top of page

Readers' Favorites 2022

The results are in! Lots of great reading recommendations from readers of my newsletter and various Facebook groups I'm in...


Thank you to the 65 people who participated in my survey, listing nearly 320 books! We had a clear winner, followed by ties for second, third, fourth and fifth place and 21 runners-up. Interesting to note that several of these books were published in previous years -- books have a long shelf life, as my publisher likes to say. Some of these books have made the list two years in a row, and Amor Towles has the distinction of having three different books among the favorites and runners-up.


I'm also thrilled to see books by authors who have appeared at Literary Modiin (One Hundred Saturdays by Michael Frank, The Netanyahus by Joshua Cohen and How to Find Your Way in the Dark by Derek B. Miller) as well as others I've recommended in my newsletters on the list of readers' favorites. I'll put links to Bookshop.org for the books I've recommended in past newsletters.


1st place:

Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus


2nd place:

Hamnet by Maggie O'Farrell (second year on the list)

The Lincoln Highway by Amor Towles (second year on the list)


3rd place:

Honor by Thrity Umrigar

Cloud Cuckoo Land by Anthony Doerr (second year on the list)


4th place:

Women on Fire by Lisa Barr

Horse by Geraldine Brooks


5th place:

The Personal Librarian by Marie Benedict and Victoria Christopher Murray

Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer

Matrix by Lauren Groff (second year on the list)

A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles


Runners up:

Crossroads by Jonathan Franzen

Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese

Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver

Fresh Water for Flowers by Valerie Perrin

Left on Tenth by Delia Ephron

Lessons by Ian McEwan

Mercury Pictures Presents by Anthony Marra

Once There Were Wolves by Charlotte McConaghy

Rules of Civility by Amor Towles

Signal Fires by Dani Shapiro

Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan

The Four Winds by Kristin Hannah

The Guncle by Steven Rowley

The Matchmaker's Gift by Lynda Cohen Loigman

The Overstory by Richard Powers

The Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane by Lisa See

The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry by Rachel Joyce

The Violin Conspiracy by Brendan Slocumb

West With Giraffes by Lynda Rutledge


More recommendations from your fellow readers:

11/22/63 by King Steven

12 Rules for Life by Jordan Peterson

A Beautiful Mind by Sylvia Nasar

A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara

A River of Stars by Vanessa Hua

A Woman of Endurance by Dahlma Llanos-Figueroa

Addie LaRue

Aftermath: Life in the Fallout of the Third Reich 1945-1955 by Harald Jähner

All the Lonely People by Mike Gayle

All Who Go Do Not Return by Shulem Deen

Am I Normal? The 200-Year Search for Normal People (and Why They Don’t Exist) by Sarah Chaney

American Dirt by Jeannine Cummins

American Seoul by Helena Rho

American Woman by Susan Choi

Anathem by Neil Stephenson

Apeirogon by Colum McCalum

Atoms and Ashes by Plokhy

Auschwitz #34207 by Nancy Sprowell Geise

Bad Jews: A History of American Jewish Politics and Identities by Emily Tamkin

Bad Mothers Bad Daughters by Maya Sonenberg

Beartown by Fredrik Backman

Beautiful Country by Qian Julie Wang

Beneath a Scarlet Sky

Big Summer by Jennifer Weiner

Billy Summers by Stephen King

Blind Man's Bluff by James Tate Hill

Book Lovers by Emily Harris

Busman's Honeymoon by Dorothy Sayers

Carrie Soto is Back by Taylor Jenkins Reid

Chasing History: A Kid in the Newsroom by Carl Bernstein

Chorus by Rachel Kauffman

City of Girls by Elizabeth Gilbert

Cold Enough for Snow by Jessica Au

Confidence Man by Maggie Haberman

Crazy to Leave You by Marilyn Rothstein

Cyclorama by Adam Langer

Death and the penguin by Kurkov

Diary of a Void by Emi Yagi

Dictionary of Lost Words by Pip Williams

Dirt Creek by Hayley Scrivenor

Empire of Pain by Keefe

Enola Holmes Series by Nancy Springer

Every Good Boy Does Fine by Jeremy Denk

Finding the Mother Tree by Suzanne Simard

Force Of Nature by Jane Harper

Foster by Claire Keegan

Frederick Douglass by David W. Blight

Free: Coming of Age at the End of History by Lea Yipi

Gilead by Marilynn Robinson

Harlem Shuffle by Colson Whitehead

Have You Seen Luis Velez by Catherine Ryan Hyde

Having and Being Had by Eula Biss

Heart's Invisible Furies by John Boyne

HEARTBROKE by Chelsea Bieker

Homeland Elegies by Ayad Akhtar

Honeymoon for One by Chris Keniston

Honeymoon for Three by Chris Keniston

Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson

How German Is It? by Walter Abish

In Love by Amy Bloom

Jerks by Sara Lippmann (watch a recording of Sara at Literary Modiin)

Joy Comes in the Morning by Jonathan Rosen

Just Kids by Patti Smith

Just Revenge by Alan Dershowitz

Lady Chatterley's Lover by D. H. Lawrence

Leaving Eastern Parkway by Matthew Daub

Lech by Sara Lippmann (watch a recording of Sara at Literary Modiin)

