book list: the 2008 edition

[fahye]

This list is sadly diminished from previous years, and also contains more rereading of comfort books, both of which are entirely the fault of med school.

Travelling has been great, though: I already have 11 books on my 2009 list!



Books read in 2008

(* denotes a rereading)

Agger, Inger -- The Blue Room
Alexie, Sherman -- The Toughest Indian in the World
Angelou, Maya -- I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings
Austen, Jane -- Emma
Baldwin, James -- Go Tell It On The Mountain
Camus, Albert -- The Plague
Coetzee, J.M. -- Elizabeth Costello
Didion, Joan -- The Year of Magical Thinking
Earls, Nick -- Perfect Skin
Fforde, Jasper -- The Eyre Affair*
Fforde, Jasper -- Lost in a Good Book*
Ford, John -- 'Tis Pity She's a Whore*
Forster, E.M. -- Howards End*
Forster, E.M. -- Where Angels Fear to Tread
Gaiman, Neil -- Stardust
Gardner, John -- On Moral Fiction
Hamlin, Catherine -- The Hospital by the River
Hong Kingston, Maxine -- The Woman Warrior
Huyler, Frank -- The Blood of Strangers
Kellehear, Allan -- A Social History of Dying
Kesey, Ken -- One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
Kushner, Tony -- Angels in America*
McDermid, Val -- Beneath the Bleeding
Medley, Linda -- Castle Waiting
Morrison, Toni -- Beloved
Murakami, Haruki -- Kafka on the Shore
Nazeer, Kamran -- Send In The Idiots
Niffenegger, Audrey -- The Time Traveller's Wife
Pratchett, Terry -- Making Money*
Pratchett, Terry -- Monstrous Regiment*
Pratchett, Terry & Gaiman, Neil -- Good Omens*
Robbins, Tom -- Half Asleep In Frog Pyjamas*
Robbins, Tom -- Fierce Invalids Home From Hot Climates
Palahniuk, Chuck -- Choke
Porter, Roy -- Blood & Guts
Russel, Mary Doria -- The Sparrow
Sacks, Oliver -- A Leg To Stand On
Sacks, Oliver -- Musicophilia
Salih, Tayeb -- Season of Migration to the North
Salinger, J.D. -- Franny and Zooey
Satrapi, Marjane -- Persepolis
Sayers, Dorothy L. -- The Nine Tailors
Smith, Zadie -- White Teeth
Stoppard, Tom -- Arcadia*
Stoppard, Tom -- Rosencrantz And Guildenstern Are Dead*
Streatfeild, Noel -- White Boots*
Tan, Amy -- The Joy Luck Club
Tartt, Donna -- The Little Friend
Thomas, Scarlett -- The End of Mr Y*
Williamson, David -- Dead White Males
Walker, Alice -- The Colour Purple
Wynne Jones, Diana -- Howl's Moving Castle** (er, I read this book a LOT)

Top five

Medley, Linda -- Castle Waiting
Niffenegger, Audrey -- The Time Traveller's Wife
Russel, Mary Doria -- The Sparrow
Smith, Zadie -- White Teeth
Walker, Alice -- The Colour Purple

(SO HARD, I read a lot of really amazing books this year, which I think was contributed to by the fact that I was trying to read a lot more books by people of colour)

Comments

[schiarire.livejournal.com]

At the time I recommended it, I hadn't actually read it ... after a lot of trouble, I did get my hands on a copy (it is hard for us people who are me. I have no idea why everyone except me seems to have had no trouble at all whereas I spent many days doing nothing but looking for this damn book). I have no idea what I think of it. Every time I try to have an opinion my brain goes into molasses mode and then stalls completely.

[tinuviel8994.livejournal.com]

I think it's very hard to maintain a culturally relativistic position with regards to that book. It's kind of morally repulsive although it's hard to imagine it wasn't trying to be. I feel like it's meant to emblematize both the barbarity of tradition (the villagers, in particular Wad Reyyes - no coincidence that he was best friends with the narrator's grandfather, the somewhat saintly spirit of tradition in the village!) and the barbarity of Western culture (Mustafa Sa'eed's past). The narrator is semi-detached from both, he hasn't thrown himself wholly into either, and he winds up being one of the only morally neutral characters in the book (although even he is implicitly condemned for his passivity with Mustafa Sa'eed's wife)--and almost drowns himself at the end of the novel... I thought it was also an interesting microcosm of discussion of colonialism in general. More like a grim novel of ideas than a convincing story in and of itself. But it also had beautiful moments! It definitely made a strong impact on me, but like you say, hard to sort out.

(Sorry to babble so much in your books post, fahye! I just hadn't found anyone else who had read it and wanted a chance to discuss the book a little.)