Best Fiction Read 2006
Discover the best fiction reads of 2006 with our curated list of top books. Find award-winning novels, hidden gems, and must-read stories from a standout year in literature.
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March
by Geraldine Brooks
Winner of the Pulitzer Prize--a powerful love story set against the backdrop of the Civil War, from the author of The Secret Chord. From Louisa May Alcott's beloved classic Little Women, Geraldine Brooks has animated the character of the absent father, March, and crafted a story "filled with the ache of love and marriage and with the power of war upon the mind and heart of one unforgettable man" (Sue Monk Kidd). With "pitch-perfect writing" (USA Today), Brooks follows March as he leaves behind his family to aid the Union cause in the Civil War. His experiences will utterly change his marriage and challenge his most ardently held beliefs. A lushly written, wholly original tale steeped in the details of another time, March secures Geraldine Brooks's place as a renowned author of historical fiction.
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Saturday
by Ian McEwan
NATIONAL BESTSELLER • The Booker Prize winner and bestselling author of Atonement follows an ordinary man through a Saturday whose high promise gradually turns nightmarish in this “dazzling [and] powerful” novel (The New York Times). Henry Perowne—a neurosurgeon, urbane, privileged, deeply in love with his wife and grown-up children—plans to play a game of squash, visit his elderly mother, and cook dinner for his family. But after a minor traffic accident leads to an unsettling confrontation, Perowne must set aside his plans and summon a strength greater than he knew he had in order to preserve the life that is dear to him. Don’t miss Ian McEwan’s new novel, Lessons, coming in September!
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Swing
by Rupert Holmes
Jazz musician Ray Sherwood, playing at the 1940 World Fair, becomes involved in the investigation into the death of a mysterious Frenchwoman, who had previously propositioned him.
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Orphan's Destiny
by Robert Buettner
In the bold, second installment of Buettner's military science fiction series that began with "Orphanage," 25-year-old General Jason Wander is returning home after long years in space, but to what? Earth is now impoverished following the alien war. The problem--the first alien invasion was merely Plan A. Original.
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The Snow Queen
by Joan D. Vinge
An epic, Hugo Award-winning novel that draws upon the classic Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale The Snow Queen.
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The Amalgamation Polka
by Stephen Wright
Born in 1844 in upstate New York as the child of ardent abolitionists, Liberty Fish finds his life influenced also by his grandparents, Carolina slaveholders, a conflict that he struggles to resolve by enlisting during the Civil War.