Very long and very short. My year of reading in 2015 included finishing both expansive novels — David Mitchell’s “The Bone Clocks” and Eleanor Catton’s “The Luminaries” — and memorable short reads, such as Ta-Nehisi Coates’ arresting “Between the World and Me” and Teju Cole’s vivid fictional return to Nigeria, “Every Day is for the Thief.”
Emily St. John Mandel’s “Station Eleven” turned out to be the most hopeful post-apocalyptic novel I’ve ever read. I traveled to Australia with Bill Bryson and took the stage with Carrie Brownstein to witness the rise of Sleater-Kinney. I learned about the complex history of the Koch brothers and found myself outraged about the failure of systems to protect people in Jon Krakauer’s “Missoula” and Jill Leovy’s “Ghettoside.”
I read eight fiction books, 10 non-fiction books and four issues of Granta in 2015, and I enter 2016 finishing the last 100 pages of Anthony Doerr’s engrossing “All the Light I Cannot See.” Looking forward to more great reading in 2016.
Here’s the list:
“The Narrow Road to the Deep North” by Richard Flanagan.
“Station Eleven” by Emily St. John Mandel.
“The Dog” by Joseph O’Neill.
Granta No. 130: India.
“The Bone Clocks” by David Mitchell.
“10:04” by Ben Lerner.
“Sons of Wichita: How the Koch Brothers Became America’s Most Powerful and Private Dynasty” by Daniel Schulman.
“The Road to Character” by David Brooks.
Granta No. 131: The Map is Not the Territory.”
“Missoula: Rape and the System of Justice in a College Town” by Jon Krakauer.
“Every Day is for the Thief” by Teju Cole.
Granta No. 132: Possession.
“Rising Strong: The Reckoning. The Rumble. The Resolution.” by Brene Brown.
“In a Sunburned Country” by Bill Bryson.
“Your Leadership Edge: Lead Anytime, Anywhere” by Ed O’Malley and Amanda Cebula.
“Ghettoside: A True Story of Murder in America” by Jill Leovy.
“Into the Beautiful North” by Luis Alberto Urrea.
“Between the World and Me” by Ta-Nehisi Coates.
“The Luminaries” by Eleanor Catton.
“Hunger Makes Me a Modern Girl” by Carrie Brownstein.
“Lafayette in the Somewhat United States” by Sarah Vowell.
Granta No. 133: What Have We Done.