A 15-year Compendium of What We've Read
After 15 years of coming together in each other's homes or at Open Book to choose, recommend, digest, and discuss books, we thought it best to list our achievement so we could all sit back and admire it. Our Chief Research Fellow Margy Ligon accepted the task of poring through the annals and created this list. Being an over-achiever, she also added the publication year and, where relevant, major prizes won.
2023
January: Cloud Cuckoo Land by Anthony Doerr (2021)
February: Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler (1993)
March, April, May: War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy (1869)
June: Small Things Like These (2021) and Foster (2010) both by Claire Keegan
July: Leonard and Hungry Paul by Ronan Hession (2020)
September: The Covenant of Water by Abraham Verghese (2023)
October: The English Experience by Julie Schumacher (2023). Julie attended the session.
November: All is Forgotten, Nothing Is Lost by Lan Samantha Chang (2010)
2022
January: The Book of Form and Emptiness by Ruth Ozeki (2021) Women’s Prize
February: The Sentence by Louise Erdrich (2021)
March: Bewilderment by Richard Powers (2021)
April: The All of It by Jeannette Haien (1986, republished 2011)
May: The Seed Keeper by Diane Wilson (Milkweed, 2021) Minnesota Book Award
June: The Party Upstairs by Lee Conell (2020)
July: 2AM in Little America by Ken Kalfus (Milkweed, 2022)
Aug & Sept: The Great Circle by Maggie Shipstead (2021)
October: So Big by Edna Ferber (1925) Pulitzer Prize
November: Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury (1951)
2021
March: The Sun Collective by Charles Baxter (2020)
April: Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead by Olga Takarczak (2009) translated from Polish in 2019 after she won the 2018 Nobel Prize in Literature)
May: Fresh Water for Flowers by Valerie Perrin (2018, translated from French 2020)
July: After Francesco by Brian Malloy (2021) Brian led the discussion.
August: Turbulence by David Szalay (2018)
September: Sharks in the Time of Saviors by Kawai Strong (2020) MN Book Award
November: Matrix by Lauren Groff (2021) National Book Award
2020
April: Weather by Jenny Offill (2020) COVID! Started meeting via Zoom
May: The Night Watchman by Louise Erdrich (2020) Pulitzer Prize
June: Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez (trans from Spanish 1988)
July: The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett (2020)
August: Writers and Lovers by Lily King (2020)
Sept: The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros (1984) American Book Award
2019
April: The Birchbark House by Louise Erdrich (1999)
May: Virgil Wander by Leif Enger (2018)
June: My Own Devices: True Stories from the Road on Music, Science, and Senseless Love by Dessa (2018)
July: Circe by Madeline Miller (2018) NEA Big Read
October: Ruby and Roland by Faith Sullivan (2019) attended the book launch at Open Book and Faith led our discussion
November: Gratitude by Oliver Sacks (2015)
2018
January: The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen (2015) Pulitzer Prize
February: The Ninth Hour by Alice McDermott (2017)
March: The Wife by Meg Wolitzer (2003)
April/May: Less by Andrew Sean Greer (2017) Pulitzer Prize
June: Warlight by Michael Ondaatje (2018)
August: The Overstory by Richard Powers (2018) Pulitzer Prize
Oct.: Winnie the Pooh by A.A. Milne (1926), The Tao of Pooh by Benjamin Hoff (1982)
November: Little Women by Louisa May Alcott (1868) 150th anniversary
2017 (dates are approximate)
January: The Golem and the Jinni by Helene Wacker (2013)
March: A Man Called Ove by Fredrik Backman (translated from Swedish 2013)
February: The Signature of All Things by Elizabeth Gilbert (2013)
April: Wintering by Peter Geye (2016) Minnesota Book Award
May: Anything is Possible by Elizabeth Strout (2017) The Story Prize
August: The Tortilla Curtain by T.C. Boyle (1995)
September: Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders (2017) Man Booker Prize
2016
February: The Heart Goes Last by Margaret Atwood (2015)
March: The Year of the Runaways by Sunjeev Sahota (2015)
April: Fates and Furies by Lauren Groff (2015) National Book Award, NBCC Award
May: Vinegar Girl: The Taming of the Shrew Retold by Anne Tyler (2016)
June: We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves by Karen Joy Fowler (2013)
September: When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi (2016)
October: Commonwealth by Ann Patchett (2016)
November: The Underground Rail Road by Colson Whitehead (2016) National Book Award, Pulitzer Prize, Andrew Carnegie Medal, etc. etc. etc.
