Year-End Lists

The Economist: The Best Books of 2021

[see also 2023 • 2022 • 2012]

Politics and current affairs

• Empire of Pain

  The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty
  Patrick Radden Keefe
• Do Not Disturb

  The Story of a Political Murder and an African Regime Gone Bad
  Michela Wrong
• Invisible China

  How the Urban-Rural Divide Threatens China’s Rise
  Scott Rozelle and Natalie Hell
• The Sex Lives of African Women

  Self-Discovery, Freedom, and Healing
  Nana Darkoa Sekyiamah
• Red Roulette

  An Insider's Story of Wealth, Power, Corruption, and Vengeance in Today's China
  Desmond Shum
• How the Word Is Passed

  A Reckoning with the History of Slavery Across America
  Clint Smith
• We Are Bellingcat

  Global Crime, Online Sleuths, and the Bold Future of News
  Eliot Higgins

History

• The Gun, the Ship, and the Pen

  Warfare, Constitutions, and the Making of the Modern World
  Linda Colley
• Tunnel 29

  The True Story of an Extraordinary Escape Beneath the Berlin Wall
  Helena Merriman
• Cuba

  An American History
  Ada Ferrer
• The Greek Revolution

  1821 and the Making of Modern Europe
  Mark Mazower

Biography and memoir

• Fall

  The Mysterious Life and Death of Robert Maxwell, Britain's Most Notorious Media Baron
  John Preston
• The Radical Potter

  The Life and Times of Josiah Wedgwood
  Tristram Hunt
• There Is Nothing for You Here

  Finding Opportunity in the Twenty-First Century
  Fiona Hill
• All the Frequent Troubles of Our Days

  The True Story of the American Woman at the Heart of the German Resistance to Hitler
  Rebecca Donner
• The Last King of America

  The Misunderstood Reign of George III
  Andrew Roberts
• All In
  Billie Jean King

Culture and ideas

• God

  An Anatomy
  Francesca Stavrakopoulou
• The Sinner and the Saint

  Dostoevsky and the Gentleman Murderer Who Inspired a Masterpiece
  Kevin Birmingham
• Fallen Idols

  Twelve Statues That Made History
  Alex von Tunzelmann
• Barça

  The inside story of the world's greatest football club
  Simon Kuper
• The Twelve Lives of Alfred Hitchcock

  An Anatomy of the Master of Suspense
  Edward White

Fiction

• Mother for Dinner
  Shalom Auslander
• The Books of Jacob
  Olga Tokarczuk
• The Plot
  Jean Hanff Korelitz
• Great Circle
  Maggie Shipstead
• Klara and the Sun
  Kazuo Ishiguro
• The Promise
  Damon Galgut
• Detransition, Baby
  Torrey Peters
• Chronicles from the Land of the Happiest People on Earth
  Wole Soyinka

Economics and business

• The World For Sale

  Money, Power, and the Traders Who Barter the Earth's Resources
  Javier Blas and Jack Farchy
• Career and Family

  Women’s Century-Long Journey toward Equity
  Claudia Goldin
• The Future of Money

  How the Digital Revolution Is Transforming Currencies and Finance
  Eswar S. Prasad
• The Power of Creative Destruction

  Economic Upheaval and the Wealth of Nations
  Philippe Aghion, Céline Antonin, and Simon Bunel
• The Story of Work

  A New History of Humankind
  Jan Lucassen
• The Key Man

  The True Story of How the Global Elite Was Duped by a Capitalist Fairy Tale
  Simon Clark and Will Louch

Science and technology

• A Shot to Save the World

  The Inside Story of the Life-or-Death Race for a COVID-19 Vaccine
  Gregory Zuckerman
• I, Warbot

