News

For Gift Giving or Personal Enjoyment

For a reader, among the best things about December are the “best books of the year” lists from people who know their stuff. Here are some of our favorites:

Goodreads has just one mission: “to help people find and share books they love. Their Best Books of 2020, therefore, are books chosen by regular readers like you, rather than by book critics.

Amazon sells a lot of books, so its annual list of best books may reflect sales, rather than literary merit, but it’s not a bad thing to find out what others are reading. You can use the Amazon book site to search for books by category, too. Just go to Amazon books, type in the search bar “best books of 2020” and hit the space bar. A whole list of categories will drop down letting you narrow your search.

National Public Radio’s Book Concierge is a fun site to use for book information. It offers filters that make it easy to find what you’re looking for, or just for the kind of browsing that will introduce you to books you might otherwise miss.

Library Reads is a monthly report of favorites chosen by librarians from throughout the country. Their favorites of 2020 is a worth a look.

Library Journal, a trade publication for librarians founded in 1876 by Melvil Dewey, inventor of the Dewey decimal system, has published its annual Best Books. Organized by genre, it is easy to find what interests you.

The Chicago Public Library’s Best of the Best Books 2020 organizes its recommendations by age, from adult though teen and on to children. The lists are extensive, so you can be sure that there is something for everyone to be found there.

The New York Times’ 100 Notable Books is one of the most anticipated compilations of outstanding books every year and 2020’s list is no exception. It is divided into five categories, fiction, non-fiction, memoirs, poetry, and stories.

Take a look at the lists and good reading to you in 2021!