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I enjoy the fact that my annual “top ten books of the year” lists are like a sort of historical document—a record and a road map of my own bookish history and the development of my tastes. It’s fun to look back and see when a particular author entered my life (or marvel at how long it’s been!), what genre I was reading an awful lot of that year, and whether my top-ten lists had an inadvertent “theme” or were wonderfully eclectic.
With the earliest lists, though, once a certain amount of years have passed, it’s interesting and sometimes a little astonishing to look back and see how different my choices would be if I was picking from that year’s reading today. Not so much that the books on the list have sunk in my estimation; but—rather, after years have passed in which I’ve re-read and gotten better acquainted with other books that didn’t originally make the cut, and had them grow into beloved favorites, it astounds me that I didn’t always value them so highly!
So here’s a little “alternate history” take on what my first nine years of lists might have looked like if I’d been choosing with the hindsight I have today:
2011
Ironically, I would really change nothing from the first year I made a top-ten list. The books I picked still look to me like the best ones from what I read that year. Several of them either introduced me to a favorite author (The Magnficent Ambersons) or subject (Land of the Burnt Thigh started me on a wonderful journey through memoirs of the Old West), have remained fond favorites (Mrs. Miniver), even risen in my estimation through the years (Laddie), or rank as classics of their genre in my opinion (Green For Danger and Uncle Abner, Master of Mysteries). Beginner’s luck?
2012
On the other hand. A visit to my 2012 list with a time machine would result in complete renovation. A few of the picks would stay: Haywire, The Street of Seven Stars, and Poor, Dear Margaret Kirby and Other Stories. But almost the whole rest of the list would have to take a seat in favor of others. Fool’s Goal by B.M. Bower would probably edge her Five Furies of Leaning Ladder off the list. The Turmoil by Booth Tarkington,Mother Carey’s Chickens by Kate Douglas Wiggin, and Something Fresh by P.G. Wodehouse would absolutely have to be on there. There would be several contenders for the three remaining spots, but in hindsight, the picks would probably be A Bride Goes West by Nannie Tiffany Alderson, Wyoming Summer by Mary O’Hara, and then Wodehouse’s The Man With Two Left Feet and Other Stories wrestling it out with Mary Roberts Rinehart’s Love Stories for the final spot.
2013
This was a very good year. A lot of excellent books that remain favorites to this day. But The Moonspinners by Mary Stewart absolutely should have been on there, and The Magic City by E. Nesbit (probably just edging Miss Buncle’s Book and Firmament: Radialloy, though both good books themselves!). And Stewart’s Airs Above the Ground might give Day of Infamy a bit of a contest.
2014
Again, a good year. But again, This Rough Magic by Mary Stewart would be on there if I was choosing today, and Frederica by Georgette Heyer (probably edging off Five Came Back and Rabble in Arms).
2015
This year is a tough one because there are three or four other books that I would include on it today, but only one or two that I would want to drop. A Tangled Web would give way, probably replaced by Summer Half by Angela Thirkell or Old Christmas by Washington Irving. The Warden by Anthony Trollope feels like it ought to be on there because my introduction to Barchester was a red-letter day; but Trollope and Barchester would make my lists multiple times in succeeding years, after all. The Prisoner of Zenda also looks like an outside shot in hindsight, probably pushing the (still interesting) Lonely Vigil off the list…but then it would still have to grapple with the runner-up of Thirkell or Irving.
2016
2016 is officially the What Was I Thinking year…but then also the What Else Could I Have Done year. It is absolutely mind-boggling to me that The Franchise Affair by Josephine Tey did not make my top-ten list. Nor The Unknown Ajax by Georgette Heyer. In hindsight, Trollope’s Barchester Towers should perhaps have gone on instead of his Doctor Thorne…but they’re both so good! Moccasin Trail by Eloise Jarvis McGraw and The Wheel Spins by Ethel Lina White both deserved a spot…but what on earth would I have taken off? If I absolutely had to, I would probably go with The Santa Claus Man, The American Home Front 1941-1942, and The Diary of a Provincial Lady…yet the first two were fascinating and the latter still a charming favorite.
2017
Again, any changes here would have been tight (and this in a year when I snuck in an honorable-mention eleventh title). The Nerve of Foley and Other Stories by Frank H. Spearman and Rumbin Galleries by Booth Tarkington should have had a look-in, but I honestly don’t know what they would displace.
2018
I pretty much agree with 2018-me on these choices. The Wreck of the Mary Deare by Hammond Innes and Up On the Rim by Dale Eunson could possibly offer some contention, but I don’t really know whether they would end up ousting The City Beyond the Glass and A Short History of Germany (probably because I haven’t re-read the latter two to compare).
2019
I would unhesitatingly drop Newsletter Ninja (I have never become a newsletter ninja) in favor of Death Mask by Ellis Peters. And there’s a slight possibility that The Comings of Cousin Ann by Emma Speed Sampson might displace Children of the Desolate by Suzannah Rowntree, which I think says more about my shifting tastes than the books themselves.
From 2020 onward, I look at my top-ten lists and tend to agree with them. I don’t know if that’s because I’ve gotten better at picking ’em, or (much more likely) it’s simply that same matter of perspective: not enough time has gone by yet for me to know which books will have staying power and which were chosen more on the whim of the moment. Five years from now? Who knows how they’ll look to me then.
So…do you have any “hindsight” favorite books? Books that didn’t exactly set the pond on fire when you first read them, but with re-readings and the passage of time, you developed an appreciation for them that made you wonder why in the world you didn’t realize they were so good before? Tell me about them!
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The older I get the less inclined I've come to rate books in the moment, just because there have been a few that I didn't particularly love fully when I first read them but then I find myself still thinking and mulling them over years down the line. This feels especially true of a lot of my assigned readings from college. Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri would be one of these. I originally rated that collection of short stories three stars on Goodreads but six years later, I still regularly think about the stories in that collection and have gone on to actively seek out the rest of her short stories.
I've always loved your yearly book and movie lists. Found many a new favorite that way. :)
I get this mostly with books I loved as teenager. Some are still good, while others are such utter rubbish!
And for books of a philosophical nature, I sometimes disagree violently with comments that a younger me wrote in the margins.