As I wrote in my last post, 2024 was a difficult year, one that challenged me in more ways than I could have ever anticipated. On the positive side, being forced to slow down and rest more meant that I was able to read more books than any previous year–over ninety in total! There was so much incredible literature I consumed last year that it was hard to narrow down this list to just ten titles, but here they are:
Never Let Me Go – Kazuo Ishiguro
Never Let Me Go is a beautifully-written work of literary science-fiction told from the perspective of Kathy, a young woman who works as a carer for “donors.” She and her friends came of age at Hailsham, a boarding school in the English countryside. Through Kathy’s nostalgic recollections, which comprise much of the text, the reader discovers that Hailsham isn’t as pleasant as it may first appear, and that Kathy’s sheltered, seemingly normal upbringing was little more than a pretense, concealing the tragic role she and the other students were preordained to fulfill in adulthood.
Watership Down – Richard Adams
This 1972 classic follows a group of anthropomorphic rabbits escaping the destruction of their warren and seeking a new home in the English countryside. Along the way, the rabbits encounter danger and temptation, and uncover shocking truths about the world they live in and the brutal, often senseless nature of humans. It’s a timeless story that can be enjoyed by almost any age group, and a thought-provoking allegory chock-full of important themes of interconnectedness, respect for nature and wildlife, and animal versus human behavior.
Trainspotting – Irvine Welsh
Trainspotting is a challenging yet rewarding read. Written entirely in Scottish dialect, and featuring a cast of deeply flawed yet fully realized characters, the novel consists of a series of connected stories centered around a group of working class young adults and their struggles with various forms of addiction. Interspersed with the excess partying, drug and alcohol abuse, and casual sex are surprisingly tender exchanges between characters and thought-provoking observations on society, conformity, and the purpose of life. Don’t let the dialect deter you; this novel is well worth it!
The World According to Garp – John Irving
I fell in love with John Irving in 2023 when I read A Prayer for Owen Meany and The Cider House Rules. Irving’s fourth novel is a hilarious, heartwarming, character-driven saga about T.S. Garp Fields, the son of independent, ahead-of-her-times feminist, Jenny Fields, and their wildly nontraditional life of fame, loss, and misadventure. The World According to Garp is the kind of novel that straddles the line between the real and the absurd, that pulls the reader in with its beautiful prose and fantastic characterization and keeps you guessing as to what will happen next.
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn – Betty Smith
Betty Smith’s acclaimed bildungsroman tells the story of Francie Nolan, a girl growing up in poverty in Williamsburg, Brooklyn at the turn of the 20th Century and the trials and tribulations she and her family endure as they fight to make it in the world. Based on Smith’s own upbringing, the novel is a well-written human story chock-full of humor and heartbreak that stands the test of time.
No Country for Old Men – Cormac McCarthy
This Western crime-thriller, set on the Texas-Mexico border in the 1980s, is not the kind the book I would have expected to like as much as I did. But McCarthy’s subtle subversion of expectations, superb characterization, and thought-provoking dialogue sealed this violent, twisted tale as one of my favorite reads of the year. No Country for Old Men is much more than your run-of-the-mill crime novel; it’s a story about good versus evil, fate versus free will, and the downfall of human society, told in McCarthy’s unconventional yet effective style of run-on sentences and minimal punctuation.
Poor Deer – Claire Oshetsky
Oshetsky’s second novel is a poignant, beautiful story about a young woman grappling with a childhood tragedy and the terrifying deer-like apparition that haunts her. Margaret, our troubled protagonist, has finally decided to tell the truth about the death of her best friend when she was four, but as she sets out to write her own story, in a narrative that alternates between past and present, she merges into the classic unreliable narrator, and we, as the reader, are left to guess what really happened on that fateful day twelve years ago.
One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest – Ken Kesey
The third classic to grace this list, this 1960s novel, set in a psychiatric ward, is a brilliant (albeit slightly dated) portrayal of mental illness and social conformity. Told from the unreliable perspective of Chief Bromden, a giant of a man who the world has made to feel small, Bromden’s routine life as a “chronic” is disrupted by the arrival of Randle McMurphy, a rule-bucking trickster who challenges the tyrannical head nurse, Nurse Ratched, and the strict regime with which she governs the ward. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest is at once hilarious, honest, devastating, thought-provoking, and timeless.
Martyr – Kaveh Akbar
Cyrus is a young man grappling with addiction and struggling to make sense of the seemingly senseless deaths of his parents. An obsession with martyrdom leads him to examine the mysteries of his past, and along the way, he makes some shocking discoveries about his own life and the world in which he lives. Akbar’s debut novel is introspective, original, and moving, experimenting with format and exploring timeless themes of identity, grief, family, and the purpose of life. The novel’s end is both ambiguous and otherworldly, and remained on my mind days after I’d turned the final page.
Flowers for Algernon – Daniel Keyes
Flowers for Algernon is told through a series of Progress Report, written by Charlie Gordon, a young man with an IQ of 68 who submits to a novel operation that will turn him into a genius. But intelligence comes at a cost, and as Charlie’s IQ steadily rises, painful memories of his past return, and he begins to see his friends and the world in an entirely different light. The novel raises a lot of important questions about science, human behavior, and disability, those who often exist on the outskirts of society. The format is unique and effective, and Charlie’s journey is deeply moving and gripping.
Let me know what your favorite reads of the year were!
Great list, Julia. I hope this year is a more positive one for you.