Best books you've read so far in 2016?

[James]

I think the best book I've read this year is Eimear McBride's The Lesser Bohemians. It's not quite the masterpiece that A Girl is a Half-Formed Thing is, and I have a few minor quibbles with it, but it is a powerful piece of writing all the same.

Some honorable mentions:

The Maintenance of Headway by Magnus Mills. I don't think I've read a more enjoyable book this year. I can't wait to read more of his stuff.

Cedilla by Adam Mars-Jones. Similar in a way to the Mills, in that this book (as well as the first in the series, Pilcrow) isn't really about much. It's about a boy with a severe physical disability growing up. But the narrator is so charming that you don't mind spending 800 pages with him while he's wheeled around and experiencing the world. It's great.

The Last Samurai by Helen DeWitt. Another coming-of-age story about a boy, raised by his mother, looking for his (a? any?) father. The thing is, this boy is a genius. His mother taught him Ancient Greek at 2, plus a dozen other languages (when he takes over the narration, he's 14 and working on Icelandic). It's a novel about knowledge and learning and family, and it's truly wonderful and a book to seek out.

[Neil]

Reading threads like this is a mixed blessing. I already have a long TBR list and now it is even longer!

Here are the books to which I have given 5 stars this year:

Richard Powers : The Gold Bug Variations
Richard Powers : The Time of Our Singing
Richard Powers : Prisoner's Dilemma
Ted Hughes : Crow
Stephen Marche : Shining at the Bottom of the Sea
Deborah Levy : The Unloved
Deborah Levy : Hot Milk
Thomas Pynchon : V.
Emily St John Mandel : Last Night in Montreal
Emily St John Mandel : The Singer's Gun
Milan Kundera : The Unbearable Lightness of Being
Ali Smith : Autumn
Ali Smith : Artful
Madeleine Thien : Do Not Say We Have Nothing
Jennifer Egan : A Visit from the Goon Squad
Yuri Herrera : Signs Preceding the End of the World
Sunil Yapa : Your Heart is a Muscle the Size of a Fist
Eleanor Catton : The Luminaries

It's been a good year. A lot of 4-star reads, as well.

[Dan]

Neil wrote: "Reading threads like this is a mixed blessing. I already have a long TBR list and now it is even longer!

Here are the books to which I have given 5 stars this year:

Richard Powers : The Gold Bug ..."

Nice to see Emily St. John Mandel pop up on your list.

[Neil]

I really like her books. I am going to re-read Station Eleven very soon. That will probably be another 5-star read in 2016.

[Nicole]

Neil wrote: "Reading threads like this is a mixed blessing. I already have a long TBR list and now it is even longer!

Here are the books to which I have given 5 stars this year:

Richard Powers : The Gold Bug ..."

I've recently (in the past couple of years) been very into Powers. The Prisoner's Dilemma was the one that pushed me over into a slightly mild obsession.

I'm happy to see some love for Eleanor Catton also: I was beginning to think I was alone in loving that book. I went back and found another, earlier novel of hers that I liked even better than the Luminaries: The Rehearsal. It's well worth a read.

[Doug]

Nicole wrote: "Neil wrote: "Reading threads like this is a mixed blessing. I already have a long TBR list and now it is even longer!

Here are the books to which I have given 5 stars this year:

Richard Powers : ..."

I liked The Luminaries a lot also, but enjoyed The Rehearsal even more (since I think I understood it a lot more - never did quite get all the astrology stuff in the former) - and the drama academy setting resonated with me. I am due for a re-reading of BOTH, I think.

[Neil]

Nicole wrote: "I've recently (in the past couple of years) been very into Powers..."

I got a bit obsessed by Powers although I found I couldn't read his books consecutively: I needed a break between them with a few other books. But this year I reached the point where I have read them all. The Time of Our Singing is my most favourite (6-stars!).

[Neil]

Doug - The Rehearsal - yet another one to add to the TBR list! I definitely am not keeping up!

[Hugh, Active moderator]

I liked The Luminaries a lot but must admit that I didn't even try to make sense of the astrological stuff. The Time of our singing is a candidate for my best of the year too but I will leave it a few more weeks before sharing that list.

[Jibran]

This thread makes my TBR even heavier. Plenty of fine books to peruse. Thanks, guys.

