The Ultimate Best Books
of 2020 List

This year has been “unprecedented” and “unusual” and “an outlier” and “anomalous” and “freakish” and “extraordinary” in many ways. The Covid-19 pandemic has upended our way of life, our topics of conversation, and our entire world. However, some things will always be the same. What I mean to say is: Nothing can stop listicle season.

Yet again, I have scoured he internet to find out which books were recommended most on the “best of the year” lists, consulting 2020 roundups published by everyone from Literary Hub (that would be us) to Apartment Therapy. I read a total 41 lists, which recommended a whopping 952 different books. But a few were mentioned repeatedly, and you will find those ranked below, by order of frequency of inclusion. Does this mean these books are The Best? Only as much as any popularity contest ever does, I suppose. But if you’re looking to add some books to your holiday reading list, you could do a lot worse.

Here are the results:

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25 lists:

Brit Bennett, The Vanishing Half 

20 lists:

Rumaan Alam, Leave the World Behind

17 lists:

Yaa Gyasi, Transcendent Kingdom

16 lists:

Raven Leilani, Luster
James McBride, Deacon King Kong

15 lists:

Maggie O’Farrell, Hamnet
Isabel Wilkerson, Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents

14 lists:

Bryan Washington, Memorial

13 lists:

Ayad Akhtar, Homeland Elegies
Megha Majumdar, A Burning
Hilary Mantel, The Mirror & The Light
Jenny Offill, Weather

12 lists:

Danielle Evans, The Office of Historical Corrections
Garth Greenwell, Cleanness
Douglas Stuart, Shuggie Bain
Natasha Trethewey, Memorial Drive: A Daughter’s Memoir
Robert Kolker, Hidden Valley Road: Inside the Mind of an American Family

11 lists:

Elena Ferrante, The Lying Life of Adults
N. K. Jemisin, The City We Became
Lydia Millet, A Children’s Bible
Barack Obama, A Promised Land
Claudia Rankine, Just Us: An American Conversation
Anna Wiener, Uncanny Valley: A Memoir
C Pam Zhang, How Much of These Hills is Gold

10 lists:

Susanna Clarke, Piranesi
Samantha Irby, Wow, No Thank You: Essays
Emily St. John Mandel, The Glass Hotel
Kiley Reid, Such a Fun Age

9 lists:

Akwaeke Emezi, The Death of Vivek Oji
Cathy Park Hong, Minor Feelings
Lily King, Writers & Lovers
Brandon Taylor, Real Life
Charles Yu, Interior Chinatown

8 lists:

Mikki Kendall, Hood Feminism
Helen Macdonald, Vesper Flights
Silvia Moreno-Garcia, Mexican Gothic
Les Payne and Tamara Payne, The Dead are Arising
V. E. Schwab, The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue
Karla Corejo Villavinencio, The Undocumented Americans
Jess Walter, The Cold Millions

7 lists:

S.A. Cosby, Blacktop Wasteland
Emily Danforth, Plain Bad Heroines
Anne Enright, Actress
Erik Larson, The Splendid and the Vile
Marilynne Robinson, Jack
Kawai Strong Washburn, Sharks in the Time of Saviors
Kevin Young, ed., African-American Poetry: 250 Years of Struggle and Song

6 lists:

Alyssa Cole, When No One is Watching
Diane Cook, The New Wilderness
Lacy Crawford, Notes on a Silencing
Louise Erdrich, The Night Watchman
Stephen Graham Jones, The Only Good Indians
Peace Adzo Medie, His Only Wife
David Mitchell, Utopia Avenue
Wayétu Moore, The Dragons, The Giant, The Women: A Memoir
Aimee Nezhukumatathil, illustrated by Fumi Nakamura, World of Wonders: In Praise of Fireflies, Whale Sharks, and Other Astonishments
Sigrid Nunez, What Are You Going Through
Kate Elizabeth Russell, My Dark Vanessa
Curtis Sittenfeld, Rodham
Danez Smith, Homie: Poems
Zadie Smith, Intimations: Six Essays
Adrian Tomine, The Loneliness of the Long-Distance Cartoonist

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Full list of lists surveyed:

TIME’s 100 Must Read Books of 2020; Vanity Fair‘s 15 Best Books of 2020; The New York Times Book Review’s 100 Notable Books of 2020; Vulture’s 10 Best Books of 2020; Literary Hub’s 65 Favorite Books of the Year; Esquire’s Best Books to Elevate Your Reading List in 2020; Los Angeles Time’s 10 Best Books of 2020; Slate’s Best Books of 2020 (Laura Miller); Slate’s Best Books of 2020 (Dan Kois); Refinery29’s The Best Books of 2020, So Far; The Washington Post’s 50 notable works of nonfiction in 2020; The Washington Post’s 50 notable works of fiction in 2020; The New York Times’ Critics’ Top Books of 2020; The Chicago Public Library’s Best Books of 2020; Book Riot’s Best Books of 2020; BuzzFeed’s Best Books We Read in 2020; Publishers Weekly’s Best Books of 2020; Library Journal’s Best Books 2020; O, The Oprah Magazine‘s 20 Best Books of 2020; Chicago Tribune’s 10 Best Books of 2020; EW’s 10 Best Books of 2020; Teen Vogue’s Best Books of 2020 You Should Be Reading Right Now; Apartment Therapy’s Must-Read Books of 2020; Amazon’s Top 100 Books of 2020; Barnes & Noble’s 10 Best Books of 2020; Real Simple’s Best Books of 2020 (So Far); Kirkus Reviews’s Best of 2020 (Fiction and Nonfiction); Marie Claire’s The 2020 Books You Should Add to Your Reading List; Town and Country’s Best Books of 2020; Parade’s 40 Best Books of 2020; The New York Public Library’s Best Books of the Year; The Wall Street Journal’s 10 Best Books of 2020; USA TODAY’s Best Books of 2020; People’s Top 10 Books of 2020; The Guardian’s Best Books of 2020; The Undefeated’s 25 Can’t-Miss Books of 2020; Men’s Health’s 14 Best New Books of 2020; BBC’s Best Books of the year 2020; and The Telegraph’s 50 Best Books of 2020; and The Independent’s 20 Best Books of 2020.