Which is the correct alternative?
I have a little doubt concerning Russian language: a friend of mine asked me how I would translate the sentence "Yesterday I finished reading Жизнь и судьба" into Russian.
I would say: "Вчера я закончила Жизнь и судьба", whereas my friend would use the verb кончить - "Вчера я кончила Жизнь и судьба".
I looked both verbs up in a dictionary, and кончить actually seems to be right; however, закончить sounds better to me.

Question

Which is the correct alternative?
I have a little doubt concerning Russian language: a friend of mine asked me how I would translate the sentence "Yesterday I finished reading Жизнь и судьба" into Russian.
I would say: "Вчера я закончила Жизнь и судьба", whereas my friend would use the verb кончить -> "Вчера я кончила Жизнь и судьба".
I looked both verbs up in a dictionary, and кончить actually seems to be right; however, закончить sounds better to me.

Answer

Вчера я закончила читать "Жизнь и судьба".

Вчера я дочитала "Жизнь и судьба".

Answer

Вчера я закончила читать "Жизнь и судьба"

Answer

that's right ))
bear in mind that "кончить" in modern Russian has the same embarrassing connotation as "to come" in English
200-100 years ago it would be perfectly normal to say "Я кончила читать книгу".  Pushkin would say like this. Even now some people of older generation would say like this.
But you beware ^__^

Answer

After all I think that the best variant is: 
Вчера я дочитала книгу "Жизнь и судьба".

Answer

Я закончила "Жизнь и судьба" (судьба in the Nominative) sounds unnatural, and it's strange to me that you all write this variant above. A Russian would definitely say: Я закончила/дочитала "Жизнь и судьбУ" (both in the accusative case).