Now you can often hear the sarcastic opinion that soon the inhabitants of the Earth will forget how to read. Of course, this is not so. People still read a lot, only these days the ball is ruled not by paper, but by electronic devices. Although what's the difference? Yes, the reading format has changed, but the form is not as important as the content. And with the content, I must say, there are no problems - worthy works are published every year, and readers only need to track them. But with this, difficulties may arise. Unfortunately, there are no popular advertising of publications and mass book criticism in our country, so it is sometimes difficult for people to understand which works are worth paying attention to.
Rating of Russia. Fiction
In this review, we will highlight the most popular books of 2014 in our country, so that you have what to look for when choosing printed materials for reading. Agree that a bad thing is unlikely to become known, because human rumor in any case will spread information about its quality. Therefore, we included in the list of popular books only the most sensational works of the past year in the literary world. They will be an excellent choice for those who are wondering what to read at their leisure.
1. “50 shades of gray”
This scandalous novel created by the English writer E.L. James last year became the undisputed sales leader in the Russian fiction market. The book was published in Russian by Eksmo Publishing House. The work tells the story of the relationship between entrepreneur Christian Gray and university graduate Anastacia Steel, teeming with erotic scenes. The frank content and sales data, indicating that the lion's share among buyers were women over thirty years of age, led to the fact that the book in the press was dubbed "mother's porn." An impressive part of the audience was made up of students and teenage girls. Many critics who wrote reviews of popular books to read, found the creation of E. L. James rather controversial. But such opinions did not affect sales in any way, and in 2014, “50 shades of gray” were sold out in millions of copies. Such popularity marked the film adaptation of the work - on February 13, 2015, it is expected to release a movie shot from the book.
2. “Russian canary. Zheltukhin »
In second place in our ranking is the first part of the family saga written by Dina Rubina. This is a stormy and colorful novel, telling about the history of a many-sided family, about the amazing interweaving of fates over distances and years. In the work, Alma-Ata, Odessa and Israel are inextricably linked. We are talking about two genera, united by one little bird, a young man with unique singing talent and a deaf girl with unlimited inner freedom. This is both an exciting detective story and a deep drama about the maestro and his descendants.
3. “Russian canary. Vote"
The third line of the ranking is occupied by the second part of the Rubin trilogy - the continuation of an intricate espionage-detective story, consisting of closely interwoven stories of two completely different, but connected by one common secret families from Odessa and Almaty, which went through all the twists and turns of the twentieth century. It is not surprising that the most popular books of 2014 are presented by Dina Rubina’s novels, because her piercing and deep syllable touches the thinnest soul strings.
4. The "cloister"
This is a work of Zakhar Prilepin dedicated to Solovki - an archipelago in the White Sea. The book draws a wide canvas with clear traces of the past and glimpses of the future, with dozens of heroes - this is a whole life that fit in one fall. In the Solovetsky Lake, as in a mirror, against the backdrop of a dramatic love story, the tragic story of a whole country with its pain, blood, hatred was reflected. The novel "The Abode" weaves into a ball the majestic nature and human fate, where it is no longer possible to distinguish executioners from victims. Zakhar Prilepin created a very strong work on the boundaries of personal human freedom and the degree of physical abilities, which could not go unnoticed, so the novel was included in the rating “Most Popular Books of 2014”.
5. “Inferno”
Another mystical blockbuster Dan Brown is located on the fifth line of our top 10. While professional critics researching popular reading books seek out inaccuracies and factual errors from the author, ordinary readers enthusiastically solve the mysteries of the past with the protagonist of the novel, art historian Robert Langdon. This time, a historian with a Harvard diploma is waiting for an interesting trip to the Apennine Peninsula, where he will plunge into the world of the mysterious "Divine Comedy" created by Dante Alighieri. The work will once again present readers with everything that they loved Dan Brown’s previous popular books for: codes, symbols, and, of course, a mystery, the disclosure of which determines the fate of all mankind.
6. “Blame the stars”
On the sixth line, as opposed to heroic mysticism, is John Green's romantic drama, which tells of a piercing love story, which nonetheless did not have a happy ending. The fact that this work was included in the rating of “Most Popular Books of 2014” is explained by the recent film adaptation, which caused a new round of fame. The plot of the novel is tied to one of the most tragic phenomena of our time - the lives of adolescents who have cancer. Hazel, a 17-year-old girl, has been suffering from a severe form of cancer for several years. She miraculously manages to survive, but now she is forever deprived of the opportunity to breathe on her own. Hazel does not go to college, suffers from depression and is in the world of her own fantasies. But once an event happens that completely changes her life, the girl meets Augustus. The first tender feelings are born in the hearts of young people, and all this happens against the backdrop of an impending Damocles sword, because cancer almost never recedes irrevocably.
