We have really similar taste I think, I loved so many books on this list and am interested in all the others. I just gave my parents When Breath Becomes Air for Christmas and they've both read it already and found it so moving. Happy 2018!
The Secret History!! It was one of my favorites from last year, glad to hear you loved it. I still really need to read Stay With Me, which I added to my TBR because of you way back in the spring. Great video, Lauren!
So much to love about this list! I have been meaning to read Home Fire for ages... you have pushed it to the top of my list. I really loved Jen’s Book, Stay With Me and The Essex Serpent. You really speak of them in a marvelously. I want to read the Gender Games but it hasn’t come out in the US yet! Wonderful video.
YES the best for last! The Secret History! so glad you got to it and in your best of 2017 none the less! I was about to re read it but I got new books for Christmas. I will re read it however in the future, definitely one of my favorite all time books. happy new year!
I really need to get to When Breath Becomes Air and The Essex Serpent, this is a great list! I read All Quiet on the Western Front and it was incredible, surprisingly funny and unsurprisingly moving, would highly recommend. Looking forward to another year of your videos :)
I've owned When Breath Becomes Air for a while now and, like you, I was a bit apprehensive to read it because I wasn't sure how much a memoir about death would be an enjoyable read, but I'm reassured by your thoughts and think I might bite the bullet and read it next. Great list, I agreed with lots of them and the others are all ones I'm interested in reading!
i've watched a lot of your videos and i gotta tell you, you're one of the best booktuber out there. All of the books you talk about look so interesting and a lot actually ended up on my "want to read" list. lots of love from italy!
You're making me need to read Home Fire even more! Might have to see if I can get the paperback when it comes out. And yay for Stay With Me, Gender Games and The Secret History :D
When Breath Becomes Air was also one of my favourite books of 2017! And I also loved Stay With Me and The Essex Serpent. Do Not Say With Have Nothing is on my shelves to read this year, and I also really want to get to The Decent of Man and Gender Games. You’ve intrigued with Home Fire, I think I’ll have to check that out😊 Your recommendations are always so great and perfect for my reading tastes, thank you😊
Thankyou for your top books , loved your review. I just ordered the Essex serpent so looking forward to that. I'm currently reading his dark materials book one the compass, wishing you a happy new year!
I've got Stay With Me to read this year - heard so many amazing things! And I also fell in love with The Secret History this year too, such a great book :)
I would really like to read The Secret History in 2018, and most of the books you speak of are in my wish-list! I ADORED The Beginning of the World in the Middle of the Night, it was such a good book! My favorite story was "The Beginning of the World in the Middle of the Night"! I have multiple favorites for the year, including Diary of a Vampire in Pyjamas by Mathias Malzieu (a memoir about his disease, but the author keeps making the reader laugh, and he never indulges in self pity, really inspiring, it is so beautiful written (at least in French)) and Everything Is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer (such a perfect book to me)I wish you a happy New Year, full of joy and great reads!! xx
I TOTALLY agree about how important enjoyability is. how worthwhile is a book, really, if it's brilliant but unenjoyable? I feel like the best books are the ones that manage to both be enjoyable AND touch our souls.
Any other book written by Ayobami Adebayo will *DEFINITELY* be purchased and read by me. "Stay with me" 'twas a fantastic read. Totally deserves to be on your top faves.
I really loved Giovanni’s room by James Baldwin and Human acts by Han Kang. I’d recommend them to you! Now I really want to read Stay with me. Great video!
Oooh I’ve been looking forward to this one. I definitely need to read Home Fire, if you and my Mum love it then it must be good. She also loved the Grayson Perry I think. Ooh accomplishment over enjoyment shade, made me giggle. Stay With Me was such a wonderful, wonderful book. Should have won. Hooray for Jen’s stories. The Gender Games is BRILLIANT. I didn’t do a non fiction list and I’m kicking myself. Hooray for The Essex Serpent too. I was a huge fan of The Secret History, I’ve never read anything else by her strangely. Great list.
