My Favorite Reads of 2016

Because this is a thing writers do, I went through my Goodreads list and found the books I enjoyed reading the most last year. Some of them were published earlier, but why should that matter? I try to read a varied list, but it’s always something I struggle with, because there are so many great books I haven’t read yet, and my library request list is currently over 350 books long.

In Sunlight or In Shadow: Stories Inspired by the Paintings of Edward Hopper, edited by Lawrence Block.

You Will Know Me, by Megan Abbott

The Nix, by Nathan Hill

Ratlines, by Stuart Neville

Moonstone: The Boy Who Never Was, by Sjón

The Cold Cold Ground, by Adrian McKinty

What If? Serious Scientific Answers to Absurd Hypothetical Questions, by Randall Munroe

Foxfire: Confessions of a Girl Gang, by Joyce Carol Oates

Juliet Takes a Breath, by Gabby Rivera

Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, by John Berendt

True Grit, by Charles Portis

The Last Samurai, by Helen DeWitt

The Jealous Kind, by James Lee Burke

Cutting Teeth, by Julia Fierro

Stranded, by Bracken MacLeod

The Big Rewind, by Libby Cudmore

Super Sad True Love Story, by Gary Shteyngart

All the Bridges Burning, by Neliza Drew

The Devil’s Highway, by Luis Alberto Urrea

God of the Rodeo: The Quest for Redemption in Louisiana’s Angola Prison, by Daniel Bergner

No Happy Endings, by Angel Colón

The Fade Out, by Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips

My Brilliant Friend, by Elena Ferrante

Twilight, by William Gay

Last Night at the Lobster, by Stewart O’Nan

Beloved, by Toni Morrison

Cannibals and Other Stories from the Pine Barrens, by Jen Conley

Midnight Falcon, by David Gemmell

On the Move: a Life, by Oliver Sacks

And I read many more, but these stood out the most.