Year-End Lists

The Washington Post: 100 Notable Books of 2018, Fiction and Nonfiction

[see also The 10 Best Books of 2023 • 50 Notable Works of Nonfiction in 2023 • 50 Notable Works of Fiction in 2023 • 50 Notable Works of Nonfiction in 2022 • 50 Notable Works of Fiction in 2022 • The 10 Best Books of 2022 • 50 Notable Works of Nonfiction in 2021 • 50 Notable Works of Fiction in 2021 • The 10 Best Books of 2021 • 10 Best Books of 2020 • 50 Notable Works of Nonfiction in 2020 • 50 Notable Works of Fiction in 2020 • Best Books of 2019 • 10 Best Books of 2018 • 10 Best Books of 2017 • The 10 Best Books of 2016 • 10 Best Books of 2015 • The Ten Best Books of 2014 • Top 10 Books of 2013 • The 10 Best Books of 2012]

Fiction

• An American Marriage
  Tayari Jones
• Baby, You're Gonna Be Mine
  Kevin Wilson
• Cherry
  Nico Walker
• Children of Blood and Bone
  Tomi Adeyemi
• Circe
  Madeline Miller
• Conscience
  Alice Mattison
• Crudo
  Olivia Laing
• The Female Persuasion
  Meg Wolitzer
• Flights
  Olga Tokarczuk
• Florida
  Lauren Groff
• French Exit
  Patrick deWitt
• Girls Burn Brighter
  Shobha Rao
• The Great Alone
  Kristin Hannah
• The Great Believers
  Rebecca Makkai
• How to Be Safe
  Tom McAllister
• If You Leave Me
  Crystal Hana Kim
• The Immortalists
  Chloe Benjamin
• The Incendiaries
  R.O. Kwon
• Killing Commendatore
  Haruki Murakami
• The Kiss Quotient
  Helen Hoang
• A Ladder to the Sky
  John Boyne
• Lake Success
  Gary Shteyngart
• The Largesse of the Sea Maiden
  Denis Johnson
• Love and Ruin
  Paula McLain
• The Mere Wife
  Maria Dahvana Headley
• A Million Drops
  Víctor del Árbol
• The Music Shop
  Rachel Joyce
• My Sister, the Serial Killer
  Oyinkan Braithwaite
• My Year of Rest and Relaxation
  Ottessa Moshfegh
• November Road
  Lou Berney
• Only Child
  Rhiannon Navin
• The Pisces
  Melissa Broder
• The Poet X
  Elizabeth Acevedo
• Red Clocks
  Leni Zumas
• A River of Stars
  Vanessa Hua
• The Shakespeare Requirement
  Julie Schumacher
• The Shape of the Ruins
  Juan Gabriel Vásquez
• The Silence of the Girls
  Pat Barker
• Still Life with Monkey
  Katharine Weber
• Strike Your Heart
  Amélie Nothomb
• That Kind of Mother
  Rumaan Alam
• Theory of Bastards
  Audrey Schulman
• Transcription
  Kate Atkinson
• Upstate
  James Wood
• Warlight
  Michael Ondaatje
• What We Were Promised
  Lucy Tan
• When Katie Met Cassidy
  Camille Perri
• The Winter Soldier
  Daniel Mason
• You Think It, I'll Say It
  Curtis Sittenfeld
• Your Duck Is My Duck
  Deborah Eisenberg

Nonfiction

• 1,000 Books to Read Before You Die

  A Life-Changing List
  James Mustich
• Air Traffic

  A Memoir of Ambition and Manhood in America
  Gregory Pardlo
• All You Can Ever Know
  Nicole Chung
• Amity and Prosperity

  One Family and the Fracturing of America
  Eliza Griswold
• The Apprentice

  Trump, Russia and the Subversion of American Democracy
  Greg Miller
• Bad Blood

  Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup
  John Carreyrou
• Because We Are Bad

  OCD and a Girl Lost in Thought
  Lily Bailey
• Becoming
  Michelle Obama
• Beneath a Ruthless Sun

  A True Story of Violence, Race, and Justice Lost and Found
  Gilbert King
• Boom Town

  The Fantastical Saga of Oklahoma City, Its Chaotic Founding, Its Apocalyptic Weather, Its Purloined Basketball Team, and the Dream of Becoming a World-Class Metropolis
  Sam Anderson
• Calypso
  David Sedaris
• Chesapeake Requiem

