These are my 15 favorite books of 2012 (amongst the ones that I blogged about)

Things Fall Apart	Achebe, Chinua
Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian	Alexie, Sherman
Extra Lives: Why Video Games Matter	Bissell, Tom
Pyongyang: A Journey In North Korea	DeLisle, Guy
Mill On The Floss	Eliot, George
The Sportswriter	Ford, Richard
The Feminist Mystique [2]	Friedan, Betty
The Power And The Glory	Greene, Graham
Second Shift	Hochschild, Arlie Russell
Collected Poems	Larkin, Phillip
The Blind Side	Lewis, Mike
Pursuit of Love	Mitford, Nancy
The Pillow Book	Shonagon, Sei
The Warden	Trollope, Anthony
Let’s Talk About Love: A Journey To The End Of Taste	Wilson, Carl

 

And these are all the books that I blogged about in 2012

Things Fall Apart	Achebe, Chinua
Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian	Alexie, Sherman
Speak	Anderson, Laurie Halse
Pride and Prejudice	Austen, Jane
The Girl’s Guide To Hunting And Fishing	Bank, Melissa
The Possessed: Adventures With Russian Books And The People Who Read Them	Batuman, Elif
Extra Lives: Why Video Games Matter	Bissell, Tom
Magic Hours: Essays on Creators and Creation	Bissell, Tom
Drop City	Boyle, T.C.
Agnes Grey	Bronte, Ann
How To Stop Worrying And Start Living	Carnegie, Dale
Silent Spring	Carson, Rachel
The Perks Of Being A Wallflower	Chbosky, Stephen
Falconer	Cheever. John
The Murder of Roger Ackroyd	Christie, Agatha
The Hunt For Red October	Clancy, Tom
Hunger Games	Collins, Suzanne
Chocolate War	Cormier, Robert
Best American Essays (2011)	Danticat, Edwidge (ed)
Robinson Crusoe	Defoe, Daniel
Pyongyang: A Journey In North Korea	DeLisle, Guy
Little Dorrit	Dickens, Charles
Mill On The Floss	Eliot, George
Middlemarch	Eliot, George
Collected Poems	Eliot, T.S.
Bridget Jones’ Diary [2]	Fielding, Helen
Tender Is The Night	Fitzgerald, F. Scott
The Sportswriter	Ford, Richard
Independence Day	Ford, Richard
The Feminist Mystique [2]	Friedan, Betty
Stranieri	Gans, Tristan
The Man Who Folded Himself	Gerrold, Davi
Something Borrowed	Giffin, Emily
The Fault In Our Stars	Green, John
The Power And The Glory	Greene, Graham
Brighton Rock	Greene, Graham
Escape From Camp 14	Harden, Blaine
House of the Seven Gables (didn’t finish)	Hawthorne, Nathaniel
Second Shift	Hochschild, Arlie Russell
The Odyssey	Homer
The American	James, Henry
Why We Can’t Wait [2]	King Jr., Martin Luther
Confessions of a Shopaholic	Kinsella, Sophie
Collected Poems	Larkin, Phillip
Conjure Wife	Leiber, Fritz
The Stepford Wives	Levin, Ira
The Blind Side	Lewis, Mike
Changing Places	Lodge, David
Small World: An Academic Romance	Lodge, David
Sloppy Firsts	McCafferty, Megan
Dragonflight	McCaffrey, Anne
Oranges	McPhee, John
Pursuit of Love	Mitford, Nancy
Election	Perrotta, Tom
Atlas Shrugged	Rand, Ayn
Wide Sargasso Sea	Rhys, Jean
The Overachievers	Robbins, Alexandra
God’s Harvard	Rosin, Hanna
Nine Stories	Salinger, J.D.
Redshirts	Scalzi, John
It’s A Good Life, If You Don’t Weaken	Seth
And The Band Played On	Shilts, Randy
The Pillow Book	Shonagon, Sei
Against Interpretation and other essays	Sontag, Susan
Red Plenty	Spufford, Francis
Pulphead	Sullivan, John Jeremiah
Confessions of a Pickup-Artist Chaser	Thorn, Clarisse
The Warden	Trollope, Anthony
The Way We Live Now	Trollope, Anthony
Barchester Towers	Trollope, Anthony
Framley Parsonage	Trollope, Anthony
The Small House At Allington	Trollope, Anthony
Adventures of Huckleberry Finn	Twain, Mark
Farthing	Walton, Jo
Half A Crown	Walton, Jo
Drinking at the Movies	Wertz, Julia
Miss Lonelyhearts	West, Nathanael
House of Mirth	Wharton, Edith
Picture of Dorian Gray	Wilde, Oscar
Stoner	Williams, John
Let’s Talk About Love: A Journey To The End Of Taste	Wilson, Carl
Old School	Wolff, Tobias
Revolutionary Road	Yates, Richard
Heroines	Zambreno, Kate

 

The most bittersweet part of compiling this list is looking at all the books that I didn’t blog about. As always, these included many of my most favorite books of the year. Sometimes you read something, and you just don’t have anything to say. Or you do have something, and then the moment passes. Out of all the books that I didn’t blog, perhaps my favorite was The Road by Cormac McCarthy. What a thoroughly excellent book. Here are twenty books that I enjoyed but did not write about.

No Longer At Ease	Achebe, Chinua
A Man Of The People	Achebe, Chinua
U and I	Baker, Nicholson
A Provincial Celebrity in Paris	Balzac, Honore de
How To Win Friends And Influence People	Carnegie, Dale
The Little Sister	Chandler, Raymond
Great Expectations	Dickens, Charles
Less Than Zero	Ellis, Brett Easton
Washington Square	James, Henry
Portrait Of A Lady	James, Henry
Thinking, Fast And Slow	Kahnemann, Daniel
The Road	McCarthy, Cormac
Freaks, Geeks, and Cool Kids	Milner, Murray Jr.
Major Barbara	Shaw, George Bernard
Beyond Freedom and Dignity	Skinner, B.F.
Seven Days In The Art World	Thornton, Sarah
A Handful of Dust	Waugh, Evelyn
Put Out More Flags	Waugh, Evelyn
The Touchstone	Wharton, Edith
In Pharaoh’s Army	Wolff, Tobias