It became a common refrain over this past year: I can’t read. Attention spans disappeared as pandemic anxiety expanded into an abundance of sadness and anger over police brutality. All the while, we held our breath as the presidential campaign barreled onward. For many, Netflix was easier. Doomscrolling matched the numb, endless feeling of days bleeding one into the next. Time stopped making sense.

Let's be positive for a sec, k? Even though 2020 was the worst of the worst (I'm seriously ready to wipe it from my memory foreverrrr), it did give us ample time to do one thing: Read a sh*t-ton of books. But if this end-o'-year holiday season has you reflecting on the fact that there were actually quite a few reads you *didn't* manage to get through when everyone else on Instagram was (allegedly) devouring them in one sitting, then step right up. Boy, do I have a list for you!

"I had no problem finishing it in two days because I literally couldn't put it down."

From Barack Obama’s candid memoir to Maggie O’Farrell’s Shakespearean dream: the clear-eyed nonfiction and transporting novels that helped us through an unprecedented year.

"A poignant combination of mystery and history, the novel moves briskly while addressing issues of great weight."

"Hype for The Vanishing Half is huge, and the novel, with its Instagram-friendly cover and formidably talented author (she wrote the devastating fable The Mothers in 2017) lives up to it. . . . . Bennett has a talent for turning the hardest topics into addictive storylines that demand that we turn a new page."

The bestselling author shares her favorite books that make great holiday gifts.

With tens of thousands of votes from readers across 20 categories, the Goodreads Choice Awards hoist up the most popular books of the year.

"Bennett made a splash in 2016 with her debut novel, The Mothers. Her follow-up indicates a talented artist who has refined her skills. . . . The subject matter invites facile comparisons to Nella Larsen’s Passing, but it feels more like a descendant of Toni Morrison’s Sula."

"The Vanishing Half is not only a narrative about the shape of our lives and the forces that sculpt them but also on the ways in which identity and self-image are things that we can sometimes control and fashion into something of our own desire, to beautiful or disastrous effects."

"Rich with commentary on colorism, identity, and family, 'The Vanishing Half' is a breathtaking literary journey you won’t be able to put down. It’s no wonder HBO paid seven figures (after a heated auction with 17 other bidders) for the critically-acclaimed novel."

"Engrossing, engaging read and an ambitious undertaking for a nation that is still wrestling with the fallout of segregation.”

"Bennett writes with evident compassion for all of her characters and with such absorbing descriptions that you’ll want to linger longer in Mallard and beyond."

Brit Bennett discusses her novel "The Vanishing Half," which examines America's history of Black people who pass as white in order to navigate the racial hierarchy of the Jim Crow era.

Twins who escape from a small town are separated by systematic racism. When one abandons the other to pass as a white woman, she finds that the world is a little bit smaller than she thought it was.

In a blockbuster book year, The Vanishing Half had the ultimate staying power — and was just what we needed, as explained by best-selling author Samantha Irby (Wow, No Thank You).

It's easy to see why Brit Bennett's poignant sophomore novel The Vanishing Half has been heralded as the year's best.

If you’re like us, you’ve probably wondered what famous people add to their carts. Not the JAR brooch and Louis XV chair but the hairspray and the electric toothbrush. We asked Brit Bennett, author of the critically acclaimed novel The Vanishing Half, about the travel mug, pen, and brow gel she can’t live without.

The Vanishing Half is, to me, the perfect gift book this year. It’s a page-turner full of big ideas about race, gender, and identity, written by an author who already had one bona fide hit (so your giftee is likely to have heard of her). —Izzy Grinspan, deputy style editor.

By the author of the acclaimed 2016 book The Mothers, The Vanishing Half is a thought-provoking novel about identical twins Desiree and Stella, and, decades later, their daughters.