the third one. Luckily I bought that or I would owe a King's ransom in library fines!

annpan, consider yourself lucky that it is only a King's ransom you have to pay the library, especially for a book about Thomas Cromwell. Back in the day it could have been "Off with you head."

Ouch, that is a bit OTT for an overdue book! I stopped around 3/4 of the way through and haven't got back to it, knowing it doesn't finish up well!

I'd include the last five books in the Louise Penny series ending with All The Devils Are Here . Hands down , she writes the best stories !

I also enjoyed The Gown by Jennifer Robson.

I also enjoyed The Gown a lot.

I have such a list I'm not able to choose just five. I did spend most of 2020 reading and have not completed most of the series yet. You be the judge.

The Liz Carlyle series by Stella Remington

The Marjory Fleming series by Aline Templeton

Michael Connelly's Harry Bosch series

Gail Bowen's Joanne Kilbourn series

All the Devils are Here, Louise Penny

A Private Cathedral, James Lee Burke

The Red Horse, James R. Benn

The Order, Daniel Silva

Hid from Our Eyes, Julia Spencer-Fleming

Benefit of Hindsight, Susan Hill's Simon Serrailler series

Robert Galbraith's books

Anthony Horrowitz's books

The Paper Son, S. J. Rozan

and many mo-o-o-re

Carolyn, did you like The Order? I thought it was bland.

Yes, if it is by Silva I like it!

My favorites read in 2020:

Virgil Wander --Leif Enger

A Gentleman in Moscow -- Amor Towles
(a second reading, still way up there in my list of favorires)

Nothing to See Here -- Kevin Wilson

The Gown -- Jennifer Robson

Anxious People -- Fredrick Backman

The Dutch House -- Ann Patchett

No outstanding read for me this year but the bests were:

Celestine: Voices from a French Village - Gillian Tindall

Grandmothers - Salley Vickers

Minding Frankie - Maeve Binchy

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest - Ken Kesly

The Mirror and the Light - Hilary Mantel

Down and Out in Paris and London - George Orwell. What a terrific writer! Lent it to two friends who loved it and now my 14 year old granddaughter is enjoying it. Extreme poverty, but Orwell makes it fascinating and not hugely depressing though certainly eye opening.

The House of Mirth - Edith Wharton, a reread and still magnificent.

News of the World - Paulette Jiles. Also a reread because I chose it for our book club. Everyone loved it and I found it even better the second time around. (BTW, saw a trailer for a movie version and was appalled--all the power of the book seemed to be gone in what they'd done to it.)

None of the other many books I read this year jump to mind, but I might add to this list later.

My list:

"Phenomenal" by Leigh Ann Henion ( a hesitant adventurer's search for wonder in the natural world).

"Five Days Gone" - Laura Cumming

"The Stranger in the Woods" - Michael Finkel ( the last true hermit)

"Denmark Vesey's Garden"-Kyle & Roberts ( concerning a slave uprising in SC and reconstruction)

"When Paris Went Dark" ( non-fiction - Occupation of Paris by the Germans in WW II)

Lastly: my all time favorite: "American Dirt" by Jeanine Cummins. I think this should be required reading for all North Americans, in order to understand the immigration crisis at our southern borders. This was so good that I read it twice. It is fiction but is told like a saga. It is mind-changing and so well-written. I look forward to more from this author.

I am on a list waiting for the newest Louise Penny comfort food/book.

I tried to read "Dutch House" but could not get into it.

Laceyvail, I'm hoping that the movie version of News of the World will turn out to be better than the trailer indicated. I heard a review of it on the radio today, and the critic was actually quite impressed with it.

Book Woman of Troublesome Creek, Richardson

O, America, William Least Heat-Moon

Runner up: Peony, Pearl Buck

I'm sincerely so glad you asked. I just wish I had kept better track.

I really liked Piranesi. I also recall really, really liking several other books but I cannot at this moment remember what they were. If I come across them later I will come back and add on.

