Best Books I Read in 2018:

This year I read 80 books.  These are what I consider the best of the list (in the order I read the books).

1. Maus I a Survivor's Tale - My Father Bleeds History by Art Spiegelman (1991) Pantheon Books

The Special Pulitzer Prize winning graphic novel about his father and his experiences in World War II going from a successful garment salesman, then evading capture and then into Aushwitz

Maus II a Survivor's Tale - And Here My Troubles Began by Art Spiegelman  (1991) Pantheon Books

A continuation of the earlier work that tells of his father's life in the camps until he is reunited with his wife after the war.

2. Mr. Majestyk by Elmore Leonard (2002) Mariner Books

All he wants to do is get his melon crop harvested and to market.  But he let his temper get away from him when a local hoodlum tries to drive off his workers and replace them with drunks.  He ends up on a bus with a killer whose crew tries to break him out and now he has to deal with that man.

3. The Girl Who Drank the Moon by Kelly Barnhill (2016) Algonquin

Each year, in the Protectorate, a child must be sacrificed to the Witch.  But one year, the witch, who feeds each child starlight and takes them to a better place and finds good parents, accidentally feeds one child from the moon and keeps her because her magic will be too wild for most people to control.

4. Artemis by Andy Weir (2017) Ballantine Books

Mr. Weir is back, this time using the actual name of a NASA project to establish a colony on the moon.  A girl living on the moon in the Artemis colony, saves her city by breaking all the rules 

5. The Neon Rain by James Lee Burke (1987) Henry Holt & Co.

Dave Robicheaux, a Lieutenant in the New Orleans Police department struggles with the death of a young woman in another Parrish that is written-off as a drowning death.  He is sure it was a murder and checking into the case causes a lot of bad guys to come out of the woodwork - even his partner.  When his brother gets shot, he goes after the mobster who was supposed to be his friend.

6. Red Sparrow by Jason Matthews (2013) Scribner

A ballerina is intentionally injured by a competitor and wreaks her revenge.  Then she is offered a way to keep her mother in their apartment by becoming a spy. She is sent to Sparrow school, where she is trained to seduce foreign diplomats so they can be blackmailed to give up state secrets.

7. Mr. Mercedes by Stephen King (2014) Scribner

Bill Hodges, a retired detective is contacted by the mass murderer about his last case.  Only now, the killer plans on something much more elaborate and deadly.

8. The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman (2013) William Morrow

An old man returns to his childhood neighbor's home and remembers that the pond in the back was called the ocean.

Excellent writing from a master storyteller - it includes the mythic triple goddess of the maiden, the mother and the crone.  Gaiman has mixed mythology, fantasy and reflection of the fears of our childhood and the cost of the mistakes in our lives.  It starts with a wonderful epigraph: "I remember my own childhood vividly . . . I knew terrible things.  But I knew I mustn't let adults know I knew.  It would scare them."  -Maurice Sendak

9. The Women in the Castle by Jessica Shattuck (2017) William Morrow

Three very different women live through World War II in a castle in Germany.

10. The Cuckoo's Calling by Robert Galbraith aka J K Rowling (2013) Mulholland Books

Cormorant Strike, a disabled British veteran MP is now a private detective with a ruined love life, enough bills to sink his business and a new temp receptionist.  He’s also the son of a rock star.  A client wants him to find the murderer of their famous model sister, whom has been ruled a suicide.