  The Dawn of Artificially Intelligent Conflict
  Kenneth Payne
• Being You

  A New Science of Consciousness
  Anil Seth
• The Genetic Lottery

  Why DNA Matters for Social Equality
  Kathryn Paige Harden
• Water

  A Biography
  Giulio Boccaletti

Library Journal: Best Literary Fiction of 2021

[see also 2023 • 2022 • 2020 • 2019 • 2017 • 2016 • 2012 • 2011]

• What Storm, What Thunder
  Myriam J A Chancy
• Cloud Cuckoo Land
  Anthony Doerr
• Matrix
  Lauren Groff
• The Removed
  Brandon Hobson
• The Prophets
  Robert Jones Jr.
• Once There Were Wolves
  Charlotte McConaghy
• Open Water
  Caleb Azumah Nelson
• Bewilderment
  Richard Powers
• The Five Wounds
  Kirstin Valdez Quade
• Chronicles from the Land of the Happiest People on Earth
  Wole Soyinka

Annabel Gutterman: The 10 Best Fiction Books of 2021, as published by Time Magazine

[see also The 10 Best Fiction Books of 2023 • The 10 Best Nonfiction Books of 2023 • The 10 Best Fiction Books of 2022 • The 10 Best Nonfiction Books of 2022 • The 10 Best Nonfiction Books of 2021]

1. Great Circle
   Maggie Shipstead
2. The Prophets
   Robert Jones Jr.
3. My Monticello
   Jocelyn Nicole Johnson
4. Detransition, Baby
   Torrey Peters
5. The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois
   Honorée Fanonne Jeffers
6. The Life of the Mind
   Christine Smallwood
7. Cloud Cuckoo Land
   Anthony Doerr
8. Afterparties
   Anthony Veasna So
9. Open Water
   Caleb Azumah Nelson
10. Klara and the Sun
    Kazuo Ishiguro

USA Today: The Best Books of 2021

[see also 2022]

• The Burning Blue

  The Untold Story of Christa McAuliffe and NASA's Challenger Disaster
  Kevin Cook
• Let Me Tell You What I Mean
  Joan Didion
• King Richard

  Nixon and Watergate--An American Tragedy
  Michael Dobbs
• The Sentence
  Louise Erdrich
• The Girls Are All So Nice Here
  Laurie Elizabeth Flynn
• Shooting Midnight Cowboy

  Art, Sex, Loneliness, Liberation, and the Making of a Dark Classic
  Glenn Frankel
• Crossroads
  Jonathan Franzen
• Matrix
  Lauren Groff
• Sex Cult Nun

  Breaking Away from the Children of God, a Wild, Radical Religious Cult
  Faith Jones
• The Prophets
  Robert Jones Jr.
• Broken (in the best possible way)
  Jenny Lawson
• On Animals
  Susan Orlean
• These Precious Days
  Ann Patchett
• Little and Often

  A Memoir
  Trent Preszler
• Beautiful World, Where Are You
  Sally Rooney
• Filthy Animals
  Brandon Taylor
• Fight Night
  Miriam Toews

Michael Silverblatt: Top 10 Books of 2021, as posted by KCRW, a list of favorites from the host of Bookworm

[see also 2019]

1. The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois
   Honorée Fanonne Jeffers
2. Klara and the Sun
   Kazuo Ishiguro
3. Street Cop
   Robert Coover and Art Spiegelman
4. The Sentence
   Louise Erdrich
5. Bewilderment
   Richard Powers
6. Trafik
   Rikki Ducornet
7. Heard-Hoard
   Atsuro Riley
8. A Swim in a Pond in the Rain

   In Which Four Russians Give a Master Class on Writing, Reading, and Life
   George Saunders
9. The Prophets
   Robert Jones Jr.
10. City of a Thousand Gates
    Rebecca Sacks

The Boston Globe: The Best Books of 2021

[see also 2023 • 2020]

