10 books we loved reading this year
Titles that made a lasting impression on USA TODAY’s reviewers in 2018
1. “Becoming” By Michelle Obama (Crown, nonfiction)
“Becoming”– a huge best-seller – is more candid than the usual first lady’s memoir; there’s little about grand State Dinners and a lot about the lessons Obama learned from her parents; the challenges she faced as a black woman both at Princeton and later, when she reluctantly followed her husband into national politics and the White House.
2. “The Female Persuasion” By Meg Wolitzer (Riverhead, fiction)
A righteously angry young #MeToo-era feminist meets her ‘70s-era women’s rights idol, and discovers the real-life compromises that are made to keep the movement going. Wolitzer keeps the pages turning with relatable characters and a couldn’t-be-more-current storyline.
3. “Calypso” By David Sedaris (Little, Brown, nonfiction)
The humorist turns a bit melancholy in this rewarding essay collection as he reflects on his sister’s suicide and mother’s alcoholism, but he brightens the mood with sardonically witty pieces on his Fitbit obsession and the tumor he fed to a snapping turtle.
4. “An American Marriage” By Tayari Jones (Algonquin, fiction)
A penetrating love story about artist Celestial and Roy, an on-the-rise Morehouse man, whose fragile young marriage is torn asunder when Roy is wrongly accused of rape. An Oprah’s Book Club pick that also ended up on Barack Obama’s summer reading list, “An American Marriage” exposes the intimate toll of our national shame, the unjust imprisonment of African-American men.
5. “The Fifth Risk” By Michael Lewis (Norton, non-fiction)
Master researcher and storyteller Lewis (“Liar’s Poker”) offers a spellbinding analysis of what is happening now from inside the U.S. government, indict- ing the Trump administration’s dangerous, foolhardy ignorance of what federal agencies actually do to keep Americans safe. A book that’s anything but dull and wonkish.
6. “Clock Dance” By Anne Tyler (Knopf, fiction)
Anne Tyler isn’t unsung – half-sung, maybe? – but there’s something remarkable about her unassuming fivedecade string of masterpieces, most recently this year’s wry, humane “Clock Dance,” about a middle-aged woman forced to remake herself for a second time.
7. “The Library Book” By Susan Orlean (Simon & Schuster, nonfiction)
A book for people who love books – not to mention libraries. Framed around the massive fire that swept Los Angeles Central Library in 1986 and the search for the arsonist, “The Library Book” is so much more – an homage to the quirky world of librarians and an appreciation of one of humanity’s greatest inventions, books.
8. “The Italian Teacher” By Tom Rachman (Viking, fiction)
A poignant, pictureperfect tale of how a brazen artistic genius affects other lives — especially his son’s.
A mesmerizing portrait of the artist as a charming, irresistible, eccentric pain in the you-know-what.
9. “You Think It, I’ll Say It” By Curtis Sittenfeld (Random House, fiction)
Sittenfeld has her razor-sharp finger on the pulse of heartland America in this breezy, zeitgeisty, very funny collection of 10 short stories starring bright, uppermiddle-class characters going their merry, often totally clueless way.
10. “Feel Free” By Zadie Smith (Penguin Press, nonfiction)
From high art to binge-watch TV, this collection of essays refuses to stay in one place. But “Feel Free” is unified by Smith’s impassioned arguments for honest and fearless art in divisive times.