All through the year I’ve reviewed books I thought “best,” including Cyndi Sand-Eveland’s “A Tinfoil Sky,” Priscilla Maltbie and Daniel Miyares’s “Bambino and Mr. Twain,” Rachel Vail and Matthew Cordell’s “Justin Case: Shells, Smells and the Horrible Flip-flops of Doom,” and Claire A. Nivola’s “Life in the Ocean: The Story of Oceanographer Sylvia Earle.” Here, at the 11th hour of 2012, are a few I couldn’t bear to leave behind.