\nAmazon.com (NASDAQ: AMZN)– Today, Amazon announced 2020\u2019s Best Books of the Year<\/a>, selecting Brittany K. Barnett\u2019s \u201cA Knock at Midnight\u201d as the top pick. The inspiring true story is a brilliant memoir of Barnett\u2019s own journey navigating the criminal justice system, which also chronicles the stories of three of her clients. Their lives\u2014including their crimes, their families, and their jail time\u2014are rendered with such care and compassion that the Amazon Books Editors found it impossible to put down.\n<\/p>\n
\nThe process of choosing the Best Books of the Year begins the year prior, as the Amazon Books Editors begin debating the list for January\u2019s Best Books of the Month. The editors collectively read thousands of books each year in service of creating an editorially curated list and reviews each month. These monthly lists culminate in the Best Books of the Year, which includes an overall Top 100 for 2020 as well as top lists for individual genres like literature & fiction, mystery and thriller, children\u2019s books, cookbooks, food & wine, and young adult\u2014all to help customers find their next favorite book or thoughtful holiday gift pick.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cIt\u2019s been a year, and the editorial team set out to create a list that reflected what we\u2019ve collectively been experiencing, hearing and seeing in 2020, and also the books that gave us a welcome respite from the anxieties of the world,\u201d said Sarah Gelman, Editorial Director, Amazon Books. \u201cOur number one book practically chose itself. Brittany K. Barnett\u2019s empathetic and genre-bending \u2018A Knock at Midnight\u2019 provides a glimpse into the criminal justice system and the seemingly impossible path to freedom. This book is timely and powerful.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nBrittany K. Barnett adds, \u201cI am deeply grateful and honored that \u2018A Knock at Midnight\u2019 was chosen Best of the Year. This life has taken me on a remarkable journey \u2013 one that continues to transform my understanding of justice and the very definition of freedom itself. There are hundreds of thousands of Americans buried alive under unjust laws, and I hope this book draws attention to their plight and inspires people to take action to push for impactful change.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nFor Kindle readers, the most highlighted passage echoed Brittany\u2019s sentiment on how race and class impact our societal norms: \u201cOn the very first day of class, this dynamic, poised Black professor \u2013 my very first \u2013 laid out in the first moments as an inarguable premise something that by now I knew in my very bones: that race shaped all of our lives, brown, white, or Black, in both visible and invisible ways, and that our legal systems were inseparable from our sordid racial past.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cA Knock At Midnight\u201d joins other incredible titles from the last few years to receive the Best of the Year accolade, including Margaret Atwood\u2019s \u201cThe Testaments,\u201d David Grann\u2019s \u201cKillers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI,\u201d and Colson Whitehead\u2019s \u201cThe Underground Railroad.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nThe Amazon Books Editors Top 10 picks of 2020 are:\n<\/p>\n
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- A Knock at Midnight: A Story of Hope, Justice, and Freedom<\/a> by Brittany K. Barnett: At times, Barnett\u2019s memoir reads like page-turning crime fiction; at others, a galvanizing and redemptive portrait of a lawyer trying to defend Black lives that were never protected in the first place. Urgent, necessary, hopeful\u2014and a knockout read.\n<\/li>\n
- Migrations<\/a> by Charlotte McConaghy: Teeming with adventure, darkness, love, and loss, Migrations is a novel that\u2019s impossible to put down as you learn about the life of Franny Stone\u2014a sharp, flawed, and determined woman who will stop at nothing to regain what she\u2019s lost.\n<\/li>\n
- Blacktop Wasteland: A Novel<\/a> by S.A. Cosby: A pedal to the metal thriller about a retired getaway driver, caught between the rock of poverty and the hard place of Southern racism, who gambles on one last heist to get him ahead. Toggling between high-stakes action, and quiet\u2014even tender\u2014family scenes, this is Southern noir with heart.\n<\/li>\n
