I’m so glad I didn’t write my favorite books post earlier this month because one of my favorite reads came very recently. I’m glad I don’t have to skip including it, since it’s one that got a bit of buzz but maybe not as much as it should, and certainly not in the format I read it. I’ve listened to a significant number of audiobooks this year, and while some of my favorite audio titles will be included here, I’ll pull together a list next week with some of my favorite listens of 2019.

This list includes books I read this year which published this year. I read a lot of back list titles, especially in audio, but I wanted to put the spotlight on the newer titles. My final tally on books will likely be in the neighborhood of 190, which is about what my reading averages tend to be every year. These are in alphabetical order by title and cover a little bit of everything: YA, literary fiction, and nonfiction.

I could have easily doubled this list, but I limited myself to just ten.

Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking The Stress Cycle by Emily and Amelia Nagoski

If there’s one book I recommended more than any other in 2019, it was this one. I listened to it on audio and while I cannot recommend that experience enough — these sisters are so great at performing their work! — I think this is a book I’ll go back and purchase in print because I want to be able to reference it.

Let me begin by saying that, if you know anything about how stress works on the body, you won’t be surprised at the information in this book. But it’s the way the Nagoskis are able to explain why we need to have a release of our stress to complete the cycle that makes this book so good. We always hear that when we’re stressed, we should work out. Yes, we should, but the why is lost in that. The Nagoskis give the why.

The book really digs into the importance of rest, as well. Resting allows our brains to do a ton of work. I was kind of blown away by the fact we’re to rest 40% of our days, but when they break down what that entails, it’s really not that challenging (they are good about the caveats, of course).

The chapter on the “bikini industrial complex” and about how women choosing to be liberated from body hatred is so good. It’s not about body love or acceptance, which is something I really dislike. You can’t go from one extreme to the other without whiplash, and frankly, it’s just not realistic. But they offer up ways to think about having and operating within a human body that are really worthwhile. As someone who cares deeply about body stuff, I shouldn’t have been surprised to hear the history of some of the medically-ingrained biases, and yet, I still was.

The Honey Bus: A Memoir of Loss, Courage, and A Girl Saved By Bees by Meredith May

I think about this book almost daily.

May’s memoir is about growing up in a dysfunctional series of homes and how she came to find beekeeping a way of not only working through her familial challenges but also as a means of finding hope.

When she was young, May’s parents went through a messy divorce following her mother’s outbursts and abuse toward her father. Her mother took her and her brother from their home in Rhode Island to the home of her grandparents in Big Sur, California. Mom disappeared into herself, leaving May and her brother to grow up under the watch of a demanding and unfriendly grandmother and a man that they only ever know as their grandfather — a kind, generous, loving man who had a penchant for beekeeping and encouraged May to join him while he taught her about the ins and outs of the honeybees. This man was not May’s grandfather by blood though; he was a step-grandfather, and the discovery of this unravels into the history of abuse that plagued her family for generations. May’s father never quite reemerges except for one excellent trip back to Rhode Island for her, and her mother becomes more abusive toward her as she grows up. There is a lot of fear and anger throughout the story, but it’s tempered beautifully with the magic of bees and May’s grandfather.

We can’t rank dysfunction, but the level of fear and terror in this memoir isn’t as pronounced as EDUCATED or THE GLASS CASTLE, but readers who find those books to be captivating will find this to be one worth picking up. May’s writing is stunning, and her passion for bees comes through, both in her own voice and in the voice of that unbelievable grandfather in her life.

I grew up in a family that, although not like May’s, was one where I found myself close with my grandfather, too, so this one hit home in a lot of ways. It’s a lovely homage to the people in our lives who give us hope and love, even when we don’t know we need it. Likewise, the naturalist aspects of beekeeping and the incredible power bees have in the world made this bee-lover satisfied. The bulk of this book happens during May’s childhood and teenage years, so it’s totally appropriate for teens who eat up these kinds of true life stories.

Nothing To See Here by Kevin Wilson

This book absolutely surprised me, and it’s the one I referenced above. I didn’t read it until this month and was blown away by it — and this is one I could not stop listening to on audio, with great credit to Marin Ireland’s performance and spot-on southern accent.

Lillian and Madison went to a private high school together for a short period of time, and when Madison was caught with drugs, Lillian took the fall. She was kicked out of the school, and it further cemented to her what it meant when someone has financial privilege and when someone else doesn’t (she doesn’t). Years later, when Madison offers her a job and security, Lillian takes the opportunity because she wants to get out of the rut that her life has been in since she was young.

That job? Taking care of the children from Madison’s husband’s first marriage. His ex-wife has died, and since he’s running for political office, he needs to present a certain image that those kids don’t project.

Those kids start on fire.

Though this is a book about fire kids (what a hook!), it’s really about class and what privilege can do. It’s also a book about friendship and family, and Lillian is such a complex, compelling, and easy-to-love character, even when she gets prickly. The children are well-drawn and way more than simply kids who have a condition that causes them to become engulfed in flames. It’s heartening, it’s sad, and it’s also quite funny.

