The bottom of a year’s list more or less coincides with January, the top with December. Bolded titles are special to me.
Currently Reading
Thomas Bernhard — The Loser
Ravi Mangla — The Observant
2022
Rachel Lyon — Self Portrait with Boy
Donald Antrim — Elect Mr. Robinson for a Better World
Kate Folk — Out There
Padgett Powell — Indigo: Arm Wrestling, Snake Saving, and Some Things In Between
Matt Bell — Refuse to Be Done
Gene Wolfe — The Urth of the New Sun
Rachel Cusk — Second Place
Ursula K. Le Guin — The Left Hand of Darkness
2021
Gene Wolfe — The Citadel of the Autarch
Gene Wolfe — The Sword of the Lictor
Gene Wolfe — The Claw of the Conciliator (reread)
Gene Wolfe — The Shadow of the Torturer (reread)
Donald Barthelme — 40 Stories (reread)
Dana Spiotta — Lightning Field (reread)
Rivka Galchen — Everyone Knows Your Mother Is A Witch
Leah Hampton — Fuckface
Alex McElroy — The Atmospherians
Chris Bachelder — Abbott Awaits
Elif Batuman — The Idiot
Kevin Brockmeier — The Ghost Variations
Lauren Oyler — Fake Accounts
Hilary Leichter — Temporary
Rodrigo Rey Rosa — The African Shore
Dantiel Moniz — Milk Blood Heat
Rachel Kushner — The Mars Room
Rachel Kushner — The Flamethrowers
2020
Rachel Kushner — Telex from Cuba
Matthew Baker — Why Visit America
Karen Russell — Sleep Donation (audio)
Zadie Smith — Intimations
Hari Kunzru — Red Pill
Elisa Gabbert — The Unreality of Memory
Taylor Jenkins Reid — Daisy Jones & The Six (audio)
Jane Allison — Meander, Spiral, Explode
C. Pam Zhang — How Much of These Hills Is Gold
Ben Marcus — The Flame Alphabet (audio)
Charles Yu — Interior Chinatown (audio)
James Baldwin — The Fire Next Time
Ben Lerner — 10:04 (audio)
Colson Whitehead — The Underground Railroad (audio)
Anna North — The Life and Death of Sophie Stark
Susan Choi — Trust Exercise
Kevin Wilson — Nothing to See Here (audio)
Mary South — You Will Never Be Forgotten
Lydia Kiesling — The Golden State (audio)
Sam Lipsyte — The Fun Parts
Alexandra Chang — Days of Distraction
James Wood — How Fiction Works
Jenny Offill — Dept. of Speculation (audio)
Megan Angelo — Followers
Sarah Moss — Ghost Wall (audio)
Greg Jackson — Prodigals
Sophie Mackintosh — The Water Cure (audio)
Justin Torres — We The Animals
Claire Messud — The Emperor’s Children
Laura van den Berg — I Hold a Wolf by the Ears
2019
Joshua Mattson — A Short Film About Disappointment
Denis Johnson — Train Dreams
Amy Hempel — Sing To It
Courtney Maum — Costalegre
Samuel Rafael Barber — Thousands of Shredded Scraps of Paper Located across Five Landfills, That if Pieced Together Form a Message
Lucy Ives — Loudermilk, or The Real Poet, or The Origin of the World
Kali Fajardo-Anstine — Sabrina & Corina
Rivka Galchen — Atmospheric Disturbances (reread)
Steven Millhauser — Voices in the Night
Kimberly King Parsons — Black Light (interview at The Adroit Journal)
Christopher Castellani — The Art of Perspective
Claire Messud — The Burning Girl
Claire Messud — The Woman Upstairs
Wendy Rawlings — Time For Bed
Andrew Sean Greer — Less
Martin Riker — Samuel Johnson’s Eternal Return
Ryan Chapman — Riots I Have Known
Rachel Khong — Goodbye, Vitamin (reread)
Dana Spiotta — Innocents and Others
Jess Walter — Beautiful Ruins
Jesse Ball — How To Set A Fire And Why
Jeff Jackson — Destroy All Monsters
Patrick deWitt — The Sisters Brothers (audio)
Kristen Arnett — Mostly Dead Things (review at BWR)
Erin Somers — Stay Up With Hugo Best
Azareen Van der Vliet Oloomi — Fra Keeler (reread)
Karen Russell — Vampires in the Lemon Grove (audio)
Viet Thanh Nguyen — The Sympathizer
Padgett Powell — Mrs. Hollingsworth’s Men
Laura van den Berg — What The World Will Look Like When All The Water Leaves Us
George Saunders — Fox 8
Curtis Sittenfeld — You Think It, I’ll Say It (audio)
Nicole Rivas — A Bright & Pleading Dagger
Mohsin Hamid — Exit West (audio)
Nathan Hill — The Nix
Ben Lerner — Leaving the Atocha Station (audio)
Tasha Coryell — Hungry People (interview in The Adroit Journal)
Andrew O’Hagan — The Secret Life: Three True Stories of the Digital Age
Alexandra Kleeman — You Too Can Have A Body Like Mine (audio)
Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah — Friday Black
John Berger — Ways of Seeing
Joyce Carol Oates — Wild Nights!
Lauren Groff — Florida
R.O. Kwon — The Incendiaries
Ling Ma — Severance
2018
Lorrie Moore — Bark (audio)
Laura Sims — Looker (essay at Ploughshares)
Rebecca Schiff — The Bed Moved
Alena Graedon — The Word Exchange
Daniel Torday — Boomer1
Padgett Powell — A Woman Named Drown (reread)
Chris Bachelder — U.S.!
Azareen Van der Vliet Oloomi — Fra Keeler
Ian MacKenzie — Feast Days
Rachel Kushner — The Strange Case of Rachel K
Ottessa Moshfegh — My Year of Rest and Relaxation
Rachel Heng — Suicide Club (review at BWR)
Christine Schutt — Pure Hollywood
Dana Spiotta — Lightning Field
Lauren Groff — Delicate Edible Birds
Laura van den Berg — The Third Hotel (review at Ploughshares)
Azareen Van der Vliet Oloomi — Call Me Zebra
Gabe Habash — Stephen Florida
Celeste Ng — Everything I Never Told You
Valeria Luiselli — The Story of My Teeth
Dana Spiotta — Stone Arabia
Rachel Cusk — Outline
Megan Hunter — The End We Start From
Hernan Diaz — In The Distance
Emma Smith-Stevens — The Australian (review at BWR)
Ravi Mangla — Understudies
Emma Cline — The Girls (audio)
Rachel Khong — Goodbye, Vitamin
Hari Kunzru — White Tears