In 2002 I made a New Year's resolution: I resolved to keep a list of all the books I read that year. I did it! It is the only New Year's resolution I've ever kept, and I have kept my list ever since.

My top five picks from recent years are highlighted with links.

2008

1. Monique and the Mango Rains: Two Years with a Midwife in Mali by Kris Holloway
2. Finding George Orwell in Burma by Emma Larkin
3. Elephant Run by Roland Smith
4. The White Masai: An Exotic Tale of Love and Adventure by Corinne Hofmann
5. Salty by Mark Haskell Smith
6. Candy Girl: A Year in the Life of an Unlikely Stripper by Diablo Cody
7. A Beginner’s Guide to Changing the Universe: A True Life Adventure Story by Isabel Losada
8. Faceless Killers by Henning Mankell
9. A Beginner’s Guide to Changing the World by Isabel Losada
10. The Art of French Kissing by Kristin Harmel
11. The Fortune Cookie Chronicles: Adventures in the World of Chinese Food by Jennifer 8. Lee

2006

1. The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon
2. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
3. Tess of the D'Ubervilles by Thomas Hardy
4. Ghost Soldiers by Hampton Sides
5. Bangkok 8 by John Burdett
6. Old Filth by Jane Gardam
7. Shibumi by Trevanian
8. The Tree of Red Stars by Tessa Bridal
9. Backpack by Emily Barr
10. Love Walked In by Marisa de los Santos
11. Five Quarters of the Orange by Joann Harris
12. Saturday by Ian McEwan
13. The Last Song of Dusk by Siddharth Dhanvant Shanghvi
14. Hope and Other Dangerous Pursuits by Laila Lalami
15. Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer
16. Someone Else by Tonio Benacquista
17. Let Me Go by Helga Schneider
18. Burning the Map by Laura Caldwell
19. Losing Gemma by Katy Gardner
20. Es Cuba: Life and Love on an Illegal Island by Kea Aschkenas
21. Angles and Demons by Dan Brown
22. Lost Girls & Love Hotels by Catherine Hanrahan
23. Bangkok Tatoo by John Burdett
24. Blood Orange Brewing by Laura Childs
25. What Color is Your Jockstrap? Edited by Jen Leo
26. Lost and Found by Carolyn Parkhurst
27. The Dancing Girls of Lahore by Louise Brown
28. The Almond Picker by Simonetta Agnello Hornby
29. Frangipani by Celestine Hitiura Vaite
30. The Unwanted by Kien Nguyen
31. The Ganster We Are All Looking For by Le Thi Diem Thuy
32. Cuba Diaries: An American Housewife in Havana by Isadora Tattlin

2005

1. The Lucky Ones by Rachel Cusk
2. The Kitchen Boy by Robert Alexander
3. Welcome to My Planet by Shannon Olson
4. Children of God Go Bowling by Shannon Olson
5. Honeymoon with my Brother by Franz Wisner
6. French Women Don't Get Fat by Mireille Guiliano
7. In a Sunburned Country by Bill Bryson
8. The Bitch in the House Edited by Cathi Hanuer
9. The Devil's Highway by Luis Alberto Urrea
10. Cuba 15 by Nancy Osa
11. Revenge by Marry Morris
12. Maya Running by Anjali Banerjee
13. Whose Panties are These? edited by Jen Leo
14. Easter Island by Jennifer Vanderbes
15. Night of the Radishes by Sandra Benitez
16. They Poured Fire On Us From the Sky by Alephonsion Deng, Benson Deng, Benjamin Ajak, Judy A. Bernstein
17. Around the Bloc by Stephanie Elizondo Griest
18. A Way to See the World by Thomas Swick
19. The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien
20. Lucky Girls by Nell Freudenberger
21. Best American Travel Writing 2004 edited by Pico Iyer
22. Roads Less Traveled Catherine Watson
23. The Sex Lives of Cannibals by J. Maarten Troost
24. Holy Smoke by Tonio Benacquista
25. The Rule of Four by Ian Caldwell and Dustin Thomason
26. The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency by Alexander McCall Smith
27. Whiteout by Ken Follet
28. A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving
29. Trading Up by Candace Bushnell
30. Digital Fortress by Dan Brown
31. The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini

