Peace Corps service comes with a lot of free time. At the beginning of my service I read less because I was trying so hard to integrate into my community.
Now I am taking better care of my self by trying to worry less about the little work I have done in my community and read instead.
Reading has never been punishment to me, and I always strive to finish what I have started. I have a few lingering, unfinished books from 2017 that I need to work on, but otherwise, I read 45 books. My numbers surged at the end of the year as my lessons at school were canceled and I had more free time.
These were my favorites, in alphabetical order:
The 40 Rules of Love by Elif Shafak
American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis
Bel Canto by Ann Patchett
Born a Crime by Trevor Noah
The Boys in the Boat: Nine Americans and their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Olympis by Daniel James Brown
The Darling by Russel Banks
The Elephant Whisperer: My Life with the Herd in the African Wild by Lawrence Anthony
The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer by Siddhartha Mukherjee
Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond
Killing for Profit: Exposing the Illegal Rhino Horn Trade by Julian Rademeyer
The Long Walk to Freedom by Nelson Mandela
O’Mandingo! The Only Black at a Dinner Party by Eric Miyeni
Purple Hibiscus by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
For my complete list, click here.
For 2018, I would love to read just as much. And I am planning to read as much written by African authors as I can.
travelin' the globe 
Reading was one of my favorite past times in PC as well, and still is. Now that I am retired, I am able to read a lot more again. . I fell in love with Doris Lessing while in Senegal. If you can get her book of short stories set in southern Africa (I think it is called African Stories), I highly recommend it. She was raised in what was then Rhodesia and some of her stories and novels are set there. On the other hand, we obviously have different tastes, as the few of your favorites I have read I was less impressed with, and liked better some of the ones you did not list as favorites. Keep reading, and writing.
I will definitely see if I can find Lessing’s book. Thanks for the recommendation!