I love to read, and it's a big prerequisite for writing. A while back, I started keeping track of all the books I read, so here's the complete list for 2011. From these 76 titles, here are my ten favorites with links to Amazon. They're not in any particular order--I just listed them by author last name. Keep in mind that they were all published at different times; I just read them in 2011.
The China Study by T. Colin Campbell: In looking into vegan nutrition, this book/study was referenced over and over again by many different experts. I decided to go to the primary source, and I am glad I did. Basically, it was a giant study with thousands of people that ultimately showed a link between what we eat and our health. It sounds kind of obvious, right--you are what you eat. But Dr. Campbell found things like a link between casein (milk protein) and cancer. Most of our western diseases--heart disease, cancer, diabetes, obesity, etc--can be linked to our western diet that is heavy on the animal products. READ THIS BOOK. It will change your life. Even if you don't "drink the Kool-Aid" and join me in a more vegan way of life, you'll still learn a lot and be more educated about the food and nutrition industry as well as the various research and studies done in this field.
One of Our Thursdays is Missing by Jasper Fforde: This is the sixth book in one of my favorite series by one of my author heroes. (I even named my dog Thursday.) Basically, the series follow Thursday Next, who can book jump and enter fiction. It's this whole alternate-reality thing that's too complicated to go into but I'll just put it this way: The Thursday Next Series is Harry Potter for book nerds. And one of my favorite things about the series is it keeps getting better (a lot of series do the opposite). In this book, the Bookworld is teetering on the brink of an all-genre war, and Thursday is the only one who can stop it. Unfortunately, she's nowhere to be found, so the powers that be turn to the bookworld Thursday (the character who plays her in the books) and ask her to play the real Thursday and help smooth things over. It's an interesting twist for Fforde to switch points of view after five books from Thursday's perspective, but it worked. What can I say--he's one of my author heroes, which makes him a genius.
The Last Dragonslayer by Jasper Fforde: This book brought on feelings of anger for my author hero--not because the book was lacking, but because it was lacking in the United States. Since it is only published and distributed in the UK, I had to order this on Ebay (I just ordered the second one, released last November, the same way). The book is the first in a series for young adults. Teenager Jennifer Strange helps run Kazam, an employment agency for magical folk who do odd jobs, like rewiring your entire house in an afternoon. Magic is highly regulated, and wizards have delicate egos, so much of Jennifer's work involves paperwork and politicking. But her life starts to change when visions start prophesying the death of the last dragon by the dragonslayer, and many of the clues suggest Jennifer is that dragonslayer.
The Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett: The premise of this book is unexciting--750 pages about building a cathedral in 12th century England. But it's not really about the cathedral, it's about the people who are brought together by the cathedral. It all starts with a pregnant woman at a hanging and cursing the men who have witnessed against the baby-daddy. About 740 pages later, the truth comes out about all of that. In the middle, you have a varied cast of characters from evil villain to benevolent priest and everyone in between. They all struggle to get what they want, whether their aims be altruistic, selfish, or just a means of survival. Be warned, however, there is graphic sexual content in this book.
Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet by Jamie Ford: This book starts in the 1980s with a discovery in the Panama Hotel, near Seattle's Japantown. Crates and crates of possessions were stored in the hotel by Japanese families who were sent to World War II internment camp, were then sealed up with the closed hotel, and resurfaced when a new owner began remodeling. Henry Lee, a Chinese-American resident of Seattle for his whole life, and a recent widower, is reminded of his childhood 40 years ago, and Keiko, the Japanese girl he befriended at school. It's a very engaging story--I hesitate to call it a love story, but that's really what it is, just with a childhood innocence as Henry slips back and forth between past and present and begins to wonder what happened to Keiko.
Born to Run by Christopher McDougall: You'll put down this book and say, "Wow!" I don't even know how to explain it--memoir, biography, science, medicine, anthropology...it's all in there. The book centers on the author's search for the Tarahumara tribe in the Copper Canyons of Mexico--a tribe known for running hundreds-mile races in flimsy leather sandals in the unforgiving heat with surprisingly few injuries or maladies common to the more "advanced" runner. From there, his journey branches off into looking at various runner athletes and tribal hunters who actually run their prey to death. Eventually he finds his answers, and much, much more. This is truly a groundbreaking work--and if you're curious about those weird glovelike, finger-toe shoes, the answer's here. Check out his interview on The Daily Show.
Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs: Jacob's grandfather was always telling stories about his childhood, showing pictures of his many friends with special powers--a levitating girl, a strong boy. Jacob believed them all, but eventually outgrew them, seeing the stories as metaphors for his grandfather's difficult years as a Jew and soldier in World War II. But after his grandfather's mysterious death, Jacob wonders if he was correct in his disbelief and sets out to discover the truth.
The Psychopath Test by Jon Ronson: I learned about this book thanks to Jon Ronson's interview on The Daily Show. For him, it all started when he was contacted to use his investigative journalism skills to figure out the mystery of a strange book being sent to various neurologists. His search takes him into the middle of the psychology industry, both the doctors and the critics (most notably the Scientologists). What he discovered is that psychopaths, who we generally equate with serial killers and rapists, make up 1% of the regular population and 25% of the prison population. They also make up 25% of top ranking CEOs and other high-power positions where a lack of empathy might come in handy.
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot: In 1951, cervical cancer cells were taken from Henrietta Lacks which turned out to be the holy grail scientists were looking for. They wanted cells to run tests on, but "farming" cells was difficult because after a few generations the cells would no longer reproduce. Henrietta Lacks's cells, known as HeLa cells, kept going and going, and ultimately founded multimillion dollar industries and helped develop vaccines and treatments for ailments such as polio. Meanwhile, her family lived in poverty without any knowledge of this. Over a ten-year period, Rebecca Skloot researched the cells, the woman behind them, and the ethics surrounding this sort of research. Others had tried to do this before, but had failed to gain the trust of the Lacks children and other family members. Here is a great interview on The Colbert Report.
The Help by Kathryn Stockett: I won't go to into detail on this one since it was EVERYWHERE. I'll just say that I really loved it.
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