Best Books of the Half (January-June)

I haven't seen any best books of the quarter threads yet, but I thought I'd start one for best books of the half. What are the best books you read in the first half of the year?

Mine are:
The Snow Child
Marcelo in the Real World
You Are an Ironman
Fire
Some Girls

I also made a List if anyone wants to post there as well.

It's been a good reading year so far, Zoe. I have quite a few I can't decide between. How many is it OK to list?

I'll leave it up to your discretion--whatever you think is reasonable. I had a pretty slow start to the year, so even though I only listed 5 books, that's actually 20-25% of my reading.

Here are my top five for this year, so far.

The Hobbit, by J. R. R. Tolkien
The Snow Child, by Eowyn Ivey
The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka
Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, by John le Carre
Code Name Verity, by Elizabeth Wein

This is adapted and condensed from a much longer list I posted over in Club Read, but it's still more than five.

Fiction: The Best of the Best
Binocular Vision: New and Selected Stories by Edith Pearlman-- Many stunning, insightful, and humane stories
GB84 by David Peace - A complex, scathing, violent, and absorbing look at the British miners strike
The Corner That Held Them by Sylvia Townsend Warner - A 14th century British nunnery, with wonderful characters, a vivid setting, and sly, biting wit
The Kingdom of This World by Alejo Carpentier -- Vivid, compelling, entrancing look at the Haitian revolution and its aftermath
An Ermine in Czernopol by Gregor von Rezzori -- Witty, sometimes funny, beautifully characterized, and deeply insightful novel, both psychologically and sociologically, about a lost world
The Inspector Montalbano mysteries by Andrea Camilleri -- Wonderful characters, a wry sense of humor, luscious food, and a detective who tries to do the right thing.
Reread of The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov

Nonfiction: The Best
Cleopatra by Stacy Schiff - A well researched and very readable look at a compelling and accomplished woman and her times
To the Finland Station by Edmund Wilson -- Intellectual history and biography, literary criticism and economics combine in a broad and detailed study of ideas leading up to the Russian Revolution, as interesting for its flaws as for its successes
Armies of Heaven: The First Crusade and the Quest for Apocalypse by Jay Rubenstein - A fascinating chronicle of a period and series of events that were unfamiliar to me and yet have echoes today.
The Mansion of Happiness: A History of Life and Death by Jill Lepore --One of my favorite writers, with fascinating insights and history.

My top 5:

The Belly of Paris, Emile Zola
A Journal of the Plague Year, Daniel Defoe
Selected Journals, Henry David Thoreau
Cosmology, Edward Harrison
Mort, Terry Pratchett

OK, here's my list:

Favorite Fiction:
Iron House by John Hart
The Fitzgerald Ruse by Mark deCastrique
He Who Fears the Wolf by Karin Fossum
Blood Hollow by William Kent Kreuger
Gone, Baby, Gone by Dennis Lehane

Noteworthy YA
Dead to You Lisa McMann (YA)

Best Non-Fiction:
Under a Flaming Sky
The Civil War: A Narrative, Volume 2 by Shelby Foote (Non-fiction)
The Johnstown Flood by David McCullough

Notewworthy Audio Rendition:
Doc by Mary Doria Russell, narrated by Mark Bramhall
(I listened to some of the other books listed on audio, but on this one I believe the quality of the narration actually added to the enjoyment of the story.)

I love these lists. Here's mine (slightly shortened from my thread, but still pretty long):

Best Fiction of the Year (So Far):
Salvage the Bones
Running the Rift
The Sisters Brothers
The Sense of an Ending
The Hummingbird's Daughter
The Kitchen House
The Homecoming of Samuel Lake
The Orphan Master's Son
Q Road
A Widow for One Year

Best Non-fiction of the Year (So Far):
Drive: The Surprising Truth about what Motivates Us
lots of candles, plenty of cake
Behind the Dream: The Making of the Speech that That Transformed a Nation
Behind the Beautiful Forevers
The Sound of a Wild Snail Eating

Best YA of the Year (So Far):
Wonderstruck
War Horse
Here Lies Linc
Looking for Alaska

I had posted mine over on my thread earlier this month, but am happy to repurpose it!