The Revolution of Birdie Randolph by Brandy Colbert

My new tradition to begin every year is to start with a Brandy Colbert book, and I love how even 12 months later, they’re on my mind. It makes me sad that this book seems to have fallen off many reader radars, as it’s maybe her strongest work yet. This is a book about following the rules and breaking them, as well as a book about the family we’re born into and the families that we make along the way.

Birdie’s aunt shows up at her family’s apartment right before the summer begins, and that’s when everything changes; it’s at this same time Birdie is secretly dating a boy she knows her very strict, proper parents wouldn’t like. Despite never pushing boundaries before, these two new people in her life encourage her to take some chances and learn some lessons she never would have on her own.

Colbert depicts her aunt Carlene’s alcoholism with tenderness and offers up the whole range of emotions people experience both as those who are addicts and those who are friends and family of addicts. There is support, but there is also caution exercised around Carlene that showcase hope for her to find recovery but also experience in knowing that this is a disease that is challenging to manage.

The Chicago setting is vibrant and real, and isn’t also afraid to highlight the racial challenges within the city, in terms of violence, racism, and bigotry, and the places and spaces where those do and don’t overlap.

Also handled really fabulously is anger and anger management, recovery from trauma and what that does and doesn’t look like, and it offers such a refreshing perspective on teens, especially teens of color, who’ve been in the juvenile justice system.

The Saturday Night Ghost Club by Craig Davidson

This little book was an absolute surprise to me when I read it, and like the others on this list, it comes back into my mind frequently. Note that in discussing this title, I’ve included the spoiler because that’s ultimately what made this one stand out.

Jake Breaker is a neurosurgeon and he knows how complex the brain can be. The story begins with him talking about the delicacy involved in surgery, and it weaves in the history of one summer in his youth in 1980s Niagara Falls, Canada. He’s been the victim of a vicious bully, which puts him in contact with Billy, the Metis boy who becomes a long-time friend. Over the course of the summer, Jake and Billy, as well as Billy’s older sister Dove (who struggles with bipolar disorder) become close to Jake’s eccentric uncle Cal, who runs an occult store in their small town. Cal suggests that they create a weekly ghost club, taking the lead on treating and terrorizing his nephew and nephew’s friends to stories of the ghosts that haunt their small town. The stories are horrific, though they’re far more about loss and sadness than they are about being scared. They’re stories of death, of people gone missing, of the relics of lives that never got to become what they were meant to be.

But one night, Jake learns that everything his uncle has taught him is simply reconstructed memories from Cal’s own horrific experiencing of losing his wife and unborn child. Cal, who has no recollection of these things, believes these to be ghost stories and not the facts of his own life. Jake wrestles with knowing the truth, both at his youthful age and now, as a neurosurgeon reflecting upon that summer which changed everything he thought he knew.

It’s heartbreaking and heartwarming, as it’s a story about love and loss and the things that we do when we’ve experienced tremendous pains and powerful highs. It’s a short story but one that packs a punch. For readers who are put off by horror, this would make an excellent read in the genre, and the comparisons to Stranger Things and Stand By Me are excellent. It reminded me, too, of the children’s sections of Stephen King’s It, minus Pennywise. This has some great crossover appeal — which isn’t surprising, given that Davidson’s other writing alias has become a Canadian horror writer with huge appeal to teen readers. Gorgeous, poetic, nostalgic writing.

Thirteen Doorways, Wolves Behind Them All by Laura Ruby

I’m not going to talk about this one in depth, in part because I wrote a whole piece about this book over on Book Riot. It’s a tragedy that it did not take home the National Book Award (I don’t think it’s fair to compare books, but I also read 1919, this year’s winner, and I had a number of issues with it that made me wonder why that was the ultimate winner). This was also one of Kimberly’s favorites of the year.

One of the things I started doing this year was dedicating one day a week to writing dates with fellow author Alyssa Wees (her The Waking Forest is a fabulous dark fairy tale, a la Pan’s Labyrinth). As soon as I finished Ruby’s book, I told Alyssa she needed to read it ASAP because I knew she’d love it. I wasn’t wrong, and we spent one of our two-hour dates raving about it.

 

 

Trick Mirror by Jia Tolentino

I never would have picked this book up or become an impassioned fan of Tolentino’s writing were it not for a friend who told me to pick this one up and read the first essay about Twitter, since it’d likely articulate a lot of feelings I had about the platform after I chose to leave it. She was right. But more than that, this entire book was an outstanding, challenging, and thoughtful exploration of a number of social and cultural phenomenon explored through the lens of a millennial feminist of color. I told everyone I could to read it, and nearly every one of them also put this book on their favorites list this year. This is a book of meaty, challenging essays that takes time. I read it over the course of months.

