Best Reads of 2011: First Quarter

Somehow three months have passed already. What are your favourite books from January-March?

In the order I read them, mine are:
Under the Banner of Heaven (thanks in large part to the great discussion in this group)
The Mysterious Howling (a reread, but so good that I have to list it)
The Children's Blizzard
I'd Tell You I Love You, But Then I'd Have to Kill You
I Shall Not Hate
Euclid's Elements Books I-IV

Here's my top five, in order of preference:

The Memory Chalet by Tony Judt
I Shall Not Hate: A Gaza Doctor's Journey by Izzeldin Abuelaish
The Gospel According to Jesus Christ by José Saramago
An African in Greenland by Tété-Michel Kpomassie
Angel of Death: The Story of Smallpox by Gareth Williams

Looking over my first quarter's reading, I feel kind of sad that so much of it is junky, or at least, not the kind of things I've been wanting to read - and then I remembered that I haven't actually finished some of the less junky books, and at least one book made me not want to read anything at all for several weeks. (And most of the junk stuff was enjoyable, and short.)

That said, two of my favorites are also two of my most recent reads:

Fantomina by Eliza Haywood (this is a re-read of a long-time favorite, but also reading other stories in the book I hadn't bothered with before)
Book Girl and the Suicidal Mime by Mizuki Nomura (short, 177pg light novel)
The Hidden Gallery (Incorrigible Children!)

I guess that this means one of my big goals this next quarter is to read fewer easy/quick books. It shouldn't be difficult, since I have plenty stacked on my TBR table.

My favourites for the quarter, in reverse chronological order:-

1. Beowulf - Seamus Heaney
2. Thus Spake Zarathustra - Friedrich Nietzshe
3. The Secret Agent - Joseph Conrad

Not in any particular order.

Fiction
Doctor Zhivago by Boris Pasternak
The Lost Steps by Alejo Carpentier
Wandering Stars by Sholem Aleichem
Who Was Changed and Who Was Dead, The Vet's Daughter, and Our Spoons Came from Woolworths by Barbara Comyns
Matigari by Ngugi wa Thiong'o
The Red Riding Quartet by David Peace: Nineteen Seventy-Four, Nineteen Seventy-Seven, Nineteen Eighty, Nineteen Eighty-Three
She Drove without Stopping by Jaimy Gordon
Vacant Possession by Hilary Mantel
Conquered City by Victor Serge

Nonfiction
Just Kids by Patti Smith

Best to not best but still awfully good:

Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf
The Hours by Michael Cunningham
If I Loved You, I Would Tell You This by Robin Black
Wait for Me: The Memoirs of Deborah Devonshire
All Passion Spent by Vita Sackville-West
The King's Daughter by Christie Dickason
The Lake Shore Limited by Sue Miller

Out of the books I've read so far, only 3 stand out as the best.

The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss - can't believe I still haven't bought the second one...
Boneshaker by Cherie Priest - zombies & dirigibles. :D yay steampunk
A Modern Witch by Debora Geary - received through Member Giveaway - I can't quite figure out why, but I loved this book. It was funny and heartwarming and I found myself tearing up a few times.

It's sad that out of 50something books only 3 were really good. I hope the next quarter will show an improvement.

The best three books I've read so far this year are all nonfiction:
Let Our Fame Be Great: Journeys Among the Defiant People of the Caucasus by Oliver Bullough
The Killer of Little Shepherds: A True Crime Story and the Birth of Forensic Science by Douglas Starr
The Lampshade: A Holocaust Detective Story from Buchenwald to New Orleans by Mark Jacobson

As far as fiction goes, it's probably a tie between Away by Amy Bloom and Petty Magic by Camille DeAngelis.

The best three reads, all fiction (in order of leat (3) to greatest (1)):

3. Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
2. His Majesty's Dragon by Naomi Novik
1. Lord of the Flies by William Golding

City of Shadows by Arianna Franklin (historical mystery taking place in Berlin between WWI and WWII)
Bruiser by Neal Shusterman (YA dealing with abuse, family, and friendship)
Death Comes for the Archbishop by Willa Cather (one of my favorite authors - takes place in southwest U.S. when New Mexico just becomes a state)
They Called Themselves the KKK by Susan Campbell Bartoletti (YA non-fiction describes how KKK came to being and how they operated - lots of pics and primary source material without pages of bombastity)

First Quarter:

Neverwhere (5 stars)
On Stranger Tides (4.5 stars)
Leviathan (4.5 stars)

Followed by a bunch o' 4 stars!