Fiction

• Afterparties
  Anthony Veasna So
• Bewilderment
  Richard Powers
• Caul Baby
  Morgan Jerkins
• The Glassy, Burning Floor of Hell
  Brian Evenson
• Great Circle
  Maggie Shipstead
• Harlem Shuffle
  Colson Whitehead
• In the Company of Men
  Véronique Tadjo
• The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois
  Honorée Fanonne Jeffers
• The Man Who Lived Underground
  Richard Wright
• Monkey Boy
  Francisco Goldman
• Monster in the Middle
  Tiphanie Yanique
• My Heart Is a Chainsaw
  Stephen Graham Jones
• Of Women and Salt
  Gabriela Garcia
• The Other Black Girl
  Zakiya Dalila Harris
• The Prophets
  Robert Jones Jr.
• Skye Falling
  Mia McKenzie
• The Sweetness of Water
  Nathan Harris
• The Turnout
  Megan Abbott
• Velvet Was the Night
  Silvia Moreno-Garcia
• What Storm, What Thunder
  Myriam J A Chancy

Nonfiction

• America on Fire

  The Untold History of Police Violence and Black Rebellion Since the 1960s
  Elizabeth Hinton
• All That She Carried

  The Journey of Ashley's Sack, a Black Family Keepsake
  Tiya Miles
• Burning Boy

  The Life and Work of Stephen Crane
  Paul Auster
• Covered with Night

  A Story of Murder and Indigenous Justice in Early America
  Nicole Eustace
• Disorientation

  Being Black in The World
  Ian Williams
• Empire of Pain

  The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty
  Patrick Radden Keefe
• Festival Days
  Jo Ann Beard
• How the Word Is Passed

  A Reckoning with the History of Slavery Across America
  Clint Smith
• Keats's Odes

  A Lover's Discourse
  Anahid Nersessian
• A Little Devil in America

  Notes in Praise of Black Performance
  Hanif Abdurraqib
• On Freedom

  Four Songs of Care and Constraint
  Maggie Nelson
• On Juneteenth
  Annette Gordon-Reed
• On Violence and On Violence Against Women
  Jacqueline Rose
• Read Until You Understand

  The Profound Wisdom of Black Life and Literature
  Farah Jasmine Griffin
• Red Comet

  The Short Life and Blazing Art of Sylvia Plath
  Heather Clark
• The Right to Sex

  Feminism in the Twenty-First Century
  Amia Srinivasan
• Seek You

  A Journey Through American Loneliness
  Kristen Radtke
• Smile

  The Story of a Face
  Sarah Ruhl
• Travelling While Black

  Essays Inspired by a Life on the Move
  Nanjala Nyabola
• What Just Happened

  Notes on a Long Year
  Charles Finch

Laura Miller: The Best Books of 2021, as published by Slate

[see also 2023 • 2022 • 2020 • 2019 • 2018 • 2017]

• The Sentence
  Louise Erdrich
• Crossroads
  Jonathan Franzen
• Empire of Pain

  The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty
  Patrick Radden Keefe
• No One Is Talking About This
  Patricia Lockwood
• All That She Carried

  The Journey of Ashley's Sack, a Black Family Keepsake
  Tiya Miles
• Things I Have Withheld
  Kei Miller
• The Committed
  Viet Thanh Nguyen
• Light Perpetual
  Francis Spufford
• Harlem Shuffle
  Colson Whitehead
• Crying in H Mart
  Michelle Zauner

Annabel Gutterman: The 10 Best Nonfiction Books of 2021, as published by Time Magazine

[see also The 10 Best Fiction Books of 2023 • The 10 Best Nonfiction Books of 2023 • The 10 Best Fiction Books of 2022 • The 10 Best Nonfiction Books of 2022 • The 10 Best Fiction Books of 2021]

1. A Little Devil in America

   Notes in Praise of Black Performance
   Hanif Abdurraqib
2. Crying in H Mart
   Michelle Zauner
3. Invisible Child

   Poverty, Survival & Hope in an American City
   Andrea Elliott
4. How the Word Is Passed

   A Reckoning with the History of Slavery Across America
   Clint Smith
5. Aftershocks
   Nadia Owusu
6. Empire of Pain

