From the Top 10 Archives - Jen's 10 Favorite Books of 2002

Part of an ongoing trip through time looking back at my top 10 book lists, today we'll re-visit my 10 favorite books from 2002.  As a reminder, that means I made this list in January 2003 covering books I read in 2002, not necessarily books published that year.

Here's my list from 2002, in alphabetical order by author's last name:

Almost - Elizabeth Benedict
The Dearly Departed - Elinor Lipman
The Nanny Diaries - Emma McLaughlin and Nicola Kraus
Ghostwritten - David Mitchell
Bel Canto - Ann Patchett
Salem Falls - Jodi Picoult
Empire Falls - Richard Russo
Kissing in Manhattan - David Schickler
The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
Good in Bed - Jennifer Weiner

How Does This List Hold Up Over Time?

"Bel Canto,"  "The Lovely Bones," and "Good in Bed" all remain very memorable and beloved books for me.  I also remember the basic plots of "The Nanny Diaries," "Salem Falls," and "Empire Falls" .  "Ghostwritten" I remember mostly for being weird, and I don't really remember "Almost," "The Dearly Departed," or "Kissing in Manhattan."

I've already told you that I feel no guilt for loving chick lit, and I have no problem at all with "Good in Bed" being on this list as it's definitely one of the best of its genre; however, I'm definitely embarrassed that "The Nanny Diaries" made it to this Top 10 list!  In my defense, it was one of my lowest reading volume years ever, where I only read 45 books, so by definition 1 out of every 4.5 books I read had to make it onto the list...  But seriously, in retrospect, I just don't know what I was thinking!  Or maybe that book was better than I now remember it?

Genres

As I just indicated, "Good in Bed" and "The Nanny Diaries" are both chick lit.  "Kissing in Manhattan" is a short story collection.  The rest are pretty much all contemporary fiction, with "Ghostwritten" having SF/fantasy elements and "The Lovely Bones" having both supernatural and mystery elements.

Popularity

"The Lovely Bones" was a massive best-seller, though I feel like it's not a book people really talk about anymore, even though seemingly everyone read it at the time.  "The Nanny Diaries," "Good in Bed," and "Bel Canto" were all best sellers too.  Jodi Picoult is a very famous author, but "Salem Falls" is definitely one of her less well known books.

"Almost" is probably the most obscure of these books, with only 607 ratings on Goodreads.

Other Random Stuff

This marks Jodi Picoult's second appearance on the list, following "The Pact" in 1999.

"Empire Falls" won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction.

Of these books, "Ghostwritten" is the highest rated on Goodreads, with an average rating of 4.06, while "Almost" is the lowest rated with a 3.14.

Note that I'll give all these posts the tag "Top 10," so you should be able to click on the label  "Top 10" at the bottom of the post and see all my other Top 10 posts.  And if you just want to see all my old Top 10 lists now without waiting, you can also click through to my Goodreads profile - I have a separate shelf for each of my old lists.