89 Books in 2021

2021 was a big year for the LaFaves. We started the year in Denver with no plans to move and ended the year in our new house in Omaha, with two new jobs, celebrating the holidays with our families.

The poet Mary Oliver poses this question in her poem “The Summer Day” – “Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?” I had planned to mostly stay home and read, but life had other plans.

In the middle of all of the madness, I managed to enjoy 89 books. My favorites from the year are marked with asterisks.

I have a feeling that some of my 2022 reads will include titles like, “Goodnight Moon” and “The Very Hungry Caterpillar.” If you have suggestions of the baby board book variety, I’d love to hear them.

1. Hero of Ages (Mistborn #3) - Brandon Sanderson
2. The Most Fun We Ever Had - Claire Lombardo*
3. Outlawed - Anna North (Book of the Month)
4. Blood & Honey - Shelby Mahurin
5. In a Holidaze - Christina Lauren
6. Big Friendship - Aminatou Sow and Ann Friedman
7. A Promised Land - President Barack Obama
8. The Duke Who Didn’t - Courtney Milan
9. Blitzed (The Playbook #3) - Alexa Martin
10. Miracle Creek - Angie Kim
11. The Searcher - Tana French
12. Endings and Beginnings - Nora Roberts
13. The Lost Apothecary - Sarah Penner
14. The Five: The Untold Lives of the Women Killed by Jack the Ripper - Hallie Rubenhold
15. Guns, Germs, and Steel - Jared Diamond
16. All Girls - Emily Layden
17. Goodnight Beautiful - Aimee Molloy
18. The Hunting Wives - May Cobb (Book of the Month)
19. Act Your Age, Eve Brown (The Brown Sisters #3) - Talia Hibbert
20. We Keep the Dead Close: A Murder at Harvard and a Half Century of Silence - Becky Cooper
21. Snapped (The Playbook #4) - Alexa Martin
22. Love in Color - Bolu Babalola (Book of the Month)
23. A Court of Silver Flames (A Court of Thorns and Roses #4) - Sarah J. Maas
24. The Alice Network - Kate Quinn
25. Bring Me Back - B.A. Paris
26. Libertie - Kaitlyn Greenidge
27. The Great Believers - Rebecca Makkai
28. While Justice Sleeps - Stacey Abrams
29. Hamnet - Maggie O’Farrell
30. The Ratline: Love, Lies, and Justice on the Trail of a Nazi Fugitive - Philippe Sands
31. Billionaire Wilderness - Justin Farrell
32. Migratory Birds - Mariana Oliver*
33. The Final Revival of Opal & Nev - Dawnie Walton*
34. Firekeeper’s Daughter - Angeline Boulley*
35. Montana Sky - Nora Roberts
36. The Identicals - Elin Hilderbrand
37. Somebody’s Daughter - Ashley C. Ford
38. The Maidens - Alex Michaelides
39. Bird By Bird - Anne Lamott
40. Empire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty - Patrick Radden Keefe
41. Maeve in America: Essays by a Girl from Somewhere Else - Maeve Higgins
42. The Guncle - Steven Rowley
43. The Unlikely Spy - Daniel Silva
44. Mediocre - Ijeoma Oluo
45. The President’s Daughter - Bill Clinton and James Patterson
46. Thanks for Waiting - Doree Shafrir
47. Body Talk - Katie Sturino
48. While We Were Dating (The Wedding Date #6) - Jasmine Guillory
49. Beartown - Frederik Backman*
50. Falling - T.J. Newman
51. Broken Horses - Brandi Carlile
52. Daughters of Sparta - Claire Heywood
53. The Queen’s Gambit - Walter Tevis
54. God Spare the Girls - Kelsey McKinney
55. Good Company - Cynthia D’Aprix Sweeney
56. Seven Days in June - Tia Williams
57. The Personal Librarian - Marie Benedict and Victoria Christopher Murray
58. The Wildest Ride - Marcella Bell
59. The Huntress - Kate Quinn
60. The Paper Palace - Miranda Cowley Heller
61. The Night Circus - Erin Morgenstern
62. Sometimes I Trip on How Happy We Could Be - Nicole Perkins
63. A Slow Fire Burning - Paula Hawkins
64. Us Against You - Frederik Backman
65. The Trusted Advisor - David Maister, Charles Green and Robert Galford
66. Daughter of a Daughter of a Queen - Sarah Bird
67. The Mismatch - Sara Jafari
68. False Witness - Karin Slaughter
69. Come Fly the World: The Jet Age Story of the Women of Pan Am - Julia Cooke
70. Payback’s a Witch - Lana Harper
71. The Love Hypothesis - Ali Hazelwood
72. World Travel - Anthony Bourdain and Laurie Woolever
73. Legacy - Nora Roberts
74. Bombshell - Sarah MacLean
75. All the Young Dudes (fanfiction) - MsKingBean89, Archive of Our Own
76. Dune - Frank Herbert
77. Anxious People - Fredrik Backman
78. Verity - Colleen Hoover
79. The Duke and I (Bridgerton #1) - Julia Quinn
80. The Viscount Who Loved Me (Bridgerton #2) - Julia Quinn
81. An Offer From a Gentleman (Bridgerton #3) - Julia Quinn
82. Like a Mother: A Feminist Journey Through the Science and Culture of Pregnancy - Angela Garbes
83. Mom Jeans and Other Mistakes - Alexa Martin
84. The Idea of You - Robinne Lee
85. The Lincoln Highway - Amor Towles*
86. Winter in Paradise (Paradise #1) - Elin Hilderbrand
87. What Happens in Paradise (Paradise #2) - Elin Hilderbrand
88. Troubles in Paradise (Paradise #3) - Elin Hilderbrand
89. Expecting Better - Emily Oster