My blog might be 20 or so reviews behind my Facebook page but I thought I at least report on what were my favourite ten books for 2016 (with an eleventh just for luck and because it’s brilliant).

But before I list my favourites for the year here are some stats.  Overall I read 117 novels (and a smattering of novellas).  Of those 65 were by men and 52 were by women.  In regard to the genre literary divide that plagues us ALL!!!! I read 82 books that lean to the genre side of the ledger while 37 of the novels were more literary.

And so here is my top 10 (or 11):

  1. Lovecraft Country by Matt Ruff (2016)
  2. The Thing Itself by Adam Roberts (2015)
  3. The Shore by Sara Taylor (2015)
  4. The Sellout by Paul Beatty (2015)
  5. Martin John by Anakana Schofield (2016)
  6. The Ballad of Black Tom by Victor Lavalle (2016)
  7. Solar Bones by Mike McCormack (2016)
  8. The Tsar of Love and Techno by Anthony Marra (2015)
  9. Eileen by Ottessa Moshfegh (2015)
  10. The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead (2016)

And number 11..

The Vegetarian by Han Kang (2015 – though first published in South Korea in 2007).

So that was 2016 for me.  Obviously I highly recommend the books above.  Though I could easily have recommended another 30 or more books.  2016, for all the talk of annus horribilis I read some really fine fiction.  Hoping 2017 produced something similar.