aslant | 2012's Year in Books

After some final scrambles to sort out a few misnumbered reviews, my 2012 total stands at 48. I'm pretty proud of that number, as it was attained in between work and parenting and a hell of a year. I read more books than that, but I think of this primarily as a way of digesting what I've read, getting my thoughts together, and only secondarily about quantity.

Most of the best books didn't fit into any themes, per se, but there were a couple obvious themes: 1) childbirth and parenting, 2) nonviolent communication and relationships, 3) British domestic service between the wars, and 4) the holocaust. You could say my class schedule this past academic year has been a bit erratic, to say the least.

Here is a list of the top 8 that stuck out when I reread through my reviews, unranked:

42. The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, Junot Diaz, believe the hype
41. La Batarde, Violette Leduc a.k.a. the writer I should have written my thesis about
34 & 35. books 1 & 2 of the Kingkiller Chronicles, Patrick Rothfuss
15. Wild, Cheryl Strayed
20. You're An Animal, Viskovitz!, Alessandro Boffa, hilarious, sweet and clever like a randy Calvino
8. Mating in Captivity, Esther Perel, a.k.a. the book that might have saved my marriage
6. Mothers and Others, Sarah Blaffer Hrdy, best unintentional utopia
1. The Tiger's Wife, Tea Obrecht

There are lots more I would add to the honorable mentions list, which I don't care to list out, but these top 8 are the ones I would spend money to have on my bookshelf. That is a big endorsement these days.