  A Year with the Watermen of Vanishing Tangier Island
  Earl Swift
• The Corrosion of Conservatism

  Why I Left the Right
  Max Boot
• Directorate S

  The C.I.A. and America's Secret Wars in Afghanistan and Pakistan
  Steve Coll
• Dopesick

  Dealers, Doctors, and the Drug Company That Addicted America
  Beth Macy
• Eager

  The Surprising, Secret Life of Beavers and Why They Matter
  Ben Goldfarb
• Educated
  Tara Westover
• Fear

  Trump in the White House
  Bob Woodward
• The Girl Who Smiled Beads

  A Story of War and What Comes After
  Clemantine Wamariya and Elizabeth Weil
• Heavy

  An American Memoir
  Kiese Laymon
• A Higher Loyalty

  Truth, Lies, and Leadership
  James Comey
• How Democracies Die
  Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt
• How to Change Your Mind

  What the New Science of Psychedelics Teaches Us About Consciousness, Dying, Addiction, Depression, and Transcendence
  Michael Pollan
• How to Write an Autobiographical Novel
  Alexander Chee
• I’ll Be Gone in the Dark

  One Woman’s Obsessive Search for the Golden State Killer
  Michelle McNamara
• The Known Citizen

  A History of Privacy in Modern America
  Sarah E. Igo
• The Lies That Bind

  Rethinking Identity
  Kwame Anthony Appiah
• A Life of My Own
  Claire Tomalin
• Look Alive Out There
  Sloane Crosley
• Mad, Bad, Dangerous to Know

  The Fathers of Wilde, Yeats and Joyce
  Colm Tóibín
• The Mirage Factory

  Illusion, Imagination, and the Invention of Los Angeles
  Gary Krist
• Ninety-Nine Glimpses of Princess Margaret
  Craig Brown
• Presidents of War
  Michael Beschloss
• The Poisoned City

  Flint's Water and the American Urban Tragedy
  Anna Clark
• Political Tribes

  Group Instinct and the Fate of Nations
  Amy Chua
• Questioning Minds

  The Letters of Guy Davenport and Hugh Kenner
  Guy Davenport and Hugh Kenner
• The Real Lolita

  The Kidnapping of Sally Horner and the Novel That Scandalized the World
  Sarah Weinman
• Rising Out of Hatred

  The Awakening of a Former White Nationalist
  Eli Saslow
• Russian Roulette

  The Inside Story of Putin's War on America and the Election of Donald Trump
  Michael Isikoff and David Corn
• The Schoolhouse Gate

  Public Education, the Supreme Court, and the Battle for the American Mind
  Justin Driver
• Smoketown

  The Untold Story of the Other Great Black Renaissance
  Mark Whitaker
• The Souls of Yellow Folk
  Wesley Yang
• The Spy and the Traitor

  The Greatest Espionage Story of the Cold War
  Ben Macintyre
• These Truths

  A History of the United States
  Jill Lepore
• Tigerland: 1968-1969: A City Divided, a Nation Torn Apart, and a Magical Season of Healing
  Wil Haygood
• We the Corporations

  How American Businesses Won Their Civil Rights
  Adam Winkler
• What Truth Sounds Like

  Robert F. Kennedy, James Baldwin, and Our Unfinished Conversation About Race in America
  Michael Eric Dyson
• Why Baseball Matters
  Susan Jacoby
• Winners Take All

  The Elite Charade of Changing the World
  Anand Giridharadas
• The Wizard and the Prophet

  Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Dueling Visions to Shape Tomorrow's World
  Charles C. Mann

Kirkus Prize: Nonfiction 2018, awarded by Kirkus Reviews

[see also Fiction 2023 • Nonfiction 2023 • Nonfiction 2022 • Fiction 2022 • Nonfiction 2021 • Fiction 2021 • Nonfiction 2020 • Fiction 2020 • Nonfiction 2019 • Fiction 2019 • Fiction 2018 • Nonfiction 2017 • Fiction 2017 • Nonfiction 2016 • Fiction 2016 • Nonfiction 2015 • Fiction 2015 • Nonfiction 2014 • Fiction 2014]

Winner

• Call Them by Their True Names

  American Crises (and Essays)
  Rebecca Solnit

Finalists

• American Prison

  A Reporter’s Undercover Journey Into the Business of Punishment
  Shane Bauer
• Heavy