Fiction:

1. Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller
2. Sea of Poppies by Amitav Ghosh
3. The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern
4. Gillespie and I by Jane Harris
5. Bring Up the Bodies by Hilary Mantel
6. Moth Smoke by Mohsin Hamid
7. The Radetzky March by Joseph Roth
8. In the Shadow of the Banyan by Vaddey Ratner
9. Pure by Andrew Miller
10. The Last Waltz by Anne Enright

Mystery/Suspense/Thriller:

1. Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn
2. Before the Poison by Peter Robinson
3. 1222 by Anne Holt
4. House of Silk by Anthony Horowitz
5. The Lantern by Deborah Lawrenson

Non-Fiction

1. Behind the Beautiful Forevers by Katherine Boo
2. Catherine the Great by Robert Massie
3. Hood Rat by Gavin Knight
4. Winter King by Thomas Penn
5. People Who Eat Darkness by Richard Lloyd Perry
6. The Man Within My Head by Pico Iyer
7. Darkmarket by Misha Glenny
8. White Gold by Giles Milton
9. The Man Without a Face by Masha Gessen
10. Maphead by Ken Jennings

I've had a pretty good reading year so far, but some that definitely stick out are:

Fiction
Charles Jessold, Considered as a Murderer by Wesley Stace
PYG by Russell Potter
Bring up the Bodies by Hilary Mantel

Non-Fiction
Books as History by David Pearson
The Passage of Power by Robert Caro
Chasing Venus by Andrea Wulf

In no order:

Book of Enchantments by Patricia C. Wrede
Among Others by Jo Walton
Gnomes by Wil Huygen
Behemoth by Scott Westerfeld
We Need to Talk About Kevin by Lionel Shriver

So it turns out that there's only one nonfiction book in my list of 5- and 4.5-stars so far this year. That's weird. anyway, here's the list

Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern
Map of Time by Felix J. Palma
Dandelion WIne by Ray Bradbury

11/22/63 by Stephen King
The Woman in Black by Susan Hill
Blockade Billy by Stephen King
The Master of Heathcrest Hall by Galen Beckett
Ganymede by Cherie Priest
Johannes Cabal the Detective by Jonathan L. Howard
Beyond the Blue Horizon by Brian Fagan

Here are my best reads of 2012 so far, in no particular order:

March by Geraldine Brooks
The Light Between Oceans by M. L. Stedman
Imagined Lives by John Banville, Tracy Chevaliler, Julian Fellowes, Alexander McCall Smith, Terry Pratchett, Sarah Singleton, Joanna Trollope, and Minette Walters
Painter of Silence by Georgina Harding
The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes
Bring Up the Bodies by Hilary Mantel
Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel
Five Bells by Gail Jones
My Life in Pieces by Simon Callow
The Last Chronicle of Barset by Anthony Trollope
Sister Queens: The Tragic, Noble Lives of Katherine of Aragon and Juana of Castile by Julia Fox

Just the books I enjoyed the most, rather than the greatest books written of those I've read:

Captain Vorpatril's Alliance - Lois McMaster Bujold
Solitary House - Lynn Shepherd
The Alienist - Caleb Carr
Blackbirds - Chuck Wendig
The Crossing Places - Elly Griffiths

Nearly all of what I read was good (I wouldn't waste my time if I didn't have some idea a book would have some value), but here are the real stand-outs from the past six months:

Los Angeles Stories - Ry Cooder
Laika - Nick Abadzis
The Salt Roads - Nalo Hopkinson
King City - Brandon Graham
Friends with Boys - Faith Erin Hicks
Emma - Jane Austen
In The Forest Of Forgetting - Theodora Goss
Violence Girl - Alice Bag

So I looked at my "read 2012" tag and here are books I gave 5 stars and 4.5 stars:

New Reads:
Bitterblue by Kristin Cashore
The Fault in Our Stars by John Green
Packing for Mars by Mary Roach
Two Whole Cakes: How to stop dieting and learn to love your body by Lesley Kinzel
Cinder by Marissa Meyer
Redshirts by John Scalzi

Rereads:
Beauty by Robin McKinley
Sunshine by Robin McKinley
Griffin & Sabine trilogy by Nick Bantock
Graceling by Kristin Cashore
Bloodhound by Tamora Pierce
Fire by Kristin Cashore

There were some really good books that I gave 4 stars, also, like Lifelode by Jo Walton and His Majesty's Dragon by Naomi Novik.

I am a bit disappointed in the amount I've read so far, but it's been a motivational 6 months! My favourites are:

4. The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern
8. One Foot in Eden by Ron Rash
9. Sea Heartsby Margo Lanagan
10.A Lovesong for India by Ruth Prawer Jhabvala
14. Dead Point by Peter Temple
15. The Yacoubian Building by Alaa Al Aswany
16.The Tenderness of Wolves by Steph Penney
17. Remarkable Creatures by Tracy Chevalier
18. Norwegian Wood by Haruki Murakami
19.The Cove by Ron Rash

Hi! I review so there are quite a few this year but...

