From The New York Times:
The books we’ve chosen as the year’s 10 best — five novels, a short-story collection, a memoir, two biographies and a historical study — present a broad range of voices and subjects. What do they have in common? Each is a triumph of storytelling, and each explores the past, whether through research, recollection, invention or some combination of the three.
Gilead by By Marilynne Robinson
The Master by Colm Toibin
The Plot Against America by Philip Roth
Runaway by Alice Munro
Snow by Orhan Pamuk
War Trash by Ha Jin
Alexander Hamilton by Ron Chernow
Chronicles: Volume One by Bob Dylan
Washington’s Crossing by David Hackett Fischer
Will in the World: How Shakespeare Became Shakespeare by Stephen Greenblatt