Essex Serpent klaxon! It makes me grin every time someone else loves it. That book completely stole my heart. I’m so excited for her next book in autumn this year 😀 I feel like the only person on the planet who hasn’t read The Secret History yet... I’ve had a copy for years and I must get to it in 2018. Brilliant brilliant video. 😀
I loved Do not say we have nothing (on my top 5) and really enjoyed The Essex Serpent ! and Mend the living is a strong book (I've read it in French because I'm French, her writing style is really good)." When breath becomes air" is a book I want to read, despite the subject. Thanks for your review !
Mend the Living sounds really fascinating. My top books of the year were Sapiens, The Lonely Hearts Hotel, Tell the Wolves I'm Home, All Quiet on the Western Front, Hillbilly Elegy, All the Light We Cannot See and An Untamed State. Would highly recommend them all :) Happy 2018 reading.
LOVED All The Light We Cannot See! I have to my Mum this Christmas 😊 I’ve not read any of the others though, so thanks for those great recommendations! Xx
You should definitely read An Untamed State by Roxane Gay. I don't usually cry during books but I was literally sobbing almost the entire way. It broke me. Really want to read Hunger by her now
Honestly I just love the way you talk about books. You're so articulate. I want to read every single one of these now, but especially The Descent of Man. I'm always glad to get a layered view of men's perspectives on the current gender shift.
Great picks! Some of my favourite books of the year: The Wonder, The beginning of the world in the middle of the night (obvs, Jen is awesome), The girl who circumnavigated Fairyland in a ship of her own making, and The comet seekers by Helen Sedgwick. My boyfriend is currently reading The Descent of Man, when he finishes it I’m going to read it and give him Girls will be Girls by Emer O’toole, another favourite read of the year. I’m also going to have to pick up Home Fire, it sounds great and I actually studied Antigone at University :)
Love your comments on the enjoyability of a book - I feel like literary prizes really need to take this into account more. For example, I picked up A Brief History of Seven Killings and it was a total nightmare to read! Literary genius I’m sure but my god... I’m so surprised at how much you loved The Secret History. It had been hyped up to me by friends for so many years, and I loved the Goldfinch so I thought I’d finally give in a shot. What a nightmare. The first half of the book was relatively enjoyable, but after Bunny’s murder (which was painfully lacking detail) there were what felt like a million pages of nothing. It was boring, the characters were boring, it felt like they were on a cycle of getting drunk, smoking and trying to find Henry, but with no purpose. The book had nothing to do with Julian’s classes, which I imagined to be the very core of the novel - nothing really about Ancient Greek or their study of classics, more about their privileged lives. I didn’t find it mysterious, the romances scattered throughout seemed totally irrelevant and shoehorned into the book. GAH it frustrates me on a personal level because I’d been told by so many people how “great” this book was. A little like A Little Life, it tried too hard to be a “fantastic work of literature”
That’s so interesting we had diffident experiences! Although I do hear that people tend to like The Goldfinch OR The Secret History and that they’re not necessarily that similar? I guess it also depends what your expectations are going in, because it’s such a long novel that I can imagine getting really frustrated if you’re not completely on board with it. That’s how I felt about A Little Life anyway, so I feel you! 😂
I adored When Breath Becomes Air this year, though I didn't enjoy The Descent of Man very much unfortunately. I felt he could have gone into a lot more detail
I loved Out by Natsuo Kirino. A Japanese feminist thriller, with some seriously complex female characters. I read it January and it's stayed with me all year. Hoping to get my 2018 favourites up soon, once my new camera comes in the post. There's just something so special about this time of year on booktube!
The Essex Serpent was one of my fave reads this year too. I also loved Station Eleven by Emily St John (post apocalyptic book revolving around a travelling Shakespearean troupe), Margaret the First by Danielle Sutton (historical fiction based on the real life of Margaret the First. Reminded me of Orlando), The Muse by Jesse Burton (flicks between 1960s London art world and Spain before the civil war - huge twist at the end & beautifully hewn), the Beat and the Nightingale by Katherine Ardern (set in Russia, female heroine, magic realism around Russian folklore. So special and transporting) and Beother of the More Famous Jack by Barbara Trapido which was a re-read. Adore this book - it made me laugh and cry. I think you would love it. It moves between London and Italy, the protagonist is a woman following her journey from her early 20s to late 30s and her relationship with this very literary and eccentric family as they fall in and out of her life. It’s full of discovery and love and hate and sex and death and utterly compelling.
