{"id":7068116,"date":"2026-09-27T06:54:38","date_gmt":"2026-09-27T06:54:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/peraltafinancing.com\/uncategorized\/my-best-and-worst-books-of-2020-all-by-my-shelf\/"},"modified":"2026-09-27T06:54:38","modified_gmt":"2026-09-27T06:54:38","slug":"my-best-and-worst-books-of-2020-all-by-my-shelf","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7068116","title":{"rendered":"My best and worst books of 2020 \u2013 All By My Shelf"},"content":{"rendered":"


\n<\/p>\n

\n

Like many people, I imagine, my reading habits changed in 2020. I read more; and I read different types of books. It\u2019s been a year of comfort reading, no doubt, and as the year went on I found myself increasingly drawn to either 19th century staples \u2013 Austen, Hardy \u2013 or to \u2018boy\u2019s own\u2019 thrillers from the 60s and 70s by the likes of Desmond Bagley, Hammond Innes and Victor Canning.<\/p>\n

Still, amongst all that retro reading there was still time for some relatively<\/em> new material, although by no means all of it was published during the year itself. Here\u2019s my best and worst of the year, selected from all of the above.<\/p>\n

Best<\/h2>\n

1. The Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n

Although dealing with another harrowing subject \u2013 the abuse of boys in a Florida reform school in the 1960s \u2013 this relatively slim volume is a significant departure stylistically from Whitehead\u2019s slavery era The Underground Railroad. It feels pared back, restrained, and entirely rooted in a grim reality. All of which means that, when the inevitable rushes of violence do arrive, they become all the more powerful. <\/p>\n

2. To The Lions by Holly Watt<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n

Some reviewers felt that this first novel by investigative journalist Watt failed to live up to her reporting work, and didn\u2019t quite work. They are wrong. It\u2019s a gripping and entirely believable account of two journalist trying to uncover a gruesome secret being played out in the Libyan desert. And it\u2019s wonderful to see a real, functioning newsroom portrayed properly in a novel, rather than the dismissive and one-dimensional version seen in most books and TV dramas.<\/p>\n

3. David Copperfield by Charles Dickens<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n

Here\u2019s a hot tip for you \u2013 keep an eye on this up-and-coming author, he could have a bright future. I\u2019d read plenty of Dickens before last year \u2013 Great Expectations, Hard Times, A Tale Of Two Cites etc. <\/em> \u2013 but for some inexplicable reason had never got around to what the author called his \u201cfavourite child\u201d. Clearly there will be nothing I can write here that hasn\u2019t been written before, but it was a joy to find that the twin evils found elsewhere in his novels \u2013 caricature instead of character, and overbearing moralising \u2013 were entirely absent. A pleasure from start to finish.<\/p>\n

Worst<\/h2>\n

There were a few candidates here. Despite previously enjoying Cormac McCarthy\u2019s The Road<\/em> and No Country For Old Men<\/em>, the ultra-sparse style of The Crossing<\/em> was a step too far for me. I thought Sally Rooney\u2019s Normal People<\/em> was overrated, being extraordinarily simplistic in places. And I started Lisa Jewell\u2019s bestseller The Family Upstairs but really didn\u2019t have the inclination to finish it. But this novel, first published in 1998, took the overall prize:<\/p>\n

The Savage Detectives by Roberto Bolano<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n

I really wanted to love this. Billed as the Latin American novel which blew away all the old giants of the scene (Gabriel Garc\u00eda M\u00e1rquez, Mario Vargas Llosa, Carlos Fuentes), the Chilean writer Bolano forget everything that made all of those other authors so successful. Plot. Imagination. Characters to care about. This is part road movie, part Bildungsroman, part treatise on poetry, and the sum of its middling parts never once threatens to become a coherent whole. <\/p>\n

\t<\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Like many people, I imagine, my reading habits changed in 2020. I read more; and I read different types of books. It\u2019s been a year of comfort reading, no doubt, and as the year went on I found myself increasingly drawn to either 19th century staples \u2013 Austen, Hardy \u2013 or to \u2018boy\u2019s own\u2019 thrillers […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7068117,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[1752,2064,11258],"dealstore":[],"offerexpiration":[],"class_list":["post-7068116","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-books","tag-shelf","tag-worst"],"yoast_head":"\nMy best and worst books of 2020 \u2013 All By My Shelf - Som2ny Network<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7068116\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"My best and worst books of 2020 \u2013 All By My Shelf - Som2ny Network\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Like many people, I imagine, my reading habits changed in 2020. 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