In order in which I read them:

The Help by Kathryn Stockett
Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen
The Heretics Daughter by Kathleen Kent
The Hunger Games and Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins

I had a great first quarter, these were my top five:

The Lies of Locke Lamorra by Scott Lynch
Blacklands by Belinda Bauer
The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman
The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield
The Diary of Mattie Spenser by Sandra Dallas

My top reads from the first quarter (in order read):

Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl by Harriet Jacobs
The Watsons Go to Birmingham - 1963 by Christopher Paul Curtis
At the Dark End of the Street by Danielle L. McGuire
The White Family by Maggie Gee
Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell
The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind by William Kamkwamba
All Clear by Connie Willis
The Return of the Soldier by Rebecca West
Marcelo in the Real World by Francisco X. Stork
The Path to Power by Robert Caro
Treachery in Death by J.D. Robb

My top reads for the first quarter are:
Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen
Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell
A Game of Thrones by George R. R. Martin
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
The Portrait of a Lady by Henry James
No Country for Old Men by Cormac McCarthy
Downsiders by Neal Shusterman
The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov
Ex Libris: Confessions of a Common Reader by Anne Fadiman
The Complete Maus by Art Spiegelman (which I accidentally left off my March favs)

I guess I couldn't really pick!
--BJ

My top reads for the first quarter (in the order I read them):

Non-fiction:
Jane Austen: A Life by Claire Tomalin
The Complete Persepolis by Marjane Strapi
God's Philosophers: How the Medieval World Laid the Foundations of Modern Science by James Hannam

Fiction:
Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell
Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen
South Riding by Winifred Holtby
Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman
Remember, Remember!: The Selected Stories of Winifred Holtby by Winifred Holtby

Children's/YA
Behemoth by Scott Westerfeld
Sorcery and Cecilia by Patricia C. Wrede and Caroline Stevermer

FAVORITE BOOKS FROM THE FIRST QUARTER OF THE YEAR:

I find that I can't whittle any titles off, yet, from my monthly favorites. Listed in order of enjoyment.

Fiction:
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen (March)
The Whistling Season by Ivan Doig (March)
Friendship Bread by Darien Gee (February)
The Stone Diaries by Carol Shields (March)
The Language of Trees by Ilie Ruby (January)

Non-fiction:
All Things Wise and Wonderful by James Herriot (March)
Book Lust by Nancy Pearl (January)
Objects of Our Affection by Lisa Tracy (February)

My favourites- in no particular order!
Cleopatra A Life by Stacy Schiff
Mordecai The Life and Times by Charles Foran ( bad touchstones)

Annabel by Kathleen Winter

A 4-way race for top Fiction in chronological order:

The Siege - Helen Dunmore
Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
The Invisible Bridge - Julie Orringer
Portrait of a Lady - Henry James

Non-fiction:
Unbroken - Laura Hillenbrand

In no particular order:

The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet - David Mitchell
Someone Knows My Name - Lawrence Hill
Stone Angel - Margaret Laurence
Every Man Dies Alone - Hans Fallada
The Invisible Bridge - Julie Orringer
The Girls - Lori Lansens

Non-fiction:
West with the Night - Beryl Markham

So far, in order read:
Fiction:
Thread of Grace - Mary Doria Russell
Mama Day - Gloria Naylor
A Drink Before the War - Dennis Lehane

Non Fiction -
You Don't Look Like Anyone I Know - Heather Sellers
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks - Rebecca Skloot
Doubt: A History: The Great Doubters and Their Legacy of Innovation from Socrates and Jesus to Thomas Jefferson and Emily Dickinson - Jennifer Michael Hecht

In no particular order:

In the woods by Tana French (mystery)
The devil's alphabet by David Gregory (sci fi)
The gospel of Jesus Christ by Jose Saramago
Through black spruce by Joseph Boyden
Three day road by Joseph Boyden
Anil's ghost by Michael Ondaadtje

These are all fiction, and I can only claim to have found one of them on my own - the Daryl Gregory book.

I have three 9s for the first quarter of 2011.

Bridge of Birds by Barry Hughart
The Forgotten Beasts of Eld by Patricia A. McKillip
Soulless by Gail Carriger

Best Reads of First Quarter - 2011

First place: I Shall Not Hate - Izzeldin Abuelaish - autobiography
Second place: The Reluctant Fundamentalist - Mohsin Hamid - novel
Third place: Complications: A Surgeon's Notes on an Imperfect Science - Atul Gawande - essays

In a reading year that's been only so-so thus far, I would have to say my best reads have been, in order:

The Ox-Bow Incident by Walter van Tilburg Clark
The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
Love in a Cold Climate by Nancy Mitford
and
Arundel by Kenneth Roberts

I have really enjoyed most of my reads this year. Here are my favorites so far:

