books read 2010

[fahye]

I did a lot more reading last year than in any previous year. It was my primary leisure activity! Which is probably reflected in my smaller fic output (I'll do a fic roundup post later), but I don't regret it, because I read some fantastic stuff. A lot of the books on the list were part of my Booker Prize reading project. Though I only read ONE Shakespeare play in its entirety, which is just shameful.

Because I read so many this year, I'm doing two favourite lists: seven I was most impressed with, and seven I most enjoyed reading. It was going to be five and five but I simply couldn't cut the lists down any further.



* denotes a reread

Adiga, Aravind -- The White Tiger
Alexie, Sherman -- Reservation Blues
Atwood, Margaret -- Negotiating with the Dead: a writer on writing
Atwood, Margaret -- The Edible Woman
Banville, John -- The Sea
Barker, Pat -- Regeneration
Barker, Pat -- The Eye in the Door
Barker, Pat -- The Ghost Road
Barker, Pat -- Another World
Barker, Pat -- Border Crossing
Bronte, Emily -- Wuthering Heights
Brooks, Max -- World War Z
Butler, Octavia E. -- Bloodchild & other stories
Calvino, Italo -- If on a winter's night a traveller
Clarke, Suzanna -- Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell
Coetzee, J.M. -- Life & Times of Michael K
Conan Doyle, Arthur -- The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes
Cunningham, Michael -- The Hours
Dahlquist, G.W. -- The Glass Books of the Dream Eaters
Dalrymple, Theodore -- Life at the Bottom
Dalrymple, Theodore -- If Symptoms Persist
Damasio, Antonio -- Descartes' Error
Dean, Pamela -- Tam Lin
Delisle, Guy -- Pyongyang
Desai, Kiran -- The Inheritance of Loss
Dessaix, Robert -- Twilight of Love - travels with Turgenev
Diaz, Junot -- The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao
Dillard, Annie -- For The Time Being
Doyle, Roddy -- Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha
Duane, Diane -- So You Want To Be A Wizard*
Duane, Diane -- Deep Wizardry*
Duane, Diane -- High Wizardry*
Duffy, Carol Ann -- The World's Wife
Duffy, Carol Ann -- Feminine Gospels
Enright, Anne -- The Gathering
Fielding, Helen -- Bridget Jones: the Edge of Reason*
Forster, E.M. -- Two Cheers for Democracy
Forster, E.M. -- Collected Short Stories
Forster, E.M. -- Aspects of the Novel
Fry, Christopher -- The Lady's Not For Burning (& *)
Gaiman, Neil -- The Graveyard Book
Gibson, William -- Spook Country
Golding, William -- Rites of Passage
Grant, Mira -- Feed
Greene, Graham -- The Quiet American
Hollinghurst, Alan -- The Line of Beauty
Hulme, Keri -- The Bone People
Ishiguro, Kazuo -- Never Let Me Go
Ishiguro, Kazuo -- The Remains of the Day
Jamison, Kay Redfield -- An Unquiet Mind
Jemisin, N.K. -- The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms
Kelman, James -- How late it was, how late
Knox, Elizabeth -- Billie's Kiss*
