January was a month full of emotional whiplash, both for me personally and in the broader world. I basically wound up accomplishing what I could and hanging on for the ride. But here I am, finally, to give you my favorite books of 2020.
Whatever else 2020 was, and it was a lot, it was a good reading year for me. I set out to read 100 books, and I read 107. And after realizing I’d all but stopped reading books in Braille in 2019, what with finishing law school and taking the bar and moving to D.C., I made a concerted effort to read more books in Braille in 2020. I read eleven books in Braille this year.
39 of the books I read in 2020 were wonderful enough that they have now been added to my book recs page. And here they are, in no particular order.
Jameyanne’s Favorite Books of 2020:
- Savvy series by Ingrid Law
- The Thickety series by J. A. White (I read the first one at the end of 2019 and the rest of the books at the start of 2020, and they were all wonderful)
- Girl in the Blue Coat by Monica Hesse
- Forever, or a Long Long time by Caela Carter
- Greystone Secrets series by Margaret Peterson Haddix (the third book comes out this year, but I loved the first two enough I don’t want to wait for the third to recommend the series)
- Ash Princess trilogy by Laura Sebastian (I read the first one while studying for the bar in 2019, then reread it in 2020 and finished the series, and wow!)
- Renegades trilogy by Marissa Meyer
- The Light Between Worlds by Laura E. Weymouth
- Speak by Laurie Hals Anderson
- Such a Fun Age by Kiley Reid
- The Kingdom of Back by Marie Lu
- Orbiting Jupiter by Gary D. Schmidt
- You Should See Me in a Crown byLeah Johnson
- The Wayfarers series by Becky Chambers (the fourth one comes out in 2021, I think soon, and I can’t wait! But this is more a bunch of interconnected stand-alone novels than a series, and they are all so wonderful)
- Midnight at the Barclay Hotel by Fleur T. Bradley
- The Mystwick School of Musicraft by Jessica Khoury
- Endurance: A Year in Space, A Lifetime of Discovery by Scott Kelly
- Raybearer by Jordan Ifueko (I forget when the sequel is coming out but I am so excited!)
- Artemis Fowl books 1-4 by Eoin Colfer (I haven’t read the rest of the series, but everyone I’ve talked to says this is the place to stop. I may read the other books just because I like to make my own opinions, but the fourth book is a good ending to Artemis’s story)
- Upside-Down Magic books 1-5 by Sarah Mlynowski, Emily Jenkins, and Lauren Myracle (I’m still working on finishing the series but so far it’s been great fun)
- We Dream of Space by Erin Entrada Kelly
I highly recommend all of these books. Check out my monthly reading roundup posts over here for more details on all these books, and happy reading in 2021!