Best Of

For all the latest LJ reviews and more, visit Book Verdict! Book Verdict is fully accessible to all users, though certain content and functionality are only available to subscribers. If you're already an LJ subscriber, log in to your account. To view all subscription options, Get Started With Book Verdict Pro Today.

LJ’s Reviews of RUSA’s Top Genre Fiction | ALA Midwinter 2017

RUSA_Logo_Navy_500x175 (1)

On January 22, RUSA’s Reading List Council announced the 2017 selections of the annual best-of reading list, comprised of eight different fiction genres for adult readers. Check out below LJ‘s full reviews of the winners and look for the complete reviews of the short list titles in BookVerdict.

Hilary Mantel, Alexander McCall Smith, Ron Currie | Fiction Finds

c6ci-square-240

An eerie and adult take on Hans Christian Andersen’s beloved Little Mermaid tale, a modern marriage tested by freedom, and Nazi war widows when the war is over.

Best Media 2016: Music

ljx170101webbmmusic1

Music columnists Robin Bradford and Steve Kemple score their Top Five albums of 2016, which include artists Beyoncé, Nick Cave, and Bruno Mars, along with a slew of Honorable Mentions to keep users glued to their devices. Will we ever see the end of Hamilton?

Best Media 2016: Audiobooks

ljx170101webbestaudio1

We thank our hardworking reviewers for coming up with a list of the top 20 audiobooks of the year, among them Tracy Chevalier’s hard-hitting At the Edge of the Orchard and Helen Oyeyemi’s interconnected tales in What Is Not Your Is Not Yours, as well as Jennifer Boylan’s story of her transition, She’s Not There, with an afterword written and read by Richard Russo, and Matthew Desmond’s LJ Top Ten Best Book Evicted, about precarious housing in Milwaukee.

Best Media 2016: DVDs

LJ video reviewer/Fast Scans columnist Jeff T. Dick rounds up his favorite discs in a varied list that necessarily omits streaming-only titles from Netflix, Amazon, et al., and primarily favors recent releases over titles originally shown in the prior calendar year. Documentaries are limited to popular programs in lieu of arguably more worthy educational material. The biggest takeaway this year? Sixteen-plus hours—two miniseries—devoted to O.J. Simpson.

LJ’s Best Books of 2016

lj_bestbooks2016_slug_200x200

Our picks for the Top Ten books of 2016, plus Top Five picks in genre fiction, nonfiction, poetry, graphic novels, and more.

Fan Favorites and Promising Newcomers | African American Fiction (and More)

41vgplxlhgl1

Urban fiction fan favorites Ni-Ni Simone and De’Nesa Diamond return, but librarians will also want to watch promising debut authors Ginger McKnight-Chavers and Stephen Mack Jones.

Beyond Caitlyn Jenner | Collection Development: Transgender Fiction & Nonfiction, June 1, 2016

ljx160601webcda

The past ten years have seen dramatically increased visibility of transgender people in the public eye. For those in the community and those wanting to understand more about it, these 30 resources will fill in many of the blanks.

Graphic Novels from Fletcher, Wu, & Co.; Morrison, Burnham, & others; and Sejic | Xpress Reviews

blackcanaryTN

This work from Fletcher breathes new life into Black Canary, mature fans of the genre looking for something deeper will most appreciate Nameless, Sejic seems well equipped with talent and skills to become a lasting success

Still Evolving | Best Magazines 2015

DigitalIssue4_535x720__1460994370_42200

Format shifts and strategic moves are all proof of a continually evolving magazine market. Print is not going away, but publishers’ growth opportunities are largely digital.
http://reviews.libraryjournal.com/category/best-of/?ref=menu
reviews.libraryjournal.com
crawl=CC-MAIN-2017-09
107712
application/http; msgtype=response
sha1:CMKM5YSVFA34W4YJSNQWDRZGGYRCXCFI
<urn:uuid:fb67d47c-5805-4211-b031-af89d5d6a703>
2017-02-26T03:14:32Z
216.70.86.237
sha1:FB36IIRCOYNYB7LSEZOQIBUA3GB25C7R
<urn:uuid:b44392d7-2271-4fed-a462-a4bb3fbfa94a>
http://reviews.libraryjournal.com/category/best-of/?ref=menu
length
response
<urn:uuid:f9d7edfa-3c33-4c68-89bc-88bd84379e77>
robots: classic
hostname: ip-10-171-10-108.ec2.internal
software: Nutch 1.6 (CC)/CC WarcExport 1.0
isPartOf: CC-MAIN-2017-09
operator: CommonCrawl Admin
description: Wide crawl of the web for February 2017
publisher: CommonCrawl
format: WARC File Format 1.0
conformsTo: http://bibnum.bnf.fr/WARC/WARC_ISO_28500_version1_latestdraft.pdf