All the Books I Read in 2026
(Ordinarily I don’t keep a record such as this, but Padma Viswanathan was curious to see the complete field out of which my top ten will eventually emerged, so here it is. I’ve arranged these in reading order.)
Lobster by Guillaume Lecasble
Impossible People: A Completely Average Recovery Story by Julia Wertz
Shyness and Dignity by Dag Solstad
Mice 1961 by Stacey Levine
Thorpe by Mary Dutton
Sad Planets by Dominic Pettman and Eugene Thacker
Sad Tiger by Neige Sinno
Train Dreams by Denis Johnson [reread]
This’ll Make Things Easier by Attila Veres
Robot Artists & Black Swans: The Italian Fantascienza Stories by Bruce Sterling
Collision with Chronos by Barrington J. Bayley
The Camp of the Saints by Jean Raspail
Swirl & Vortex: Collected Poems by Larry Levis
Vigil by George Saunders
Broken Utopia by Ryan Boudinot
A Certain Young Man by Raeden Richardson [unpublished]