The best books you read in 2020?

The Man who knew everything - Deborah Levy
Little Fires Everywhere - Celeste Ng
Home - Toni Morrison

I enjoyed Where the Crawdads Sing but it definitely wasn't brilliant. Just loved the atmosphere. The plot was ridiculous.

House of Glass by Hadley Freeman - it’s about her relatives during WWII. Immaculately researched and very moving.

Ducks, Newburyport by Lucy Ellman. Long and very short on punctuation but totally engrossing. I’m going back for round 2 next year.

I’m getting some good recommendations on this thread, thank you!

My favourites of the year -

I’m thinking of ending things - Iain Reid. This was the most impressive thing I’ve read this year I think, really fantastic.

The Magician by Somerset Maugham. Never read Maugham before thought this was great.

Before the coffee gets cold by Toshikazu Kawaguchi. A bit twee but I found this a great comfort read.

Funnily enough I was thinking about this this morning in bed. Mine would be:

1. Jude the Obscure
2. East of Eden
3. Remains of the Day
4. The Testaments

My favourite books this year:
American Dirt
Little fires everywhere
Life, death and vanilla slices.

Just finished Everything I never Told You by Celeste Ng, which I think is way better than Little Fires Everywhere, and also Away with the Penguins, which is such an easy but happy anti Covid/Brexit/2020 read!

Hamnet
Invisible Women
The Silence of the Girls
Girl Woman Other
Where the Crawdads Sing
A long Petal of the Sea
American Dirt
Cutting for Stone
Troubled Blood

I loved all of these.

Let me know how you get on with it intermittenparps

Silver Sparrow and An American Marriage by Tayari Jones
The Vanishing Half and Mother’s by Brit Bennett
Troubled Blood
Where the Crawdads sing
American Dirt
The Underground Railroad
Three Women

3kids, thank you, you've convinced me; I'll try it again on my hols!

I went through a similar phase with Donna Tartt a year ago A Place of Greater Safety is one I found I had to really try with but once I got over half way it clicked for some reason and took off, I couldn't put it down then, I think the characters started to stick in my head more, I didn't have to keep looking at the front of the book to remind myself who they were. i have beyond black on my to read list too. I really must get her memoir. Total fan girl now

I've tried and given up on A Place of Greater Safety in the past too. Might try it again over the hols. I am hot and cold with Hilary Mantel; I LOVE the Cromwell novels, The Giant O'Brien, Eight Months on Ghazzah Street and Fludd, and liked her memoir, but didn't get/couldn't finish Beyond Black.

@3kidsareenough I admire your dedication to H Mantel . I’ve started A Place of Greater Safety twice, I get quickly confused by all the character names and give up! Perhaps I’ll give it another go this Christmas.

I’m re-reading Charlotte Gray, it’s been 15 years and I’m enjoying it.

It's not been a great year for new reading but I enjoyed Such A Fun Age. I read a bunch of fantasy books, a genre I've not really got into before. In crime, I think Jane Casey's Maeve Kerrigan books get better and better. I did read a fair number of pretty disposable novels, none of which I can recommend, just to distract from the general awfulness of 2020, and I completely failed to read The Mirror and the Light, despite having loved the previous two, but I'm hoping to give that a go over Christmas.

This was the year I borrowed far more library books than I actually read, just because I found concentrating so hard. (Last year I thought Station Eleven, The Silence of the Girls and Fleishman is in Trouble were all brilliant.) I comfort re-read most of Mary Stewart's romantic thrillers and Lois McMaster Bujold's Vorkosigan novels.

In non-fiction, Prairie Fires, about the life of Laura Ingalls Wilder, was absolutely fascinating, as was Lady in Waiting, in a completely different way.

My top read of the year has been Troubled Blood, in preparation for which I read all the previous Galbraiths, and I love them even more now. But Troubled Blood is the best yet.

I read Khaled Hosseini's books for the first time this year; A Thousand Splendid Suns, The Kite Runner and And the Mountains Echoed. I loved them all. I also enjoyed Stacey Hall's The Foundling and I'm currently reading and thoroughly enjoying Hungry by Grace Dent.

Another vote for The Salt Path. And The Five. Also The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle.

Thank you so much for this thread! Have found reading such a struggle this year, but books I read and enjoyed include:

Joan Didion - The Year of Magical Thinking
David Nicholls - Us
Hilary Mantel - Wolf Hall and Bring Up the Bodies

It's nice to see all these recomendations. I have a few bought ready to read but I personally have found it a hard year to read anything emotional or challenging so have found myself rereading old safe books. Lots of Terry Pratchett, some Madeline Miller etc. Looking forward to reading a lot of good books in 2021.

Mine were

The World I fell out off Melanie Reid
The patron saint of lost souls Menna Van Praag
The complete Uxbridge English dictionary by Graeme Garden
Little fires everywhere Celeste Ng
Mythos Stephen Fry
Swell Jenny Landreth
The Sealwoman's Gift Sally Magnusson
Fierce Bad Rabbits Clare Pollard
Rough Magic Lara Prior-Palmer
Queens of the KIngdom: The woman of Saudia Arabia speak
In your defence Sarah Langford
The January Man Christopher Somerville
Names for the Sea Sarah Moss
Three hours Rosamund Lupton
A honeybee heart has five openings Helen Jukes

15/163. Not such a great year for reading!

Elizabeth is Missing
Before the Coffee gets Cold
The Only Plane in the Sky - 9/11 from lots of people’s perspectives
Just finishing Michael Palin’s book about North Korea. Really interesting.

The one I enjoyed most was He by John Connolly. It’s hard to describe but basically it’s a fictional retelling of the life of Stan Laurel. It’s both beautiful and slightly disturbing. I just loved the way it’s written.

Wolf Hall Hilary Mantel
Bring up the bodies Hilary Mantel
The Mirror and the Light Hilary Mantel
A place of greater safety Hilary Mantel
Conversation with Friends Sally Rooney
Ordinary People Sally Rooney
Somebody's Mother Somebody's Daughter (an emotive read to say the least) by Carol Ann Lee
Plain Sight Dan Davis
Hangover Square Patrick Hamilton
The end of the affair Graham Green
Just Ignore Him Alan Davis
Killing for Company Brian Masters
One of our own Carole Ann Lee
White House Farm Murders Carol Ann Lee
Thomas Cromwell Tracey Borman

I've just finished, The Confession, by Jessie Burton, and really enjoyed it. Great to hear what everyone else has been reading.

Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton
Song of the Girls By Pat Barker

American Dirt - loved this.

Hamnet. Superb.

Dark Tides by Phillipa Gregory. Part of a series.

Americanah
American Dirt
Kolymsky Heights
Half of a Yellow Sun

These were all on Audible and I think the narration on each is partly why I enjoyed them so much.