Best and worst of 2015

[charlatti]

What were your favorite reads this year? What were your least favorite?

[rootbeerfloat]

Favorite:
I'll Give You the Sun, Jandy Nelson
Everything I Never Told You, Celeste Ng
The Martian, Andy Weir

Least Favorite:
The Fiery Cross (Outlander #5), Diana Galbadon
Go Set a Watchman, Harper Lee

[pinkpinot]

I dove into two huge series this past year, Outlander and GOT. My favorite Outlander book was A Breathe of Snow and Ashes. I am only on book 4 for GOT so I don't know which will be my favorite yet. I need to finish A Feast for Crows before Jan 1 to make my goodreads goal!

Favorite:
Station 11
We Were Liars

Least Favorite:
Red Rising
The Fire Seekers

[mrspez07]

Best:
All the Light we Cannot See

Worst:
Size 12 is Not Fat by Meg Cabot

[charlatti]

Best: In the Kingdom of Ice by Hampton Sides and The Infinite Tides by Christian Kiefer
Worst: Dark Rooms by Lili Anolik (I can't recall why I picked that one up, but I really hated it)

[Nonny]

Favorites:

Station Eleven

All the Light We Cannot See

Big Little Lies

Hated:

We Were Liars

Death of a Red Heroine

The Circle

[AJL]

Favorites -
The Light Between Oceans
All the Bright Places
The Nightingale

Did NOT Like -
Bright Side
We Were Liars
Fangirl

[berrysweet]

Dec 30, 2015 20:08:58 GMT -5 AJL said:

Favorites -
The Light Between Oceans
All the Bright Places
The Nightingale

Did NOT Like -
Bright Side
We Were Liars
Fangirl

I didn't like Bright Side either...but I inexplicably cried through the whole thing, and stayed up until almost 2am to finish it. It was the weirdest book related thing that's ever happened to me, to be so affected by a book that I didn't actually even like.

[dorothyinAus]

Favorites:
>> Around the World in 80 Days, Jules Verne -- this book really surprised me with how much I enjoyed it

>> A Proud Taste for Scarlet and Miniver, E.L. Konigsburg -- this was a re-read, and I enjoyed it every bit as much the second time and it spurred me to get Alison Weir's biography of Eleanor of Aquitaine, which is on my list for this year.

>> Murder by the Book, Rex Stout -- I read this book to fit a category of "books your mother likes" as Nero Wolfe is one of her favorite characters.  I had never read a Nero Wolfe book and from watching the Timothy Hutton series and listening to old-time radio shows featuring the character, Wolfe drove me crazy, but I was pleasantly surprised by the book and have downloaded quite a few more to continue with the series

>> The Coronation, Boris Akunin -- Erast Fandorin is my all-time book-crush and I was hoping that there would be an adventure around the coronation of Czar Nicholas II.  I was pleased with how the author wove the fictional mystery into real-life events.

Least favorites
>> 1984, George Orwell -- I do not think there are words to express how much I did not like this book.  DH and MIL say you are not supposed to like it, but I really did not like it.  There was no happy in the book, none.  I'm glad I read it, but it definitely cemented my suspicions that I do not like dystopian literature.

>> The Professor and the Madman, Simon Winchester -- I was disappointed by this book.  I really expected to have more about how the dictionary was compiled and produced, but that seemed to be second, third, or even fourth, to the story of the professor and the madman.  It was interesting, but I was disappointed because I thought it would be something different than what it was.

>> Bite the Biscuit, Linda O. Johnston -- I was very disappointed by this book.  The author took way too much time to preach to her readers about dog treats, so much so that it took away from the story and the mystery.

[marigoldgirl]

According to my Goodreads ratings;

Best: 
The Goldfinch
The Nightingale
The Ocean at the End of the Lane

Worst:
The Handmaid's Tale
All The Light We Cannot See

[MrsAxilla]

Best:
The Light Between Oceans
Prince Lestat
My Beloved World (Sonya Sotomeyer memoir)
Gone with the Wind
The Throne of Glass series

Worst:
Miramont's Ghost (kindle first)
Death on the Nile
The Luminaries

I had a good year. Lots of fives and fours. Or maybe I'm just a generous rater.

[5kcandlesinthewind]

Best were:
Lafayette and the Somewhat United States by Sarah Vowell
The Royal We by Heather Cocks and Jessica Morgan
Big Little Lies by Lianne Moriarty
The Likeness by Tana French

Worst:
Girl in the Spider's Web - I gave up like 100 pages in, because there were too many characters, not enough Salander, and I just. didn't. care.
Vanishing Girls by Lauren Oliver - I usually like her books, but this one was just not good

[abs]

Best;
The Nightingale
Orphan Train
Yellow Crocus

Worst:
Red Rising
All the Things I Never Told You
All the Light We Cannot See
The Martian

It was honestly a pretty terrible reading year for me. There were very few books I really enjoyed, especially in the second half of the year.

[frlcb]

How can anyone hate All The Light We Cannot See??

Best:
All The Light We Cannot See (lol)
The Nightingale
Into The Darkest Corner
China Dolls

Worst:
The Good Girl
Maude
In The Unlikely Event

[aurora]

Jan 1, 2016 11:33:08 GMT -5 marigoldgirl said:

...

Worst:
The Handmaid's Tale
All The Light We Cannot See

The Handmaid's Tale is one of my favorite books ever!

[aurora]

This is pretty hard for me to decide! Of the books I read for the first time in 2015 (as opposed to re-reads of old favorites), I'd probably rank these top three for each category:

Best:
Career of Evil - "Robert Galbraith"
Finders Keepers - Stephen King
A Dance with Dragons - GRR Martin

Worst (and these aren't really *bad*, just compared to others):
Interview with the Vampire - Ann Rice
America Again - Stephen Colbert
The Fall of Hyperion - Dan Simmons

[marigoldgirl]

Jan 2, 2016 1:50:58 GMT -5 aurora said:

Jan 1, 2016 11:33:08 GMT -5 marigoldgirl said:

...

Worst:
The Handmaid's Tale
All The Light We Cannot See

The Handmaid's Tale is one of my favorite books ever!

I know a lot of people love both of these books. I just didn't.