30-day Challenge! - Day 1: What is the best book you have read this year?

[Trisha]

Day 1: What is the best book you have read this year?

- A Casual Vacancy by JK Rowling

Who wants to play!!
There will be a new question each day!!

[Sara]

- A Game of Thrones by George r.r. Martin

[Cleo]

The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton

[Bob, Short Story Classics]

Usually when I think of a favorite book it is a book that I deeply enjoyed reading. The best book I have read this year is not what I normally think of as an enjoyable read, but it was a deeply thought provoking story. The best book so far this year is The Road by Cormac McCarthy.

[Bob, Short Story Classics]

Cleo wrote: "The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton"

Cleo, I am glad you thought enough of The House of Mirth to call it your year to date favorite. I read Ethan Frome last January and plan on reading both The House of Mirth and The Age of Innocence. Nice to know the odds are in my favor of enjoying the next two as much as I enjoyed the first. Thanks.

[Katy, Quarterly Long Reads]

I would say the best book of the year so far for me was a history;
by Daniel Walker Howe.

[Jenny]

So far it's been Wool Omnibus. Definitely a 5 star! If you're into sci-fi, especially post-apocalyptic, I highly recommend it.

[Cindy]

[Barbara]

"The Garden of Evening Mists" I think, though I'm enjoying "Flight Behaviour" very much too.

[Annina]

Oh.. hard to choose. I have read only 10 books this year, but none of those has been really good.

If I need to choose, then The Casual Vacancy by J.K. Rowling

[Maddie]

"Instructions for a Heatwave" by Maggie O'Farrell

[Terri]

Homer & Langley

[Antonio]

The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien. But I hope I could change my answer in a couple of months! A bit disappointing this year to me....

[Katy, Quarterly Long Reads]

Antonio wrote: "The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien. But I hope I could change my answer in a couple of months! A bit disappointing this year to me...."

That is a great read.

[Alicia]

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer, Annie Barrows

[Katy, Quarterly Long Reads]

Alicia wrote: "The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer, Annie Barrows"

I read that when it first came out, definitely a great read.

[Diana S]

Z: A Novel of Zelda Fitzgerald by Anne Therese Fowler
I really enjoyed reading this book!

[Tracy]

"Unbroken: A WWII Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption" by Laura Hillenbrand.

The power of forgiveness, even when it is very, very hard to do, brings great healing power.

[Kat]

I will have to answer this one in December.

[MK]

Orphan Train, by Christina Baker Kline.

Loved this book. I picked it up as a Kindle Daily Deal special, mostly because it was set on Mount Desert Island in Maine, most widely known as the home of Acadia National Park, my favorite place in the world :-).

The stories of both of the main characters were each compelling. But the subject of one of the storylines , the Orphan Trains of the mid-to-late 1800s, thru early-1900s, sparked interest that had me reading and googling after the novel was done. Really enjoyed this read.

[Connie]

Hard to choose the best book this year but I would have to go with Les Miserables.

[Kelly B]

A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by James Joyce. Not the easiest read for me (though supposedly much easier than Ulysses and Finnegans Wake) but so worth it.

[Moselle]

Rebel Springs by Morgan Rhodes

[Kristi]

Lexicon by Max Barry

[Blueberry]

On Writing by Stephen King

[Thaïs]

The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini. It's definitely my favorite book!

[Maddie]

A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini.

[Kirsten]

I can't decide. It's between and for 2013.

[Julie]

no doubt!

I love reading Ben Elton, as I really love his humour - but this was a very different - but also really great read - set in pre-WWII Germany - highly recommendable

[Bob, Short Story Classics]

This year I have read several excellent books.

#1 Favorite:
A Cry of Angels

Followed by:
Of Human Bondage
The Sea Wolf
The House of Mirth
Cannery Row

This is only April if this streak keeps up I've got some great books in my future.

[Gavin]

The Return of the King

[Janet]

The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver

[Faouzia]

Tess of the d'Urbervilles, by Thomas Hardy :)

[Shawn]

Memoirs of a Geisha

[Kalyn]

The Good Dream by Donna VanLiere

[Edīte]

by Jostein Gaarder

[Viktoria]

The Ocean at the End of the Lane, Neil Gaiman

[Alissa]

Finally got around to and i'm so glad that I did

[Rachel]

I'm a day late, but oh well just will post for both days.

May 1st Entry:

I have so many wonderful books to choice from this is going to be hard to narrow down to one.

The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton

I own the movie, and never got around to reading it until now. The book blew me away. One of the novels that I highly recommend.

[Aprilleigh]

So far this year my favorite book has been The Scarlet Pimpernel by Emmuska Orczy. The sequels may well be the first things I read after I finish my current challenges.

[Publius]

Pnin - Vladimir Nabokov

[MK]

Aprilleigh wrote: "So far this year my favorite book has been The Scarlet Pimpernel by Emmuska Orczy. The sequels may well be the first things I read after I finish my current challenges."

Those look really good! I keep hoping it will be picked for the Revisit the Shelf challenge, so I can find some time to at least read the first one :D

[Pink]

So far the best book I've read in 2014 has been My Cousin Rachel though I think Americanah might take that spot soon (currently half way through)

[Lindy-Lane]

Prodigal Summer by Barbara Kingsolver

[Andrea]

Definitely has to be Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry

[MK]

Andrea wrote: "Definitely has to be Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry"

I've heard so many good comments about that book.

[Tytti]

I have been waiting for the first of June to start this challenge, so let's try it...

If I want to choose only from the fictional books I think I have to pick The Railroad. I haven't really read anything great, yet, and this one was one of the classics I just had to read. It was funnier than I expected and the characters were very recognizable. And of course it was one of the first novels in Finnish so you can't really expect great language etc. from a person who couldn't read books in his native language as a child.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rautatie

[MK]

I love your book recs, I'll be enjoying your comments, Tytti :)

[Tytti]

Not sure if I have that much to say... :-)

Actually I forgot that I am reading a book that might be the best at this point, The Great Illusion. They are now in Paris, and mind you, it's the 1920s. The protagonist just arrived from Berlin and had a discussion in a train with a German student about the Great War and future. It's funny how modern the book is but at the same time the author uses loan words because there was not yet a Finnish word for them, like for 'an advertisement'.

[MK]

very cool ...