Flavorwire

It’s the end of the year, which means every media outlet and talkative friend has been regaling you with a fascinating list of their own personal favorite books of 2011. Now, we love lists as much as the next guy, but we also like to think a little bit about what these highly subjective choices might say about the listmaker. After all, you wouldn’t take reading advice from just anybody, now would you? Or even if you would, you should at least know what essential qualities their picks point to. Click through to read our (decidedly tongue-in-cheek) breakdown of what your favorite book of the year says about you, and in case you were wondering, our pick is on here too, and hey, we can cop to it.

The Art of Fielding, Chad Harbach
Guys who are really just waiting for the next Franzen novel.

Swamplandia!, Karen Russell
Manic pixie dream girls…and their moms.

It Chooses You, Miranda July
Future hoarders and aspiring cat ladies.

The Marriage Plot, Jeffrey Eugenides
English majors who secretly want to be the Next Great American Novelist.

The Pale King, David Foster Wallace
English majors who have told you forty times that they want to be the Next Great American Novelist.

House of Holes, Nicholson Baker
Articulate pervs.

Leaving the Atocha Station, Ben Lerner
Dudes who troll independent bookstores on the weekdays.

Zone One, Colson Whitehead
Video game addicts whose girlfriends keep nagging them to read something.

The Magician King, Lev Grossman
People who were weirdly attracted to Harry Potter characters.

The Last Werewolf, Glen Duncan
Heavily chastised ex-Twilight junkies who need just. One. More. Hit.

Pulphead, John Jeremiah Sullivan
Intellectuals who like The Real World.

1Q84, Haruki Murakami
Girls who desperately want a certain kind of surreal magic to exist in the world.

The Psychopath Test, Jon Ronson
People who wonder if they’re psychopaths.

420 Characters, Lou Beach
Art-world hipsters with short attention spans.

The Family Fang, Kevin Wilson
Die-hard Wes Anderson fans.

The Tragedy of Arthur, Arthur Phillips
That one girl who is always relating things to Shakespeare and then looking around and judging everyone who didn’t get it.

11/22/63, Stephen King
Dads who used to be cooler than you.

And So It Goes. Kurt Vonnegut: A Life, Charles J. Shields
Dads who are still cooler than you.

The Tiny Book of Tiny Stories, Joseph Gordon-Levitt
Girls who really, really loved 500 Days of Summer. Like, really loved.

Long, Last, Happy: New and Collected Stories, Barry Hannah
Writers.

The Angel Esmeralda, Don DeLillo
Purists.

The Swerve: How the World Became Modern, Stephen Greenblatt
Sensitive history buffs.

A Dance With Dragons, George R.R. Martin
Hard-core fantasy nerds, and the fastest readers on the subway.

Bossypants, Tina Fey
Hilarious ladies and the ladies who want to be them.

Steve Jobs, Walter Isaacson
Guys who use the phrase “PC Weenies.”

The Tiger’s Wife, Téa Obreht
Slaves to fashion.

Woolgathering, Patti Smith
People who would really rather be dreaming than having this conversation right now.

Blue Nights, Joan Didion
The same people who think it’s healthy to go see Greek tragedies in the winter.

The Night Circus, Erin Morgenstern
People who live to hear about the Next Big Thing before anyone else.

Parallel Stories, Peter Nádas
Show-offs.