Rosefolly, Piranesi is next to be read and I am really looking forward to it!

I read 56 books in 2020 and rated 19 of them at 3. Of those, my favourites were

The Land Beyond the Sea by Sharon Kay Penman

Exit Unicorns by Cindy Brandner

The Mirror and the Light by Hilary Mantel

Utopia Avenue by David Mitchell

Imperium by Robert Harris

New York by Edward Rutherfurd

This Tender Land by William Kent Krueger

The Order by Daniel Silva

Conclave by Robert Harris

Ordinary Grace by William Kent Krueger

The Hope by Herman Wouk

I always have a hard time choosing 'best of' for the year - there are the books which I enjoyed immensely and will re-read for fun (such as the CJ Cherryh Foreigner novels, the Bujold Penric & Desdemona novellas, or the delightful Miss Buncle's Book), that are not necessarily outstanding in other ways. Anyway, here are my 'best of' picks out of the 59 I read:

Megan Whalen Turner: Return of the Thief

A complex story of twists and turns, with an unusual narrator and wonderful characterization. An excellent wrap-up to the Attolia series, showing an adult Gen who is clearly the logical evolution from the teenager we met in Book 1.

Michael Zapata: The Lost Book of Adana Moreau

You don't read this one for plot! It was frustratingly easy to put down and hard to pick up again, since it meanders across time and through the stories of multiple characters with themes of storytelling, exile, human response to disasters of all kinds, with little plot to drive the story forward. But in the end a fascinating beautiful read as the author weaves together all these different story-lines of the many characters.

Jason Chin, Grand Canyon

A Caldecott Honor (and much better IMHO than the winner!) picture book about the geology and ecosystems of the Grand Canyon, with fantastic artwork and illustrations highlighting the perspective of the 10 year-old girl who is accompanying her father on a hike. The information provided is well explained for the younger audience but also interesting enough for the adult.

Martha Wells: The Murderbot Diaries: Network Effect

This is a book that's hugely fun space opera, but at the same time makes you think. Told in first person by a cyborg who is learning that it is a person, not an appliance to be owned and rented out. It is part of a series where the first book won the Hugo novella award a few years ago.

Nnedi Okorafor: The Book of Phoenix

Another SF, a page-turner with characters that are unique and different from the usual science fantasy. A story of bioengineering where experimental subjects are treated like cattle or utilitarian subhumans, with the wealthy and privileged taking what they perceive as their due without ever realizing their sense of entitlement - a story of inhumanity and the rage it engenders in its victims. You'll flip the pages to read as fast as you can, then put the book down and think very hard.

Jon Gertner: The Ice at the End of the World

A great non-fiction about Greenland and its ice sheets. The first half of the book is about its exploration in the late 1800's and early 1900's; the second half covers what we know about the ice sheets now and the field experiments being conducted. Have to admit that Gertner included several NASA-funded projects with which I was marginally involved, so that made the book more fun for me.

Contrary to most readers, since the pandemic began, I haven't felt like reading much, particularly fiction (what has been happening in real life, sadly, surpasses fiction).

Still, these 2 books were very good:

--The Moth Presents All These Wonders, True Stories About Facing the Unknown edited by Catherine Burns , published 2017 (NF)

These are stories told at a Moth live event (dedicated to the art and craft of storytelling), edited for the page. Some are heart wrenching (without being depressing), others uplifting, others beautiful, but all are real. There was one about a woman who had terminal cancer and threw a party to say goodbye, which was outstanding. Some of the narrators are renowned people, but not all.

For those who may not know about The Moth:

https://themoth.org/

--The Travelling Cat Chronicles by Hiro Arikawa (translated from the Japanese), published 2018 (fiction)

About the loving relationship between a cat and its human, told mostly from the cat's point of view. It is also about longtime friends.

Donnamira, I forgot about the Murderbot books. I started them in 2019, and finished up with the most recent this spring. There is another one coming this spring. I just loved them.