The Best Books of 2020

While 2020 may be the strangest year of our lives, it was also a year filled with exceptional books. These are the best I read this year. In the coming week I'll publish the best in each of the categories as it was difficult to select just one (or two or three) in each genre. If you're looking for something great to read while you stay safely at home, you won't go wrong with any of these. The image above is Diego Reading by Jack Chambers, 1970 from Canadian Paintings @CanadaPaintings on Twitter.

The Best Novels – It’s a tie. 

The Best Novel I read this year that was published this year:

Northernmost by Peter Geye tells the harrowing tale of Odd Einar Eide trying to survive alone in the Arctic Circle in 1897 combined with his great-great-great granddaughter’s struggles redefining herself and her own escape from a frozen marriage. When Greta discovers her ancestor’s story, she examines her own life as she retells his remarkable adventures. This is a compelling adventure, but first it’s a love story told with heat and compassion. This is the third novel in the Eide trilogy, but it stands alone and can be enjoyed without reading the previous books. The writing is exquisite. It’s one of the best books out this year.

 

The Best Novel I read it this year that was published in 2019:

Disappearing Earth by Julia Phillips leads the reader through the remote Kamchatka Peninsula on the northeastern edge of Russia where two young sisters disappear. Phillips uses interrelated vignettes to portray the indigenous and Russian inhabitants and their relationship to the girls’ disappearance. The novel makes the reader feel the land then it explodes into one of the best conclusions ever written. Bravo! Sense of place, fascinating details, and brave characterizations make this a debut novel deserving of its accolades. The tension builds over twelve months until we learn the girls’ fate. Book clubs will want to explore themes of xenophobia, racism, gender, vulnerability, and grief. This debut novel was a National Book Award finalist. (2019)

The Best Nonfiction published in 2020:

Memorial Drive: a Daughter’s Memoir by Natasha Trethewey embeds the reader into the poetic account of Trethewey’s mother’s murder. It reads like a true-crime detective story as told by a poet laureate. Trethewey, who won the Pulitzer Prize for poetry in 2007, paints her grief and anguish with a palette of brilliant colors that illuminate and share her anguish and her growth. This book is both a master class in the use of metaphor and a tension-filled accounting of what happens when women at risk, especially black women, aren’t heard when it matters.

The Best Nonfiction I read that was published in 2019:

Deep Creek: Finding Hope in the High Country by Pam Houston illustrates how living on a remote, 120-acre homestead in the Colorado Rockies healed Houston.  Written as an almanac of her life, it’s filled with observation and introspection. This is a woman who loves the earth and shows the reader how that love grew. Her parents were such drunks that she’d been in sixteen totaled cars before her sixteenth birthday. Her father had abused her and she had to find a way forward and reader, she did. Phenomenal writing. Animals and nature can heal us

The Best Mystery/Suspense Novel of 2020:

Your House Will Pay by Steph Cha is so much more than simply a great psychological, suspense-filled thriller, it also affords a look at our divided, unequal society. Based on the real-life killing of fifteen-year-old Latasha Harlins in 1992 by a Korean woman who was convicted of manslaughter but never sentenced to serve a day in prison, Cha takes the anger, fear, grief, and guilt of the families involved and transforms them into a masterpiece of a novel about human nature. Shawn, the cousin of the murdered girl, is a 40-year-old black man who served time and now lives a life of hard work and devotion to family. Grace Park, the daughter of the woman who killed his cousin as he watched 24 years previously, is a pharmacist in her parents’ store who didn’t know about her mother’s crime. Seeing things through both their eyes is brilliant, unsettling, and informative.

The Best Historical Fiction of 2020 – It’s a three-way tie:

Cher Ami and Major Whittlesey by Kathleen Rooney, In 1918, Cher Ami, a British-trained carrier pigeon, flew a dangerous mission in France and delivered a vital message that might save US troops. One hundred years later, the pigeon, now stuffed, is on display at the Smithsonian where she remembers the past. Major Charles Whittlesey, an erudite Manhattan attorney and the leader of what became known as The Lost Battalion, tells how he and his men were trapped in enemy territory for six days by the Germans and US friendly fire. He wrote the note Cher Ami carried. Returning home, the Major is hailed as a hero but feels responsible for so many deaths. Flying above it all, Cher Ami sees everything clearly. This is based on actual events of World War I. It touched me deeply.

 

The Night Watchman by Louise Erdrich is pure Erdrich perfection. Based on the life of Erdrich’s grandfather Patrick Gourneau, a night watchman and tribal elder who fought the US attempt to remove natives from their North Dakota land in 1953, this story offers an intriguing tale with compelling characters, a touch of magic realism, and a view of history we all need to see. Erdrich notes, “if you should ever doubt that a series of dry words in a government document can shatter spirits and demolish lives, let this book erase that doubt. Conversely, if you should be of the conviction that we are powerless to change those dry words, let this book give you heart.” Readers, it did give me heart. You won’t be able to read this without falling in love with Patrice, Thomas, and the other residents of the Turtle Mountain Reservation. It’s a masterpiece.

Washington Black by Esi Edugyan won the Scotiabank Giller Prize, was a Man Booker finalist, and was on the New York Times best books of 2018 list. It combines a swashbuckling adventure with a sensitive tale of slavery and freedom. “Wash” Black is an enslaved ten-year-old on a Barbados plantation in 1830 when he’s selected to assist his master’s brother with his invention. After a bounty is put on Wash, he escapes with Titch, who is now his master. This is a miraculous tale of loyalty and freedom. Select it for your book club and get ready for an endless conversation. (2018)

 

The Best Picture Book of 2020

The Old Truck by Jarrett Pumphrey and Jerome Pumphrey reminds this Nana of Margaret Wise Brown’s The Red Barn and the Little Truck series with its gorgeous clear and simple color. My grandson sat enamored as I read it to him on FaceTime during the pandemic. This will be a classic. PBJ Ages 2 and up

 

 

 

 The Best Middle Grade Book of 2020:

 Prairie Lotus by Linda Sue Park is a great book for children ages ten and up and it’s a remarkable story that adults will adore. If you loved the “Little House” series as a child, this book is for you. If not, it’s still fabulous as it embeds the reader in the story of Hanna a half Chinese, half white, 14-year old girl in 1880 in the Dakota Territory. Cheer as Hanna persists against slurs and danger.Ages 9 and up