Thursday, January 04, 2007

Joe's Best Reads of 2006

Mad ShipRobin Hobb

A Feast for CrowsGeorge R. R. Martin

HyperionDan Simmons

No Country for Old Men
Cormac McCarthy

KindredOctavia Butler

Death Comes for the Archbishop Willa Cather

Memories of Ice Steven Erikson

City of PearlKaren Traviss

Parable of the Sower – Octavia Butler

Crossing the Line – Karen Traviss

Parable of the Talents
– Octavia Butler

Marley and MeJohn Grogan

Acts of FaithPhilip Caputo

So Big Edna Ferber

Old Man’s War John Scalzi

The Forever War Joe Haldeman

Fledgling – Octavia Butler

House of Chains – Steven Erikson


Two things: First, I really should at least blurb all of these novels. These are the 18 best books out of the 134 that I read this year. Blurbage? Second, I feel like I'm doing John Scalzi a disservice by not including The Ghost Brigades on this list. It was on the second tier of the Best Reads (which still includes some damn good books) and it veered onto this list and off of it a couple of times, but I just got more satisfaction from Old Man's War. The Ghost Brigades may be the better written novel (which Scalzi admits), but Old Man's War gave me more visceral enjoyment.

2 comments:

Nick said...

This list in order of preference?

Never got to reading Hobb's Liveship Trader trilogy this summer, which I don't really regret since I know they'll be something good to read this summer instead.

But I was wondering; if Mad Ship was so good, what about Ship of Destiny?

Glad to see you enjoyed Memories of Ice and House of Chains as much as you did. Midnight Tides is great as well. Bonehunters was good, but felt a bit like a transitional-tying-together-loose-strings-novel.

Joe said...

Oh, no no. In order of reading. I didn't want to rank it.

Ship of Destiny was very good, but I thought Mad Ship was the best of the bunch. Ending of SoD was a little bit of a cop out, though.

If I had to rank, I'd through Butler's Kindred, Scalzi's Old Man's War, and maybe some City of Pearl up at the top.