Best reads 2017 new york times full#
Best reads 2017 new york times series#

This memoir by the leather-jacketed economist of the six months he spent as Greece’s finance minister in 2015 at a time of economic and political crisis has been described as “one of the best political memoirs ever written”. Photograph: Alkis Konstantinidis/Reuters 86 Adults in the Room by Yanis Varoufakis (2017)

The author started out as the “poet laureate of Twitter” her language is brilliant, and she has a completely original mind.Ī telling description of modern power … Yanis Varoufakis. This may not be the only account of living in a religious household in the American midwest (in her youth, the author joined a group called God’s Gang, where they spoke in tongues), but it is surely the funniest. 87 Priestdaddy by Patricia Lockwood (2017)

Best reads 2017 new york times series#

The former children’s laureate’s series is a crucial work for explaining racism to young readers. Set in an alternative Britain, this groundbreaking piece of young adult fiction sees black people, called the Crosses, hold all the power and influence, while the noughts – white people – are marginalised and segregated. Read the review 88 Noughts & Crosses by Malorie Blackman (2001) TheĪuthor gets unwittingly pregnant at 16, yet the story has a happy Sage grew up with her grandparents, who hated each other: he was a drunken philandering vicar his wife, having found his diaries,īlackmailed him and lived in another part of the house. That is one of the best accounts of family dysfunction ever written.

Best reads 2017 new york times full#

Read the review 89 Bad Blood by Lorna Sage (2000)Ī Whitbread prizewinning memoir, full of perfectly chosen phrases, The turbulent waves of 20th-century history crash over it as the house is sold by a Jewish family fleeing the Third Reich, requisitioned by the Russian army, reclaimed by exiles returning from Siberia, and sold again. Read the review 90 Visitation by Jenny Erpenbeck (2008), translated by Susan Bernofsky (2010)Ī grand house by a lake in the east of Germany is both the setting and main character of Erpenbeck’s third novel. Three narrative strands – spanning far-future space opera, contemporary unease and virtual-reality pastiche – are braided together for a breathtaking metaphysical voyage in pursuit of the mystery at the heart of reality. One of the most underrated prose writers demonstrates the literary firepower of science fiction at its best. The result is both sharp and dreamy, sliding in and out of different phases of Dylan’s career but rooted in his earliest days as a Woody Guthrie wannabe in New York City. Read the review 95 Chronicles: Volume One by Bob Dylan (2004)ĭylan’s reticence about his personal life is a central part of the singer-songwriter’s brand, so the gaps and omissions in this memoir come as no surprise.

Some readers wept all night, some condemned it as titillating and exploitative, but no one could deny its power. One man’s life is blighted by abuse and its aftermath, but also illuminated by love and friendship. This operatically harrowing American gay melodrama became an unlikely bestseller, and one of the most divisive novels of the century so far. Read the review 96 A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara (2015) The Triwizard Tournament provides pace and tension, and Rowling makes her boy wizard look death in the eye for the first time. Book four, the first of the doorstoppers, marks the point where the series really takes off. Read the review 97 Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by JK Rowling (2000)Ī generation grew up on Rowling’s all-conquering magical fantasies, but countless adults have also been enthralled by her immersive world. The high-level intrigue beguiled millions of readers, brought “Scandi noir” to prominence and inspired innumerable copycats. Radical journalist Mikael Blomkvist forms an unlikely alliance with troubled young hacker Lisbeth Salander as they follow a trail of murder and malfeasance connected with one of Sweden’s most powerful families in the first novel of the bestselling Millennium trilogy. Photograph: Allstar/Sony Pictures Releasing/Sportsphoto Ltd 98 The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson (2005), translated by Steven T Murray (2008) Daniel Craig and Rooney Mara in the 2011 film adaptation of The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo.