booklit

As the year ends with an unexpected reading slump, I know that I’m not going to get any new books written up before the end of the year, so feel that I can list my top ten reads for 2008.

Here are my picks from 2008’s reading, by year of inital publication. There’s no fixed criteria, other than that I enjoyed them or can’t get them out of my head - usually both.

• Doctor Glas, Hjalmar Söderberg (1905)
• A Swedish classic that lets us into the unreliable mind of the eponymous doctor revealing, through the entries in his diary, a love triangle that leads to murder and deals with a number of issues that today, over a hundred years on, are still remarkably relevant.

• The Invention Of Morel, Adolfo Bioy Casares (1940)
• A small slice of science fiction from Argentina, by a friend and collaborator of Jorge Luis Borges. Slight in page count, the book creates an intriguing mystery surrounding the strange inhabitants of an island the narrator, a fugitive from the law, has found himself on. For fans of the TV show Lost, this novel is a must-read, given the parallels in plot and its appearance in one episode.

• The Catcher In The Rye, J.D. Salinger (1951)
• The most famous novel from one of America’s most famous recluses. While I thought I may be late in discovering this novel, given that there was the underlying suspicion it’s best read at a more impressionable age, I was impressed by the strength of its narrator. Yes, he’s a whiny, spoilt brat, but it’s no reason not to enjoy the book.

• Pedro Páramo, Juan Rulfo (1955)
• A fascinating and concise story from one of the Spanish language’s greatest writers. Even though he published next to nothing, Rulfo dared to play with structure and, in doing so, ushered in magical realism. The novel is told in a series of fleeting whispers that are, with a first read, disorientating and bewildering; and, on rereading, amazingly coherent, despite a seemingly scattered approasch to tense, perspective, and chronology.

• Goodbye, Columbus, Philip Roth (1959)
• Having resolved to read the works of Philip Roth in order of publication, this first novel, more a novella, proved an enjoyable experience. An apprentice piece, to be sure, unhampered by Roth’s later alter-egos, but tightly structured and not without a fair share of emotion. It also comes with five short stories, a singular occurence in his fifty years of writing.

• Terra Amata, J.M.G. Le Clézio (1968)
• This year’s Nobel laureate, having been rushed back into print, had me fascinated from start to finish in this novel about a man looking back at his life and realising all that he missed within it. It can be a touch overpowering at times but the sensory overload it provides is certainly memorable and the experimental style makes me keen to read more.

• Metropole, Ferenc Karinthy (1970)
• A haunting novel, translated to English this year, that follows a linguist’s futile efforts to communicate with the people of a sprawling metropolis. Little reviewed at the time, it may yet take its place among the classics (Kafka’s The Trial and Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four are suggested on the cover), and has recently been longlisted as one of Three Percent’s Best Translated Books of 2008.

• 1933 Was A Bad Year, John Fante (1985)
• There is a punchy humour to Fante’s prose that makes him a joy to read and in 1933 Was A Bad Year, he shows it off to great effect. Set in Depression-era America, it follows one boy’s coming of age, having to choose between the harsh realities of life and chasing a dream.

• The Death Of The Author, Gilbert Adair (1992)
• As any reader of booklit knows, I’m a fan of Gilbert Adair and was over the moon to learn this book, so long out of print, was being given a new lease of life, thanks to Melville House’s Contemporary Art of the Novella series. It didn’t disappoint - not only for its spoofing of academia and literary criticism, but because it provided one of the best twists-in-the-tale I’ll probably ever read.

• The Mirror In The Well, Micheline Aharonian Marcom (2008)
• On the surface, it may seem like a stream of consciousness where every second word is designed to shock and offend, but dig underneath its sordid surface and there emerges a story that has Biblical echoes as well as the birth of the United States through immigration.

There are some notable mentions, mostly those I read but didn’t get around to posting about. I’m sad to say that, of those books, two would easily slot into my top ten, ousting both Philip Roth’s Goodbye, Columbus and J.M.G. Le Clézio’s Terra Amata. These are Joseph O’Neill’s Netherland and Anthony Burgess’ A Clockwork Orange, the latter even making a notional top three, alongside Adair’s The Death Of The Author and Söderberg’s Doctor Glas.

Now, with 2008 wrapped up, see you in 2009. Have a happy new year.

Erica Wagner, in the Times, announced a list of the greatest post-war British writers as a nice way of seeing in the new year with a discussion that’s certain to provoke all round disagreement, due to notable inclusions and exclusions. As usual with these sort of things there’s the element that don’t read the main article, something that would save them the time and effort of asking why Evelyn Waugh and Graham Greene haven’t been included.

