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The Best Books of 2015

Bestof2015

I hope everyone’s 2015 ended with some great reading, family, friends, and fantastic food.

Of those I read in the year 2015 — those published in 2015 and before — these are the best in these categories:

Best Series:

Maggie Stiefvater’s Raven Cycle (The Raven Boys, The Dream Thieves, Blue Lily, Lily Blue)

Best Children’s Book: (TIE)

Best Memoir:

Displacement by Lucy Knisley

Best Nonfiction:

LOVE: A Philadelphia Affair by Beth Kephart

Best Short Story Collection:

The Great War: Stories Inspired by Items from the First World War 

Best Young Adult Fiction:

Wintergirls by Laurie Halse Anderson

Best Reference:

How to Entertain, Distract, and Unplug Your Kids by Matthew Jervis

Best Women’s Fiction:

French Coast by Anita Hughes

Best Historical Fiction: (TIE)

Best Fiction:

Best Poetry: (TIE)

Here is the list of BEST BOOKS PUBLISHED in 2015:


  1. Wet Silence by Sweta Vikram
  2. The Race for Paris by Meg Waite Clayton
  3. Vessel by Parneshia Jones
  4. LOVE: A Philadelphia Affair by Beth Kephart
  5. The House of Hawthorne by Erika Robuck
  6. The Mapmaker’s Children by Sarah McCoy
  7. Miss Emily by Nuala O’Connor
  8. One Thing Stolen by Beth Kephart
  9. The Secret of Magic by Deborah Johnson
  10. The Sound of Glass by Karen White
  11. Mistaking Her Character by Maria Grace
  12. Earth Joy Writing by Cassie Premo Steele, PhD


What were your favorites in 2015?

Blue Lily, Lily Blue by Maggie Stiefvater (audio)

Source: Digital Library
Digital audio, 9+ hrs
I am an Amazon Affiliate

Blue Lily, Lily Blue by Maggie Stiefvater, narrated by Will Patton, is the third book in this series, and it is such a strong series of books.  Listening to these back to back on audio with the fabulous Will Patton as the narrator has been an immersive experience.  Where a hot room can feel like a jacket closing you in, readers will fall into the world Steifvater has created, wanting to uncover the magic and secrets within the pages quickly, but at the same time struggle not to linger over her images and poetic prose.  Adam and Blue are sent on a journey into the caves with the other Raven Boys, but as they are less sure of their own abilities, they are edging closer to a precipice they may not come back from.

What do you so when your psychic mother disappears, the Greenmantle comes to down to unearth darkness, and the Raven Boys are ever closer to discovering the resting place of a former Welsh king, Glendower?  While things have seen more certain, they are less certain than ever because the ley lines are in disorder, dream thieves are rifling with things they do not fully understand, and others are scrying in the search for guidance.  Time is fluid in this book, and so is what is real and what is not.  Stiefvater has woven a believable world in which readers will be trapped with Blue and the Raven Boys, searching for the unknown and hoping for answers.

Blue Lily, Lily Blue by Maggie Stiefvater, narrated by Will Patton, reveals answers and poses more questions, but readers will never tire of this world and its fantastical elements.  Her characters are nuanced, engaging, twisted and damaged, but they all cling to some form of hope, a hope that things will improve, things will go their way, and that all will be re-aligned as it should be.  However, what they believe it to be, might not be how it ends up when all is said and done.  Stiefvater is a rare talent in the young adult fiction genre.

Other Reviews:

About the Author:

New York Times bestselling author of The Shiver Trilogy, The Raven Cycle, and The Scorpio Races. Artist. Driver of things with wheels. Avid reader. All of Maggie Stiefvater’s life decisions have been based around her inability to be gainfully employed. Talking to yourself, staring into space, and coming to work in your pajamas are frowned upon when you’re a waitress, calligraphy instructor, or technical editor (all of which she’s tried), but are highly prized traits in novelists and artists. She’s made her living as one or the other since she was 22. She now lives an eccentric life in the middle of nowhere, Virginia.