   The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty
   Patrick Radden Keefe
7. A Swim in a Pond in the Rain

   In Which Four Russians Give a Master Class on Writing, Reading, and Life
   George Saunders
8. The Copenhagen Trilogy

   Childhood; Youth; Dependency
   Tove Ditlevsen
9. Finding the Mother Tree

   Discovering the Wisdom of the Forest
   Suzanne Simard
10. The Kissing Bug

    A True Story of a Family, an Insect, and a Nation's Neglect of a Deadly Disease
    Daisy Hernández

Patrick Rapa: The Best Books of 2021, as published by The Philadelphia Inquirer

[see also 2022]

• Leaving Isn't the Hardest Thing
  Lauren Hough
• My Heart Is a Chainsaw
  Stephen Graham Jones
• No One Is Talking About This
  Patricia Lockwood
• A Little Devil in America

  Notes in Praise of Black Performance
  Hanif Abdurraqib
• Crying in H Mart
  Michelle Zauner
• Appleseed
  Matt Bell
• Hell of a Book
  Jason Mott
• Land of Big Numbers
  Te-Ping Chen
• A Touch of Jen
  Beth Morgan
• The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois
  Honorée Fanonne Jeffers

Also great

• Harlem Shuffle
  Colson Whitehead
• Something New Under the Sun
  Alexandra Kleeman
• The Other Black Girl
  Zakiya Dalila Harris
• The Final Revival of Opal & Nev
  Dawnie Walton
• The Sunset Route

  Freight Trains, Forgiveness, and Freedom on the Rails in the American West
  Carrot Quinn
• Assembly
  Natasha Brown
• The Glassy, Burning Floor of Hell
  Brian Evenson
• Great Circle
  Maggie Shipstead
• The Promise
  Damon Galgut
• The Committed
  Viet Thanh Nguyen
• The Souvenir Museum
  Elizabeth McCracken
• Palmares
  Gayl Jones
• Fake Accounts
  Lauren Oyler

The Guardian: Best Fiction of 2021

[see also 2020 • 2017]

• Beautiful World, Where Are You
  Sally Rooney
• The Books of Jacob
  Olga Tokarczuk
• Crossroads
  Jonathan Franzen
• Klara and the Sun
  Kazuo Ishiguro
• Palmares
  Gayl Jones
• The Women of Troy
  Pat Barker
• Oh William!
  Elizabeth Strout
• The Book of Form and Emptiness
  Ruth Ozeki
• The Magician
  Colm Tóibín
• Harlem Shuffle
  Colson Whitehead
• Painting Time
  Maylis de Kerangal
• Treacle Walker
  Alan Garner
• Cloud Cuckoo Land
  Anthony Doerr
• A Shock
  Keith Ridgway
• The Promise
  Damon Galgut
• The Fortune Men
  Nadifa Mohamed
• Light Perpetual
  Francis Spufford
• China Room
  Sunjeev Sahota
• Second Place
  Rachel Cusk
• No One Is Talking About This
  Patricia Lockwood
• Luster
  Raven Leilani
• Assembly
  Natasha Brown
• The Manningtree Witches
  A.K. Blakemore
• Keeping the House
  Tice Cin
• Open Water
  Caleb Azumah Nelson
• Mrs Death Misses Death
  Salena Godden
• A Burning
  Megha Majumdar
• How to Kidnap the Rich
  Rahul Raina
• Pity the Beast
  Robin McLean
• Sorrow and Bliss
  Meg Mason
• The Hummingbird
  Sandro Veronesi
• My Phantoms
  Gwendoline Riley
• Dark Neighbourhood
  Vanessa Onwuemezi
• English Magic
  Uschi Gatward
• Sterling Karat Gold
  Isabel Waidner
• Burntcoat
  Sarah Hall
• The Passenger
  Ulrich Alexander Boschwitz
• Matrix
  Lauren Groff