It’s time for one of my favorite posts of the year, the post where I get to count all the books I’ve read. This year, the grand total is 140. On average, I read about 12 books a month. It’s a pretty even mix of fiction and nonfiction. I tend to listen to nonfiction on audio and read fiction (hard copy or Kindle). I’ve selected my 15 favorite novels and 15 favorite nonfiction books. It’s very difficult to narrow it down to 15! The full list of books I read is below. I would love to hear your favorite reads of 2024.
Fiction:
The Limits — Nell Freudenberger
Time’s Mouth — Edan Lepucki
They’re Going to Love You — Meg Howrey
Margo’s Got Money Troubles — Rufi Thorpe
Still Born — Guadalupe Nettel (translated by Rosalind Harvey)
Dead in Long Beach, California — Venita Blackburn
Bandit Queens — Parini Shroff
Twenty-Seven Minutes — Ashley Tate
After Birth — Elisa Albert
The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store — James McBride
Human Blues — Elisa Albert
The Nursery — Szilvia Molnar
What You Are Looking For Is In the Library — Michiko Aoyama
The Paper Palace — Miranda Cowley Heller
Dirty Laundry — Disha Bose
Nightwatching — Tracy Sierra
Behind You Is the Sea — Susan Muaddi Darraj
All the Little Bird-Hearts — Viktoria Lloyd-Barlow
None of This Is True — Lisa Jewell
The Lost Daughter — Elena Ferrante
Bear — Julia Phillips
Annie Bot — Sierra Greer
Again and Again — Jonathan Evison
The Garden — Clare Beams
Like Mother, Like Daughter — Kimberly McCreight
The End of Drum-Time — Hanna Pylväinen
Sleeping Giants — Rene Denfeld
Leaving — Roxana Robinson
Wrong Place Wrong Time — Gillian McAllister
Kink: Stories — Garth Greenwell and R.O. Kwon (editors)
The Bird’s Nest — Shirley Jackson
Good Material — Dolly Alderton
First Lie Wins — Ashley Elston
Days of Wonder — Caroline Leavitt
The Red Grove — Tessa Fontaine
The Husbands — Holly Gramazio
All the Broken Places — John Boyne
The Sicilian Inheritance — Jo Piazza
All Fours — Miranda July
The Three Lives of Cate Kay — Kate Fagan
I’m Thinking of Ending Things — Iain Reid
Women! In! Peril! — Jessie Ren Marshall
The Sisters K — Maureen Sun
Liars — Sarah Manguso
Heartburn — Nora Ephron
Exhibit — R.O. Kwon
The God of the Woods — Liz Moore
A Good Enough Mother — Catherine Dunne
The Wedding People — Alison Espach
Long Island Compromise — Taffy Brodesser-Akner
The Hypocrite — Jo Hamya
Martyr! — Kaveh Akbar
Madwoman — Chelsea Bieker
Unsheltered — Barbara Kingsolver
The Bright Years — Sarah Damoff
Heartbreaker — Claudia Dey
A Frozen Woman — Annie Ernaux
Sky Full of Elephants — Cebo Campbell
Sandwich — Catherine Newman
Same as It Ever Was — Claire Lombardo
The Unseen World — Liz Moore
Here One Moment — Liane Moriarty
How the Light Gets In — Joyce Maynard
You’re Safe Here — Leslie Stephens
A Woman’s Story — Annie Ernaux
Simple Passion — Annie Ernaux
We Were the Universe — Kimberly King Parsons
Orbital — Samantha Harvey
If You Love It, Let It Kill You — Hannah Pittard
After Hope — Heather Frimmer
Dirty Diana — Jen Besser and Shana Feste
Don’t Be a Stranger — Susan Minot
Greta & Valdin — Rebecca K. Reilly
A Reason to See You Again — Jami Attenberg
Shred Sisters — Betsy Lerner
Nonfiction:
Everyone But Myself: A Memoir — Julie Chavez
The Nature Fix: Why Nature Makes Us Happier, Healthier, and More Creative — Florence Williams
Brutalities: A Love Story — Margo Steines
Through the Groves: A Memoir — Anne Hull
More: A Memoir of Open Marriage — Molly Roden Winter
Real Self-Care: A Transformative Program for Redefining Wellness (Crystals, Cleanses, and Bubble Baths Not Included) — Pooja Lakshmin
The Comfort Crisis: Embrace Discomfort to Reclaim Your Wild, Happy, Healthy Self — Michael Easter
The Way of Integrity: Finding the Path to Your True Self — Martha Beck
