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What were your favorite SF and fantasy books of the year? Either newly published books, or older books/authors you just discovered this year. List as many as you want!

In no paticular order:

The Walls of the Universe ~ Paul Melko
Children of the Atom ~ Wilmar Shiras (Red Jacket Press )
Radio Freefall ~ Matthew Jarpe
Exile---and Glory ~ Jerry Pournelle
The January Dancer ~ Michael Flynn
The Voyage of the Space Beagle ~ A.E. Van Vogt

Julian Comstock A Story of 22nd-Century America by Robert Charles Wilson

Mistborn Trilogy by Brandon Sanderson

The Blade Itself by Joe Abercrombie

The Rapture by Liz Jensen (marketed as general fiction, but I think it is strong SF.)

The City & The City by China Miéville

Hmm this year, in no particular order


The Last Light of the Sun
The Secret History of Star Wars
Wake
The Selected Works of T. S. Spivet

The last book on the list is an unusual book, its a book that is an experience

My worst book list
Dies the Fire
Sandworms Of Dune
the final Dune book was a slap in the face of the series, its totally turned me off of anything written by Anderson and any new Dune books.

I just looked back over the books I read this year and I have been spoiled for choice. First of all, I was staggered to realise I've already read 120 books and I know I'll be adding a few more to my list before year’s end. This, I think (or at least since I started keeping track) is a record for me!

Surprisingly, there are only eight five-star books (and it’s an odd collection):
Mystic River by Dennis Lehane,
Remnant Population by Elizabeth Moon,
Outlaw Trigger (Epic, #2) by Lee Stephen,
The Time Machine by H.G. Wells,
Stuart Little by E.B. White,
Little Brother by Cory Doctorow,
Earth Abides by George R. Stewart,
Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov.

I think if I had to choose a favourite, it would be Remnant Population. For me the book was totally unexpected, one I nearly chose not to read, but picked up on a whim.

I also surprised myself this year, reading nearly one hundred books (I should reach that goal by the end of the year since I'm officially on vacation now).

My five star ratings for 2009 include:

The Book Thief by Markus Zusak - (my review)
The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien - (my review)
To Ride Hell's Chasm by Janny Wurts - (my review)

Runner's up (not quite five stars but better than four stars)

The Blade Itself by Joe Abercrombie - (my review)
The Curse of the Mistwraith by Janny Wurts - (my review)
The Gathering Storm by Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson - (my review)
A Song for Arbonne by Guy Gavriel Kay - (my review)

http://www.goodreads.com/review/list/...

Of the books I read for the first time this year,

Benighted
The Blade Itself
Unseen Academicals
The City & The City
War for the Oaks
The Last Watch
Duplicate Effort
Santa Olivia
To Ride Hell's Chasm


Two best series I read this year - Dresden Files and Kitty the Werewolf.

My five-star ratings for 2009 included the following sci-fi books:

Threshold 1 The Collected Stories of Roger Zelazny
Matter by Iain M. Banks

and the following fantasy/sci-fi rereads:

The Turn of the Screw by Henry James
Houston, Houston, Do You Read? by James Tiptree Jr.

The following non-fiction books got five stars also, the one a biography of a sci-fi writing legend, and the other the bio of a South American adventurer upon whom Sir Arthur Conan Doyle based his protagonist in "The Lost World":

James Tiptree, Jr. The Double Life of Alice B. Sheldon by Julie Phillips
The Lost City of Z A Tale of Deadly Obsession in the Amazon by David Grann

And though I didn't quite put them in 5-star category, I thoroughly enjoyed from this club (thank you, thank you, Beyond Reality!) -- "Eifelheim" "The City and the City" "Consider, Phlebas" "The Forever War" and "Blindsight".

I didn't have a lot of five star reads this year, only three in the sci fi & fantasy categories: Spin by Robert Charles Wilson, The Giver by Lois Lowry & To Ride Hell's Chasm by Janny Wurts. I also read some classic sci fi works for the first time this year that were pretty good: Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury & Journey to the Centre of the Earth by Jules Verne. My over all favorite for the year wasn't a sci fi or fantasy read, it was a classic that I can't believe I had never read before, but thoroughly enjoyed, The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas.