Aw man, I loved Margaret the First too and completely forgot to include it in this video! Ah well! Thanks for those recommendations, that’s fantastic; I’d not heard of Brother of the More Famous Jack, will definitely check it out xx
Hello... Mmm... My boyfriend is angry because he says, since I watch Booktube, I mostly read YA novels and he says it is not normal, as I am 33... What do you think? Thanks a lot for your opinion.
Isn’t he your fiancé now? Lol! I wasn’t into the Essex Serpent after reading a bit in a bookstore... I guess I need to give it a go! Love your videos :)
haha my friends said the same exact thing when they got engaged! And then it was hard for them to switch to "my husband" but they would giggle from happiness when correcting themselves :)
We have really similar taste I think, I loved so many books on this list and am interested in all the others. I just gave my parents When Breath Becomes Air for Christmas and they've both read it already and found it so moving. Happy 2018!
Beautifully said reviews! I feel very inspired to pick them up, and I love the diversity of cultures/genres in your favorite books.
You explain the synopsis so well of all the books .....
Thanks Lauren-this came at a very good time for me as I’m on page 46 of the Essex serpent and struggling! I’ll push on! :)
Happy new year to you xxx
The Secret History!! It was one of my favorites from last year, glad to hear you loved it. I still really need to read Stay With Me, which I added to my TBR because of you way back in the spring. Great video, Lauren!
The way you talk about these books makes me want to read them even if I'm not interested in them. You're great and passionate, I love that.
So much to love about this list! I have been meaning to read Home Fire for ages... you have pushed it to the top of my list. I really loved Jen’s Book, Stay With Me and The Essex Serpent. You really speak of them in a marvelously. I want to read the Gender Games but it hasn’t come out in the US yet! Wonderful video.
YES the best for last! The Secret History! so glad you got to it and in your best of 2017 none the less! I was about to re read it but I got new books for Christmas. I will re read it however in the future, definitely one of my favorite all time books. happy new year!
I really need to get to When Breath Becomes Air and The Essex Serpent, this is a great list! I read All Quiet on the Western Front and it was incredible, surprisingly funny and unsurprisingly moving, would highly recommend. Looking forward to another year of your videos :)
I've owned When Breath Becomes Air for a while now and, like you, I was a bit apprehensive to read it because I wasn't sure how much a memoir about death would be an enjoyable read, but I'm reassured by your thoughts and think I might bite the bullet and read it next. Great list, I agreed with lots of them and the others are all ones I'm interested in reading!
i've watched a lot of your videos and i gotta tell you, you're one of the best booktuber out there.
All of the books you talk about look so interesting and a lot actually ended up on my "want to read" list.
lots of love from italy!
You're making me need to read Home Fire even more! Might have to see if I can get the paperback when it comes out. And yay for Stay With Me, Gender Games and The Secret History :D
Such an interesting list! Stay with me sound so interesting!
Oh my gosh! I want to pick up so many books now! Especially the Heart and When Breath Becomes Air.
I love your book reviews!! You are my absolute favorite book blogger. Thank you for sharing all your insights, truly inspiring :)
When Breath Becomes Air was also one of my favourite books of 2017! And I also loved Stay With Me and The Essex Serpent. Do Not Say With Have Nothing is on my shelves to read this year, and I also really want to get to The Decent of Man and Gender Games. You’ve intrigued with Home Fire, I think I’ll have to check that out😊 Your recommendations are always so great and perfect for my reading tastes, thank you😊
Thankyou for your top books , loved your review. I just ordered the Essex serpent so looking forward to that. I'm currently reading his dark materials book one the compass, wishing you a happy new year!
