It is always interesting to look back and see what my reading year was like-the highs, the lows, the books I tried to like, but just couldn’t and the ones that surprised me and made me glad that I read them. All are a part of the reading life which enriches and informs my my real life.

In 2014 I read 85 books. Most of them were fiction but fewer than usual were in the mystery/thriller genre that I usually prefer and more in the literary or general fiction category. For non-fiction I continued to read Atkinson’s WWII series; Day of Battle: The War in Sicily and Italy 1943-4 and another in Cahill’s series: Desire of the Everlasting Hills
both of which I thoroughly enjoyed which is really encouraging me to read more non fiction in the new year.

My Top Picks for this year are :

Lost City Radio by Daniel Alarcon tells the story of a South American radio show where Norma, the host of the show, intersperses the news of the day with music and the reading of the names of the missing and lost. One day a boy arrives at the radio station carrying more names and Norma is shocked to find her missing husband’s name on the list. A gentle yet compelling story, Lost City Radio is a quiet meditation on war and it’s aftermath and the power of second chances.

The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt which won a Pulitzer Prize tells the story of  Theo, who struggles to come to terms with his life after his mother’s death in an explosion at the New York Metropolitan Museum. In the aftermath of the explosion Theo picked up a small painting, one that his mother loved, for safe keeping but in the end never gives it back. Somehow the painting becomes both a talisman-reminder of what life was like before and after the explosion and then later a burden and symbol of bad choices. Tart asks thoughtful questions about living a life of integrity and how we overcome our own bad choices and live fully even in the face of death.

A Deniable Death by Gerald Seymour is a spy thriller, but it is one of the most thoughtful of its genre that I have ever read. The main characters are fully human right down to all their annoying habits and tics, and yet they are doing something that requires enormous endurance, patience, skill and strength.  Their target, an Iranian bomb maker called the Engineer is even handedly described and we are given insights into our “enemy” including his family which are both disconcerting and humanizing. Seymour has been called the “best spy novelist ever,” an assessment with which I fully concur!

Natchez Burning by Greg Iles is a haunting story of the legacy of slavery and  the fight for civil rights in Mississippi. When Dr. Tom Cage’s former nurse, Viola, dies under suspicious circumstances, Dr. Cage becomes a primary suspect.  However citing patient doctor confidentiality he refuses to defend himself, leaving his son,  Penn Cage a lawyer and now mayor of Natchez, to  defend him without any help or insight. Raising issues that seem all the more prescient given the recent incidents in Missouri, this book was very thought provoking.

Other books that I really enjoyed were How To Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia by Mohsin Hamid, Pendragon’s Banner Triology by Helen Holick, Life after Life by Kate Atkinson and The Storied life of A. J. Fikry by Gabrielle Zevin.  

I hope that you can find a few new books that you might want to try from this list!

Thanks for following my blog!

Happy New Year!

Brenda