What I Read in 2017

It’s here! My annual reading round-up!  As I have done every year since 2008, I’ve kept a record of everything new that I read this year. My favourites are in bold. I feel like I’ve bolded a lot this year…

Some of my books this year came in my Illumicrate subscription. I absolutely love receiving this quarterly book box – it’s like having a little birthday every three months. If you have a special occasion coming up for a book lover, you can wow them with this as a gift – or, indeed, buy it for yourself.

To the books!

1. The Immortals by S.E. Lister
2. The Diabolic by S.J. Kincaid
3. Roumeli: Travels in Northern Greece by Patrick Leigh Fermor
4. Mani: Travels in Southern Greece by Patrick Leigh Fermor
5. Strange the Dreamer by Laini Taylor (sumptuous prose, compelling fantasy)
6. Traitor to the Throne by Alwyn Hamilton
7. A Conjuring of Light by V.E. Schwab (masterful ending to a brilliant trilogy)
8. The Good Immigrant ed. Nikesh Shukla (highly recommended collection of essays)
9. The One Memory of Flora Banks by Emily Barr
10. The Power by Naomi Alderman (you’ve probably heard of this one. Sci fi with a feminist sting)
11. Wintersong by S. Jae-Jones
12. Red Sister by Mark Lawrence (if Arya is your fave Stark, you will love this fantasy)
13. The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton
14. Into the Woods by John Yorke (brilliant breakdown of storytelling techniques – definitely recommended for fellow writers!)
15. Railsea by China Mieville (oh, China! You and your love for trains…)
16. Seveneves by Neal Stephenson (feel like this could be a Marmite book as it’s heavy on the science and goes a bit bananas in the final third…but worth it)
17. The Pearl Thief by Elizabeth Wein (if you read Code Name Verity and, like me, fell madly in love with Julie, you will adore this prequel)
18. Who Let the Gods Out? by Maz Evans
19. The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas (this. book. READ IT. Black Lives Matter but also a brilliant and complex coming of age. I WISH I was still teaching so I could put it in the hands of girls who sorely need it)
20. The Fallen Children by David Owen
21. The Edge of Me by Jane Brittan
22. Nul Points by Tim Moore
23. The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes
24. The Waking Land by Callie Bates
25. Truth or Dare by Non Pratt (brilliant, brilliant contemporary. See above – my former pupils would adore this tale of vlogging, heartache and coming to terms with tragedy)
26. Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov
27. Spectacles by Sue Perkins (laugh out loud, esp. for this South London girl)
28. October by China Mieville (China turns his hand to the Russian Revolution in this non-fic that makes for gripping reading)
29. Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders (will haunt you, probably forever)
30. Sweetpea by C.J. Skuse
31. Now I Rise by Kiersten White (this is the second book in the Lada series and I LOVE IT – set in a fascinating time period and place!)
32. Hot Milk by Deborah Levy
33. Wonder by R. J. Palacio
34. Salt to the Sea by Ruta Sepetys (all the feels in this historical, WWII YA that tells a little known story)
35. The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead (masterful storytelling, putting a fantastical spin on slavery that nonetheless makes the horror of the era unbelievably vivid)
36. Help! I’m a Manager by Sue Willcock (can you tell when I got my work promotion? Lol)
37. Smarter, Harder, Faster by Charles Duhigg (genuinely interesting work related book with some great case studies in a whole host of different areas)
38. Wonder Woman: Warbringer by Leigh Bardugo
39. The Silkworm by ‘Robert Galbraith’
40. Nyxia by Scott Reintgen
41. Circe by Madeline Miller
42. Widow Basquiat by Jennifer Clements
43. The Oxford Collection of Japanese Short Stories (every single story is monumentally depressing…but don’t let that put you off…the Japanese are the masters of the short story form)
44. Goldenhand by Garth Nix
45. Secularism by Andrew Copson
46. HHhH by Laurent Binet (part history, part novel, all fascinating)
47. Winter by Len Deighton
48. Blackshirt: Sir Oswald Mosley and British Fascism by Stephen Dorril (this book is long and incredibly dense but the history is SO INTERESTING)
49. The Language of Thorns by Leigh Bardugo

So, I didn’t quite beat last year’s score, but I did read quite a few awesome books and again managed a real mix of fic and non-fic. Looking forward to another year of reading and, as always, please let me know your top reads so I can start building the TBR!

Tags: books, reading, recommendations