I selected this book as my favorite for Book Riot’s Best Books roundup this year. Here’s the short blip I wrote: “Tolentino’s debut essay collection sinks its teeth deep into what it means to be a Millennial in today’s capitalist, hustle-focused culture. Whether it’s Twitter, athleisure, $12 salad lunches consumed at one’s work desk, weddings, or reality TV, each piece shines a feminist lens on what they mean on both the micro and the macro level. Meticulous and critical, Tolentino’s essays challenge readers to think deeply and broadly. This collection is humorous and erudite and offers a sense of relief to fellow Millennials feeling over and under whelmed with the current state of the world.”

We Set The Dark On Fire by Tehlor Kay Mejia

The only thing I did not love about this book was that I was half-way through before realizing it was a duology. I felt like salt was added to this wound when I got a package from the publisher not too long ago and there was a publicity one-sheet for the second book but the book itself wasn’t actually in the package (I have it now!).

On the Island, there are the privileged and those who aren’t privileged. But, if you play the system a bit, you can rise above your status and become an elite. This is what happened to Dani, whose parents sacrificed everything for her to attend the Medio School for Girls, where she trained to become a Primera, one of the two wives a man of status takes. She keeps her status as a lower-than-low class girl quiet, and she regrets ever telling Carmen when she believed them to be friends years earlier.

So when Carmen is named the Segunda to her Primera for one of the most powerful men in the country, Dani panics. Can she trust her? How awful will it be living her life with Carmen and this boy forever?

But Dani had been offered something she couldn’t refuse just before the marriage. And it sets her up on a course as a spy from inside the grounds of her new home and not only does it mean defying all of the social mores of her elite status, but it means choosing loyalties. It also means she has to decide whether to harm another girl to get what she needs. Carmen, too, seems to becoming closer and closer to her, too, and Dani becomes more paranoid she’s the target of a ruse.

There’s no secret this book is super queer, and it’s pretty evident from early on who will fall for who. It isn’t a surprise — and it’s really a wonderful relationship. Mejia develops full, round female characters who are caught up in a patriarchal system and choosing to act as they do to not only better themselves, but to also better their sisters. And more, this is a book about class, about borders, and about why it is the elite hate those who are of a lower class than them. It’s about resistance, about power, and about using your voice and your status to make the world better, as opposed to worse.

Compelling, immersive, and beautifully written, this book is feminist as hell, it’s a book that would be perfect to hand to readers who are not necessarily fantasy readers, and those who enjoy mythology, stories of taking down power, and the dynamics of female relationships as they exist in a world meant to keep girls as enemies, rather than as friends or lovers.

We Speak in Storms by Natalie Lund

Genre-blending books — particularly those which blend ghost stories with contemporary stories — have stood out to me this year. Lund’s debut checked literally every box I have when it comes to books that are catnip for me: it’s about tornadoes, about ghosts, small midwestern towns, and it’s set about 20 miles from where I live (not a necessity, but a bonus, as I could picture so many of these places and could read up on the history of the real events that inspired the book).

Fifty years after Mercer’s infamous, deadly tornado, another tornado rolls through, waking the ghosts of those who died in the first storm. The ghosts become close companions to Callie — currently losing her mother and so much of her stability to cancer; to Joshua — coming out as gay, in a fat body, with a stepfather who won’t accept him at all; and to Brenna — struggling post-breakup to reconcile her Latina heritage with her current life with a single mother in a small town where she’s one of a mere handful of people of color.

Their voices are interwoven with the ghosts, which speak like a Greek chorus.

The language is lush, imagery evocative, and the characters are all rich. This reminded me so much of Jenna Blum’s The Stormchasers, another book I absolutely loved.

Who Put This Song On? by Morgan Parker

If there’s a book I can point to on this list and say it was wildly overlooked. . . I could point to a lot, actually. But Parker’s debut YA novel may be at the very top. This book is one of the best depictions of depression and anxiety I’ve read, and it’s especially noteworthy that Morgan, the main character who is based on Morgan the author, is black, as her mental illnesses intersect directly with her experiences being black.

By turns funny and heartbreaking, this book is a slice of life into Morgan’s ups and downs in her conservative Christian school and very white suburban southern California youth. She doesn’t apologize for her experiences, nor feel the need to make excuses for them. She struggles, and it’s honest.

Morgan’s faith plays a big role in the story. She wants to believe in Christianity, but wrestles with what some of the teachings say and how they go against her own beliefs. It’s neatly juxtaposed with how she lays into being an emo kid, despite the fact she is the antithesis of what people believe an “emo” kid to be — white, sad, and covered in eyeliner. She instead loves herself some vintage fashion, is black, and just enjoys (as much as she can!) feeling her feelings to intense music.

One of the criticisms I’ve seen of this book is the thing that makes this such a REAL depiction of depression: Morgan isn’t likable all the time, and she’s not sympathetic all the time. Depression does this. It makes you a monster, even though deep down, you’re hoping to be anything but; we see this tension tugging at Morgan page after page.

The climax of the book is a moment where Morgan puts on a public art performance/activist project and it’s one that really seals the way her mental illness intersects with her blackness, as well as the history of black activism in the United States.

This is one of those books you’ve got to also read through the author’s note and resources. Those are as vital to the story — to Morgan — as every other chapter in the book.