No doubt some of you spotted the item in your newsfeeds: a recent article noting that both Amazon and Publisher’s Weekly have already produced their lists of the Best Books of 2014, despite the fact that the year still has two months to go. This is of course both canny and craven; on the one hand, such lists are perennially popular, and the early bird gets the worm, and on the other hand, why not publish the thing this early? After all, the whole world basically shuts down from Thanksgiving to New Year’s Day, right? What with holidays and family and traveling and obnoxiously yelling into cellphones in airports, amiright? Who can expect to get any reading – come on, get real – done in those weeks? The thinking is obviously pandemic, since these big-name entries join a very long list of such lists already published for poor deathwatched 2014.

They serve their purpose, such lists, but as long-time followers of Stevereads will know, their main purpose is as dress rehearsals for the Main Event, the Real Deal, the rollicking Ragnarok of Year-End Book Lists.

I refer, of course, to the annual Stevereads Best – and Worst – Books of the Year, now in its eighth year.

This year the Stevereads list will be bigger than ever, and also – in response to requests from you harried gift-shoppers out there – it’ll be earlier, well in time for the holidays instead of kicking off just as they’re ending. I’ve read more books so far in 2014 than in any previous year of my life, and that tally already is considerbly higher than most whole book departments at some media outlets, let alone most individual reviewers. I’ll be putting the gleanings of all that reading at your disposal in only three weeks.

Emphasis on “so far”! In all of my Stevereads Year-End categories, I’m leaving a spot or two open until the last minute. I get an average of ten books in the mail every day (sometimes fewer, yes, but also sometimes twice that), and although most of them have been 2015 items for a while now, there are still plenty of 2014 candidates in all subjects. I’m busily, happily reading all these jonny-come-latelies, and I’m leaving spots open for great (and crappy) books I didn’t see coming. No cutting out early for MY readers!

Can you feel the approaching hoofbeats? I’ve got LOTS of picks to share with all of you, so I thought a friendly reminder was in order!