Top 21 of 2021

A few things I learned in my reading life in 2021:

1) I almost never regret taking the time to read a chunkster. I put them off, but they consistently end up on my favorites lists. (Big exception: Les Miserables. I read that for 230+ days straight through the Serial Reader app, and just didn’t like it that much. I should have stopped wasting my time.)

2) Audiobooks aren’t the same as curling up with a book, but they’re where I am right now. My audiobook reading has risen sharply since March 2020. It’s not ideal, but it’s better than nothing.

3) After refusing to buy a kindle for years and years I finally did, and I like it.

4) Cookbooks can make for good reading.

Overall I had a great reading year. Better than I thought actually once I took the time to make this list. Note: these are books I read in 2021, not necessarily published in 2021. Actually very few were published in 2021. I’m a backlist reader mostly. Also I re-read about 26 titles this year, but I left them off this list.

My favorite read of 2021:

Cutting For Stone by Abraham Verghese - I read this book in March and it’s still with me. It’s sweeping, and beautiful, and so worth the read. It’s the story of orphaned twins growing up in a hospital in Ethiopia, and where their lives take them. If you haven’t read this I highly, highly recommend that you do.

And My Top Twenty Runners Up

I read a lot of great novels, some armchair adventure, a few excellent Jame Austen retellings not set in Britain or the US (it really works), traveled without leaving home by reading and cooking from exotic cookbooks, and realized I don’t dislike poetry after all. Honestly, after I created this image I wanted to hug it. That’s how much I loved these books. They were such a comfort in a year of turmoil.

My kids and I listened to Gone Crazy In Alabama on a long and unexpected drive home from a funeral. I read Brown Girl Dreaming while waiting for my post vaccination fever to go away. The Windsor Knot made me smile during a not entirely welcome holiday season. And so many more just kept me company while drama big and small played out in the background.

Here’s to great books and less drama in 2023. Don’t know if there will be less drama, but 800+ books on my TBR list says there will at least be great books!

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