  An American Memoir
  Kiese Laymon
• Dopesick

  Dealers, Doctors, and the Drug Company That Addicted America
  Beth Macy
• Heartland

  A Memoir of Working Hard and Being Broke in the Richest Country on Earth
  Sarah Smarsh
• The Road to Unfreedom

  Russia, Europe, America
  Timothy Snyder

Kirkus Prize: Fiction 2018, awarded by Kirkus Reviews

[see also Fiction 2023 • Nonfiction 2023 • Nonfiction 2022 • Fiction 2022 • Nonfiction 2021 • Fiction 2021 • Nonfiction 2020 • Fiction 2020 • Nonfiction 2019 • Fiction 2019 • Nonfiction 2018 • Nonfiction 2017 • Fiction 2017 • Nonfiction 2016 • Fiction 2016 • Nonfiction 2015 • Fiction 2015 • Nonfiction 2014 • Fiction 2014]

Winner

• Severance
  Ling Ma

Finalists

• Halsey Street
  Naima Coster
• Florida
  Lauren Groff
• Mourning
  Eduardo Halfon
• Heads of the Colored People
  Nafissa Thompson-Spires
• Tell the Machine Goodnight
  Katie Williams

The Booker Prize: Best Fiction of 2018

[see also 2023 • 2022 • 2021 • 2020 • 2019 • 2017 • 2016 • 2015 • 2014 • 2013 • 2012 • 2011]

Winner

• Milkman
  Anna Burns

Shortlist

• The Mars Room
  Rachel Kushner
• The Overstory
  Richard Powers
• The Long Take
  Robin Robertson
• Washington Black
  Esi Edugyan
• Everything Under
  Daisy Johnson

Longlist

• Snap
  Belinda Bauer
• Sabrina
  Nick Drnaso
• In Our Mad and Furious City
  Guy Gunaratne
• The Water Cure
  Sophie Mackintosh
• Warlight
  Michael Ondaatje
• Normal People
  Sally Rooney
• From a Low and Quiet Sea
  Donal Ryan

Women's Prize for Fiction: 2018

[see also 2023 • 2022 • 2021 • 2020 • 2019 • 2017 • 2016 • 2015 • 2014 • 2013 • 2012 • 2011]

Winner

• Home Fire
  Kamila Shamsie

Shortlist

• Sight
  Jessie Greengrass
• Sing, Unburied, Sing
  Jesmyn Ward
• The Idiot
  Elif Batuman
• The Mermaid and Mrs. Hancock
  Imogen Hermes Gowar
• When I Hit You or a Portrait of the Writer as a Young Wife
  Meena Kandasamy

Longlist

• A Boy in Winter
  Rachel Seiffert
• H(A)PPY
  Nicola Barker
• Three Things About Elsie
  Joanna Cannon
• Miss Burma
  Charmaine Craig
• Manhattan Beach
  Jennifer Egan
• Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine
  Gail Honeyman
• Elmet
  Fiona Mozley
• The Ministry of Utmost Happiness
  Arundhati Roy
• See What I Have Done
  Sarah Schmidt
• The Trick to Time
  Kit de Waal

Gina Vaynshteyn: 27 Best Books of 2017, as published by Hello Giggles

1. Little Fires Everywhere
   Celeste Ng
2. The Hate U Give
   Angie Thomas
3. The Idiot
   Elif Batuman
4. The Rules Do Not Apply
   Ariel Levy
5. Forest Dark
   Nicole Krauss
6. Exit West
   Mohsin Hamid
7. Difficult Women
   Roxane Gay
8. Sour Heart
   Jenny Zhang
9. Like a Beast
   Carly Joy Miller
10. Stay with Me
    Ayobami Adebayo
11. Rabbit Cake
    Annie Hartnett
12. How to Murder Your Life
    Cat Marnell
13. We Are Never Meeting in Real Life.
    Samantha Irby
14. Priestdaddy
    Patricia Lockwood
15. Weird in a World That’s Not

    A Career Guide for Misfits
    Jennifer Romolini
16. Startup
    Doree Shafrir
17. Woman No. 17
    Edan Lepucki
18. All the Lives I Want

    Essays About My Best Friends Who Happen to Be Famous Strangers
    Alana Massey
19. A Separation
    Katie Kitamura
20. Things That Happened Before the Earthquake
    Chiara Barzini
21. Eat Only When You’re Hungry
    Lindsay Hunter
22. Spineless

