The Best Book of the Year is announced twice a year by Amazon editors. For the summer and the holidays, it's a terrific place to find new novels that might otherwise go unnoticed.

As of mid-June, a new ranking will be unveiled that includes not just titles that appeared on the Best Books of the Month list between January and June, but also noteworthy new titles that have been released recently.

For the summer of 2021, which Amazon book is the best? Described by Sarah Gelman, Amazon Books Editorial Director, as "ambitious, literary, yet entirely approachable," the editors chose Maggie Shipstead's epic novel Great Circle.

Over 300 titles are included in the top Amazon books of 2021 list, which spans twelve prominent genres, including biographies, children's books, romance, history, and literary fiction.

best Amazon Kindle and print books of 2021 so far

Great Circle

Maggie Shipstead

Marian and Jamie Graves, who were saved from a sinking ocean liner as newborns in 1914, are reared in Missoula, Montana, by their dissolute uncle.

A wealthy bootlegger sponsors Marian's flight training and equips her with a plane at the age of fourteen, an arrangement that would plague Marian for the rest of her life: flying across the world, passing over the North and South Poles.

Hadley Baxter has been cast as Marian in a film based on Marian's disappearance in Antarctica a century after her death. Hadley is eager to reclaim her identity after being ensnared in the cult notoriety of a romance film franchise.

Klara and the Sun

Kazuo Ishiguro

An Artificial Friend named Klara keeps an eye on both the people inside the store and those walking by on the street outside her window as they come and go, and this is the first novel by Kazuo Ishiguro that he has written after being named a Nobel laureate for literature. She hasn't given up hope that she'll get a customer soon.

The Code Breaker

Walter Isaacson

For anyone who enjoyed his previous bestsellers about Leonardo da Vinci and Steve Jobs, and who want to learn more about the groundbreaking work of Nobel laureate Jennifer Doudna and her colleagues, this is the book for you.

Doudna and her colleagues turned a natural curiosity into a technology that would revolutionize the human race: an easy-to-use tool that can edit DNA.. An acronym for Crispr, it ushered in a new age of medical wonders and moral quandaries.

With the advent of CRISPR and the race to develop coronavirus vaccines, we'll be well on our way to the next big wave of innovation. The last half-century has been a digital era, driven by microchips, computers, and the internet. We are now in the midst of a biotechnological revolution.

We Begin at the End

Chris Whitaker

At the age of thirteen, Duchess Day Radley proclaims herself an outlaw. In addition to protecting her 5-year-old brother, Robin, she serves as a mother to her mother, a single mother who is unable to care for herself.

Walk and Star were born and raised in the same little coastal town in California. He may now be the chief of police, but he's still trying to overcome the pain of testifying against his best friend, Vincent King, decades ago, which resulted in him serving time in prison. And he's doing everything he can to safeguard the Duchess and her younger brother from harm.

Vincent has been held captive for the past three decades and is finally being set free. And now that he's back, Duchess and Walk will have to deal with the consequences.

What’s Mine and Yours

Naima Coster

Piedmont residents are furious that a county plan is sending pupils from the primarily Black east side of town to predominantly white high schools in town's westernmost reaches.

There will be a twenty-year chain reaction that begins with the integration of two pupils, Gee and Noelle, and ends with the integration of their entire families.

Their paths cross in a school play intended to unite new and old students, bringing together two seemingly disparate families whose entanglements will have long-lasting effects on the course of their futures.

The Four Winds

Kristin Hannah

The year is 1921, and we are in the state of Texas. With so much to choose from. The Great War is ended, the land is ripe, and the United States is poised to embark on a new period of hope and prosperity.

However, the future looks gloomy for Elsa Wolcott, who is judged too old to marry at a period when marriage is a woman's sole choice. After meeting Rafe Martinelli, she makes a decision to improve her life. This means that she has just one legitimate choice left: marrying a man she has never met.

There are millions of people without jobs and the Great Plains are destroyed by a drought by 1934. Even Elsa's shaky marriage is on the verge of disintegrating on the Martinelli farm, and every day is a struggle to keep her children alive in the face of overwhelming natural forces.

Punch Me Up to the Gods

Brian Broome

As a young, dark-skinned Black guy growing up in Ohio with crushes on other boys, Brian Broome is introduced in Punch Me Up to the Gods as a bold new voice to watch.

A persistent outsider writhing awkwardly to find his way in, Brian's tales show a painful, amusing, and cringe-worthy journey. In order to heal his wounded adolescent psyche, he engages in increasingly risky sexual behavior and increasingly dangerous drug usage, often with disastrous results.

Our misfit's journey begins with a strict mother and a shattered father. In the narrative, Brian's voice conveys the actual depth of sensitivity for young Black males that is often close to bursting.

Gold Diggers

Sanjena Sathian

It's no secret that Neil Narayan is an intelligent and amusing second-generation Asian American youngster living in the Bush-era Atlanta suburbs. But the pressures of his family and his Asian American community weigh heavily on him. His desire for Anita Dayal, who lives across the cul-de-sac from him, is the only thing that matters to him.

A "lemonade" manufactured from stolen gold that channels the ambition of the gold's original owner is discovered by Neil, and he sees it as an opportunity to climb ahead.

The Plot

Jean Hanff Korelitz

Once upon a time, Jacob Finch Bonner was a bright young novelist with a well-received debut. For the past few years, the author has been teaching at a third-rate MFA program and battling to maintain his self-respect; he hasn't written anything good in years.

It's no surprise to Jake when Evan Parker, his most self-confident student, declares that he doesn't need Jake's help because the plot of his book in progress has already been written. When he hears the story, he's confused.

As Evan Parker's first novel is published, Jake returns to a downward track in his own career.

Chatter

Ethan Kross

Psychotherapist Ethan Kross examines our inner monologue in his book Chatter.

It is through these talks that Kross shows how our lives, work, and relationships are all influenced by the revolutionary behavioral and brain research from his own lab.

According to him, engaging in self-defeating and confusing self-talk, which he refers to as "chatter," is bad for our health, lowers our emotions, strains our social bonds, and makes us give in to pressure.

Malibu Rising

Taylor Jenkins Reid

In August 1983, Malibu, Calif. Nina Riva's annual end-of-summer bash is just around the corner, and everyone is getting antsy. There is no shortage of admiration for the Rivas family: Nina, a skilled surfer and supermodel; her brothers Jay and Hud, both professional surfers; and their adored infant sister, Kit.

Because of their famous father Mick Riva's legacy, the siblings have become a popular attraction in Malibu and around the world. Only Nina, who has never desired to be the center of attention, is looking forward to the biggest party of the year.

There's no telling what may happen once the clock strikes twelve o'clock. By the time you wake up, the Riva mansion will be a charred ruin.

The Other Black Girl

Zakiya Dalila Harris

Wagner Books editing assistant Nella Rogers, 26, is fed up with being the sole African-American employee. She's fed up with the isolation and microaggressions, so when Harlem-born and bred Hazel starts working next to her, she's overjoyed.

Hazel becomes the new Office Darling, and Nella is left in the dust. They've just just started comparing natural hair care regimens.

Then Nella's desk starts to fill up with notes like, "Leave Wagner." Now.

A angry message from Hazel would be hard to believe. In the end, Nella learns that more than her job is at danger as she spirals and obsessively investigates the evil forces at work.

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