The counter says I'm reading my 70th book this year, of which only a dozen or so were truly impressive, including those that alter one's point of view and contribute to the development of one's artistic-intellectual capital. I've mentioned five or six books in a post I made earlier in April. I'm waiting for the end of December to come up with my final list.

[Will]

It was difficult to narrow down my best reads of the year but I've given it a shot. Most received 5 stars, some came close, some simply truly entertained me ( McInerney, for example.)

Thus Bad Begins: A novel – Javier Marias (may not be his best, but the writing was just so good.)
Reputations – Juan Gabriel Vasquez
Iza’s Ballad – Magda Szabo
Miss Jane – Brad Watson
The Sellout – Paul Beatty
The Gustav Sonata – Rose Tremain
Born on a Tuesday – Elnathan John
Imagine Me Gone – Adam Haslett
The Glorious Heresies – Lisa McInerney
Human Acts – Han Kang
The Vegetarian – Han Kang
What Belongs to You – Garth Greenwell
Preparation for the Next Life – Atticus Lish
Thirteen Ways of Looking – Colum McCann
My Name Is Lucy Barton – Elizabeth Strout

Notable mentions:
Not a 5 star book for me, but one that kept me thinking for days:
Multiple Choice – Alejandro Zambra
What exactly was this? A novel, short stories, a literary experiment? Interesting in that it forced you to be a participant. I'm thinking it wasn't liked by most readers.

Not my best and not 5 star books, but debut authors I will watch:
The Mothers – Brit Bennett
Behold the Dreamers – Imbolo Mbue

Since I previously sent the NY Times 100 Notable Books, I'll follow up with their 10 Best. I have read four from the fiction list and one from the non-fiction. Only one made my personal list. What do you think? And has anyone read War and Turpentine?

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/20...

[Dan]

Will, I've also read four of the five novels from the Times' 10 Best list, and I also haven't read War and Turpentine yet. If it's available at my local library, I plan to read it soon. I'm glad that the Times' 10 Best included two translated novels, and that the Mahajan and the Kang were included. Not surprisingly, I'm puzzled by the absence of some of my personal favorites.

[Stujallen]

The panorama one of the istros books Slovenia series for me is one of the best of 2016 also land of my fathers

[Dan]

Will wrote: “And has anyone read War and Turpentine?”
Yes, I’ve now read War and Turpentine, which I read only because it was listed as one of the NYT’s 5 most notable novels of 2016. Another is it a memoir, is it a biography, is it a novel, is it all of these, and, most of all for me, what difference does it make? Part memories of a grandfather, his life, and his highly disciplined and repressed person; part memories of the grandfather’s years heroically suffering through World War I as a Belgian soldier; and part reflections on the grandfather’s obsessive years as a color-blind copyist of old masters. Highly memorable, surprisingly affecting, and nonetheless a novel that I would only recommend selectively. Given the many other choices of fine novels published in 2016, and some of those included in the NYT’s list of 100 notable books, I’m surprised that this was chosen for the top 5. It's also possible that I may think more highly of War & Turpentine a few months or years after first reading it.

[Jibran]

Further to post#6 I made in April, here is a list of best books I read in 2016. Since M&G folks aren't keen on poetry, I've not included the few contemporary and classic poetry collections I've read.

[In no particular order].

- The Vegetarian by Han Kang
- Visitation by Jenny Erpenbeck
- The Palm-Wine Drinkard by Amos Tutuola
- The Sound of the Mountain by Yasunari Kawabata
- Anna Karenina by Lev Tolstoy
- The House of the Spirits by Isabel Allende
- Gargantua and Pantagruel by Rabelais (First two books)
- His Bloody Project by Graeme Macrae Burnet
- The Literary Conference by César Aira
- Varamo by César Aira
- Spanking the Maid by Robert Coover
- Light in August by William Faulkner
- Agapē Agape by William Gaddis
- Love in the Time of Cholera by Marquez
- Netsuke by Rikki Ducornet
- The Tunnel by Ernesto Sabato
- Season of Migration to the North by Tayib Saleh
- Jamilia by Chingiz Aitmatov
- Distant View of a Minaret and Other Stories by Alifa Rifaat
- The Second Book by Muharem Bazdulj
- The Recognition of Shakuntala by Kalidasa
- Signs Preceding the End of the World by Yuri Herrera
- Tram 83 by Fiston Mwanza Mujila

2016 on Goodreads