It’s been the kind of year when I particularly appreciate the diversion of a really good book, and I’ve read or listened to quite a few. Here are my 2016 recommendations in no special order. I would love to hear yours (with bonus points if The Middle Step is on your list!):

Fiction
A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara (tough read but masterful)
The Doubter’s Almanac by Ethan Canin
The Nest by Cynthia D’Aprix Sweeney
Here I Am by Jonathan Safran Foer
The Neapolitan Series (4 books) by Elena Ferrante
Harmony by Carolyn Parkhurst
The Trespasser by Tana French
My Name is Lucy Barton by Elizabeth Strout
The Year She Left Us by Kathryn Ma
Another Brooklyn by Jacqueline Woodson
A Small Hotel by Robert Olen Butler
I Will Send Rain by Rae Meadows
The Expatriates by Janice Y.K. Lee
Circling the Sun by Paula McLain
Everyone Brave is Forgiven by Chris Cleave

Non-Fiction
Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson
Deep, Down, Dark by Hector Tobar
Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates
The Short and Tragic Life of Robert Peace by Jeff Hobbs