The Eating Instinct: Food Culture, Body Image, and Guilt in America — Virginia Sole-Smith
100 Ways to Change Your Life: The Science of Leveling Up Health, Happiness, Relationships, and Success — Liz Moody
Doppelganger: A Trip Into the Mirror World — Naomi Klein
Splinters: Another Kind of Love Story — Leslie Jamison
This American Ex-Wife: How I Ended My Marriage and Started My Life — Lyz Lenz
How to Be the Love You Seek: Break Cycles, Find Peace, and Heal Your Relationships — Nicole Lepera
Eve: How the Female Body Drove 200 Million Years of Human Evolution — Cat Bohannon
I Am Yours: A Shared Memoir — Reema Zaman
Things I Learned From Falling: A Memoir — Claire Nelson
Night Vision: Seeing Ourselves Through Dark Moods — Mariana Alessandri
While You Were Out: An Intimate Family Portrait of Mental Illness in an Era of Silence — Meg Kissinger
Making Motherhood Work: How Women Manage Careers and Caregiving — Caitlyn Collins
Lessons for Survival: Mothering Against the Apocalypse — Emily Raboteau
Fed Up: Emotional Labor, Women, and the Way Forward — Gemma Hartley
The Age of Magical Overthinking: Notes on Modern Irrationality — Amanda Montell
Sociopath: A Memoir — Patric Gagne
Small Animals: Parenthood in the Age of Fear — Kim Brooks
Love and Trouble: A Midlife Reckoning — Claire Dederer
Committed: On Meaning and Madwomen — Suzanne Scanlon
Ambition Monster: A Memoir — Jennifer Romolini
Releasing the Mother Load: How to Carry Less and Enjoy Motherhood More — Erica Djossa
Love Is A Burning Thing: A Memoir — Nina St. Pierre
Grief is for People — Sloane Crosley
How to Raise Kids Who Aren’t Assholes: Science-Based Strategies for Better Parenting—From Tots to Teens — Melinda Wenner Moyer
Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art — James Nestor
Liliana’s Invincible Summer: A Sister’s Search for Justice — Cristina Rivera Garza
Everything I Know About Love: A Memoir — Dolly Alderton
A Well-Trained Wife: My Escape From Christian Patriarchy — Tia Levings
Up to Speed: The Groundbreaking Science of Women Athletes — Christine Yu
Men Have Called Her Crazy: A Memoir — Anna Marie Tendler
All of This: A Memoir of Death and Desire — Rebecca Woolf
Not the End of the World: How We Can Be the First Generation to Build a Sustainable Planet — Hannah Ritchie
Better Faster Farther: How Running Changed Everything We Know About Women — Maggie Mertens
The Light Eaters: How the Unseen World of Plant Intelligence Offers a New Understanding of Life on Earth — Zoë Schlanger
Mother Hunger: How Adult Daughters Can Understand and Heal from Lost Nurturance, Protection, an D Guidance — Kelly McDaniel
Over Work: Transforming the Daily Grind in the Quest for a Better Life — Brigid Schulte
Break the Cycle: A Guide to Healing Intergenerational Trauma — Mariel Buqué
Mad Wife: A Memoir — Kate Hamilton
The Neuroscientist Who Lost Her Mind: My Tale of Madness and Recovery — Barbara K. Lipska
I Will Do Better: A Father’s Memoir of Heartbreak, Parenting, and Love — Charles Bock
Did I Ever Tell You?: A Memoir — Genevieve Kingston
Consent: A Memoir — Jill Ciment
Languishing: How to Feel Alive Again in a World That Wears Us Down — Corey Keyes
Rabbit Heart: A Mother’s Murder, A Daughter’s Story — Kristine S. Ervin
Lifeform — Jenny Slate
Six Walks: In the Footsteps of Henry David Thoreau — Ben Shattuck
Somehow: Thoughts on Love — Anne Lamott
How Do You Feel?: One Doctor’s Search for Humanity in Medicine — Jessi Gold
Social Justice for the Sensitive Soul: How to Change the World in Quiet Ways — Dorcas Cheng-Tozun
Poetry, plays, and other stuff:
Good Grief — Brianna Pastor
Daughter Drink This Water: A Book of Sacred Love — Jaiya John
Lucky Wreck: Poems – Ada Limón
The Emergency Poet: An Anti-Stress Poetry Anthology — Deborah Alma (editor)
Stars At Last: Poems — Jessica Jocelyn
You Better Be Lightning — Andrea Gibson