2012 Reading List

Here's my 2012 reading list. 156 books. Tomorrow I'll share my thoughts on 2012's best reads.

“There is no immortality that is not built on friendship and work done with care.”

--Robin Sloan, Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore

January         

1.         North of Nowhere, Steve Hamilton

2.         The Outlaw Album, Daniel Woodrell

3.         The Impossible Dead, Ian Rankin

4.         Forgotten Bookmarks, Michael Popek

5.         Lean on Pete, Willy Vlautin

6.         Before I Go To Sleep, S.J. Watson

7.         Crimes in Southern Indiana, Frank Bill

8.         Death Comes to Pemberley, P.D. James

9.         When The Thrill Is Gone, Walter Mosley

10.       Breach of Trust, David Ellis

11.       Rereading, Patricia Meyer Spacks

12.       The Glass Rainbow, James Lee Burke

13.       William Henry Harrison, Gail Collins

14.       Getting Off, Lawrence Block

15.       Let It Bleed, Ian Rankin

16.       The Most Dangerous Thing, Laura Lippman

17.       Cold Is The Grave, Peter Robinson

February

18.       Dancing Bear, James Crumley

19.       Vulture Peak, John Burdett

20.       Taken, Robert Crais

21.       Midnight Rising, Tony Horwitz

22.       Wild Thing, Josh Bazell

23.       Unpacking My Library: Writers and Their Books, ed. Leah Price

24.       Raylan, Elmore Leonard

25.       A Quiet Vendetta, R.J. Ellory

26.       All I Did Was Shoot My Man, Walter Mosley

27.       Blood Is The Sky, Steve Hamilton

28.       Feast Day of Fools, James Lee Burke

29.       Saints of New York, R.J. Ellory

30.       Ice Run, Steve Hamilton

31.       20 Under 40, ed. Deborah Treisman

March

32.       The Solitude of Prime Numbers, Paolo Giordano

33.       At Home, Bill Bryson

34.       Lolita, Vladimir Nabokov

35.       What It Was, George Pelecanos

36.       Behind the Beautiful Forevers, Katherine Boo

37.       The Art of Joe Kubert, ed. Bill Schelly

38.       The Orphan Master’s Son, Adam Johnson

39.       Carry the One, Carol Anshaw

40.       The Train of Small Mercies, David Rowell

41.       The Border Lords, T. Jefferson Parker

42.       The Great Leader, Jim Harrison

43.       Comanche Moon, Larry McMurtry

44.       And So It Goes, Charles J. Shields

45.       A Stolen Season, Steve Hamilton

April

46.       Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, J.K. Rowling

47.       Night Work, Steve Hamilton

48.       The Beginner’s Goodbye, Anne Tyler

49.       Misery Bay, Steve Hamilton

50.       Reservation Blues, Sherman Alexie

51.       The Rook, Daniel O’Malley

52.       Running the Rift, Naomi Benaron

53.       Wild, Cheryl Strayed

54.       The Book of Jonas, Stephen Dau

55.       Rizzo’s Daughter, Lou Manfredo

56.       The Wrecking Crew, Kent Hartman

57.       Triggers, Robert Sawyer

May

58.       The Digger’s Game, George V. Higgins

59.       The Drowned Cities, Paolo Bacigalupi

60.       The Technologists, Matthew Pearl

61.       The Song of Achilles, Madeline Miller

62.       When I Was A Child I Read Books, Marilynne Robinson

63.       John F. Kennedy, Alan Brinkley

64.       Bring Up The Bodies, Hilary Mantel

65.       Open Season, C.J. Box

June

66.       Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, J.K. Rowling

67.       Room for Improvement, John Casey

68.       Ready Player One, Ernest Cline

69.       Home, Toni Morrison

70.       The Chemistry of Tears, Peter Carey

71.       Before the End, After the Beginning, Dagoberto Gilb

72.       The Uninvited Guests, Sadie Jones

73.       Canada, Richard Ford

74.       Railsea, China Mieville

75.       A Touch of the Creature, Charles Beaumont

