Boston.com readers say these are the best books of 2020

Recently, local booksellers shared their picks for the best books of 2020. 

Now, Boston.com readers are naming their favorite new titles of the year. Scores of readers responded to our call for recommendations, putting forward a range of fiction and nonfiction titles — from thrillers to beach reads to history to memoirs. 

Four new books from the year stood out among the slew of picks for the best books of the year, drawing a handful of selections each from readers: “A Promised Land” by Barack Obama, “Caste” by Isabel Wilkerson, “The Vanishing Half” by Brit Bennett, and “Hamnet” by Maggie O’Farrell. 

Below, we list 79 titles organized by genre and publish date that Boston.com readers say were the best books published in 2020.

Fiction

Poetry

Nonfiction