What a beautiful thing to read in January! Hope you enjoy it 😊
I've got Stay With Me to read this year - heard so many amazing things! And I also fell in love with The Secret History this year too, such a great book :)
I would really like to read The Secret History in 2018, and most of the books you speak of are in my wish-list! I ADORED The Beginning of the World in the Middle of the Night, it was such a good book! My favorite story was "The Beginning of the World in the Middle of the Night"! I have multiple favorites for the year, including Diary of a Vampire in Pyjamas by Mathias Malzieu (a memoir about his disease, but the author keeps making the reader laugh, and he never indulges in self pity, really inspiring, it is so beautiful written (at least in French)) and Everything Is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer (such a perfect book to me)I wish you a happy New Year, full of joy and great reads!! xx
You made me want to pick up The Secret History so much! I have the book but have also been put off by the length! - L x
So many more books that I need to read 😅😅
I've come across a number of booktubers that read The Secret History and loved it. On my 2018 tbr list for sure (an ebook version though!).
Ebook 100%, I read it on my kindle 😂
I TOTALLY agree about how important enjoyability is. how worthwhile is a book, really, if it's brilliant but unenjoyable? I feel like the best books are the ones that manage to both be enjoyable AND touch our souls.
Any other book written by Ayobami Adebayo will *DEFINITELY* be purchased and read by me. "Stay with me" 'twas a fantastic read. Totally deserves to be on your top faves.
I really loved Giovanni’s room by James Baldwin and Human acts by Han Kang. I’d recommend them to you! Now I really want to read Stay with me. Great video!
Oooh I’ve been looking forward to this one. I definitely need to read Home Fire, if you and my Mum love it then it must be good. She also loved the Grayson Perry I think. Ooh accomplishment over enjoyment shade, made me giggle. Stay With Me was such a wonderful, wonderful book. Should have won. Hooray for Jen’s stories. The Gender Games is BRILLIANT. I didn’t do a non fiction list and I’m kicking myself. Hooray for The Essex Serpent too. I was a huge fan of The Secret History, I’ve never read anything else by her strangely. Great list.
Stay With Me SHOULD HAVE WON 💅🏻
And yes, you must read Home Fire, I think you would love it (even though I do, which is usually an oxymoron 😂)
Essex Serpent klaxon! It makes me grin every time someone else loves it. That book completely stole my heart. I’m so excited for her next book in autumn this year 😀 I feel like the only person on the planet who hasn’t read The Secret History yet... I’ve had a copy for years and I must get to it in 2018. Brilliant brilliant video. 😀
I loved Do not say we have nothing (on my top 5) and really enjoyed The Essex Serpent ! and Mend the living is a strong book (I've read it in French because I'm French, her writing style is really good)." When breath becomes air" is a book I want to read, despite the subject. Thanks for your review !
My 2017 most beloved book is Call me by your name by André Aciman.
Whatever you recommend - i buy. And I usually enjoy them very much.
Mend the Living sounds really fascinating. My top books of the year were Sapiens, The Lonely Hearts Hotel, Tell the Wolves I'm Home, All Quiet on the Western Front, Hillbilly Elegy, All the Light We Cannot See and An Untamed State. Would highly recommend them all :) Happy 2018 reading.
LOVED All The Light We Cannot See! I have to my Mum this Christmas 😊 I’ve not read any of the others though, so thanks for those great recommendations! Xx
You should definitely read An Untamed State by Roxane Gay. I don't usually cry during books but I was literally sobbing almost the entire way. It broke me. Really want to read Hunger by her now
Honestly I just love the way you talk about books. You're so articulate. I want to read every single one of these now, but especially The Descent of Man. I'm always glad to get a layered view of men's perspectives on the current gender shift.
Great picks! Some of my favourite books of the year: The Wonder, The beginning of the world in the middle of the night (obvs, Jen is awesome), The girl who circumnavigated Fairyland in a ship of her own making, and The comet seekers by Helen Sedgwick. My boyfriend is currently reading The Descent of Man, when he finishes it I’m going to read it and give him Girls will be Girls by Emer O’toole, another favourite read of the year. I’m also going to have to pick up Home Fire, it sounds great and I actually studied Antigone at University :)
Ah, in which case you should absolutely read Home Fire! I love, love, loved Girls Will Be Girls, I hope your boyfriend does too, haha!
Love your comments on the enjoyability of a book - I feel like literary prizes really need to take this into account more. For example, I picked up A Brief History of Seven Killings and it was a total nightmare to read! Literary genius I’m sure but my god...
