The past twelve months were a very busy reading and reviewing year for me. Though I’m sure a few slipped through the cracks and didn’t get counted, in looking back at my records it appears I read 192 books (novels, novellas, and collections) this year, and reviewed 116 of those.
And you know what? There were still a ton of books I wanted to read this year but just didn’t manage to get to by year’s end. (Cash Out by Greg Bardsley and The Dark Room by Steve Mosby are two biggies that leap to mind in particular.)
Given the amount I read this year, and with most of it being top-notch, narrowing things down to a Top 10 list was quite excruciating, as you may imagine.
As I have in years past, to make things a tad more manageable I selected my Top 10 only from full-length novels. And I’ll tell you what, even with the herd already thinned of novellas and short story collections (many of which were fantastic!), picking only ten was still a painfully difficult exercise. So much so, actually, that I’ve cheated a tiny bit and counted two books from one author as only one spot on the list. Of course, having too many fantastic reads to choose from is a “problem” I’ll gladly take any day.
So many authors gave me hours and hours of reading pleasure this year through their amazing abilities, and I am grateful to each and every one of you. For writing what turned out to be my favorite reads of 2012, I am especially grateful to Ian Ayris, Andrez Bergen, Declan Burke, Wiley Cash, Peter Farris, Sam Hawken, Chris F. Holm (for whom I cheated and counted two books from his Collector Series as one spot on the list), Grant Jerkins, Roger Smith and James Thompson. Thank you.
Eric Beetner
January 3, 2013 - 1:06 AM