I rank two of these books as “excellent” – Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine and Homegoing. I think my reading experience of the latter suffered a bit from it being the second long family saga I read this year (the first was Pachinko) and I was not completely fond of that format, although it makes sense for the story that Homegoing tells.
A Man Called Ove was funny. Beartown, by the same author, was horrible.
The best fiction I
read (for the first time) in 2019
Eleanor Oliphant is
Completely Fine, by Gail Honeyman, © 2017.
Homegoing, by Yaa
Gyasi. © 2016. (trigger warning – sexual assault)
A Man Called Ove
by Fredrik Backman, translated by Henning Koch.
© 2014.
The Story of Arthur
Truluv, by Elizabeth Berg.
The best
non-fiction I read (for the first time) in 2019
Gift from the Sea,
by Anne Morrow Lindbergh, © roughly 1955, renewed in 1975 and 1983.
The Line Becomes a
River, by Francisco Cantu. ©
2018.
An Altar in the World:
A Geography of Faith, by Barbara Brown Taylor. © 2009.
Essay “Total Eclipse” by Annie Dillard, in the collection The Abundance.
In the OMG
category
Report On The
Investigation Into Russian Interference In The 2016 Presidential Election, by
Special Counsel Robert S. Mueller, III.
Washington, D.C. March 2019
A.k.a. The Mueller Report
Books I re-read in
2019
The Misunderstood Jew:
The Church and the Scandal of the Jewish Jesus, by Amy-Jill Levine. © 2006.
The Handmaid’s Tale,
by Margaret Atwood. © 1985.
Least Favorite
Beartown, by
Fredrik Backman, © 2016. Translated by
Neil Smith © 2017. (originally published
in Swedish in 2016 as Björnstad).
3 comments:
Weird how Backman can write so wonderfully and then not-so-great. But that's all writers. I also loved Elinor Oliphant. The voice in that book was incredible. Happy New Year and happy reading in 2020!
I haven't read ANY of these except The Handmaid's Tale, which for some reason seems weird to me. I've heard rave reviews of A Man Called Ove and I own it, and for some reason I feel resistant to reading it. I felt the same way about the movie Life is Beautiful and then watched it and loved it, so I should get over that. The subject matter of Bear Town puts me right off - interesting to see you didn't like it. Elinor Oliphant is high up on my list and I have seen the Homegoing cover many times in the short-term ereads lineup, so I will give it a try. Currently working on my own book roundup post.
I read Gift from the Sea, a long time ago and now I can't remember anything about it! And Elinor Oliphant is Completely Fine is on my "to be read" list. I'm glad to see another review that affirms how good it is. I read The Handmaid's Tale shortly after it was published and was deeply traumatized by it. I can't bear to watch the TV show and I don't think I can bring myself to reread it either.
I wish you happy reading in 2020!
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