Coming in ABA’s December Red Box: Bookmarks Featuring New York Times Book Review’s 10 Best Books of 2018

The American Booksellers Association’s December Red Box, mailing to 500 stores this month, will include a packet of 50 bookmarks with a design featuring the New York Times Book Review’s (NYTBR) picks for the 10 Best Books of 2018.

The 10 best books of the year were narrowed down by the Times Book Review’s editors from an earlier list of the 100 Notable Books of the Year.

“We are thrilled to announce our list of Best Books of 2018,” Pamela Paul, editor of The New York Times Book Review, told Bookselling This Week. “These are books that we think are not only of the moment, but books that transcend the moment. And we are delighted to share these bookmarks with independent bookstores across the country, whose work bringing books to readers we are delighted to support.”

The books on this year’s list, which include two Indie Next List number-one picks, are:

Fiction

• The Great Believers by Rebecca Makkai (Viking)
• Washington Black by Esi Eduygan (Knopf)
• The Perfect Nanny by Leila Slimani (Penguin)
• Asymmetry by Lisa Halliday (Simon & Schuster)
• There There by Tommy Orange (Knopf) *June 2018 Indie Next List number-one pick

Nonfiction

• American Prison by Shane Bauer (Penguin Press)
• How to Change Your Mind by Michael Pollan (Penguin Press)
• Small Fry by Lisa Brennan-Jobs (Grove)
• Educated by Tara Westover (Random House) *March 2018 Indie Next List number-one pick
• Frederick Douglass by David W. Blight (Simon & Schuster)

This year, for the first time, the New York Times announced its 10 best books at a live taping of The Book Review podcast on November 29 at the Greene Space in Manhattan. During the taping, Paul spoke about each selection with a panel of NYT Books Desk editors, including John Williams, Lauren Christensen, Greg Cowles, Tina Jordan, Emily Aiken, and Gal Beckerman.

Below is a sample of the front and back sides of the New York Times’ 2018 bookmark pictured next to one another.