For me, it’s an interesting list as it brings a few new names to mind and also acts as a spur to get around to reading a number of others. However, some of those new names being poets, I won’t be rushing in. Of the seven post-war Nobel Laureates in literature that Britain has, three of them make an appearance in this list. I have a disagreement with the the inclusion of Derek Walcott, a Saint Lucian, as, if they are going to consider someone from a Commonwealth nation as British, then they need to consider all Commonwealth nations and I’m sure we’d see the landscape of this list changed somewhat, as the Indians, Australians, and more take their place.

Wagner explains how the list came to be:

You might begin by asking how we came up with our half-hundred; and the order in which we placed them. Because there is no scientific method for making such a list in the correct order, we applied no scientific method. But we considered a number of factors — sheer quality of writing, longevity, lasting impact and, naturally, commercial success.

That latter point ensures J.K. Rowling a place on the list but not, as some commenting bemoan, Terry Pratchett. While I’m not a fan, he at leasts boasts longevity, too. Tolkien I can understand, despite being bored by his The Fellowship Of The Ring and abandoning the quest and going home. But Ian Fleming? Ian Fleming! I honestly believe that it’s the Bond film franchise that has kept his books in print, as, having read some, I’ve never had anything special to report.

But, I suppose, whittling down over fifty years of writing and hundreds of writers to a top fifty is never going to be an easy task and nobody is ever going to be happy. Here’s the list, with links to a short biography on the Times website:

01. Philip Larkin
02. George Orwell
03. William Golding
04. Ted Hughes
05. Doris Lessing
06. J. R. R. Tolkien
07. V. S. Naipaul
08. Muriel Spark
09. Kingsley Amis
10. Angela Carter
11. C. S. Lewis
12. Iris Murdoch
13. Salman Rusdie
14. Ian Fleming
15. Jan Morris
16. Roald Dahl
17. Anthony Burgess
18. Mervyn Peake
19. Martin Amis
20. Anthony Powell
21. Alan Sillitoe
22. John Le Carré
23. Penelope Fitzgerald
24. Philippa Pearce
25. Barbara Pym
26. Beryl Bainbridge
27. J. G. Ballard
28. Alan Garner
29. Alasdair Gray
30. John Fowles
31. Derek Walcott
32. Kazuo Ishiguro
33. Anita Brookner
34. A. S. Byatt
35. Ian McEwan
36. Geoffrey Hill
37. Hanif Kureshi
38. Iain Banks
39. George Mackay Brown
40. A. J. P. Taylor
41. Isaiah Berlin
42. J. K. Rowling
43. Philip Pullman
44. Julian Barnes
45. Colin Thubron
46. Bruce Chatwin
47. Alice Oswald
48. Benjamin Zephaniah
49. Rosemary Sutcliff
50. Michael Moorcock

And here’s another list, also from the Times, telling us who they left off:

Peter Ackroyd, Simon Armitage, Pat Barker, Stan Barstow, Antony Beevor, William Boyd, Malcolm Bradbury, John Braine, Basil Bunting, Jonathan Coe, Robert Conquest, William Dalrymple, Richard Dawkins, Margaret Drabble, Carol Ann Duffy, Lawrence Durrell, D.J. Enright, Sebastian Faulks, J.G. Farrell, Thom Gunn, Alan Hollinghurst, Nick Hornby, W.G. Hoskins, Howard Jacobson, P.D. James, B.S. Johnson, Hermione Lee, Penelope Lively, David Lodge, Michael Longley, Olivia Manning, Hilary Mantel, Roger McGough, David Mitchell, Brian Moore, Michael Morpurgo, P.H. Newby, Andrew O’Hagan, Christopher Priest, Kathleen Raine, Ian Rankin, Ruth Rendell, Andrew Roberts, Paul Scott, Tom Sharpe, Iain Sinclair, Ali Smith, Zadie Smith, David Storey, Graham Swift, E.P. Thompson, Rose Tremain, William Trevor, Barry Unsworth, Sarah Waters, Fay Weldon, Raymond Williams, Angus Wilson, Jeanette Winterson

They must be bored.

I sometimes feel that best of lists come too early and in the case of picking a best of list for 2007, many book bloggers seem to have compiled theirs already. I’m always optimistic that the next read will be a perfect ten, and with that in mind I’ve held off until the year was over and no more reading could be done. The following, in no particular order, are my picks from 2007’s reading; not 2007’s publications.