Kundera, Milan -- The Unbearable Lightness of Being
Kushner, Ellen -- The Privilege of the Sword
Lahiri, Jhumpa -- Interpreter of Maladies
Le, Nam -- The Boat
Lee, Lilian -- Farewell to my Concubine
Le Guin, Ursula K. -- The Dispossessed
Le Guin, Ursula K. -- The Language of the Night
Le Guin, Ursula K. -- The Left Hand of Darkness
Lo, Malinda -- Ash
Maalouf, Amin -- Ports of Call
Mantel, Hilary -- An Experiment in Love*
Mantel, Hilary -- Wolf Hall
Matar, Hisham -- In the Country of Men
McCarthy, Cormac -- The Road
McEwan, Ian -- Amsterdam
McKinley, Robin -- Beauty
Mieville, China -- King Rat
Mishima, Yukio -- Confessions of a Mask
Moore, Christopher -- Fool
Naipaul, V.S. -- In a Free State
Niffenegger, Audrey -- Her Fearful Symmetry
Novik, Naomi -- Temeraire*
Novik, Naomi -- Throne of Jade*
Novik, Naomi -- Empire of Ivory
Novik, Naomi -- Victory of Eagles
O'Brien, Patrick -- H.M.S. Surprise
Owen, Wilfred -- The War Poems
Palahniuk, Chuck -- Snuff
Pamuk, Orhan -- The White Castle
Pamuk, Orhan -- Other Colours
Perez-Reverte, Arturo -- The Fencing Master
Pierre, D.B.C. -- Ludmila's Broken English
Plath, Sylvia -- The Bell Jar*
Pratchett, Terry -- Unseen Academicals
Purcell, Leah -- Black Chicks Talking
Robbins, Tom -- Still Life With Woodpecker*
Roy, Arundhati -- The God of Small Things
Rees Brennan, Sarah -- The Demon's Lexicon*
Rees Brennan, Sarah -- The Demon's Covenant
Reeve, Philip -- Starcross*
Reeve, Philip -- Mothstorm
Remarque, Erich Maria -- All Quiet on the Western Front
Renault, Mary -- The Charioteer
Ryan, Carrie -- The Forest of Hands and Teeth
Sayers, Dorothy L. -- Clouds of Witness
Sayers, Dorothy L. -- Murder Must Advertise*
Sayers, Dorothy L. -- Strong Poison
Sayers, Dorothy L. -- Have His Carcase
Sayers, Dorothy L. -- Gaudy Night
Sedaris, David -- When You Are Engulfed In Flames
Serano, Julia -- Whipping Girl
Shakespeare, William -- King Lear*
Shem, Samuel -- Mount Misery*
Shriver, Lionel -- Game Control
Shriver, Lionel -- We Need To Talk About Kevin
Stephenson, Neal -- Quicksilver
Stephenson, Neal -- The Confusion
Stephenson, Neal -- The System of the World
Syjuco, Miguel -- Ilustrado
Underhill, Paco -- Why We Buy: the science of shopping
Walters, Minette -- The Ice House
Waters, Sarah -- Affinity
Whalen Turner, Megan -- The Thief (& *)
Whalen Turner, Megan -- Queen of Attolia (& *)
Whalen Turner, Megan -- King of Attolia (& *)
Whalen Turner, Megan -- A Conspiracy of Kings
Wilde, Oscar -- An Ideal Husband
Willis, Connie -- Doomsday Book
Willis, Connie -- To Say Nothing Of The Dog
Willis, Connie -- Blackout
Willis, Connie -- Passage
Wynne Jones, Diana -- House of Many Ways
Wynne Jones, Diana -- The Lives of Christopher Chant
Wynne Jones, Diana -- Charmed Life
Wynne Jones, Diana -- The Magicians of Caprona
Wynne Jones, Diana -- Witch Week
Woolf, Virginia -- Mrs Dalloway
Xiaolong, Qiu -- Death of a Red Heroine
Yashimoto, Banana -- Kitchen

