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Cover of Second Place by Rachel CuskSecond Place
New · Fiction, Romance, Contemporary

Second Place

by Rachel Cusk
2021 · 192 pages · Fiction
Critics' pick
≈ 5 hours to read · about 10 days at 30 minutes a day

By the numbers

56.2Must-Read Score
  • Readers6 out of 100 · counts 42%
  • Critics37 out of 100 · counts 34% (its stronger lane)
  • Bestseller14 out of 100 · counts 14%
  • Buzz19 out of 100 · counts 10%

Critics and Bestseller are two ways to earn a place: a book's stronger one counts more. Buzz rewards recent bestseller weeks and prizes, so older books start at zero. The parts combine into the Must-Read Score, shown on a scale where the best book we found scores 99 and the last book to make the ranking scores 50.

Where it ranks

Why it made the list

Shortlisted
NBCC Award (Fiction) finalist (2021)Booker Prize longlist (2021)

Reads as

Epic

How we rank

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