    The Science of Jellyfish and the Art of Growing a Backbone
    Juli Berwald
23. New People
    Danzy Senna
24. The Bright Hour

    A Memoir of Living and Dying
    Nina Riggs
25. Touch
    Courtney Maum
26. Pachinko
    Min Jin Lee
27. Sing, Unburied, Sing
    Jesmyn Ward

Alex Balk: Favorite Books of 2017, as published by The Awl

• Priestdaddy
  Patricia Lockwood
• Other Minds

  The Octopus, the Sea, and the Deep Origins of Consciousness
  Peter Godfrey-Smith
• Shrinking Violets

  The Secret Life of Shyness
  Joe Moran
• O Sing unto the Lord

  A History of English Church Music
  Andrew Gant
• The Secret Life of the American Musical

  How Broadway Shows Are Built
  Jack Viertel
• Border

  A Journey to the Edge of Europe
  Kapka Kassabova
• No Friends but the Mountains

  Dispatches from the World’s Violent Highlands
  Judith Matloff
• Pale Rider

  The Spanish Flu of 1918 and How It Changed the World
  Laura Spinney
• Asia’s Reckoning

  China, Japan, and the Fate of U.S. Power in the Pacific Century
  Richard McGregor
• The Future Is History

  How Totalitarianism Reclaimed Russia
  Masha Gessen
• Istanbul

  A Tale of Three Cities
  Bettany Hughes
• The Attention Merchants

  The Epic Scramble to Get Inside Our Heads
  Tim Wu
• Admissions

  Life as a Brain Surgeon
  Henry Marsh
• Behave

  The Biology of Humans at Our Best and Worst
  Robert M. Sapolsky
• Why Buddhism is True

  The Science and Philosophy of Meditation and Enlightenment
  Robert Wright
• Beyond the Self

  Conversations between Buddhism and Neuroscience
  Matthieu Ricard and Wolf Singer
• My Favorite Thing Is Monsters
  Emil Ferris
• Hostage
  Guy Delisle
• Fear City

  New York’s Fiscal Crisis and the Rise of Austerity Politics
  Kim Phillips-Fein
• Uncommon People

  The Rise and Fall of The Rock Stars
  David Hepworth
• The Best We Could Do

  An Illustrated Memoir
  Thi Bui
• Bunk

  The Rise of Hoaxes, Humbug, Plagiarists, Phonies, Post-Facts, and Fake News
  Kevin Young
• The Illustrated Dust Jacket, 1920-1970
  Martin Salisbury
• Peach
  Emma Glass
• Red Winter
  Anneli Furmark
• Victorious Century

  The United Kingdom, 1800-1906
  David Cannadine
• God Save Texas

  A Journey into the Soul of the Lone Star State
  Lawrence Wright
• Dancing Bears

  True Stories of People Nostalgic for Life Under Tyranny
  Witold Szablowski
• Amiable with Big Teeth
  Claude McKay

Joseph Salvatore: Best 50 Books of 2017, as published by The Brooklyn Rail

Nonfiction

1. China Lake

   A Journey into the Contradicted Heart of a Global Climate Catastrophe
   Barret Baumgart
2. The Best We Could Do

   An Illustrated Memoir
   Thi Bui
3. Cornell ’77

   The Music, the Myth, and the Magnificence of the Grateful Dead’s Concert at Barton Hall
   Peter Conners
4. Je Suis L’Autre

   Essays & Interrogations
   Kristina Marie Darling
5. Why I’m No Longer Talking to White People About Race
   Reni Eddo-Lodge
6. The Death and Life of the Great Lakes
   Dan Egan
7. The Doubles
   Scott Esposito
8. Do I Make Myself Clear?

   Why Writing Well Matters
   Harold Evans
9. Abandon Me
   Melissa Febos
10. World Without Mind

    The Existential Threat of Big Tech
    Franklin Foer
11. Shirley Jackson

    A Rather Haunted Life
    Ruth Franklin
12. Hunger

    A Memoir of (My) Body
    Roxane Gay
13. Sunshine State
    Sarah Gerard
14. Killers of the Flower Moon

    The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI
    David Grann
15. Knowing Knott

    Essays on an American Poet
    Edited by Steven Huff
16. Question Like a Face
    Christine Hume and Jeff Clark
17. Literary Witches

    A Celebration of Magical Women Writers
    Taisia Kitaiskaia
18. After Kathy Acker
    Chris Kraus
19. Tell Me How It Ends

