Books I read in 2017, ranked from best to worst

Last year I posted Books I read in 2016, ranked from best to worst, so here’s my list for this year.

I realized that more than half of the books I read in 2016 were written by white men, and thus all the recommendations I got from Goodreads were for books also written by white men. My goal for this year was to read at least 26 books written by People of Colour or trans/non-binary people, and I believe I have exceeded that goal (though there are still a few books on the list below written by cis white people).

Book count:

Screen Shot 2017-12-30 at 2.48.54 PM

Page count:

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As with last year’s post, I’ve broken down the list into different categories based on how I enjoyed the stories:

  • Numbers 1 – 10 are joining my list of favourites
  • Numbers 11 – 18 were very good, and I would happily read them again
  • Numbers 19 – 31 were good, but not my taste. I would not choose to read them again, though I may recommend them to someone else.
  • Numbers 32 – 38 were not so good, would avoid re-reading and would only recommend to others in very specific circumstances
  • Numbers 39 – 40 were terrible and I would not recommend to anyone

Best Reads of 2017

  1. The Drowning Girl by Caitlín R. Kiernan
  2. The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas
  3. Every Heart a Doorway (Wayward Children, #1) by Seanan McGuire
  4. Small Beauty by Jai Qing Wilson-Yang
  5. The Summer We Got Free by Mia McKenzie
  6. Bow Grip by Ivan Coyote
  7. Version Control by Dexter Palmer
  8. The Lamb Will Slaughter the Lion by Margaret Killjoy
  9. Rise: A Newsflesh Collection by Mira Grant
  10. After Dark by Haruki Murakami
  11. Midnight Robber by Nalo Hopkinson
  12. The Mothers by Brit Bennett
  13. Birdie by Tracey Lindberg
  14. A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki
  15. A Safe Girl to Love by Casey Plett
  16. Let the Right One In by John Ajvide Lindqvist
  17. Feed (Newsflesh Trilogy, #1) by Mira Grant
  18. Shadows Cast By Stars by Catherine Knutsson
  19. Allegedly by Tiffany D. Jackson
  20. Hadriana in All My Dreams by René Depestre
  21. American Street by Ibi Zoboi
  22. Blackout (Newsflesh Trilogy, #3) by Mira Grant
  23. He Mele A Hilo by Ryka Aoki
  24. Holding Still For As Long As Possible by Zoe Whittall
  25. Blood Oranges by Kathleen Tierney
  26. The Shadow Speaker by Nnedi Okorafor
  27. The Dream of Perpetual Motion by Dexter Palmer
  28. A Wish After Midnight by Zetta Elliott
  29. Behold the Dreamers by Imbolo Mbue
  30. If I Was Your Girl by Meredith Russo
  31. Killer of Enemies (Killer of Enemies, #1) by Joseph Bruchac
  32. Deadline (Newsflesh Trilogy, #2) by Mira Grant
  33. One Day We’ll All Be Dead and None of This Will Matter by Scaachi Koul
  34. The Illegal by Lawrence Hill
  35. Discount Armageddon (InCryptid, #1) by Seanan McGuire
  36. Annabelle by Kathleen Winter
  37. Fellside by M.R. Carey
  38. The First Bad Man by Miranda July
  39. Faust Among Equals by Tom Holt
  40. Adam by Ariel Schrag

Got any recommendations for my 2018 list? Leave a comment!

5 responses to “Books I read in 2017, ranked from best to worst”

  1. I have a few different recommendations for you. I tried to tailor them to your tastes as much as possible. It’s really helpful that you mentioned which books you did and didn’t like in your list above!

    “The Snow Child” by Eowyn Ivey. While the only thing these two plots have in common are mysterious little girls who show up out of nowhere, the writing style in general reminded me of “Let the Right One In.”

    While I haven’t read it yet, I’ve heard nothing but good things about “When Dimple Met Rishi” by Sandhya Menon. It’s something I’m planning to read in 2018.

    I loved “The Crossover” by Kwame Alexander. It’s written in the form of free-verse poetry by a 12-year-old African-American protagonist who has to balance his love of basketball with his growing fear that something is seriously wrong with his father’s health.

    I noticed you have some Canadian books on your list, too. If you’re into nonfiction and art, I can’t recommend “The Many Deaths of Tom Thomson” by Gregory Klages highly enough. This one was a bit of a stretch, but I thought I’d mention it in case you were looking to branch out.

    Happy reading!

    1. Thanks so much! I will be sure to check out all 4 titles. I tend to prefer fiction, but I’m willing to try different genres of nonfiction because maybe I just haven’t found the right one yet. I used to think that I didn’t like sci-fi and horror, but as you can see from my list, that’s certainly not the case!

  2. […] Books I read in 2017, ranked from best to worst […]

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