My Top Five Books of 2021 — kelsey holtaway

I read 259 books in 2021. Listen. I know. You don’t have to tell me. BUT. Like. I’m pretty proud of myself so there’s that.

Throughout the year, whenever I came across a book that was particularly special, I added it to my 2021-favorites Goodreads shelf. And while I thought it would be impossible to look at that long list and narrow 259 books down to a top five, I’m happy to announce for all of our sake that I actually did it.

These are the books that stuck to my ribs. That I started unknowing that I wouldn’t be able to stop until I consumed the entire thing. These are the books that touched some part deep within me I personally believed to be withered. So. Yeah. I recommend these.

These are in no particular order UNTIL the last one, which is my top top favorite of the year.

The House in the Cerulean Sea by T.J. Klune
When I talk about awakening a part of myself I believed to be withered, this is the book. You might have seen this book everywhere. As in you couldn't escape it and it felt overhyped but, I, personally, think it’s perfectly hyped.
In HOUSE IN THE CERULEAN SEA we’re following Linus, a case worker for the Department in Charge of Magical Youth. He’s feeling stagnant in his life, and also constricted at his job, so when he gets the chance to audit an orphanage housing six extremely dangerous magical children, he’s hesitant but hopeful. Upon arriving at the crooked house perched atop a hillside overlooking the ocean on a remote island, he’s ready to audit the orphanage in earnest, but he finds a piece of himself in the children and the master of the orphanage that had been missing.
About belonging, love, found family, and wanting more for yourself. This is an adult fantasy, but written in a way that almost feels like a middle-grade fantasy, and I think that’s very much done on purpose, in a way to foster any hurts left lingering from youth that still need to heal. This is such a pure story, described as being wrapped up in a big gay blanket. This touched even my cold, dead heart.

2. In the Dream House by Carmen Maria Machado

This book got into my gut. It felt like a form of therapy because I was able to relate a little too much to some of Machado’s experiences that I found I had never processed before, and while I didn’t want to be able to relate to any part of this extremely painful book, I almost found it freeing to see something I had never been able to personally express written plainly.

In IN THE DREAM HOUSE, Machado shares her experience in an abusive same-sex relationship, each experience written as a different narrative trope.

It was fascinating, and unputdownable, and hard, and heartbreaking. Machado shines a light on something that is often swept under the rug. It’s vulnerable and hopeful. I deeply love this book.

3. The Color Purple by Alice Walker

My god, what a poignant book. I’ve been making it a point to read more classics, and while I’ve liked and appreciated a lot of what I’ve read, they often follow the same type of slower, contemplative pacing. And while this was definitely contemplative, I genuinely could not put this down. I was so enraptured by Celie’s life I shrugged off all my responsibilities and relationships for the day while I tore through this.

In THE COLOR PURPLE we’re following Celie through a series of letters to her sister Nettie, who she had been separated from. Sharing what it’s like to be a Black woman in Georgia in the early 1900s through her days with a growing cast of characters, we Celie’s life and growth through different stages of her life.

I wanted to know every scrap of Celie’s life. Her voice and characterization felt so alive on the page, and seeing her experiences of being a Black woman at the time with little sway over her own life, made seeing her come into herself in whatever small ways she could build in each moment was so special.

A powerful story, one of those that should be required reading.

4. The Last Graduate by Naomi Novik

This series!!! I loved the first installment in this series, and as a person who typically doesn’t like the second installments in series (although A COURT OF MIST AND FURY is a huge exception) I enjoyed this even more than A DEADLY EDUCATION. This was just so much fun, I’m already itching for a reread.

I don’t want to summarize LAST GRADUATE because I don’t want to spoil anything from the first book if you haven’t read it, but in DEADLY EDUCATION we’re following El as she tries to survive the deadly Scholomance. A magic school intent on toughening up the students to the point where many of them die in the process. El is our reluctant hero, trying to NOT fulfill her destiny of being the destroyer of worlds. It’s honestly hilarious.

The first book is heavy on world building and info-dumping (but like…done in a way I still enjoyed somehow), but this one totally takes off and the cast of characters El befriends against her will in the first book grow, and somehow my heart expanded while reading this. Funny, irreverent, I was delighted by this.

5. Amari and the Night Brothers by B.B. Alston

Okay so remember how I said at the beginning that these books weren’t in order except the last one? Yeah. This was my favorite book of the year. I can’t remember the last time I had to put a book down because I was too excited by the direction the author was taking. When there is a fork in the road of this story, the author ALWAYS takes the cooler, more exciting path. And that becomes something you begin to inherently trust, and thus the excitement just builds and builds.

In AMARI AND THE NIGHT BROTHERS we’re following Amari, a young girl often the target of racist bullying from fellow classmates and their parents, trying to get by while not giving up hope of finding her brother who has gone missing. Knowing her brother isn’t the type to run away, but not believed by any of the authorities, Amari is frustrated and hurting. Until she receives a magical message from her brother, and she begins her quest to track him down, which includes getting accepted to a magic summer school. At the school Amari is learning about her own powers while investigating the disappearance of her brother.

A fun, fast paced, exciting, but tender story. I scream about this book every chance I get and the only problem I have is that I read it right when it came out, and I have to wait in REAL TIME until the next one comes out. It is true pain.