This year, LJ eschews our traditional top ten list of best books in favor of a larger and more diverse mix of titles across 20 categories. We’ve used numerous methodologies in the past, such as starting with a long list of staff favorites based on personal reading and LJ reviews, which was then winnowed down to a final list of ten, supplemented with additional genre and subject-specific lists compiled by staff and reviewers. Breaking out of that mold, this year we cast a broad net and coalesced small committees, each headed by an LJ Reviews editor and composed of columnists, reviewers, additional LJ editors, and/or industry experts, for each category, culminating in a compelling collection of titles that spotlight the full spectrum of the thousands of books that were published this year.

 

Our selections, the result of in-depth deliberations, represent the very best fiction and nonfiction

published between January and November 2018. (In our ongoing effort to surface exemplary work

and not miss contenders published late in the year, December titles will be considered for the

2019 Best Books list). Some of these works will be familiar, already finding happy homes on library

shelves and—even better—in readers’ eager hands. Others, we hope, will be new to you, and their choice will help supplement and support the work of collection development librarians and readers’ advisors.

 

This year you’ll also find several new categories, including crime fiction, wellness, and horror.

With 188 titles to peruse and enjoy, there’s something here for every library and every reader.