BOOKISHNESS

[lizardek]

I've had this list for a while, before we went to Rome, in fact, but I was waiting until I had finished writing about our vacation after our return. We had a bumper crop of recommendations for next year's book group books: FORTY-SIX books to choose from. GAH. I actually hope that the organizer will cut the max to 3 per person in the future, because having to wade through a list that long is hard! And, of course, it narrows the chances of any of MY recommendations being chosen...which is what happened this year. Five excellent recommendations from me, and not one made the cut. Curses. Ah well, it won't stop me from reading them.

I was pleased that none of the books I really DIDN'T want...except one, and I'll let you guess which, made the list. And glad that 3 of the books I DID vote for were chosen, AND glad that the 3 I had already read didn't make the cut, even though one of them is an excellent book that I think everyone should read and that I would read again (Henrietta Lacks). Once again, a lot of heavy subjects and non-fiction on the list! We are a serious bunch, but I'm glad that plenty of fiction was voted in as well, because last year's books were quite heavy. We actually had to do a second round of voting because a pile of books all got 3 votes each.

Here is the list, in case you are interested or looking for something to read:

Key: blue=recommended/voted for by me, green=voted for by me, yellow=already read. The ones with a star in front won.

1. The Club by Ellery Lloyd
2. *The Christie Affair by Nina de Gramont
3. Apples Never Fall by Liane Moriarty
4. This Is My America by Kim Johnson
5. An American Marriage by Tayari Jones
6. The Last Winter by Porter Fox
7. The Plot: a Novel by Jean Hanff Korelitz
8. Sea of Tranquility by Emily St. John Mandel
9. H is for Hawk by Helen Macdonald
10. The Echo Chamber by John Boyne
11. No one is talking about this by Patricia Lockwood
12. *The President and the Freedom Fighter by Brian Kilmeade
13. The Omnivore’s Dilemma by Michael Pollan
14. The Plot against America by Philip Roth
15. *Tipping the Velvet by Sarah Waters
16. In the Dream House by Carmen Maria Machado
17. This Is How it Always Is by Laurie Frankel
18. She Would be King by Wayetu Moore
19. Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro
20. Inland by Téa Obreht
21. Behold the Dreamers by Imbolo Mbue
22. *America the Anxious:  How our Pursuit of Happiness is Creating a Nation of Nervous Wrecks by Ruth Whippman
23. Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead
24. The Book of Joy;  Lasting Happiness in a Changing World by Dalai Lama, Desmond Tutu and Douglas Cartton Abrams
25. The Sellout by Paul Beatty
26. The Burgess Boys by Elizabeth Strout
27. The History of the World in 6 Glasses by Tom Standage
28. Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 by Cho Nam-Joo
29. They will Drown in their Mother’s Tears by Johannes Anyuru
30. Queen of Wishful Thinking by Milly Johnson
31. Hurricane Season by Fernanda Melchor
32. *Family Lexicon by Natalia Ginzburg
33. *Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan
34. The School for Good Mothers by Jessamine Chen
35. Beautiful Country by Qian Julie Wang
36. *Anatomy: A Love Story by Dana Schwartz
37. The Island of Missing Trees by Elif Shafak
38. The Accidental Empress by Allison Pataki
39. The Almost Nearly Perfect People by Michael Booth
40. The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot
41. *Vanderbilt by Anderson Cooper
42. The 100 Year Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared by Jonas Jonasson
43. The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning by Margareta Magnusson
44. How The Word Is Passed by Clint Smith
45. The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story by Nikole Hannah-Jones
46. *12 Major World Religions: The Beliefs, Rituals, and Traditions of Humanity's Most Influential Faiths by Jason Boyett
How am I ever going to find time to read all the books on MY list, let alone this one??