2021 reading list

Well it was another strange year, but like the past few years, reading has been a tonic, a friend, a portal to the outside world. Here are my top ten picks of books both old and new from poetry to memoir to fiction.

• A River Called Time by Courttia Newland.
• Lote by Shola von Reinhold.
• Detransition Baby by Torrey Peters.
• Bitterhall by Helen McClory.
• Tell Me How It Ends by Valeria Luiselli.
• Small Bodies of Water by Nina Mingya Powles.
• Exciting Times by Naoise Dolan.
• Magnolia by Nina Mingya Powles.
• Homie by Danez Smith.
• sikfan glaschu by Sean Wai Keung.

Here is everything I read in 2021:

1. Byobu – Ida Vitale
2. Night Sky with Exit Wounds – Ocean Vuong
3. Olga Dies Dreaming – Xochitl Gonzalez
4. Faces In The Crowd – Valeria Luiselli
5. Experiments in Imagining Otherwise – Lola Olufemi
6. The Private Joys of Nnenna Maloney – Okechukwu Nzelu
7. Rotten Days in Late Summer – Ralf Webb
8. The Story of My Teeth – Valeria Luiselli
9. A Recipe for Sorcery – Vanessa Kisuule
10. Notes on Loneliness – Daniel Cockrill
11. Flip The Script – Arusa Qureshi
12. Blind Spot – Maud Rowell
13. Swimming in the Dark – Tomasz Jędrowski
14. Tell Me How It Ends – Valeria Luiselli
15. How We Are Translated – Jessica Gaitán Johannesson
16. C+nto – Joelle Taylor
17. Kindred – Octavia Butler
18. The Rabbit Magician Plate – Judith Kazantzis
19. The Gospel According to Cane – Courttia Newland
20. Autumn – Ali Smith
21. The New University – James Coe
22. A Thousand Mornings – Mary Oliver
23. Signs Preceding the End of the World – Yuri Herrera
24. The End – Katie Goh
25. Deep Wheel Orcadia – Harry Josephine Giles
26. Magnolia – Nina Mingya Powles
27. Queer Poets of Color – Christopher Soto
28. The Selfless Act of Breathing – JJ Bola
29. Keeping The House – Tice Cin
30. A Blood Condition – Kayo Chingonyi
31. Quesadillas – Juan Pablo Villalobos
32. Morgan & Me – Hamish Whyte
33. Detransition, Baby – Torrey Peters
34. Ballad of a Happy Immigrant – Leo Boix
35. A Boy’s Own Story – Edmund White
36. The Tradition – Jericho Brown
37. Paul – Daisy Lafarge
38. The One Who Wrote Destiny – Nikesh Shukla
39. The Appendix – Liam Konemann
40. Burnt sugar – Avni Doshi
41. Love That Journey For Me – Emily Garside
42. A River Called Time – Courttia Newland
43. Rendang – Will Harris
44. Under the Blue – Oana Aristide
45. The Topeka School – Ben Lerner
46. The Prosperities of Perpetual Light – Julian Aguon
47. Small Bodies of Water – Nina Mingya Powles
48. Sincerity – Carol Ann Duffy
49. To Bury Our Fathers – Sergio Ramírez
50. The Carrying – Ada Limón
51. Granta 155: Best of Young Spanish-Language Novelists
52. A Body Made of You – Melissa Lee-Houghton
53. The Country Girls – Edna O’Brien
54. pandemonium – Andrew McMillan
55. Everyone In This Room Will Someday Be Dead – Emily Austin
56. We Have Always Been Here – Samra Habib
57. A Choosing – Liz Lochhead
58. HWFG – Chris McQueer
59. The Actual – Inua Ellams
60. The Vanishing Half – Brit Bennett
61. sikfan glaschu – Sean Wai Keung
62. 100 Boyfriends – Brontez Purnell
63. Exciting Times – Naoise Dolan 
64. House of Names – Colm Tóibín 
65. Checkpoint – Joe Donnelly
66. Tongues of Fire – Seán Hewitt
67. Call Me By Your Name – André Aciman
68. Mexica Mix – Marina Sánchez
69. Bitterhall – Helen McClory
70. Homie – Danez Smith
71. Dryland – Sara Jaffe
72. Teeth in the Back of My Neck – Monika Radojevic
73. Where the Crawdads Sing – Delia Owens
74. Occupation -Julián Fuks
75. Felicity – Mary Oliver
76. Scabby Queen – Kirstin Innes
77. My Darling from the Lions – Rachel Long
78. Postcolonial Love Poem – Natalie Diaz
79. Lairies – Steve Hollyman
80. Havana Year Zero – Karla Suárez
81. The Opposite of Fate – Amy Tan
82. Empty Houses – Brenda Navarro
83. Open Water – Caleb Azumah Nelson
84. The Speculative Book 2021 – Various Writers
85. Luckenbooth – Jenni Fagan
86. Before the Coffee Gets Cold: Tales from the Cafe –  Toshikazu Kawaguchi
87. Real Life- Brandon Taylor
88. Fourteen Poems – Issues 1, 2, 3
89. This Is Not About Me – Janice Galloway
90. On the Edges of Vision – Helen McClory
91. Lote – Shola von Reinhold