2015
January: Let Me Be Frank With You by Richard Ford (2014)
February: A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki (2013)
March: The Waves by Virginia Woolf (1931)
April: Vanessa and Her Sister by Priya Parmar (2015)
May: Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (2014) NBCC Award
June: Dead Wake: The Last Crossing of the Lusitania by Erik Larson (2015)
July: Old Filth by Jane Gardam (2006)
August: H is for Hawk by Helen MacDonald (2014) attended her talk at Open Book
September: On the Move: A Life by Oliver Sacks (2015)
October: To Kill a Mockingbird (1960) OR Go Set a Watchman (2015) by Harper Lee, OR The Mockingbird Nextdoor: Life with Harper Lee by Marja Mills (2014)
November: Good Night, Mr Wodehouse by Faith Sullivan (2015) Faith Sullivan led the discussion.
2014
January: Flight Behavior by Barbara Kingsolver (2012)
February: Dear Life: Short Stories by Alice Munro (2012) Read when Munro won the 2013 Nobel Prize in Literature
March: The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt (2013) Pulitzer Prize
April: Great Expectations by Charles Dickens (1861)
May: Lovers at the Chameleon Club, Paris 1932 by Francine Prose (2014)
June: Dancing Fish and Ammonites by Penelope Lively (2014)
July & Aug: Middlemarch by George Eliot (1871-2)
September: My Life in Middlemarch by Rebecca Mead (2014)
October: Shadow Tag by Louise Erdrich (2011)
November: Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End by Atul Gawande (2014)
2013
January: The Passage of Power: The Years of Lyndon Johnson by Robert Caro (2012) National Book Critics Circle Award (NCCB)
February: Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel (2009) Man Booker Prize and NCCB Award
March: The Yellow Birds by Kevin Powers (2012)
April: A Week in Winter by Maeve Binchy (2012)
May: Woke Up Lonely by Fiona Maazel (Graywolf, 2013)
June: Odessa: Poems by Patricia Kirkpatrick (Milkweed, 2012) Minnesota Book Award, Patricia led our discussion.
July: Transatlantic by Colum McCann (2013) attended his talk at MPL
August: Jewelweed by David Rhodes (Milkweed, 2013)
September: In Times of Fading Light by Eugen Ruge (Graywolf, 2013)
October: On Sal Mal Lane by Ru Freeman (Graywolf, 2013) with Ru via Skype
November: Tumbledown by Robert Boswell (Graywolf, 2013)
2012
January: State of Wonder by Ann Patchett (2011)
February: Death Comes to Pemberly by P.D. James (2011)
March: How It All Began by Penelope Lively (2011)
April: The Snow Child by Eowyn Ivey (2012)
May: A Backward Glance by Edith Wharton (1934)
June: Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman by Robert Massie (2011)
July: A Moveable Feast by Ernest Hemingway (1964)
August: The Paris Wife by Paula McLain (2011)
September: The Housekeeper and the Professor by Yoko Ogawa (2003)
October: Canada by Richard Ford (2012) Andrew Carnegie Medal
November: The Round House by Louise Erdrich (2012) National Book Award
2011
What We Read, our book blog, goes live in July.
February: The End by Salvatore Scibona (2011)
March: Moon Tiger by Penelope Lively (1987) Man Booker Prize
April: Invisible Strings: Poems by Jim Moore (Graywolf, 2011) Jim led the discussion.
July: Let the Great World Spin by Colum McCann (2009) National Book Award and Dublin Award
August: The Hare with the Amber Eyes by Edmund de Waal (2010)
September: The Anthologist by Nicholson Baker (2009)
October: In Caddis Wood by Mary Rockcastle (Graywolf, 2011) Mary was to lead our discussion but had to cancel.
November: The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes (2011) Man Booker Prize
So, What Can We Learn From This List?
+ Apparently, we can't get enough of Louise Erdrich.
+ We like to invite the authors of our books when we can. We should do it more often.
+ There are many more books on this list than there are blog posts as there was a period of time during which the blog was sleeping.
+ Fiction is our thing. The occasional non-fiction title sneaks in but is not made to feel very welcome. Poetry would love to be included but is rarely invited to the party.
+ Occasionally, we like to read a classic. As long as it's not War and Peace.
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