2004

1. Avoiding Prison and Other Noble Vacation Goals by Wendy Dale
2. The Orchid Thief by Susan Orlean
3. The Translator by John Crowley
4. Caramelo by Sandra Cisneros
5. Bad Times in Buenos Aires by Miranda France
6. Along the Inca Road by Karin Mulle
7. Reading Lolita in Terhan by Azar Nafisi
8. Priority by Iselin C. Hermann
9. The Stone Boudoir by Teri Maggio
10. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime by Mark Haddon
11. The Ladies' Coupe by Anita Nair
12. The Mango Season by Amulya Mallad
13. A Good Year by Peter Mayle
14. Almost French by Sarah Turnbul
15. High Tide by Mark Lynas
16. The Food of Love by Anthony Capella
17. Nickel and Dimed by Barbara Ehrenreich
18. The Bookseller of Kabul by Asne Seierstad
19. The Book of Salt by Monique Truong
20. The Quiet American by Graham Greene
21. The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri
22. The Dogs of Babel by Carolyn Parkhurst

2003

1. The Leaf Storm by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
2. Yoga for People Who Can't Be Bothered to Do It by Geoff Dyer
3. Eva Peron by Alicia Dujorne Ortiz
4. Reviving Ophelia by Mary Piphen
5. A Multitude of Sins by Richard Ford
6. Iron and Silk by Mark Salzman
7. Travelers' Tales: Cuba Edited by Tom Miller
8. Islands in the Stream by Ernest Hemingway
9. Bel Canto by Ann Patchett
10. Memoirs of a Geisha by Aurthur Golden
11. The Life of Pi by Yann Martel
12. The Little Chinese Seamstress by Dai Sijie
13. Can River Lalita Tademy
14. A Bend in the River by V.S. Naipaul
15. All the Names by Jose Saramago
16. Good in Bed by Jennifer Weiner
17. Travels in a Thin Country by Sara Wheeler
18. Our Man in Havana by Graham Greene
19. No Horizon is So Far by Ann Bancroft
20. The War of the Beavers by Verena Andermatt Conley
21. Waiting with Gabriel by Amy Kuebelbeck

2002

1. The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera
2. Dakota by Kathleen Norris
3. Frida by Barbara Mujica
4. Never Again a World Without Us by Teresa Ortiz
5. Breath, Eyes, Memory by Edwidge Danticat
6. Lying Awake by Mark Salzman
7. Daughter of the Queen of Sheba by Jacki Lyden
8. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith
9. Where She Came From by Helen Epstein
10. Letters to a Young Poet by Rainer Maria Rilke
11. The Old Man Who Read Love Stories by Luis Sepulveda
12. Notes from a Small Island by Bill Bryson
13. Prague by Arthur Phillips
14. The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants by Anne Brashares
15. The Art of Travel by Alain de Bottom
16. The Miracle Life of Edgar Mint by Brady Udall
17. The Book of Laughter and Forgetting by Milan Kundera
18. Mr. Maybe by Jane Green
19. Tales of a Female Nomad by Rita Golden Gelman
20. The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down by Anne Fadiman
21. The Death of Vishnu by Manie Suri
22. How Proust Can Change Your Life by Alain de Bottom
23. The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
24. The Red Tent by Anita Diamant
25. Lucky by Alice Sebold
26. The Greatest Salesman in the World by Og Mandino
27. Making Sense of Life's Changes: Transitions by William Bridges
28. Daughter of Fortune by Isabelle Allende
29. The Snake Charmer by Sanjay Nigam

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