Best books of the year are bolded. Poster Girl left me eager to read anything Veronica Roth wants to writer. The Field of Blood kicked off a brand-new interest in the lead-up to the Civil War, which influenced the rest of my reading. The Wonder and The Idiot were very different takes on religion, the violence lurking under everyday normalcy, and the tendency of outsiders to say bluntly the things that cannot, but must, be said. Blumenthal’s Lincoln bio, All the Powers of Earth, somehow made the cut against some stiff competition despite having the worst copyediting and prose style of any book on this list. Elizabeth Keckley’s memoir of her rise from slavery to fashion industry leader and confidante of the First Lady was not one of my top five favorites, but should definitely be better known–a hidden gem from the 19th century with an incredible voice and an eye for telling details.

Born With Teeth – Liz Duffy AdamsAurelius (To Be Called) Magnus – Victoria GoddardSame Sun Here—Neela Vaswanti and Silas HouseWith the Fire on High—Elizabeth AcevedoPoster Girl—Veronica RothArch-Conspirator—Veronica RothStateless—Elizabeth WeinJust and Unjust Wars—Michael WalzerThe Next New Syrian Girl—Ream ShukairyThe Idiot—Fyodor DostoevskyWilderness—Robert Penn WarrenThe Field of Blood: Violence in Congress and the Road to Civil War—Joanne B. FreemanBehind the Scenes, or Thirty Years a Slave and Four Years in the White House—Elizabeth KeckleyThe Turnaway Study: The Cost of Denying Women Access to Abortion—Diana Greene FosterThe Bostonians—Henry JamesPersuasion—Jane AustenAspects of the Novel—E.M. ForsterThe Wonder—Emma DonoghueThe Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club—Dorothy L. SayersA Safe Girl to Love—Casey PlettThe Betrothed—Alessandro ManzoniKomarr—Lois McMaster BujoldSimon Sort of Says—Erin BowThe Political Life of Abraham Lincoln, Volume III: All the Powers of Earth—Sidney BlumenthalThe Battle of Maldon: together with The Homecoming of Beorhtnoth and ‘The Tradition of Versification in Old English’—J.R.R. Tolkien, edited by Peter GrybauskasNormal People—Sally RooneyAmbitiosa Mors: Suicide and the Self in Roman Thought and Literature—T.D. Hill