Finally made out my Top 20 list, although I had to make it 21 because I just could. not. remove. any. more. titles from the list. I had already taken off The Age of Innocence, The Help, and Shanghai Girls, which was painful to say the least. I did include some ya/children’s titles as well, though, because they were just that good. Still, I probably left off at least ten 4.5 star books, but what’s the use of a top 30-35 list? It just must be narrowed down somehow.
I’m also working on a stats post, but that takes a little time so look for that later in the week.
I read a lot of great books in 2009. Really great. It’s too bad I didn’t review more of them. I’m still going to try to at least get to the ones on this list, though. I owe them that much. I just hope I have the same success in 2010 as well.
Anyway, in the list below, the first five are ranked, while the rest are in no particular order.
- The Houskeeper and the Professor by Yoko Ogawa (2009)
- A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini (2007)
- So Long a Letter by Mariama Ba (1980-81)
- Unless by Carol Shields (2002)
- The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver (1998)
- Tess of the d’Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy (1891)
- The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck (1931)
- Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri (1999)
- The Remains of the Day by Ishiguro (1989)
- Fear and Trembling by Amelie Nothomb (1999)
- Solaris by Stanislaw Lem (1961)
- The Devil and Miss Prym by Paulo Coelho (2006)
- Finn by Jon Clinch (2007)
- Petropolis by Anya Ulinich (2007)
- Intuition by Allegra Goodman (2006)
- The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie by Alan Bradley (2009)
- The Hungry Tide by Amitav Ghosh (2004)
- The Forest Lover by Susan Vreeland (2004)
- The First Part Last by Angela Johnson (2003)
- The House of the Scorpion by Nancy Farmer (2002)
- Dear Mr. Henshaw by Beverly Cleary (1983)