The Lost Books of the Odyssey by Zachary Mason
Black Ships by Jo Graham
Stardust by Neil Gaiman
The Book Thief by Markus Zusak

The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms by NK Jemisin
Behemoth by Scott Westerfeld
Elfland by Freda Warrington
Among Thieves : A Tale of the Kin by Douglas Hulick

I've had some great reads so far and could really add a couple more titles besides these:

The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss
The Ask and the Answer & Monsters of Men by Patrick Ness
The Most Beautiful Libraries in the World by Guillaume de Laubier
A Game of Thrones by George R.R. Martin (re-read)

I've had some good reads this quarter, but these are the ones that stand out in reading order:

Daughter of Time - Joshephine Tey
Soulless - Gail Carriger
Doomsday Book - Connie Willis
To Say Nothing Of The Dog - Connie Willis
Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
Mistborn Trilogy - Brandon Sanderson

I've had a fantastic quarter especially for non-fiction. No particular order.

Fiction:
Moonlight Mile by Dennis Lehane
Major Pettigrew's Last Stand by Helen Simonson
So Many Ways to Begin by Jon McGregor

Non-fiction:
Just Kids by Patti Smith
My Reading Life by Pat Conroy
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot
Quiverfull by Kathryn Joyce
A Life Like Other People's by Alan Bennett

Though it's hard to choose, my favorite books of the quarter (in the order read):

Fiction
The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet by David Mitchell
The Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver
The Heart is a Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers
Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
Case Histories by Kate Atkinson
Room by Emma Donoghue
The Portrait of a Lady by Henry James

Non-fiction
Zeitoun by Dave Eggers
Just Kids by Patti Smith
I Shall Not Hate by Izzeldin Abuelaish

I tried to post here a few days ago and my toddler poked the keyboard and disappeared the post. Favorite reads of the first quarter, in no particular order:

The Lightning Thief, The Sea of Monsters, and The Titan's Curse which is as far as I have gotten so far in the Percy Jackson series
Naomi Novik's story Vici in The Dragon Book: Magical Tales...
Witch World
Mouse Guard: Fall 1152 and Mouse Guard: Winter 1152
Linda Grant's Never Too Old, Patricia Sprinkle's For the Common Good and Margaret Maron's You May Already Be a Winner from Sisters on the Case

ETA: kicked touchstones

My top 5 reads for the 1st quarter of 2011:

Framed by Frank Cottrell Boyce
The Whistling Season by Ivan Doig
The Leper of Saint Giles by Ellis Peters
The Franchise Affair by Josephine Tey
The Stone Diaries by Carol Shields

In no particular order:

The Professor's House by Willa Cather
In pursuit of the proper sinner by Elizabeth George
Sir Percy hits back by Baroness Orczy
Lady Wu by Lin Yutang
Your mind matters by John R. Stott

My best:

Nothing to Envy by Barbara Demick
Fall on Your Knees by Ann-Marie Macdonald
The Red Garden by Alice Hoffman
Miss Timmins' School for Girls by Nayana Currimbhoy

My favorites in reading order (and not counting rereads):

My Reading Life by Pat Conroy (nonfiction)
Book Lust to Go by Nancy Pearl (nonfiction)
The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness (YA science fiction; the whole trilogy)
Little Princes by Conor Grennan (nonfiction)
Dave at Night by Gail Carson Levine (children's historical fiction)

My favorites for the first quarter:

Room by Emma Donaghue
Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand
The Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver
A Voyage Long and Strange by Tony Horwitz

There isn't a 5th one that I liked well enough to include.

I know it's a bit late for the list but I have had a rather busy first quarter. Didn't get much reading done either. Anyway, here are my top 5 reads,

1. The Diary of a Nobody. George Grossmith.

2. Mrs Lirriper's Lodgings. Charles Dickens.

3. Mrs. Lirriper's Legacy. Charles Dickens.

4. The Country of the Pointed Firs. Sarah Orne Jewett.

5. Head Over Heels in the Dales. Gervase Phinn.

I know I am waaay behind, but here are my top reads of Q1:

Sandman: Death (graphic)
Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter
Maus II: And Here My Troubles Began (graphic)
The Bridge of Birds
Soulless
Treachery in Death

I've really enjoyed seeing what others listed as their favorites of the first quarter. Some of them I have read and also loved, others I haven't heard of but find myself intrigued.

I just found this thread or series of threads.
My favorites from the year's first quarter are:

The Shutter of Snow by Emily Holmes Coleman,
Moments of Being by Virginia Woolf,
The Way We Live Now by Anthony Trolloppe,
Outlander by Diana Gabaldon, and
A Secret Kept by Tatiana de Rosnay.

I read so many good books that it was really hard to limit myself.