More than 100,000 members have spoken, and the Book of the Month 2017 Book of the Year is The Heart's Invisible Furies by John Boyne. The book was chosen by judge Liberty Hardy as a Book of the Month selection for August 2017, and it was clearly a hit with readers.
Best known for his 2006 novel The Boy in the Striped Pajamas, Irish author John Boyne has written 16 books, including five novels for children and a short-story collection. In The Heart's Invisible Furies, Boyne centers on Cyril Avery: an Irishman born to an unwed teenager and adopted by a well-to-do couple in Dublin. The novel follows Cyril for 70 years, from 1945 to 2015, as he wrestles with his identity and sexuality through a period of great social upheaval.
As the author of the 2017 Book of the Year, Boyne will receive $10,000 from Book of the Month, and The Heart's Invisible Furies will be re-issued "in a special limited edition rose gold jacket, available exclusively to Book of the Month members," according to Penguin Random House. The publisher calls Boyne's novel "big, bawdy, and brimming with heart," which sounds like exactly the sort of book that should kick off your 2018 reading list.
In addition to being Book of the Month's 2017 Book of the Year, The Heart's Invisible Furies was also nominated for two other awards: the 2018 Andrew Carnegie Medal for Fiction and the 2017 Goodreads Choice Award for Historical Fiction. Unfortunately, The Heart's Invisible Furies did not win either prize. The Andrew Carnegie Medal for Fiction will go to two of the three shortlisted titles — Manhattan Beach by Jennifer Egan, Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders, and Sing, Unburied, Sing by Jesmyn Ward — on Feb. 11. Lisa Wingate's Before We Were Yours won the 2017 Goodreads Choice Award for Historical Fiction.
If you want to help choose Book of the Month's 2018 Book of the Year, you can start by joining up today. For $15 per month — at most! — you can receive one of five hardcovers, handpicked by the fantastic judges and guest judges, delivered right to your door. Add on extra books for $9.99 each, or snag yourself a tote bag for $10. Don't like any of the books the judges have selected? Just skip this month within the first six days and your subscription will last for another round of reading fun. Just be sure to add John Boyne's The Heart's Invisible Furies as an extra book with your next box, because you can't miss out on reading Book of the Month's 2017 Book of the Year.