1. Devil's Lair by David Wiseheart
2. Bird of Prey by Griffin Hayes
3. Broods of Fenrir by Coral Moore
4. Bedtime Stories for Cats by Amy Neftzger
5. Tempest by Hollyanne Hook
6. Creepers by Bryan Dunn
7. Fire Elements of the UnDead by William Esmont
8. Blind Traveler's Blues by
9. Force of Habit by Cahs Peters
10. Promise Me Eternity by
11. From the Ashes by Jeremy Burns
12. Neurotically Yours by Trachtenberg
13. Ice Gorilla by Mike Esola
14. On Little Wings by Regina Sirois
15. Bacterium by Nathan Pennington
16. Diary of a Mad Fat Girl by Jessica Butler
17. Pirates of Aden by Daniel Rasic
18. Quaker State Affair by Dan Romain
19. The Reconstructionist by Nick Adams

That's through February. Which is enough typing for now.

I was going to cull, but I copied my whole list, and now I can't get rid of anything, so here they are again! * = Best of the Best

Fall on Your Knees*
The Broom of the System*
A Splendor of Letters
1Q84
Arcadia
Purgatory
The Siege
We Need to Talk about Kevin*
Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy
Up the Country*
Lord of Misrule*
Loitering with Intent
The Bone People*
Bring Up the Bodies*
Means of Ascent*
Doc*

5 star ratings, Jan-Jun.

025 A Viking Voyage. Hodding Carter NF (320) - Reviewed ★★★★★
042 German Autumn. Stig Dagerman NF (128) - Reviewed ★★★★★
046 The Last Stand of Chinese Conservatism; the Tʻung-chih restoration, 1862-1874. Mary Wright NF (426) - Reviewed ★★★★★
049 A Man on the Moon. Andrew Chaikin NF (720) - Reviewed ★★★★★
052 Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters & Seymour an Introduction. J.D. Salinger (256) - Reviewed ★★★★★
061 A Journey in Ladakh. Andrew Harvey NF (236) - Reviewed ★★★★★
070 The Smile of the Murugan: A South Indian Journey. Michael Wood NF (247) - Reviewed ★★★★★
091 Ancestral Passions: The Leakey Family and the Quest for Humankind's Beginnings. Virginia Morell NF (638) - Reviewed ★★★★★

My favorites for the first half (counting only new reads, though I've reread some 5-star favorites, too):

The Fault in Our Stars
Breaking Stalin's Nose
The Night Circus
Chime
Bitterblue
Shades of Milk and Honey
All Men of Genius
Listening for Lions
Wonder
Code Name Verity

There are others that got 4.5 stars, but of those, I only picked the most memorable ones.

Great lists ~ a lot here I haven't yet read. My own favorites of the first half of 2012:

Best Fiction (Adult):
The Last Werewolf by Glen Duncan (audio)
The Drop by Michael Connelly
The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern (audio)
The Last Policeman by Ben Winters (ER book)

Best Fiction (YA):
A Drowned Maiden's Hair by Laura Amy Schlitz
Mockingbird by Kathryn Erskine
The Scorpio Races by Maggie Stiefvater (audio)
Fire by Kristin Cashore

Best Nonfiction:
Packing for Mars by Mary Roach (audio)
The Glass Castle by Janette Walls (audio)

Best Rereads:
Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke
Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman (audio, again)

Best Series:
Dr. Siri Mysteries, beginning with The Coroner's Lunch by Colin Cotterill

I call that a stellar first half of the year reading list!

I've read 93 books by this point, but this is Jan - June. Read 74 in that time period.

On my own thread I did a "best of month" run down. I'll post that here.
Books of merit first six months:
Best of January: Litigators - John Grisham - 01/04/2012-01/06/2012 - 4.50 (Legal, fiction)
Best of February: Homer's Odyssey - Gwen Cooper - 02/20/2012-02/21/2012 - 4.65 (Nonfiction, cats) *
Best of March: Fair Game - Patricia Briggs - 03/26/2012-03/27/2012 - 4.80 (fantasy, fiction)
Best of April: Echoes of Betrayal - Elizabeth Moon - 04/17/2012-04/18/2012 - 4.98 (fantasy, fiction)
Honorable Mention: Racing in the Rain - Garth Stein - 04/9/2012 - 4.93 (young adult, fiction) *
Best of May: Atlantic Fever - Joe Jackson - 4.50 (nonfiction, aviation history) *
Best of June: Catwoman Volume 1: The Game - Judd Winick, Guillem March, Tomeu Morey - 5.00 (comic book collection, fiction) *
Honorable Mention: The Scorpio Races - Maggie Stiefvater - 06/25/2012-06/26/2012 - 4.68 (fantasy, young adult) *
* - First read by that author

So, best overall would be:
1. Catwoman Volume 1: The Game by Judd Winick, Guillem March, Tomeu Morey with a rating of 5.00
2. Echoes of Betrayal by Elizabeth Moon with a rating of 4.98.
3. Racing in the Rain by Garth Stein with a rating of 4.93
4. Fair Game by Patricia Briggs with a rating of 4.80

Whoops - just found this thread! Here are my favorite first-time reads in the first half of the year:

Fiction
Defending Jacob by William Landay

Nonfiction
Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand
Seabiscuit by Laura Hillenbrand

Children's/YA
The Wednesday Wars by Gary D. Schmidt (the audio was fabulous!)
Wonder by R.J. Palacio
Hexwood by Diana Wynne Jones

I'm a little surprised there's only one fiction title on this list, though I have been reading more nonfiction this year than in past years.