- Group<\/a> by Christie Tate: Tate was a summer intern at a law firm and top of her class, and yet her memoir opens with her sitting in her car alone, wishing someone would shoot her. Written with the gift of hindsight, Group is an honest, heart-breaking and hilarious look at reaching rock bottom and climbing your way back to life.\n<\/li>\n
- The Vanishing Half<\/a> by Brit Bennett: Ideal for book clubs, The Vanishing Half examines sisterhood, personal identity, starting fresh, and what it means to be Black (and white) in America. Bennett is known for creating taut family dramas, and like her brilliant debut, The Mothers, this novel shows just how strong the bonds of sisters are, even at their weakest.\n<\/li>\n
- Fifty Words for Rain<\/a> by Asha Lemmie: Set in post WWII Japan, this sweeping story about a love child left with her scandalized, and brutal, grandparents will have you rooting for its resilient heroine, Nori, who must summon the courage to assert her own identity and live life on her own terms. This is a debut you don’t want to miss.\n<\/li>\n
- Caste<\/a> by Isabel Wilkerson: Ten years after her award-winning The Warmth of Other Suns, Wilkerson argues that our entire social structure is built upon an unrecognized caste system. White people\u2014whether their ancestors were slave owners or abolitionists\u2014have been able to live and thrive under these set assumptions of inequality. This is a mind-expanding book.\n<\/li>\n
- The Girl with the Louding Voice<\/a> by Abi Dar\u00e9: In this rousing tale of courage and pluck, a 14-year-old Nigerian girl is sold into servitude by her father when her mother\u2014a proponent of education\u2014passes away. You will root for Adunni as she endeavors to escape her sorry\u2014and often harrowing\u2014lot, and applaud the kind strangers who buoy her efforts, and her spirits.\n<\/li>\n
- Memorial<\/a> by Bryan Washington: Memorial unfolds with depth, humor, and telling detail. Mike is a Japanese-American chef. His partner, Benson, is a Black daycare teacher. When Mike leaves Houston to visit his ailing father in Osaka, his mother comes to live with Benson. You will laugh, cry, and ask yourself: What makes a family?\n<\/li>\n
- Hidden Valley Road: Inside the Mind of an American Family<\/a> by Robert Kolker: A medical mystery story\u2014with twists and reveals to rival any thriller\u2014that shows how an all-American family was ravaged as an elusive, centuries-old mental illness caught and kept them in its crosshairs for decades.\n<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n
\nAuthors of the top three books\u2014Brittany K. Barnett, Charlotte McConaghy, and S.A. Cosby\u2014will come together for an Amazon Live Author Series conversation in celebration of the Best Books of the Year selection on November 19, 2020 at 12 PM PT. To tune in, visit Amazon Live<\/a>.\n<\/p>\n
\nFor more information on the books featured on the Best Books of the Year list, as well as insightful reviews on new books, author interviews, and hand-curated roundups in popular categories, visit the Amazon Book Review at www.amazon.com\/amazonbookreview<\/a>, and subscribe to the Amazon Book Review Podcast on Amazon Music, Apple<\/a> or TuneIn<\/a>. You can also follow the Books Editors recommendations and conversations @amazonbooks on Facebook<\/a>, Twitter<\/a>, and Instagram<\/a>.\n<\/p>\n
About Amazon<\/b><\/p>\n
\nAmazon is guided by four principles: customer obsession rather than competitor focus, passion for invention, commitment to operational excellence, and long-term thinking. Customer reviews, 1-Click shopping, personalized recommendations, Prime, Fulfillment by Amazon, AWS, Kindle Direct Publishing, Kindle, Fire tablets, Fire TV, Amazon Echo, and Alexa are some of the products and services pioneered by Amazon. For more information, visit www.amazon.com\/about<\/a> and follow @AmazonNews.\n<\/p>\n
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- Migrations<\/a> by Charlotte McConaghy: Teeming with adventure, darkness, love, and loss, Migrations is a novel that\u2019s impossible to put down as you learn about the life of Franny Stone\u2014a sharp, flawed, and determined woman who will stop at nothing to regain what she\u2019s lost.\n<\/li>\n
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