    An Essay in 40 Questions
    Valeria Luiselli
20. Draft No. 4

    On the Writing Process
    John McPhee
21. After the Eclipse

    A Mother’s Murder, a Daughter’s Search
    Sarah Perry
22. The Mother of All Questions
    Rebecca Solnit
23. The Blood of Emmett Till
    Timothy B. Tyson
24. Among the Living and the Dead

    A Tale of Exile and Homecoming on the War Roads of Europe
    Inara Verzemnieks
25. The Show That Never Ends

    The Rise and Fall of Prog Rock
    David Weigel

Fiction

1. The Power
   Naomi Alderman
2. The Hunger Saint
   Olivia Kate Cerrone
3. So Many Olympic Exertions
   Anelise Chen
4. American War
   Omar El Akkad
5. Future Home of the Living God
   Louise Erdrich
6. The Gypsy Moth Summer
   Julia Fierro
7. The Iliac Crest
   Cristina Rivera Garza
8. The Epiphany Machine
   David Burr Gerrard
9. The Gargoyle Hunters
   John Freeman Gill
10. Bad Dreams and Other Stories
    Tessa Hadley
11. Exit West
    Mohsin Hamid
12. A Separation
    Katie Kitamura
13. The Leavers
    Lisa Ko
14. Stranger, Father, Beloved
    Taylor Larsen
15. Pachinko
    Min Jin Lee
16. Dear Cyborgs
    Eugene Lim
17. Her Body and Other Parties
    Carmen Maria Machado
18. The Ninth Hour
    Alice McDermott
19. My Heart Hemmed In
    Marie NDiaye
20. Little Fires Everywhere
    Celeste Ng
21. The Standard Grand
    Jay Baron Nicorvo
22. Heritage of Smoke
    Josip Novakovich
23. Refrigerated Music for a Gleaming Woman
    Aimee Parkison
24. Wait Till You See Me Dance
    Deb Olin Unferth
25. Sour Heart
    Jenny Zhang

The Michigan Daily: Top 10 Books of 2017

1. We Were Eight Years in Power

   An American Tragedy
   Ta-Nehisi Coates
2. Hunger

   A Memoir of (My) Body
   Roxane Gay
3. Gather the Daughters
   Jennie Melamed
4. Little Fires Everywhere
   Celeste Ng
5. They Can’t Kill Us Until They Kill Us
   Hanif Abdurraqib
6. A Column of Fire
   Ken Follett
7. Ill Will
   Dan Chaon
8. The Idiot
   Elif Batuman
9. Goodbye, Vitamin
   Rachel Khong
10. Mean
    Myriam Gurba

Book Riot: Best Books of 2017

• A Conjuring of Light
  V.E. Schwab
• All Grown Up
  Jami Attenberg
• An Extraordinary Union
  Alyssa Cole
• Bluebird, Bluebird
  Attica Locke
• Don’t Call Us Dead
  Danez Smith
• Exit West
  Mohsin Hamid
• Hate to Want You
  Alisha Rai
• Her Body and Other Parties
  Carmen Maria Machado
• Hunger

  A Memoir of (My) Body
  Roxane Gay
• Lincoln in the Bardo
  George Saunders
• Little Fires Everywhere
  Celeste Ng
• My Favorite Thing Is Monsters
  Emil Ferris
• One Day We’ll All Be Dead and None of This Will Matter
  Scaachi Koul
• Pachinko
  Min Jin Lee
• Priestdaddy
  Patricia Lockwood
• Sing, Unburied, Sing
  Jesmyn Ward
• The Changeling
  Victor LaValle
• The Fact of a Body

  A Murder and a Memoir
  Alexandria Marzano-Lesnevich
• The Gauntlet
  Karuna Riazi
• The Gentleman’s Guide to Vice and Virtue
  Mackenzi Lee
• The Hate U Give
  Angie Thomas
• The Prey of Gods
  Nicky Drayden
• The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo
  Taylor Jenkins Reid
• The Wanderers
  Meg Howrey
• We Are Okay
  Nina LaCour
• We Were Eight Years in Power

  An American Tragedy
  Ta-Nehisi Coates
• What It Means When a Man Falls from the Sky
  Lesley Nneka Arimah
• When Dimple Met Rishi
  Sandhya Menon
• White Tears
  Hari Kunzru
• You Don’t Have to Say You Love Me
  Sherman Alexie