Happy Thursday, book friends! The Goodreads Choice Awards winners have been announced. I always enjoy looking at the winners for the genres I read to see how many of them I’ve read. Even though the awards are really more of a popularity contest than anything, that’s sort of why I find them so interesting. I like to see what people were hearing about and reading the most in any given year, even if I don’t think that always equates to the “best” books of the year.
Let’s take a stroll through the winners from genres that are commonly covered here on Your Book Friend.
Fiction
Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow took this category, which I found 0% surprising. It’s actually the only nominee from this category that I’ve read (though a few others are on my TBR), which is one of the reasons I always feel a bit silly voting for the Goodreads Choice Awards.
Romance
Emily Henry’s Book Lovers snagged the win in this spot, which is also not that surprising. I’ve read a good handful of the nominees for this category, and I definitely think Book Lovers is up there. It isn’t my favorite of hers, but it still delivers on the bookish love story front.
Memoir & Autobiography
I’m Glad My Mom Died took the top spot here, and I am so pleased to see it. This book surprised the heck out of me and it’s truly such a well-written and raw memoir.
Debut Novel
My favorite book of the year, Lessons in Chemistry, snagged the win and it is so very deserved in my opinion. This book has such a unique humor and storytelling mode to it. I’ll be thinking about this reading experience for a while.
Nonfiction
This is the only commonly-read category this year where I haven’t read the winner, which is kind of impressive if I’m being honest. I usually have a much lower hit rate for what’s popular. Brené Brown’s Atlas of the Heart took the win here, which makes sense, because people do adore Brené Brown.
Since these are the only genres I reliably read this year, my commentary on the rest won’t be that interesting. I’m pretty happy that many of my favorities wound up winners, even if I’m not that surprised to see them there. If you want to know who won the other categories this year, the full list of winners is available here.
Your Book Friend 
The only one I read is Book Lovers, but I do have Tomorrow and Tomorrow and tomorrow on my TBR shelf. I very seldom have read the winners in this awards list, but I still vote every year.
This is the first year I’ve read so many of them! Normally I’ve only read one or two of the nominees and almost never the winners.
I actually had quite a few I voted for win. I didn’t vote for Tomorrow, Carrie Soto, Lessons in Chemistry (not in the category it won), or Book Lovers, but I enjoyed them all. I voted for The Maid and The Final Gambit and was happy to see them win. I was pleased to see any of my choices win, to be honest.
It’s always exciting to see the books you vote for win!
Of these I’ve only read Book Lovers – loved it. I have a couple of the others on my TBR. McCurdy’s book is definitely the most talked about memoir that I’ve seen this year. I’m definitely hoping to read it soon.
Yes, that memoir is really everywhere! Hopefully you feel the hype is as deserved as I do when you get to it!
Lessons in Chemistry is my favorite book of the year too. I want to read Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow soon. And I really enjoyed Book Lovers. So glad all these won. I know there are some wonderful books that didn’t win too.
It was so good! Yes, there are so many good books out there!
I always end up doing the same thing! I’m hoping to read Lessons in Chemistry and Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow soon.
I hope you enjoy them both as much as I did!