Best Books of 2015

The best books of 2015 lists are being published in the newspapers these days and I have collected the best of the ‘best lists’. I don’t necessarily agree with all their choices, but there are lots of interesting books here.

The books that keep reappearing are:

Elena Ferrante’s last instalment in her Neapolitan series, The Story of the Lost Child (and rightly so, I very much enjoyed My Brilliant Friend and The Story of a New Name)

Andrea Wulf’s non-fiction The Invention of Nature: Alexander von Humboldt’s New World, which sounds like a riveting read if you’re interested in ecology and natural science, and perhaps even if you’re not?

Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates, an African American father’s letter to his 15 year old trying to make sense of racial injustices in contemporary America (which I’ve added to my own reading list.)

The Booker Prize nominated A Spool of Blue Thread by Anne Tyler, a family saga set in Baltimore which was also nominated for the Man Booker Prize.

I don’t agree with those who rate Jonathan Franzen’s Purity amongst the best this year (he can do better than that!) and equally, Kazuo Ishiguro’s The Buried Giant was a big let down for me.