Here are the books I read in 2017. I didn’t read as much as I usually do this year. I was kind of on tour constantly and also life. But I read many excellent books this year and only one inexcusably bad book that I am still very angry about.
My Favorite Book of the Year
I cannot say enough about Pachinko. This novel was utterly absorbing. I knew nothing about it when I picked it up, and I couldn’t put it down. I read it voraciously and was so taken by the writing, by the elegance of the prose, the sweeping ambition and scope of the narrative, how much I learned without feeling lectured, how I wanted so very much for the characters and was very invested in their lives. I love this book.
My Second Favorite Book of the Year
Stephen Florida by Gabe Habash
A girl (woman obvi) I’m always trying to impress gave me this book so I of course read it and at first, I was like, hmm, this is just an uncomfortable read. As in literally, the prose is so weird that it was uncomfortable to read. But I kept reading. And I kept reading. And it was all so strange, so intensely committed to being what it was, no pretense, no bullshit, just incredibly stylistic storytelling about a young man who lives to wrestle. I loved all the details, the intense focus on the body, the obsession with ambition, the plainness of Stephen Florida’s wants and needs. I never knew what was going to happen next. I was always anxious about what might happen next. The execution of this novel is flawless. So many very good books are very good but unoriginal. This book is excellent and truly original.
The Other Best Books of the Year
What It Means When a Man Falls From the Sky by Lesley Nneka Arimah
Her Body and Other Parties by Carmen Maria Machado
We Are Never Meeting In Real Life by Samantha Irby
Spoiler Alert by xTx
Eat Only When You Are Hungry by Lindsay Hunter
The Collapsing Empire by John Scalzi
The Idiot by Elif Batuman
I’m So Fine: A List of Famous Men & What I Had On by Khadijah Queen
An Absolutely Delightful Novel That Was Thoroughly Imaginative and Strange and Charming
All the Birds in the Sky by Charlie Jane Anders
A Memoir that Was Really Very Extra but the Writing Was Fine and the Book Certainly Held My Prurient Interest
How to Murder Your Life by Cat Marnell
Gorgeous Collections of Poetry That Astonished Me And Opened The World Up To Me
Don’t Call Us Dead by Danez Smith
Wade in the Water by Tracy K. Smith
Blud by Rachel McKibbens
Call a Wolf a Wolf by Kaveh Akbar
Bestiary by Donika Kelly
Silencer by Marcus Wicker
A Really Creepy True Crime Book About an English Girl’s Disappearance in Japan
The People Who Eat Darkness by Richard Lloyd Parry
An Utterly Underwhelming (and Often Annoying) but Very Competent Short Story Collection
Uncommon Type by Tom Hanks
An Ambitious Essay Collection From a Talented Writer Where I Wanted More Depth From Each Essay
All the Lives I want by Alanna Massey
The Celebrity Memoir I Absolutely Loved and Did Not Expect to Love About an Artist I Knew Nothing About and Now I Can’t Stop Listening to His Song “Lemonade” Which Is Not to Be Confused With God’s Album “Lemonade”
The Autobiography of Gucci Mane by Gucci Mane
The Book I Hated Most, For Excellent Reasons I Explain in My Goodreads Review and That I WIll Summarize by Saying NO NOPE NO Because For One the Protagonist Scoops Semen Out of Her Vagina With Alarming Frequency (WTF DUDE? COME ON)
My Absolute Darling by Gabriel Tallent
A Book From My Childhood That I Adored and Found Again With the Help of Some Fans At An Event (It totally holds up)
Caroline by Willo Davis Roberts
An Amazing Dystopian Feminist Novel I Couldn’t Put Down
The Book of the Unnamed Midwife by Meg Elison
A Fun, Unexpectedly Interesting Book About the Worst Movie Ever
The Disaster Artist by Greg Sestero with Tom Bissell
A Novel About Rich White Women That Was Okay And Very Readable But Also Very Predictable And Way Better Than the Dry Ass TV Adaptation With Bad Music
Big Little Lies by Liane Moriarty
A Quintessential New Yorker’s New York Book That Is Wonderful
Arbitrary Stupid Goal by Tamara Shopsin
A Moving Novel About A Man Trying to Grapple WIth His Weight and His Grief and Keeping His Family Together
The Weight of Him by Ethel Rohan
A Book About Young Folk In the Big City Trying to Make It Work in Start Up World
A Solid Memoir About Brain Trauma and A Woman Finding Her Way Back to Herself
Tell Me Everything You Don’t Remember by Christine Hyung-Oak Lee
A Book of Pictures Of Signs From the Women’s March (Literally)
Why We March: Signs of Protest and Hope
A Hilarious Book by a Comedian Which Is Notable Because Most Comedian Books Are Neither Good Nor Funny
The Awkward Thoughts of W. Kamau Bell by Kamau Bell
A Book by A Comedian That Was Fine But I Didn’t Love It
The Last Black Unicorn by Tiffany Haddish
Unique Poetry Collections That Experimented With Form, Language, and Thought In Really Interesting Ways
Electric Arches by Eve Ewing
Madness by Sam Sax
My Mother Was a Freedom Fighter by Aja Monet
A Book From A Writer I Love That I Wanted to Like But It Made Me Cringe A Lot, Particularly Where Race Is Concerned
A Bad Romance Novel Where The Sex Metaphors Made Me Irate and Also The Woman Was Constantly Wetting Herself Over the Man’s Masculine Scent and Let’s Be Real In That Men Only Smell Good Once In A While DON’T AT ME
Deadly Rumors by Cheris Hodges
A Really Descriptive Novel Where Los Angeles and the California Desert Are More Vivid and Compelling As Characters Than the Human Characters
Wonder Valley by Ivy Pochoda
The Essay Collection About Race in America I Am Still Grappling With
We Were Eight Years in Power by Ta-Nehisi Coates
A Book Where the Very Last Scene Was the Strongest, And Still Haunts Me Months After First Reading It
New People by Danzy Senna
Books I Taught In My Fiction Workshops
The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen
On Writing by Stephen King
Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy 2015
Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy 2016
The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood
Disgrace by J.M. Coetzee
Excellent Books I Blurbed
Reset by Ellen K Pao
This Will Be My Undoing by Morgan Jerkins
The Sarah Book by Scott McClanahan
The Belles by Dhonielle Clayton
This Is My Face by Gabourey Sidibe
The Guidebook to Relative Strangers by Camille Dungy
Now My Heart is Full by Laura June
The Wedding Date by Jasmine Guillory
Heart Berries by Terese Mailhot
Goodbye, Sweet Girl by Kelly Sundberg
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