NYT and Washington Post
Best books of 2020
How are the top 10 books chosen each year?
According to an article in the ‘Times Insider’, written by Terence McGinley and published in November of 2019, the process of choosing the ‘best books’ for any year begins right after the current year’s list is published. A diverse group of people who work on the New York Times Book Review section of the paper, including editors, reporters and assistants, begins to develop a running list of books. Books on the list may be dropped and certainly other book added as the year progresses. By the fall of the year, fewer than a dozen editors are now in charge of deciding the ten best. Pamela Paul, one of the editors of the review, reports that the discussions get very passionate but remain respectful. The panel of editors gives no preference to certain authors nor do they attempt to maintain a variety of genres in the final group.
While I could not find specific details on how the Washington Post Best 10 Books list is developed, I assume from reading this year’s announcement that the process is similar to the NYT.
Of course, books on the Best Books list may or may not show up on the Best Sellers lists.
New York Times Washington Post
A Children’s Bible Caste: the Origins of Our Discontents
Deacon King Kong, The Cold Millions
Hamnet Hamnetl
Homeland Elegies Hidden Valley Road: Inside the Mind of an American Family,
The Vanishing Half Homeland Elegies
Hidden Valley Road: Inside the Mind Memorial Drive: A Daughter’s Memoir,
of an American Family
A Promised Land Transcendent Kingdom
Shakespeare in a Divided America, Unworthy Republic: The Dispossession of
Native Americans and the Road to IndianTerritory
Uncanny Valley, A Memoir Vesper Flights
WAR, How Conflict Shaped Us Writers and Lovers