The Post In Which I Rank My Top Rated Books of 2015

Oh goodie! The year end review posts are starting! I’m having a grand ol’ time printing out and counting up and percentaging and all the jazz that comes with the last week of the year.

And trying to figure out which book will be FIRST of 2016. This question keeps popping into my head and then silence. So, for right now, I have NO idea which book will be first. It’ll happen, always does. For more on that topic, visit Sheila at Book Journey.

Now. Let’s look at my top books and find out – drumroll, please – which was the very best for me in my opinion of all the books I enjoyed in 2015:

The book covers above are in no particular order as far as I can tell. It is the order goodreads.com put them in.

Here’s MY order most loved first to only very slightly less loved last:

The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry (on audio, rev)

The Good Lord Bird (review)

H is for Hawk (on audio, rev)

Between the World and Me (review)

The Elegance of the Hedgehog (review)

The Love Song of Miss Queenie Hennessy (on audio, rev)

Far From the Madding Crowd (on audio,rev)

The Snow Child

Dept of Speculation (review)

Station Eleven (review)

Big Little Lies (review)

Bad Feminist (review) *According to WP, this review was my most visited post…

 Death in the Garden (review)

All I Have in This World (review)

Heft (on audio,rev)

Inside the O’Briens (review)

Lost Lake (review)

Wow, I have some very different books here. And I know that I have some FOUR slice reads that might be worthy of jumping up into this list and maybe swap places with the lower tier but let’s just say, I had a REALLY good reading year, shall we? (Honestly, I really don’t recall much about Lost Lake. gulp.)

If tomorrow, you asked me to re-rank these, the order would likely be different. But overall, these books were the ones that hit the right buttons, the right mood, the right emotions, the everythings.

These account for almost a quarter (23%) of the books I read! 70% of my total 2015 books read were a 4 or 5 pie slicer. Wow, indeed.

Which genres do I like, you ask? Oh my, what genres these books cross! Science fiction, romance, chicklit, historical fiction, almost-not-quite fantasy, civil rights, memoir, medical lit, mystery-thriller, fictional travelogue, death and dying, feminism, experimentally-stylish?

Three of the books above are nonfiction; Between the World and Me won the National Book Award 2015. H is for Hawk won the Samuel Johnson Prize 2014.

The Good Lord Bird won the National Book Award for Fiction 2013.

Five were audiobooks.

Station Eleven and Dept. of Speculation, both pub’d in 2014, had all sorts of acclaim this year and maybe a slew of awards.  Of course, Far From the Madding Crowd is a classic (and Hardy’s least sad, I’ve heard.) My review for that was my least read and most fun to write. But you wouldn’t get it if you haven’t read the book, so… And why!??! it isn’t on the 1001 Books to Read Before You Die list is a travesty.

I read both Harold Fry and Queenie Hennessy books TWICE. Each both in print and on audio. I am now Rachel Joyce’s biggest fan.

The most popular book I read was Mockingjay. I gave it 3 slices.

My least favorite book of 2015 was The Importance of Being Oscar. Skip it, seriously. And I gave more one and/or two slices to books this year for 11%; whereas, last year I only gave 8% the dreaded 2 slicer. Any DNFs I had were due to mood and timing and not a reflection of the quality of the experience. I didn’t count any DNFs, in other words. Only a few put-back-on-shelf-for-later.

A good year. A fine year for reading, was 2015. On to more stats and stuff… Posts, they are a-comin’.

 

Copyright © 2007-2015. Care’s Online Book Club. All rights reserved. This post was originally posted by Care from Care’s Online Book Club.  It should not be reproduced without express written permission.