76.       Johnny Appleseed, Howard Means

77.       All the King’s Men, Robert Penn Warren

July

78.       In The Woods, Tana French

79.       Mission to Paris, Alan Furst

80.       The Likeness, Tana French

81.       The Wrong Man, David Ellis

82.       Alpha, Greg Rucka

83.       Journalism, Joe Sacco

84.       Steve Jobs, Walter Isaacson

85.       Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk, Ben Fountain

86.       Die A Stranger, Steve Hamilton

87.       Are You My Mother?, Alison Bechdel

88.       The Age of Miracles, Karen Thompson Walker

89.       Johnson’s Life of London, Boris Johnson

90.       The Newlyweds, Nell Freudenberger

91.       The Monkey’s Raincoat, Robert Crais

August

92.       Broken Harbor, Tana French

93.       The Fault In Our Stars, John Green

94.       My Cross to Bear, Gregg Allman

95.       Turn of Mind, Alice LaPlante

96.       Phantoms on the Bookshelves, Jacques Bonnet

97.       Leaving the Atocha Station, Ben Lerner

98.       Give Us A Kiss, Daniel Woodrell

99.       Superman, Larry Tye

100.     Gold, Chris Cleave

101.     Whiplash River, Lou Berney

102.     The Listeners, Leni Zumas

103.     Leaping Tall Buildings, Christopher Irving and Seth Kushner

104.     Woe To Live On, Daniel Woodrell

105.     The Inquisitor, Mark Allen Smith

106.     And When She Was Good, Laura Lippman

107.     Dust to Dust, Benjamin Busch

September

108.     Sweet Tooth, Ian McEwan

109.     Winter Journal, Paul Auster

110.     Neverwhere, Neil Gaiman

111.     Calling Invisible Women, Jeanne Ray

112.     Savage Run, C.J. Box

113.     A Million Heavens, John Brandon

114.     A Killing in the Hills, Julia Keller

115.     Collected Ghost Stories, M.R. James

116.     The Yellow Birds, Kevin Powers

117.     Bill Veeck, Baseball’s Greatest Maverick, Paul Dickson 

118.     The Beautiful Mystery, Louise Penny

119.     This Is How You Lose Her, Junot Diaz

October

120.     The Double Game, Dan Fesperman

121.     A Wanted Man, Lee Child

122.     The Bartender’s Tale, Ivan Doig

123.     Chickadee, Louise Erdrich

124.     The Big Burn, Timothy Egan

125.     The Round House, Louise Erdrich

126.     A Dark and Broken Heart, R.J. Ellory

127.     Marvel Comics, The Untold Story, Sean Howe

128.     Telegraph Avenue, Michael Chabon

129.     Pathfinder, Orson Scott Card

130.     Odd and the Frost Giants, Neil Gaiman

November

131.     A Hologram for the King, Dave Eggers

132.     The Age of Desire, Jennie Fields

133.     John Saturnall’s Feast, Lawrence Norfolk

134.     Joseph Anton, Salman Rushdie

135.     1356, Bernard Cornwell

136.     Blasphemy, Sherman Alexie

137.     Live By Night, Dennis Lehane

138.     Luther The Calling, Neil Cross

139.     San Miguel, T.C. Boyle

December

140.     Familiar, J. Robert Lennon

141.     In Search of Willie Morris, Larry L. King

142.     The Blackhouse, Peter May

143.     What We Talk About When We Talk About Anne Frank,

             Nathan Englander  

144.     Underwater Welder, Jeff Lemire

145.     Standing In Another Man’s Grave, Ian Rankin

146.     Gone Girl, Gillian Flynn

147.     Consider the Fork, Bee Wilson

148.     Joe the Barbarian, Grant Morrison and Sean Murphy

149.     Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore, Robin Sloan

150.     One for the Books, Joe Queenan

151.     The Black Box, Michael Connelly

152.     Dear Life, Alice Munro

153.     The 100-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out The Window

             and Disappeared, Jonas Jonasson

154.     Building Stories, Chris Ware

155.     NW, Zadie Smith

156.     The Testament of Mary, Colm Toibin