I’m so surprised at how much you loved The Secret History. It had been hyped up to me by friends for so many years, and I loved the Goldfinch so I thought I’d finally give in a shot. What a nightmare. The first half of the book was relatively enjoyable, but after Bunny’s murder (which was painfully lacking detail) there were what felt like a million pages of nothing. It was boring, the characters were boring, it felt like they were on a cycle of getting drunk, smoking and trying to find Henry, but with no purpose. The book had nothing to do with Julian’s classes, which I imagined to be the very core of the novel - nothing really about Ancient Greek or their study of classics, more about their privileged lives. I didn’t find it mysterious, the romances scattered throughout seemed totally irrelevant and shoehorned into the book. GAH it frustrates me on a personal level because I’d been told by so many people how “great” this book was. A little like A Little Life, it tried too hard to be a “fantastic work of literature”
That’s so interesting we had diffident experiences! Although I do hear that people tend to like The Goldfinch OR The Secret History and that they’re not necessarily that similar? I guess it also depends what your expectations are going in, because it’s such a long novel that I can imagine getting really frustrated if you’re not completely on board with it. That’s how I felt about A Little Life anyway, so I feel you! 😂
I adored When Breath Becomes Air this year, though I didn't enjoy The Descent of Man very much unfortunately. I felt he could have gone into a lot more detail
I think that’s a fair comment, it’s a very short book, and probably serves as more of an introduction than a full examination 😊
I loved Out by Natsuo Kirino. A Japanese feminist thriller, with some seriously complex female characters. I read it January and it's stayed with me all year. Hoping to get my 2018 favourites up soon, once my new camera comes in the post.
There's just something so special about this time of year on booktube!
The Essex Serpent was one of my fave reads this year too. I also loved Station Eleven by Emily St John (post apocalyptic book revolving around a travelling Shakespearean troupe), Margaret the First by Danielle Sutton (historical fiction based on the real life of Margaret the First. Reminded me of Orlando), The Muse by Jesse Burton (flicks between 1960s London art world and Spain before the civil war - huge twist at the end & beautifully hewn), the Beat and the Nightingale by Katherine Ardern (set in Russia, female heroine, magic realism around Russian folklore. So special and transporting) and Beother of the More Famous Jack by Barbara Trapido which was a re-read. Adore this book - it made me laugh and cry. I think you would love it. It moves between London and Italy, the protagonist is a woman following her journey from her early 20s to late 30s and her relationship with this very literary and eccentric family as they fall in and out of her life. It’s full of discovery and love and hate and sex and death and utterly compelling.
Aw man, I loved Margaret the First too and completely forgot to include it in this video! Ah well! Thanks for those recommendations, that’s fantastic; I’d not heard of Brother of the More Famous Jack, will definitely check it out xx
How you talk about books makes me wanna pick them up
I just finished reading A Line Made by Walking bu Sara Baume. Cant recommend it enough!
Hello... Mmm... My boyfriend is angry because he says, since I watch Booktube, I mostly read YA novels and he says it is not normal, as I am 33... What do you think? Thanks a lot for your opinion.
Isn’t he your fiancé now? Lol! I wasn’t into the Essex Serpent after reading a bit in a bookstore... I guess I need to give it a go! Love your videos :)
Haha, he is but for some reason I feel dumb saying ‘fiancé’ 😂
Would "Home Fire" mean as much to a non-British reader as it did to you?Excellent reviews, by the way.
I couldn’t say if it would mean as much, but it would be completely understandable and enjoyable to someone non-British 😊
I am from Australia and found it brilliant and not bound by being a British story. Hope that helps.
Lia Hyde and Seek - it helps a lot, thank you.
Love ur videos and love the list ! However ur thumbnail says 2018 ,..???
😱😱😱😱😱😱😱 thank you haha
The title said 2018 initially 🙈
you mean "your fiance's nightstand"?! :-P not used to saying it yet huh! haha
Haha, I feel so awkward calling him fiancé 😂 he’ll be my boyfriend til the day we get married!
haha my friends said the same exact thing when they got engaged! And then it was hard for them to switch to "my husband" but they would giggle from happiness when correcting themselves :)
i really want to pick up decent of man... and the secret history has been staring at me from my shelves for far too long.
Sophie! You must read The Secret History, I think it would be right up your street xx