7. “Fiery finger”
Popular books of 2014 are also represented by a collection of three novels authored by Boris Akunin, or Grigory Chkhartishvili (this is the real name of the writer). The action of the works takes place in different eras. So, the first story introduces the reader to the Byzantine scout possessing superpowers, who lived in the ninth century AD, who travels in pagan Russia. The second story tells of a heroine who lived at a time when rivalry between the dilapidated Byzantium and Kievan Rus was observed. The third story takes the reader to an era when Russia was fragmented into principalities. And, of course, the works could not do without love!
8. "Call of the cuckoo"
We all know the popular books of Joan Rowling, but Call of the Cuckoo was the author’s first creation, written in the detective genre using the pseudonym Robert Galbraith. This is an amazing story, tied to the mysterious death of the model. At first glance, the cause of the death of the girl is known - she fell from the balcony, but the former military, and now private detective Cormoran Strike, intuition suggests that it is not so simple.
9. “One Hundred Years of the Way”
Detective Tatyana Ustinova, telling the story of the first Russian State Duma against a background of mysterious conflicts and love twists and turns, turned out to be quite specific, so to speak, for an amateur. But there were many such lovers, so the work “One Hundred Years of the Way” earned its place in the ranking of “Popular Books of 2014”.
10. “To Kill a Mockingbird”
This novel was first published back in 1960, but the hype surrounding it still does not subside. The work is recognized as one of the best in the twentieth century, its author, the American writer Harper Lee, received a Pulitzer Prize for it. The action takes place in Alabama in the 30s of the last century, when the USA was going through difficult times of the Great Depression, aggravation of interracial and social conflicts. The story is told on behalf of a girl nicknamed Glazastic. The book shows the world with children's eyes, covers eternal questions from the perspective of a sincere and immediate child. This work on human freedom and injustice today is especially relevant in view of the exacerbation of the problems of violence and xenophobia. This is probably why the novel “To Kill a Mockingbird", written more than 50 years ago, was so in demand by readers in 2014 and entered the list of "Popular books of the year."
Non-fiction
According to the ratings of sales in Russian bookstores among printed materials from the non-fiction series, the leader was History of the Russian State. From the origins to the Mongol invasion. " Its author is Boris Akunin, already mentioned by us, who has an amazing talent for writing popular scientific books with an easy-to-understand language and a language far from the scientific dryness of presentation.
Three works by Paola Volkova, a famous art historian, from the five-volume series “The Bridge Through the Abyss” were in demand in the past year. These popular books are a literary cycle of art history programs, the third volume of the series devoted to the theme of children's painting being the most famous.
The leader in sales was also taken by the practical directory of the hereditary doctor Alexander Myasnikov, which gave advice on how to lead a healthy lifestyle. The book was published under the title “How to live longer than 50 years. A private conversation with a doctor about medicines and medicine. ” The 2014 popular books on health are represented by two more works by this famous writing physician: “Russian Roulette. How to survive in the fight for your own health "and" On the most important thing with Dr. Myasnikov. "
Among the most bought books in 2014, one cannot fail to note the social anti-utopia “Atlas Shrugged”, created by Russian American Ain Rand. This is a novel combining realism and fantasy, in which each part is entitled according to the laws of formal logic. It took the author twelve years to write the work. Many economists and philosophers researching popular science books call the novel a “textbook on the theory of public choice.”
Best Sellers Abroad
The UK Guilty Stars book, which we already talked about above, leads the UK's fiction ranking. Also among the British in 2014, the children's work A Terrible Aunt, written by David Walliams, was popular. It tells the story of how Aunt Alberta seeks to rob a young girl, Stella Saxby, the heiress of a wealthy family. Popular books among Russians and British are often the same, and the Inferno novel widely distributed in Russia in the UK is also on the first positions in the sales list.
In the USA in 2014, readers most often purchased the work “Diary of a Wimp: The Long Road”. This book was recognized as the most popular among elementary school students. The detective novel "Gray Mountain" by John Grisham was also in demand. In third place in the ranking of the most read books in 2014 among Americans, the detective "Hoping to Die," written by James Patterson, was entrenched .