Digital Media Net - Your Gateway To Digital media Creation. News and information on Digital Video, VR, Animation, Visual Effects, Mac Based media. Post Production, CAD, Sound and Music
Categories: News

Amazon Announces 2020’s Best Books of the Year So Far

Amazon Books editorial team names Abi Daré’s debut novel, The Girl with the Louding Voice, as the best book of the year to date

The wide-ranging and diverse list spans genres, interests, and geographies to help customers discover their next great read

SEATTLE–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Amazon.com (NASDAQ: AMZN)– Today, Amazon announced its choices for 2020’s Best Books of the Year So Far, selecting Abi Daré’s debut novel, The Girl with the Louding Voice, as the top pick.

Throughout the year, the Amazon Books editorial team pores over thousands of pages to determine the Best Books of the Month, Best Books of the Year So Far, and Best Books of the Year, debating new releases across various categories—including literary fiction, mystery and thriller, biography, children’s books, and young adult—all to help customers find their next great book. For Best Books of the Year So Far, the Amazon Books editorial team read and selected titles released between January 2020 and June 2020. This year’s list includes the first adult novel of a longtime children’s book author, a sought-after tattoo artist’s memoir on assimilating to American culture after leaving Vietnam, and a gripping true story of a family trying to understand how schizophrenia has affected their lives and future.

“Determining the Best Books of the Year So Far took on even greater importance this year as many of us spent months at home and often turned to books to better understand our new normal or seek reprieve in another person’s story. In every page and chapter of these profound books, we found opportunities to escape to different worlds, travel through time, and remind ourselves of the things that connect us all,” said Sarah Gelman, Editorial Director, Amazon Books. “For the Amazon Books editors, The Girl with the Louding Voice stood out thanks to its unforgettable characters and message of hope and determination when all feels lost. It’s impossible to walk away from this book without feeling hopeful.”

The Girl with the Louding Voice’s altruistic protagonist resonated with readers as well, as the most highlighted passage from the Kindle edition of the book spoke to a desire to make an impact on oneself and others: “My mama say education will give me a voice. I want more than just a voice, Ms. Tia. I want a louding voice,” I say. “I want to enter a room and people will hear me even before I open my mouth to be speaking. I want to live in this life and help many people so that when I grow old and die, I will still be living through the people I am helping.”

Upon hearing the news that her debut novel is at the top of the Best Books of the Year So Far list, Abi Daré said: “I am completely mind-blown by this! At a time when the world feels weightless and the days an endless, timeless thing filled with uncertainty, this news brought some laughter and color into my heart. A huge thank you to the brilliant editors at Amazon, who have read countless other fabulous books this season, and have loved and selected The Girl with the Louding Voice for this accolade. Thank you for shining a light on Adunni’s inspiring and beautiful story with your very powerful beam! I am beyond thrilled and utterly grateful.”

Here are the Amazon Books editorial team’s top 10 picks of 2020 so far:

  1. The Girl with the Louding Voice: A Novel by Abi Daré: In this rousing tale of courage and pluck, a 14-year-old Nigerian girl is sold into servitude by her father when her mothera proponent of educationpasses away. You will root for Adunni as she endeavors to escape her sorryand often harrowinglot, and applaud the kind strangers who buoy her efforts and her spirits.
  2. Hidden Valley Road: Inside the Mind of an American Family by Robert Kolker: Hidden Valley Road is a heartbreaking, expertly told story of an all-American family, the Galvins, six of whom were diagnosed with schizophrenia while still teenagers. Relying on exhaustive research, Kolker weaves together cultural, medical, and family history to show the ravages of mental illness on the six Galvin boys, on their parents, and, perhaps most movingly, on their other six siblings.
  3. The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes: A Hunger Games Novel by Suzanne Collins: The 10th anniversary of the Hunger Games is beginning, and 18-year-old Coriolanus Snow—President Snow, when we met him decades later in The Hunger Games—has an important role to play. Nearly impossible to put down, The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes is an exciting and thought-provoking novel that goes outside the arena to ask interesting questions about human nature and ambition.
  4. Deacon King Kong: A Novel by James McBride: Set in the 1960s, this propulsive and darkly comic neighborhood epic features a cast of characters that are beguiling, boozed-filled, and larger than life. National Book Award-winner McBride weaves a fictional story of one Brooklyn project, but in doing so tells a broader tale of race and religion, getting by and getting out, and how grudges and alliances become embedded in the foundations of our lives.
  5. Pretty Things: A Novel by Janelle Brown: When a second-generation grifter, Nina, and her shady boyfriend move to Lake Tahoe, they collide with a woman from Nina’s past, heiress Vanessa Liebling. Behind a glittering façade of old money and fast living, a darker story of social climbing, social media, revenge, and betrayal starts to take menacing shape.
  6. Writers & Lovers: A Novel by Lily King: Writers & Lovers is about the uncertainty of relationships, and of pursuing the creative life, in a world that values success and stability. Life is not waiting for Casey to fulfill her dream of being a novelist, so she works as a waitress and she dates, and she tries to figure it out as she goes. Love and art require frequent, often imperceptible, leaps of faith—and this book captures that perfectly.
  7. Sigh, Gone: A Misfit’s Memoir of Great Books, Punk Rock, and the Fight to Fit In by Phuc Tran: Sigh, Gone is one of the funniest and most profound memoirs of the year so far. Without rose-colored glasses and with a flair for humor, Tran recounts his childhood as a Vietnamese kid growing up in a small Pennsylvania town: the racism, dislocation, and violence that surrounded him, how he fought to fit in, and how he fell in love with literature.
  8. The City We Became: A Novel by N. K. Jemisin: Five strangers unexpectedly become the living embodiments of New York City’s boroughs and must battle an evil entity that threatens the city. Jemisin infuses this live-wire love letter to the city’s diverse denizens with reality-ripping storytelling.
  9. Oona Out of Order: A Novel by Margarita Montimore: Oona Lockhart is celebrating New Year’s Eve 1982 and the eve of her 19th birthday, but at midnight she passes out and wakes up as a 19-year-old trapped in the body of a 51-year-old. Thus begins Oona living life out of order. Although Oona Out of Order could be a fun romp through the adage “youth is wasted on the young” (and it is), it’s also a deeper look at destiny, love, and family.
  10. The Mercies: A Novel by Kiran Millwood Hargrave: There isn’t much that is not unforgiving when it comes to the far-flung and frigid town of Vardø, Norway, including the sea that surrounds it, which swallows the majority of its male population in an epic storm while they’re fishing. Accusations of witchcraft quickly infect this grieving but resourceful community, threatening what hard-won normalcy they’ve regained. The Mercies is infuriating, baleful, but full of stubborn hope.

