John Green's latest book is about two teenagers, Hazel and Augustus, who meet in a cancer support group. Spoilers in this case would be inappropriate, so I'll not go into any more detail.
The book is moving, amusing and frequently insightful. The characters are complex, memorable, and you like them enough to become invested in their struggles. Green has a way with a nicely turned phrase, but he still has the occasional attempt at profundity fall flat. Understandably it's not as laugh out loud funny as the last book of his I read (An Abundance of Katherines) but there's enough humour to leaven the subject matter and indeed a few nice in-jokes for those who follow the Green brothers on youtube.
Ultimately it feels like he gets at the truth of what it's like to have cancer and happen to be a teenager, which is no mean feat.
I would definitely recommend this book. I suspect it's going to stay with me for a long time.

For those that care, the signature in my copy is in blue sharpie.

Rating: A

The second Moist von Lipwig book is a very entertaining romp. Not as powerful or as moving as the very top echelon of Pratchett's work can be, but very much worth a read.
Previously reviewed in 2007 and 2009. This re-read was prompted by a showing of the Sky production of Going Postal over xmas. It's probably the best of all the Discworld adaptations so far, with the performance by Claire Foy as Adora Belle Dearheart a particular standout.

Rating: B+

The sequel to The Magicians.
If The Magicians was Grossman's deconstruction of The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe, then this is his Voyage of the Dawn Treader. Of course that doesn't really do either book justice, and is a real disservice to the quality of what Grossman does here.
He writes an excellent fantasy novel that is somehow simultaneously a love letter to the genre and a critical response to it.
The highlight of this book is Julia's back story, told in alternate chapters with the main plot.
I'd recommend this without hesitation to anyone who read The Magicians. Everyone else should go read that first book and then move on to this one.
I personally can't wait til the third book.

Rating: A

1. Low C'mon
2. Abigail Washburn City of Refuge
3. King Creosote & Jon Hopkins Diamond Mine
4. Eleanor Friedberger Last Summer
5. The War on Drugs Slave Ambient
6. St. Vincent Strange Mercy
7. Kurt Vile Smoke Ring For my Halo
8. The Decemberists The King is Dead
9. Gillian Welch The Harrow and Harvest
10. Le Butcherettes Sin Sin Sin
11. The Cowboy Junkies Demons
12. Bill Wells & Aidan Moffat Everything's Getting Older
13. The Mountain Goats All Eternals Deck
14. Elbow Build a Rocket Boys!
15. Bill Callahan Apocalypse
16. PJ Harvey Let England Shake
17. Driftless Pony Club Buckminster
18. Josh T Pearson Last of the Country Gentlemen
19. EMA Past Life Martyred Saints
20. The Antlers Burst Apart
21. R.E.M.. Collapse Into Now

C'mon is the Duluth band's best since "Things We Lost In The Fire", the album I listened to most in 2012 and a thoroughly deserving record the year. I feel like I should note that the Low album was at number two until I realised that the only reason I had the Abigail Washburn record on top (as good as it is) was due to her relative obscurity.
One other point - the list was going to be a top 20 until I decided that as a loyal R.E.M. fan for twenty years their final release really should be on here somewhere, even if there is only one track on Collapse Into Now that I really like.
You can find 18 of the these on this Spotify playlist unfortunately the Gillian Welch, Mountain Goats and Bill Callahan records aren't available.

Complete chronological list of books I read in 2011, with links to the original reviews

1. The Book of Basketball by Bill Simmons, rated A
2. A Princess of Roumania by Paul Park, rated A-
3. Passage by Connie Willis, rated B+
4. Among Others by Jo Walton, rated A+
5. It's Lovely To Be Here by James Yorkston, rated B
6. The Emigrants by W.G. Sebald, rated A
7. The Hell Of It All by Charlie Brooker, rated A-
8. Dying Inside by Robert Silverberg, rated A-
9. The Daughter of Time by Josephine Tey, rated B+
10. Fire and Hemlock by Diana Wynne Jones, rated A
11. Codex by Lev Grossman, rated B
12. Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone by J.K. Rowling, rated B+
13. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets by J.K. Rowling, rated B-
14. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban by J.K. Rowling, rated A-
15. How To Leave Twitter by Grace Dent, rated B
16. Bloodshot by Cherie Priest, rated B
17. Coffee At Luke's edited by Jennifer Crusie, rated C-
18. Snuff by Terry Pratchett, rated B+
19. Agent To The Stars by John Scalzi, rated A-
20. Fuzzy Nation by John Scalzi, rated B