I know! It is 2018, and here I am still talking abut 2017. But I wanted to highlight some of the best books I read last year to tempt you into reading some great books during this next year. So here goes!

The best book I read last year was A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles. Tender, insightful and exquisitely written, this book takes you to Moscow and immerses you into the lives of the people at the Metropol Hotel over the course of several decades. This extraordinary novel is one of those books that reaffirms one’s faith in humanity while making the reading life very satisfying.

When Breath Becomes Air is the true story of Paul Kalanithi, a neurosurgeon who on the verge of completing his residency is diagnosed with Stage IV lung cancer. The book is his effort to find the answer to two important questions. “What is a good and virtuous life?” and “What is a good death?” Powerfully written, Kalanithi, examines a life stripped bare of anything nonessential to living or dying. Strangely, rather than being sad or depressing, the focus on these essentials is uplifting and comforting. Profound and humorous, honest and insightful, Kalanithi’s story lingers long after you have finished reading it.

 This year like many of you I watched Ken Burn’s series on the Vietnam War. While watching it I kept being reminded of the Pulitzer Prize winning book, The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen. This is a complicated book narrated by a Vietnamese communist sleeper agent full of dark, evocative satire and perceptive insights about the effect of the war on Vietnam and the US. In an interview Nguyen said he wanted to write a novel that  “directly confronts the history of the American war in Vietnam from the Vietnamese American point of view… I wanted to be very critical of the Americans in Vietnam and not adopt the usual position of Vietnamese Americans, which is either to be grateful to be rescued by Americans or conciliatory, and not directly confrontational…” He has more than succeeded in doing that and in doing so he has also humanized all the factions and actors, clearing away the simplistic one sided motives of the US’s participation and replacing it with something more complicated, yet more true.

In the same vein, I found The Girl in Green by Derek Miller to be tremendously enlightening regarding the war in Afghanistan, while The Glass Palace by Amitav Ghosh helped me see the history of colonialism in India, Myanmar and Malaysia from a new perspective. These books are both well worth reading!

On a lighter note, I thoroughly enjoyed the Magpie Murders by Anthony Horowitz who took Agatha Christie’s tried and true detective formula and created a modern interpretation. Well written, suspenseful and fun to read, this is a whodunit that will keep you guessing to the last page!

Finally, Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman is the feel good, restore your faith in humanity, there is a silver lining behind every rainstorm, book that you have been waiting for! I thoroughly enjoyed Honeyman’s ability to make me empathize with someone as complicated and off-putting as Eleanor to such an extent that by the end of the book I was cheering her on!

I hope these book suggestions get you off to good start in this new year of reading!