Life and Fate by Vasily Grossman

Lost & Found by Kathryn Schulz

Lucky Turtle by Bill Roorbach

Lucy by the Sea by Elizabeth Strout

Mad Honey by Jodi Picoult

Mary Coin by Marisa Silver

Maybe You Should Talk to Someone by Lori Gottlieb

Mercy Street by Jennifer Haigh

Migrations by Charlotte McConaghy

Mistress of the Ritz by Melanie Benjamin

Mrs. Harris Goes To Paris by Paul Gallico

My Cousin Rachel by Daphne du Maurier

Natural History by Andrea Barrett

Never Meant to Meet You by Ally Frank and Asha Youmans

Never Split the Difference by Chris Voss

Next Year Havana by Chanel Cleeton

Nobody Will Tell You This But Me by Bess Kalb

Notes on an Execution by Danya Kukafka

Nothing by Henry Green

Oh William by Elizabeth Strout

Olympus Texas by Stacey Swann

On Hampstead Heath by Marika Cobbold

On Repentance and Repair by Danya Ruttenberg

Once We Were Home by Jennifer Rosner

Pachinko by Min Jin Lee

Particularly Cats by Doris Lessing

People of the Book by Geraldine Brooks

Perla by Carolina De Robertis

Portrait of a Marriage

Recessional by James Mitchner

Relocation by Ayelet Gunder Goshen

Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt

Reptile House by Robin McLean

Safekeeping by Abigail Thomas

Secrets of Happiness by Joan Silber

Sold on a Monday

Solito by Javier Zamos

Soolie

Speak Silence by Kim Eichlin

Speciman Days by Michael Cunningham

Still Life by Sarah Winman

Tepper Isn't Going Out by Calvin Trillin

That Summer by Jennifer Weiner

The Beauty of Humanity Movement by camilla gibb

The Book of Goose by Yiyun Li

The Books of Jacob by Olga Tokarczuk

The Bookshop on the Corner by Jenny Colgan

The Candy House by Jennifer Egan

The Cellist by Daniel Silva

The Code Breaker by Walter Isaacson

The Color of Ice by Barbara Linn Probst

The Dawn of Everything by David Graeber David Wengrow

The Fault In Our Stars by John Green

The Friend by Sigrid Nunez

The Girl With the Louding Voice by Abi Daré

The Good Women of Safe Harbour by Bobbi French

The Gown by Jennifer Robson

The Great Believers by Rebecca Makai

The Great Circle by Maggie Shipstead

The Gulag Archipelago by Solgenitzen

The House in the Cerulean Sea by T.J. Klune

The Invention of Wings by Sue Monk Kidd

The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue by V.E. Schwab

The It Girl by Ruth Ware

The Last Karankawas by Kimberly Garza

The Last Samurai by Helen DeWitt

The Last Thing He Told Me by Laura Dave

The Latecomer by Jean Hanff Korelitz

The Life and Crimes of Hoodie Rosen by Isaac Blum

The Life of Samuel Johnson by James Boswell

The Lost Apothecary by Sarah Penner

The Magnificent Lives of Marjorie Post by Allison Pataki

The Marriage Portrait by Maggie O'Farrell

The Measure by Nikki Erlick

The Middle Place by Kelly Corrigan

The Midnight Library by Matt Haig

The Midwife's in Town by Kate Jessica Raphael

The Mighty Franks Michael Frank (watch a recording of Michael at Literary Modiin)

The Motion of the Body Through Space by Lionel Shriver

The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri

The Night Watchman by Louise Edrich

The Passenger by Boschwitz

The Passion by Jeanette Winterson

The Pavilion in the Clouds by Alexander McCall Smith

The Philosopher's Pupil by Iris Murdoch

The Postmistress by Sarah Blake (watch a recording of Sarah at Literary Modiin)

The Postmistress of Paris by Meg Waite Clayton

The Power and the Glory by Graham Greene

The Real Mrs. Tobias by Sally Koslow (watch a recording of Sally at Literary Modiin)

The Rent Collector by Cameron Wright

The Scent Keeper by Erica Bauermeister

The Sea of Tranquility by Emily St John Mandel

The Secret History by Donna Tartt

The Secrets Between Us

The Sentence by Louise Erdrich

The Skin by Curzio Malaparte

The Splendid and The Vile by Erik Larsen

The Sunrise by Victoria Hislop

The Sweet Remnants of Summer by Alexander McCall Smith

The Sweetness of Water

The Swimmers by Julie Osuka

The Tears of Monterini by Amanda Weinberg

The Tender Bar by JR Moehringer

The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien

The Trees by Percival Everett

The Unfinished Corner by Dani Colman

The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett

The Whalebone Theatre by Joanna Quinn

The Widh by Nicholas Sparks

The Wife Between Ys by Greer Hendricks

The Winners by Fredrik Backman

The Woman They Could Not Silence: One Woman Her Incredible Fight for Freedom and the Men Who Tried to Make Her Disappear by Kate Moore

The Yellow Wife

The Yid by Paul Goldberg

These Precious Days by Ann Patchett

They Came Like Swallows by William Maxwell

This Tender Land by William Kent Krueger

Three Floors Up by Nevo Eshkol

Transit of Venus by Shirley Hazzard

Twits in Love A Steampunk Romance by Tom Alan Robbins

Verity by Coleen Hoover

Washington Black by Eso Edugyan

What's Left of Me is Yours by Stephanie Scott

Who They Was by Gabriel Krauze

Winter in Sochko by Elisa Dushapin

Wolf Road

What is Missing by Michael Frank (watch a recording of Michael at Literary Modiin)

You Have a Friend in 10A by Maggie Shipstead

You Made a Fool of Death With Your Beauty by Akwaeke Emezi

Zarot (Strangers) by Lihi Lapid

Zuleikha by Guzel Yakhina

Yorumlar


bottom of page