2009 Year in Review: Favorite Books

Here’s my annual list of my ten favorite books read in the year.  As always, this is merely the best books I read this year not books published in 2009.  For previous years see 2008, 2007 and 2006. You may also want to check out My Favorite Books of All Time or see Every Book I’ve Ever Read cataloged in Library Thing. I’ve also posted Book Lists ’10 which contains my reading lists for the coming year.

1. An African in Greenland by Tété -Michel Kpmoassie
2. The Death and Life of Great American Cities by Jane Jacobs
3. A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry
4. Founding Faith: Providence, Politics, and the Birth of Religious Freedom in America by Stephen Waldman
5. How the Beatles Destroyed Rock n Roll by Elijah Wald
6. Transit Maps of the World by Mark Ovenden
7. Traffic by Tom Vanderbilt
8. Ulysses by James Joyce
9. A Voyage Long & Strange by Tony Horwitz
10. The Day Wall Street Exploded by Beverly  Gage

Below is the list of all the books I’ve read in the past year.  Books actually published in 2009 are in bold.

Books Read in 2009

• Jane Goodall: The Woman Who Redefined Man by Dale Peterson
• In the Summer Country by John Conlee
• Transit Maps of the World by Mark Ovenden
• The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin by Benjamin Franklin
• The Death and Life of Great American Cities by Jane Jacobs
• Getting Unstuck by Tim Butler
• unSpun: finding facts in a world of disinformation by Brooks Jackson
• Connecticut Baseball: The Best of the Nutmeg State by Don Harrison
• The Long Tail by Chris Anderson
• An Arsonist’s Guide to Writers’ Homes in New England by Brock Clarke
• A Mercy by Toni Morrison
• The Wordy Shipmates by Sarah Vowell
• Lincoln at Gettysburg by Gary Wills
• Facing the Lion by Joseph Lemasolai Lekuton
• Fool: A Novel by Christopher Moore
• The Day Wall Street Exploded by Beverly  Gage
• The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman
• Musicophilia : tales of music and the brain by Oliver Sacks
• Faithful Dissenters by Robert McClory
• A Portrait of Jesus by Joseph Girzone
• Consistently Opposing Killing by Rachel McNair and Stephen Zunes
• The Tent of Abraham by Rabbi Arthur Waskow, Joan Chittister, OSB, and Murshid Saadi Shakur Chisti
• Quest for the Living God by Sr. Elizabeth Johnson
• Founding Faith: Providence, Politics, and the Birth of Religious Freedom in America by Stephen Waldman
• Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books by Azar Nafisi
• Playing Hard Ball: County Cricket and Big League Baseball by E.T. Smith
• Traffic by Tom Vanderbilt
• Outcasts United by Warren St. John
• The Lodger: Shakespeare on Silver Street by Charles Nicholl
• Dark Side of the Diamond by Roger Abrams
• Ulysses by James Joyce (read on DailyLit ) (reflections: #1, #2, #3, #4, #5, #6, #7)
• The New Bloomsday book : a guide through Ulysses by Harry Blamires
• Brilliant Orange by David Winner
• Blink by Malcolm Gladwell
• A Home on the  Field by  Paul Cuadros
• The Plot Against America by Phillip Roth
• Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh
• Becoming Manny by Jean Rhodes and Shawn Boburg
• “Currency” (Book 7 of the Baroque Cycle) by Neal Stephenson
• The Enchantress of Florence by Salman  Rushdie
• “The System of the World” (Book 8 of the Baroque Cycle) by Neal Stephenson
• Invisible Hook by Peter Leeson
• Skeletons at the Feast by Chris Bohjalian
• The John Cheever Audio Collection by John Cheever
• The Cul-De-Sac Syndrome by John F. Wasik
• The Last Fish Tale by Mark Kurlansky
• Wife of the Gods by Kwei Quartey
  
• The Prophet by Khalil Gibran 
• Company of Liars by Karen Maitland
• Outposts by Simon Winchester
• Salt & Saffron by Kamilla Shamsie
• All the Shah’s Men by Stephen Kinzer
• The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz
• The Prince by Niccolò Machiavelli (read on DailyLit)
• The Fortune of War by Patrick O’Brian
• An African in Greenland by Tété -Michel Kpmoassie
• Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe
• A Distant Mirror by Barbara Tuchman
• The Stone Diaries by Carol Shields
• The dangerous joy of Dr. Sex and other true stories by Pagan Kennedy
• Free : the future of a radical price by Chris Anderson
• Rex Libris : I, librarian by James Turner
• Little Fingers by Filip Florian
• Where the Wild Things Were by William Stolzenberg
• Making of the Fittest: DNA and the Ultimate Forensic Record of Evolution by Sean Carroll
• American Nerd by Benjamin Nugent
• Early Bird by Rodney Rotham
• 722 Miles by Clifton Hood
• Faith and Fear in Flushing by Greg Prince
• Aya by Marguerite Abouet
• A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry
• Central Park in the Dark by Marie Winn
• Free Lunch: How the Wealthiest Americans Enrich Themselves at Government Expense (And Stick You with the Bill) by David Cay Johnston
• A People’s History of American Empire by Howard Zinn
• Street Gang : the Complete History of Sesame Street by  Michael Davis
• The Protest Singer by Alec Wilkinson
• How the Beatles Destroyed Rock n Roll by Elijah Wald
• The Trial of Robert Mugabe by Chielo Zona Eze
• What’s next? : dispatches on the future of science edited by Max Brockman
• Little Book by Selden Edwards
• The Art of Travel by Alain De Botton
• Snow by Orhan Pamuk
• Made to Stick by Chip Heath
• The Happiest Toddler on the Block by Harvey Karp, M.D.
• Rick Steves’ Amsterdam, Bruges, & Brussels by Rick Steves and Gene Openshaw
• The Rough Guide to Amsterdam by Phil Lee & Martin Dunford
• A Voyage Long & Strange by Tony Horwitz
• The Surgeon’s Mate by Patrick O’Brian
• The Possibilities of Sainthood by Donna Freitas
• Frommer’s 24 Great Walks in Amsterdam by Robin Gauldie
• Reason for Hope by Jane Goodall with Phillip Berman
• Time Traveler by Dr. Ronald L. Mallett
• The Autocrat at the Breakfast Table by Oliver Wendell Holmes
• Live from New York by Tom Shales and James Andrew Miller
• The God of Small Things by Arundhuti Roy
• The Ionian Mission by Patrick O’Brian
• The Mom & Pop Store by Robert Spector
• I, Claudius by Robert Graves
• The Old Iron Road by David Howard Bain
• The Alienist by Caleb Carr
• Dogside Story by Patricia Grace