Happy new year! This year I read 50 books, not as many as in the past but considering how much has gone on this year I can’t be upset. This year has been a learning process as I began editing in earnest, more than before, and have enough experience now to realise I need to overhaul my site. (This thought is combined with an ‘eek!’ as websites take a while to design, let alone write.) My database shows that I read a measly 3 non-fiction books this year; I realise I have an issue in that I love the idea of non-fiction and do love reading it, but the relative mental work it requires can make me push it back for a while. I cut down on review copies.

My usual best of the best list was difficult to create this year. A combination of fewer reads and fewer stellar reads means that technically this is almost a ‘because I’ve little to choose from’ list. Quite different to last year’s problem of having too many options! You’ll find my personal favourites at the bottom of the numbered (rated?) list.

As always, books that have been reviewed have a line underneath them and the title links to the review. The personal favourites is just a paragraph of book covers, because those covers (plus review links) are of course in the objective lists too. I’m keeping the navigation I created last year – if you want to skip the objective click here to view my personal favourites. There is of course some overlap between the lists.

The Best Of The Best (Objective list)

• Gillian Flynn: Gone Girl – Amy disappears and husband Nick seems not to care – could he be the killer or is there more to Amy than we think? Yep, I finally read it, and it’s as twisted but awesome as you all said.
• Helene Wecker: The Golem And The Jinni – A master-less golem and a somewhat-freed jinni learn how to live in the world of humans whilst everyone around them learns how to live in a different situation. Fantastic.
• Irène Némirovsky – Suite Française – As the Germans invade and conquer France, thousands of refugees move to areas that are still free and later adapt to life as the German soldiers move to live amongst them. An excellent book.
• John Green: The Fault In Our Stars – Two teenagers with cancer, one in remission, the other in a stable condition, fall in love amongst the happiness and trials in their life. One of those rare books I found lived up to the hype.
• Suzanne Collins: The Hunger Games – In a dystopian world, children are chosen to fight to the death in a televised ‘game’, and Katniss has volunteered in order to save her sister. Loved this book, enough said.

5

• Johanna Lane: Black Lake
• Meike Ziervogel: Clara’s Daughter
• Suzanne Collins: Catching Fire

4.5

• Davina Blake: Past Encounters
• Hanne Ørstavik: The Blue Room
• Louise Douglas: In Her Shadow
• Pasi Ilmari Jääskeläinen: The Rabbit Back Literature Society
• Philip Pullman: The Broken Bridge
• Suzanne Collins: Mockingjay

4

• Aimee Bender: An Invisible Sign Of My Own
• Diane Setterfield: Bellman & Black
• Elizabeth Chadwick: The Leopard Unleashed
• Elizabeth von Arnim: The Enchanted April
• Emma Henderson: Grace Williams Says It Loud
• Greg McKeown: Essentialism
• Irène Némirovsky: Fire In The Blood
• Isla Morley: Above
• Jenny Barden: The Lost Duchess
• Kamal Ben Hameda: Under The Tripoli Sky
• Laini Taylor: Daughter Of Smoke And Bone
• Nancy Bilyeau: The Crown
• Natasha Solomons: Mr Rosenblum’s List
• Suzannah Lipscomb: A Visitor’s Companion To Tudor England

3.5

• Andra Watkins: To Live Forever
• Erica Vetsch: A Bride’s Portrait Of Dodge City, Kansas
• Heather Walsh: The Drake Equation
• Jane Austen: Mansfield Park
• Kristy Cambron: The Butterfly And The Violin
• Lindy Woodhead: Shopping, Seduction & Mr Selfridge
• M J Rose: The Collector Of Dying Breaths
• Merryn Allingham: The Crystal Cage
• N K Jemisin: The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms
• Taylor Stevens: The Catch

3

• Ai Mi: Under The Hawthorn Tree
• Emily St John Mandel: Station Eleven
• Kay Kenyon: A Thousand Perfect Things
• Lisa Jewell: Before I Met You
• Peggy Riley: Amity & Sorrow
• Shannon Stacey: Love A Little Sideways
• Susanna Fraser: A Christmas Reunion

2.5

• Noelle Adams: Married For Christmas

2

• Elise Alden: Pitch Imperfect

My Personal Favourites

This year was about reading as much as I could whilst working around challenges (life ones rather than bookish). I had a vague notion of reading more classics but when it came to my goals, that I met any at all was mere luck. I will be making goals for this year but, as I’ve started to do, they will be general.

In many ways, even though the reading itself fell mostly in the latter months, this year was about long classics. If I wasn’t reading them, I was thinking about them, especially those I hadn’t finished. I couldn’t take more than 50 pages of Nicholas Nickleby per few days, especially given that it started to hurt my back to read it (and I would counsel that it’s not worth the aches), but the effort was there all the same. There was also a somewhat sudden flurry of Christian fiction that was interesting despite the fact I knew I wasn’t the audience for it. I made minor progress in my aim to get back to Asian fiction, but it was enough to leave me thinking of it constantly and I very much look forward to reading Jung Chang’s Empress Dowager Cixi.

Quotation Report

If Elene of The Leopard Unleashed had to counsel, she’d speak of her unintended success in throwing cups about when arguments were in full swing. It won her both the battle and a bit of something else she might refer to with a blush.

In the next few days I’ll be posting my goals for 2015 and, after that, my second film round up.

What were your favourite books of 2014?