The best books I read in 2014
Since I don’t try very hard to read books soon after they’re published, I prefer to recommend stuff I happened to read this year, whenever it came out. Hopefully some of these are still new to you, and soon dear to you as well. Let’s dig in—here are a few books I loved:
Griffin & Sabine: An Extraordinary Correspondence
A series of letters and postcards exchanged between two people who are mysteriously and magically connected. Literal letters and postcards—exuberantly creative, masterfully executed, and written with an earnest, wide-eyed innocence that might just break your heart. My friend James’ family said to check this out after we released Blackbar; they were so right. (Get the full trilogy here or all six volumes here.)
Beautiful Darkness
Perhaps the most haunting book I’ve ever read. It starts off as a sweet fairytale and then gets twisted. You think you know where that goes, but you have no idea how upsetting a tone Vehlmann and Kerascoët achieve. If this sounds like a recommendation to you—it did to me—read it immediately.
A Canticle for Leibowitz
I was told that this was the best sci-fi book of all time, and I duly rolled my eyes at such a sweeping statement. Consider my eyes unrolled: this is the greatest sci-fi book of all time. (If I were you, I’d hunt down an older copy, sans that hideous modern cover.)
The Skies Belong to Us: Love and Terror in the Golden Age of Hijacking
A brilliant book, one half educational nonfiction, one half thrilling story of desperate love and mad action. Like a nonfiction Goodfellas at 30,000 feet.
Shakespeare: The World as Stage
If you haven’t checked out Bill Bryson yet, maybe just look at his bibliography and grab whatever topic sounds up your alley. He’s good at everything. Me, I really dig this short little book on Shakespeare’s life and times (leaning heavily on the times, given the paucity of information on the man). Smart fun.
Galveston
If you liked True Detective, pick up the show creator Nic Pizzolatto’s novel. It’s less philosophically cool, but equally existentially atheistic. Dark stories, grimy places, ugly people with nothing to lose. For those who find Cormac McCarthy too cheery.
I Want My Hat Back
It’s a simple, short book for kids. It’s also the best movie the Coen brothers never made. A masterpiece of suspenseful storytelling.
Previously: The best books I read in 2013
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