The Ice Palace, Tarjei Vesaas
“…a subtle gem, extremely unassuming, and, while it will no doubt mean different things to different people, they will all agree that it means something to them.”

Gents, Warwick Collins
“… a novel that is perfect for reading over a single sitting. So enjoyable is it, that its chapters fly by, but its true strength is in its subtlety - it gets its ideas across without shouting, and does so in style.”

The Welsh Girl, Peter Ho Davies

“…a huge surprise how assured and confident the author is with his material, with his characters, and with the questions he asks of his novel.”

Watch Me Disappear, Jill Dawson

“…the narrative is carried well by an efficient narrator who never once loses the thread of their story, which is one of sexual awakenings set around the need to confront the past .”

The Redemption Of Elsdon Bird, Noel Virtue

“…packs a lot in, its themes popping up and recurring as life develops and then disintegrates…a novel that will delight and horrify in equal measure, it’s worth making a necessity of this Virtue.”

Animal’s People, Indra Sinha

“…on the surface it follows one man’s journey in understanding his humanity, its concerns are greater in scope, using Animal to focus on issues such as poverty, religion, and corruption without being didactic.”

The Devil In The Flesh, Raymond Radiguet

“…an accomplished piece of fiction, its all too believable story enhanced with a remarkable wisdom and punctuated with images that capture the essence of a doomed relationship…”

Gold, Blaise Cendrars

“…accomplished, sifting through history and returning only the worthwhile nuggets, rich in detail…prose style is pacy, the narrative racing along as quick as the Gold Rush itself no doubt happened.”

I Could Read The Sky, Timothy O’Grady, Steve Pyke

“…a work of art that accurately captures the exile’s experience through prose and photography. It’s a slim volume but that’s only because each picture is ample replacement for a thousand words. ”

A Tragic Honesty: The Life And Works Of Richard Yates, Blake Bailey

Sadly, no review, having read this prior to starting booklit.

Some more best of 2007 lists can be found at the following blogs:

• Asylum: Twelve From The Shelves: My Books Of 2007
  
• Book Chase: Final Top 15 Reads Of 2007
• dovegreyreader scribbles: These I have loved…fiction
• Kingfisher Scrapbook: The End Of The Affair
• Lizzy’s Literary Life: 10 Of The Best From 2007
• Other Stories: Top 10 Of 2007
  
• Reading Matters: Top 10s: My Favourite Fiction Reads For 2007
• So Many Books: 2007 Reading Stats
• Tales From The Reading Room: Best Books Of 2007
  
• The Millions: A Year In Reading

Happy New Year!

I’m going to try something a little different with booklit in 2008, as I’m aware that depending on the book I’m reading, a considerable number of days can pass with little-to-no activity. That, and I feel I could add more than just reviews to the blogosphere. So, with that in mind, I’m going to do something I don’t tend to do: a reading challenge.

I was browsing the internet recently, looking for literary lists. Of those that I found the one that intrigued most was one called 1,001 Books You Must Read Before You Die. It’s a compilation of all the titles mentioned in a book titled, would you believe, 1,001 Books You Must Read Before You Die - although in the book there’s three hundred word summaries of the books in question so that, should you not be inspired to read through all 1,001, you’ll at least feel as if you’ve read them.

(Buy from Amazon: UK | US)

Looking over the list, as a bibliophile, it’s certainly debatable as to whether some of these books you must read before you die. I’ve read The Curious Incident Of The Dog In The Night-Time by Mark Haddon, for example, and wouldn’t consider it sane to include it if the list extended to a million books. I’ve not read Ardel O’Hanlon’s The Talk Of The Town, so I may be being biased against it, but, perhaps, like most Irish it seems, he has that lyrical, literary streak that justifies it being there. Still, at least there’s no Harry Potter to wade through.

The other thing that I notice from looking at the list is that, while it’s understandable that the bulk of the books listed are from the 20th Century, there are a few authors who are perhaps represented too much. Step forward Paul Auster, J.M. Coetzee, and Ian McEwan. I can’t help thinking that at least one of their books could have been replaced by something by Richard Yates. Say, Revolutionary Road.

Of the list I reckon I’ve read just over fifty off them, although I’ve reviewed little of these. Sitting on my shelves there are about 150 of them. What I’ve decided is that, as a personal reading challenge, I’m going to try and get a review on booklit of each of these books. Of course, I’m not going to set a time limit or any such deadline as, despite the variety on offer, it would be boring to become slave to a reading list. I’ve added a page to the right sidebar linking to the complete list on booklit and as I read the books from the list and review it, I’ll put a link to it. That should at least take the site through to 2068.