The Girl with the Louding Voice joins the Amazon Book editors’ past Best Book of the Year So Far selections, including Elizabeth Gilbert’s City of Girls, Tara Westover’s Educated, and Arundhati Roy’s The Ministry of Utmost Happiness.

To view the complete list of the Best Books of the Year So Far spanning literary fiction, cookbooks, children’s books and more, visit www.amazon.com/bestbookssofar.

For more coverage of the books featured on the Best Books of the Year So Far list, as well as insightful reviews on new books, author interviews, and hand-curated roundups in popular categories, visit the Amazon Book Review at www.amazon.com/amazonbookreview, and subscribe to the Amazon Book Review Podcast on Apple or TuneIn.

About Amazon

Amazon is guided by four principles: customer obsession rather than competitor focus, passion for invention, commitment to operational excellence, and long-term thinking. Customer reviews, 1-Click shopping, personalized recommendations, Prime, Fulfillment by Amazon, AWS, Kindle Direct Publishing, Kindle, Fire tablets, Fire TV, Amazon Echo, and Alexa are some of the products and services pioneered by Amazon. For more information, visit www.amazon.com/about and follow @AmazonNews.

Contacts

Amazon.com, Inc.

Media Hotline

Amazon-pr@amazon.com
www.amazon.com/pr

Staff

Recent Posts

SK Group to Provide a Model for Global AI Cooperation with Technology Innovations at CES

SK's CES 2025 booth introduces AI technology and services under the theme 'Innovative AI, Sustainable…

3 hours ago

ベルキン、BoostCharge Proモバイルバッテリーの巳年デザインを公開

カラフルでユニークなヘビのイラストをあしらった特別エディションを、一部のApple Storeおよびapple.comで販売中香港--(BUSINESS WIRE)--(ビジネスワイヤ) --40年にわたりコンシューマー向け電気製品市場をリードしてきたベルキンは、優美さ、魅力、神秘性、知性を象徴する巳年を祝い、人気製品BoostCharge Pro Magnetic Power Bank 5K with Qi2の新デザインを発表しました。新デザインは、カラフルでユニークなヘビのイラストで十二支の巳年を表しています。現在、アジア地域とオーストラリアで、apple.comおよびアップルの一部店舗で販売しており、まもなく米国とカナダでも発売予定です。 BoostCharge Pro Magnetic Power…

18 hours ago

Belkin推出BoostCharge Pro行動電源農曆新年設計以慶祝蛇年的到來

這款特別版設計現已在部分Apple Store和apple.com上架,採用色彩鮮豔的獨特蛇形圖案香港--(BUSINESS WIRE)--(美國商業資訊)-- 擁有40年歷史的一流消費電子品牌Belkin今天推出其廣受歡迎的BoostCharge Pro磁吸行動電源5K的新設計以慶祝蛇年的到來,這款支援Qi2無線充電功能的行動電源代表著優雅、魅力、神秘和智能。新設計採用色彩鮮豔的獨特蛇形圖案,象徵著中國十二生肖中的新年。它現已在apple.com以及亞洲和澳洲的部分Apple零售店發售,並即將在美國和加拿大推出。 BoostCharge Pro磁吸行動電源5K具有5000 mAh的超大電池容量,為iPhone 12及更新機型提供長達16小時的額外電池續航時間。這款行動電源採用Qi2磁吸無線充電功能和額外的USB-C埠設計,允許使用者同時為兩台裝置充電,使其成為忙碌的專業人士、旅行者和任何裝置重度依賴人士的必備配件。 與MagSafe相容的可轉換設計允許使用者在墊式和支架模式之間切換,非常適合FaceTime、接聽電話或在充電時進行視訊串流播放。它用途廣泛、效能可靠且尺寸小巧,是理想的無憂旅行伴侶。 產品特點: 通過Qi2認證,與MagSafe相容,可為iPhone12及更新機型充電,功率高達15W* 5000 mAh電池可提供長達16小時的額外電池續航時間 纖薄輕巧的設計為行動充電提供便攜性…

18 hours ago

Redfin Reports New Listings Rise 8%, Giving the New Year’s Buyers More Homes to Choose From

Supply increased from a year earlier to close out 2024, while pending home sales posted…

2 days ago

SoFi Schedules Conference Call to Discuss Q4 2024 & Full Year 2024 Results

SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--SoFi Technologies, Inc. (NASDAQ: SOFI), a member-centric, one-stop shop for digital financial services…

2 days ago