More Best of 2014 Book Lists

The best of 2014 Books lists are coming out strong now. There are a lot of repeat books (last year there was a summary list that someone put together to compile all the books and how often they were cited, so hopefully someone will do that again.) But I have to wonder how much book lists like these matter to general readers. Here is an earlier post on other Best Books of 2014 lists

I have to give props to Bill Gates for turning himself into a Lego to give his best books he read this year.

  • NPR – 250 titles with filters and categories to give most everyone at least a few books they would like. But 250 seems way too many to be helpful.
  • Amazon has their best selling lists of 2014.  I always am interested that the best selling Kindle books lists and paper books lists are so different.  The lists are both the top 100, but the top 10 only have 2 overlapping books. And the next 10 only have 2 more.
  • Paul Sohn at Salt and Light has the 11 most thought provoking books on leadership. This is a Christian site, but most are general books instead of specifically Christian leadership books.
  • Relevant Magazine has a list of best books to give as gifts. The list was prepared by C Christopher Smith of Englewood Review of Books and has a number of good books for a variety of readers, ages and interests. I have read two of the books on the list and have already bought two more
  • Vulture – a culture review site has their 10 best. I have never heard of the site before, but they have my top book of the year as their top book of the year.
  • Publisher’s Weekly has their top 10 books. Several lists have mentioned Thirteen Days in September about the 1978 Camp David Accords, Deep Down Dark (about the 33 trapped 69 days in the Chilean Mine collapse of 2010), and A Brief History of Seven Killings about 3 decades of Jamaican history centering on an attempted assassination of Bob Marley. I am interested in the Camp David Accords one at least.
  • Washington Post’s list (other than 7 Killings and Being Mortal) has 8 books I have not heard of.
  • Boston Globe has a variety of lists with nothing that explains them (not all that helpful)
  • Slate has staff picks. Which I think I like better than straight best of lists. I would rather get someone tell me their book that might be a bit quirky instead of the “˜best’ lists that often focus on literary merit more than enjoyability.
  • Audible has their Best of 2014 – which also has a short video and includes a number of categories, like best narration, listener favorites, and several book category lists.

Leave a Comment