favourite books of 2006

I started looking over my book posts to see if I could pick some of my favourites to give to people for Christmas, but in the end, I didn't think anyone I know in real life would appreciate them. Or, I would be worried about what my choice of book would be revealing about me, since the books are mostly ones about disturbed people in which I recognised parts of myself.
I think being able to share book recommendations seems like a good thing to aspire to for friendship. How do I make friends like that in real life? Alternatively, all of you who have good taste in books and don't already live here could just move so that we can hang out in person :)

My criteria for picking these books were not so much based on which are best in some objective sense or which ones I think you should read, but more about how hard I would find it to leave them behind in a bookshop, even if I already owned a copy. (And yet, I don't actually own any of them...) It's harder to love a non-fiction book that much so my list is entirely fiction. Sensing the Self would be the one I might want to own, but I still prefer to recognise myself in made-up people, I guess.
Some people seem to want to be told one specific book to read, which I can't do for fiction. My non-fiction pick would be Word Freak, but that's not going to help those who've already read it, sorry.

Overall, I read 120 books this year (one last book post still to come), so this is my top 10% or so. They're not really in any order, except possibly the first one. Links go to my post about the book, except for Middlesex, because I still haven't posted what I wrote about it...

The Bone People by Keri Hulme
Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson
My Sister's Continent by Gina Frangello
The Boy Detective Fails by Joe Meno
Salmon Doubts by Adam Sacks
The Thin Place by Kathryn Davis
The Little Friend by Donna Tartt
Black Swan Green by David Mitchell
Juniper Tree Burning by Goldberry Long
Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides
The Keep by Jennifer Egan

Update: Jeremy, who has posted his single-book recommendations, would like me to warn you to skip the second last page of The Boy Detective Fails, if you read it. I didn't hate that page, myself. It was kind of weird, but I thought it was kind of cute, anyway.

Also, I forgot to thank the people who recommended many of my favourites. Thanks to Phantom for The Bone People, Shrinky for The Boy Detective Fails, The Little Friend and Juniper Tree Burning (plus several runners-up) and Bookslut for My Sister's Continent, The Thin Place and The Keep!