Halfway Top Ten

There is a challenge going on in Instagram to post our top ten books of the year so far. Phew, this was hard. As of yesterday I'd finished 161 books for 2019. Narrowing that to 10 titles was not easy. It's tempting to make a list of runners-up but since I post my books read every month, including images of all the five-star reads, if you want more, that's where to go.

These are in no particular order, other than a bit of backwards chronologically.

1. Lost Children Archive by Valeria Luiselli
   This book had so many things for me - soundscapes, Stephen Feld, marital strife, interweaving story with research, plus a lot about current politics.
2. On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous by Ocean Vuong
   The language is everything and the emotions run deep.
3. Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell
   As much as this novel is a part of American popular culture, I really had no idea what it was really about, or how it ended. Scarlett is unforgettable and I'll be thinking about this novel a long time.
4. The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down by Anne Fadiman
   Picked for me by book club but a huge surprise favorite, about cross cultural communication, medical philosophy, and I learned a lot about the Hmong.
5. Brute: Poems by Emily Skaja
   Amazing through and through, what a debut. And I really enjoyed reading one on <a href="http://readingenvy.blogspot.com/2019/07/reading-envy-159-reading-doorways-with.html">episode 159</a> of the podcast.
6. A Place for Us by Fatima Farheen Mirza
   On the surface, a "typical" immigrant novel but the way it transitions into the story about the father was a move of brilliance I will not long forget.
7. The Deeper the Water the Uglier the Fish by Katya Apekina
   A story told through the sideways glance of everyone else in the room, brilliant.
8. Library of Small Catastrophes by Alison C. Rollins
   Another poetry volume worthy of more attention. And Rollins is a poet-librarian!
9. The Vela by Yoon Ha Lee, Becky Chambers, S.L. Huang and Rivers Solomon
   Part of it is the format - serial audio/ebook content. Part of it is the four authors and their joint writing experience, but I just thought the story itself was interesting and timely. Space refugees.
10. Outline by Rachel Cusk
    I dragged my feet reading this book but now think I could reread it every few years and get more out of it. In this book nothing happens and it's the best example of why this doesn't matter to me. 

What have your best reads been this year?