I had quite a few 4 1/2 star reads in the first half of the year, but only four that I gave 5 stars:

The Lost: A Search for Six of Six Million – Daniel Mendelsohn
Things Fall Apart – Chinua Achebe
A Tale of Two Cities – Charles Dickens
Miss Julia Strikes Back – Ann B. Ross (It's not the same class of literature as the others, but it was my most fun read of the first half of the year!)

I always find it hard to choose my favorite reads of the month but here they are:

January's Pick
Out of the 10 books that I read, I enjoyed Winter Harvest by Norah Lofts the most.

February's Pick
Out of the 9 books that I read, I think that I enjoyed Now You Know by Kitty Dukakis and Jane Scovell the most.

March's Pick
Out of the 7 books that I read, I enjoyed Crescent City by Belva Plain the most.

April's Pick
Out of the 9 books that I read, I enjoyed Outer Banks by Anne Rivers Siddons the most.

May's Pick
Out of the 9 books that I read, I enjoyed The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows the most.

June's Pick
Out of the 9 books that I read, I enjoyed The Book Club by Mary Alice Monroe the most.

July's Pick
Out of the 9 books that I read, I enjoyed Summer of the Red Wolf by Morris L. West the most.

My favourites of January - June are:

The Little White Horse by Elizabeth Goudge
The Wolves of Willoughby Chase by Joan Aiken
Alias Grace by Margaret Atwood
Room by Emma Donoghue
Catharine and Other Writings by Jane Austen
Gillespie and I by Jane Harris
A View of the Harbour by Elizabeth Taylor
Troubles by J. G. Farrell
The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller
The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins
Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel
Bring Up the Bodies by Hilary Mantel

It seems I haven't read any non-fiction which I rated more than 4 stars so far.

My favorite first half books by genre, all rated 4-1/2 stars or higher, in the order that I read them:

Novels:
Mister Blue by Jacques Poulin
1Q84 by Haruki Murakami
Gillespie and I by Jane Harris
The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller
Map of the Invisible World by Tash Aw
Painter of Silence by Georgina Harding
Scenes from Early Life by Philip Hensher

Short Stories:
The Deportees: and Other Stories by Roddy Doyle

Nonfiction:
The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America's Great Migration by Isabel Wilkerson
Fragile Beginnings: Discoveries and Triumphs in the Newborn ICU by Adam Wolfberg, MD
Panther Baby by Jamal Joseph
Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention by Manning Marable
The Patient Survival Guide: 8 Simple Solutions to Prevent Hospital- and Healthcare-Associated Infections by Maryanne McGuckin, PhD

Poetry:
One with Others by C.D. Wright
Natural Birth by Toi Derricotte
The Undertaker's Daughter by Toi Derricotte

ETA: I didn't read Bring Up the Bodies until July, but it would easily make this list had I read it in June.

28> Darryl, I didn't realize that you recently read The Deportees and Other Stories. It was at the top of my "Best" list for 2008. Doyle doed a brilliant job of examining the changing demographics of Ireland.

I only gave one 5 star rating in January through June. (I did give one in July, but we'll save that for the second half of the year.) The rest of these are 4.5 stars.

Fiction
1. A Most Contagious Game by Catherine Aird (5 stars)
2. Dissolution by C. J. Sansom
3. And Justice There Is None by Deborah Crombie
4. Blind Justice by Bruce Alexander
5. Cannery Row by John Steinbeck
6. Number the Stars by Lois Lowry (YA)

Non-Fiction
1. By Faith Alone by Bill Griffeth
2. The Last Days of the Jerusalem of Lithuania by Herman Kruk
3. Sustaining the Cherokee Family by Rose Stremlau

My 4.5 and 5 star books for Jan-June are as follows:

Fiction
The summer book - Tove Jansson
The siege - Helen Dunmore
A game of thrones - George R R Martin
A stitch in time - Penelope Lively
Gillespie and I - Jane Harris
Bring up the bodies - Hilary Mantel

Non-Fiction
Shark's fin and Sichuan pepper - Fuchsia Dunlop
Selected poems: U A Fanthorpe
Writing at the kitchen table: the authorized biography of Elizabeth David - Artemis Cooper