Some of my favorite SF/F reads from the year:

the first two books of The Gormenghast Novels Titus Groan, Gormenghast, Titus Alone by Mervyn Peake (I didn't like Titus Alone all that much)
Kindred by Octavia Butler
Passage by Connie Willis
Shaman's Crossing & the rest of the Soldier's Son trilogy by Robin Hobb
Kushiel's Mercy by Jacqueline Carey
Clockwork Heart by Dru Pagliassotti
Red Seas Under Red Skies by Scott Lynch

My list this year:

Anathem
Blood and Iron, Whiskey and Water, Ink and Steel.
The Steel Remains
The City and the City
To Ride Hell's Chasm
Line War
The Dragons of Babel
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Hammered, Scardown, Worldwired.
The Atrocity Archives

Favorite books of this year .... In alphabetical order to be fair to each ;-)

Avempartha
The Crown Conspiracy
A Dirty Job
Good Omens The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch
Mistborn The Final Empire
The Name of the Wind
Nyphron Rising

Books I didn't care for or were disappointed by

Lamb The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal
The Road
Wicked The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West

I also didn't care for 'Lamb The Gospel...' when I read it. I think I laughed for about the first 20 pages and then the joke just got old.

Books I enjoyed, that I've read for the first time, this year (in order read):

The Battle for Skandia (Ranger's Apprentice Book 4) - by John Flanagan (This is just, generally, a wonderfully fun series and one of my faves)
The Night Angel trilogy, particularly the first one - The Way of Shadows by Brent Weeks (A bit draggy in places, but overall compelling)
Dark Haven (Chronicles of the Necromancer Book 3) - by Gail Z Martin (A bit of a cliche series, but I realy enjoy the characters. This was the best of the series so far)
Ink Exchange (Wicked Lovely Book 2) - by Melissa Marr (Not as good as the first, but still a decent story)
House of Mystery Room and Boredom by Matthew Sturges (graphic novel) (Very interesting dark fantasy series, with a touch of a Sandman tie-in)
The Meaning of Night by Michael Cox (a sumptuously dark book)
The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman (Fun and touching. Not great and would've liked more depth, but I enjoyed several of the vignettes)
Faerie Lord (Fourth and Final book of The Faerie War Chronicles) by Herbie Brennan (A good conclusion to a series which had its ups and downs)
Fables The Dark Ages (volume 12) by Bill Willingham (graphic novel) (An excellent continuation after I was worried they should perhaps stop while they were ahead)
The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher Murder and the Undoing of a Great Victorian DetectiveKate Summerscale (Very interesting and generally well told)
Pride and Prejudice and Zombies by Seth Grahame-Smith (Highly amusing, even if the one joke did stretch a bit)
Soulless by Gail Carriger (Not my usual cuppa, but I enjoyed it a lot)

I'm not sure any of these are 5 star material. In fact, I don't think I rated any book I hadn't previously read as a 5 star this year. Also, the final three are the three I am fondest of, but that could also be because they are the most recent and, so, the ones I remember clearest. If I hadn't have looked at my read shelf I would've forgotten several of these books, even though I enjoyed them at the time.

Now, books I was disappointed in:

I won't say that I disliked either The Lies of Locke Lamora or The Name of the Wind, because I didn't, but from all the hype I heard about them I expected to enjoy both much better than I did.

For books that were truly disappointing or which I didn't like, tho, we have:

A Living Nightmare (Cirque du Freak Book 1) by Darren Shan. (Perhaps the book has promise, but I found the narration annoying and the plot simplistic (even for a kids book)).
The Naming The First Book of Pellinor by Alison Croggon (A coworker recommended it to me, but I found it plodding and overlong)
EvermoreAlyson Noel (In fairness, this isn't one of my preferred genres but I found it cliche and unengaging)
The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova (I should've rated this one star, just because of how much I hated it. Not even hated - just profoundly bored with. Worst vampire story ever, and I'm including Twilight in that. *shudders*)

These aren't the only boks I rated 2s. I rated a couple of group reads as twos, but since I had no real expectations, my dislike of them isn't as great as those I'd hoped to really enjoy.

I loved

The Meaning of Night A Confession. There's a sequel.

Chris wrote: "
I loved

The Meaning of Night A Confession. There's a sequel."

I haven't entirely decided whether I'm going to read the sequel or not. While I did quite enjoy the story, it was not without flaws. Also, most of my enjoyment of the story was being in the mind of that particularly narrator, with his twisted little life. I'm not sure how it would work from a different character.

That said, I haven't decided not to read it, either... so if you read it and enjoy it, let me know? :)

I am on my 40th book for 2009--don't know if I'll finish it in time to count it or not.

My "best" reads for this year were the Mistborn trilogy by Brandon Sanderson, the first 3 books of the Trade Pact Universe by Julie E. Czerneda, and the Miles Vorkosigan books we've read so far as a group (by Lois McMaster Bujold).

I'd say my favourite 5 books of the year were (the latter three being 2009 releases):

The Yiddish Policemen's Union
Watchmen
The City and the City
Dragonfly Falling
The Gathering Storm

The Gathering Storm was probably the biggest surprise to have the series return to form with a better book than the previous half-dozen Wheel of Time books.

Most disappointing was The Traveler

I've heard good things about The Yiddish Policemen's Union so just added to my TBR.