Best Books of 2004

Following is a list of books and reviews that the staff of the King County Library System felt were the best of 2004.

ADULT FICTION

An Unfinished Season

Ward Just

Houghton Mifflin, 2004

Class struggle and family tensions explode in this novel of life in a Chicago suburb in the 1950s, as a teenager watches his father's psyche crumble in the wake of union problems and marital difficulties.

” Just masterfully evokes the bittersweet beauty of city and suburb, the immensity of solitude, the fortitude life requires, and death's ever-present shadow.”

Booklist, 5/15/2004.

Tyrant’s Novel

Thomas Keneally

Delacorte, 2004

Biding his time in a detention camp for exiles, Alan Sheriff describes his life before he was hired by his government to ghostwrite the autobiography of the nation's brutal leader, an assignment that turns him into a prisoner.

“This is an exquisitely wrought study of moral corruption in a convincing-and frighteningly modern-political dystopia.”

Publisher’s Weekly 5/1/04

Gilead

Marilynn Robinson

Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2004

As the Reverend John Ames approaches the hour of his own death, he writes a letter to his son chronicling three previous generations of his family, a story that stretches back to the Civil War and reveals uncomfortable family secrets.

“A novel as big as a nation, as quiet as thought, and moving as prayer. Matchless and towering.”

Kirkus 8/15/04

ADULT NONFICTION

His Excellency:

George Washington

J. Joseph Ellis

Knopf, 2004

A landmark biography of America's first president draws on the Washington papers from archives at the University of Virginia to follow George Washington from his military career through his presidential years, discussing his personal life, marriage, struggle to keep an emerging America united, attitude toward slavery, and other accomplishments.

“A revisionist life of the Founding Father, motes and warts and all.” Kirkus 8/15/04

The Last Run

Todd Lewan

HarperCollins, 2004

Describes the 1998 rescue of five fishermen who were forced to abandon their vessel in the Gulf of Alaska during a hurricane-force storm and who were saved from insurmountable hazards by helicopter teams from the Sitka Coast Guard station.

“Immediate and terrifying, so edge-of-the-seat readers will have creases in their glutei maximi.” Kirkus, 5/15/04

The Mapmaker’s Wife: A True Tale of Love, Murder and Survival in the Amazon.

Robert Whitaker

Basic Books, 2004

When a tangled web of international politics in the eighteenth century leaves Isabel Grameson and her husband Jean Godin stranded at opposite ends of the Amazon River, Isabel makes a treacherous solo journey to reunite with her husband after twenty years of separation.

“A rare story, taut with intellectual controversy, romantic passion, and harrowing danger.” Booklist 4/15/04.

TEEN FICTION

Saving Francesca

Melina Marchetta

Knopf Books for Young Readers,

2004

Sixteen-year-old Francesca Spinelli thought her biggest problem was transferring to St. Sebastian’s, a school only recently turned co-ed, but now her usually optimistic mother, the driving force behind her attendance at St. Sebastian’s, has sunk into a deep depression, leaving the family broken and Francesca alone to face her own fears and doubts. With no one else to save her, Francesca may just have to find a way to save herself.

“Australian author Marchetta proves her craft in this fresh, funny, and heartfelt portrait of a teenage girl coping with her mother's acute depression as well as with a new school.”

Horn Book Magazine

“Readers will applaud the realistic complexity in the relationships here, the genuine love between the characters, as well as Francesca's ultimate decision to save herself.”

Publisher’s Weekly

CHILDREN’S FICTION

Gregor and the Prophecy of Bane

Suzanne Collins

Scholastic Press, 2004

In this adventure, eleven-year-old Gregor returns to the world beneath New York City to rescue his kidnapped sister, Boots, and fulfill a prophecy that will restore peace to the people, bats, rats, cockroaches, and spiders that populate the underworld.

” This is a strong choice for fantasy fans, including reluctant readers.”

School Library Journal, 10/1/2004.

CHILDREN’S PICTURE BOOK

Wild About Books

Judy Sierra

Pictures by Marc Brown

Alfred A. Knopf, 2004

In this rollicking rhymed story, a librarian named Molly McGrew introduces the animals in the zoo to the joy of reading.

“Not only are the animals reading books but they are also hugging them, licking the pictures off the pages, and trying their "hands" at writing. A wonderful advertisement for the joys of a literary life.”

Booklist, 9/1/04

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