Best of

We take a short break from the Best of the Year lists to jump to January, with the new Indie Next List. Naomi Benaron’s novel is the fourth Algonquin book in a year to claim the booksellers’ monthly No. 1 slot–preceded by Hillary Jordan’s When She Woke (October); Tayari Jones’ Silver Sparrow (June); and Jonathan Evison’s West of Here (February). Running the Rift: A Novel, by Naomi Benaron The Orphan Master’s Son: A Novel, by Adam Johnson American Dervish: A Novel, by Ayad Akhtar The Invisible Ones: A Novel, by Stef Penney The Journal of Best Practices: A Memoir of […]

We already listed the Washington Post‘s Top 10 books of the year, but their Sunday special section also lists their 50 notable fiction and nonfiction picks, along with their favorite kids books, photobooks, and more. The New Yorker‘s critics share their favorites of the year, about 40 books in all. The Seattle Times asked reviewers to “nominate the best book published in 2011 they reviewed for us, and the best book published in the past year that they read but didn’t review.” That yields 21 works of fiction and 11 nonfiction titles. The top vote-getters were The Sense of an Ending by […]

Apple’s iTunes Rewind has published their annual lists of favorite downloads. They pick Tea Obreht’s The Tiger’s Wife as best novel; Michael Lewis’s Boomerang as best nonfiction; Ruta Sepetys’ Between Shades of Gray as best teen novel; and Jaqueline Kennedy as their best enhanced book. The lists (which you will have to fire up through iTunes) also include their bestselling ebooks for the year. Among their Top 10s: Fiction The Tiger’s Wife, Tea Obreht 1Q84, Haruki Murakami Once Upon A River, Bonnie Jo Campbell Ten Thousand Saints, Eleanor Henderson The Prague Cemetery, Umberto Eco The Paris Wife, Paula McLain The Hottest […]

The last couple of days have brought a number of prominent Best of 2011 lists. They include Salon’s top 10 (divided into separate nonfiction and fiction posts), Slate’s critics’ 17 favorite books, more short NPR lists, from Lynn Neary for book clubs , and “5 books that stick” from Heller McAlpin, and GQ’s best books. Here’s the full Washington Post top 10, to spare you the advertising video that will play as soon as you visit the link: Fiction 1Q84, Haruki Murakami An Atlas of Impossible Longing, Anuradha Roy State of Wonder, Ann Patchett Doc, Mary Doria Russell Once Upon a River, Bonnie Jo […]

GoodReads.com members have picked Veronica Roth’s YA debut DIVERGENT as their Favorite Book of 2011, with over 10,000 votes (and 50 percent of members who read the book were 25 or older). Haruki Murakami’s 1Q84 was the fiction favorite, and Alexandra Robbins’ The Geeks Shall Inherit the Earth was the nonfiction selection. In all the honors span 22 categories this year. Other winners included Walter Isaacson’s Steve Jobs (history & biography); Stephen King’s 11/22/63 (science fiction); Tina Fey’s Bossypants (humor); and Paula McLain’s The Paris Wife (historical fiction). In other lists, the Kansas City Star picked their top 11 books of […]

A number of new lists of the best books of 2011 have been issued, including a number of lists from Barnes & Noble, Esquire‘s top 10 (with particular nods to Amy Waldman’s The Submission and Ron Suskind’s Confidence Men), along with lists from the likes of BookPage and NY Magazine, which runs recommendations from others rather than their own critics. We’re continuing to compile our omnibus Best of the Best of 2011 lists, where the consensus fiction favorites have solidified considerably, even as the nonfiction list remains wide open. From 19 consolidated sources so far: The Top 10 of 2011: […]