~

Top seven (most impressive)

Michael Cunningham -- The Hours

I read Mrs Dalloway and this book back-to-back in a delirious weekend of enjoyment. This is, apparently, how one gets fanfiction published :D I think the way Cunningham slides in and out of Woolf's style, and the way the three stories run in parallel, occasionally touching on the same points and themes, is extremely clever and satisfying.

Keri Hulme -- The Bone People

Oh, this book. It took me a little while to sink into the prose style, but once I did, I was utterly hooked. It's set in New Zealand, and it's a story about three very broken people who come together by accident and start to form a friendship, and struggle towards defining themselves, and love, and family.The characters are fantastically realised; they're the best thing about it, I think. The book is brutal and twisty and full of mythology and it does horrible things to your heart, but puts you back together at the end. (As a warning, though, I will say that it has strong themes of alcoholism and child abuse.)

Nam Le -- The Boat

This is a book of short stories that impressed me most of all with their enormous variety and scope; Le has a versatility of narrative voice that makes me WILD WITH ENVY. Each story on its own is enjoyable and very well written, but when you read them all together you realise just how much talent went into the collection.

Hilary Mantel -- Wolf Hall

I whipped my way through this book, despite its length; I found it a lot easier to keep track of the characters and events than in Mantel's other long historical novel, A Place of Greater Safety, and I rapidly developed an enormous crush on Thomas Cromwell, which helped. As someone who never studied history at school, ever, I get all of my historical knowledge from books, and this was a superbly written, very entertaining way to soak up the first part of Henry VIII's reign. Politics and snark and poignancy, hurrah! BRING ON THE SEQUEL.

Orhan Pamuk -- Other Colours

Orhan Pamuk and I have a bit of an uneasy relationship, where I adore half of his stuff with a passion and find the other half to be very dull. This is definitely in the former category. It's a book of essays on everything from the place of modern Turkey in Europe, to his childhood, to what he thinks about his various books, to -- heaps of things, really. I had to force myself to only read one or two per evening so that I could make it last.

Arundhati Roy -- The God of Small Things

The best thing about this book is the strucure; I don't think I've come across a story that pulls you so effortlessly along to the climax and conclusion, or is paced in such a brilliant way. I enjoyed the prose and the characters and the observations of daily life that are littered through the book, but most of all I enjoyed that overarching plot, because I am terrible at plot and structure and I wish I could do it half as well as Roy manages to.

Lionel Shriver -- We Need To Talk About Kevin

Funny that the best book I read last year (Vernon God Little) and the best book I read this year are both centred around school shootings. I'd seen this book mentioned on and off for a few years, but this was the year one of my best friends pressed it into my hands and said READ THIS, READ IT NOW. I'm very glad she did. It's the story of a woman whose son becomes a psychopath, and it's often extremely painful to get through, but it's just masterful and I'm in awe that anyone could have managed to write it. Shriver has a way of getting inside the tiny cracks and subtleties of human relationships that makes me want to gnaw her skull open and steal the ability from her brain.


Top seven (most enjoyable)

Pat Barker -- Regeneration

To be honest, I could have put the Regeneration trilogy on both lists. In every slot. These books are perfect for me, PERFECT, the ideal combination of WW1 and psychiatry and poetry, written in Barker's beautiful precise prose. I'm having trouble coming up with a description that does them justice. They're about PTSD, and the ethics of restoring someone to health only to send them back to the war that damaged them, and trauma channelled into artistic expression, and a handful of very distinct and very fallible characters.

Pamela Dean -- Tam Lin

Apart from the hilarious pacing problems of this book (ie. it is a largely plotless albeit wholly enjoyable American college saga until the last, er, fifty pages, when it suddenly remembers its fantasy plot) I found it a grand read, unapologetically aimed at classics & literature geeks who really WANT to hear about Greek comedies and huge amounts of Shakespeare and Keats and Stoppard. Plus the protagonist is immensely likable, and the complicated relationships between all the young people in the book are handled very well.

Christopher Fry -- The Lady's Not For Burning

I read this play because it was discussed extensively in Tam Lin, and it is now my favourite play of ALL TIME. The text is gorgeous and clever and I can spend hours flicking through it and speaking bits of it aloud just for the pleasure of hearing it spoken. It's just incredible.

Dorothy L. Sayers -- Gaudy Night

Most of my commentary here is HARRIET VANE OMG HARRIET <33 but I'll also say that as someone who's lived in a women's academic college modelled after the Oxbridge tradition, I thoroughly enjoyed this as a portrait of women living and studying and working together, and a glimpse into the time when a woman usually had to choose between a career in academia and marriage/family. But mostly, it's a fantastic, nasty mystery story investigated by a wonderful protagonist, with a hugely satisfying romance and a strong sense of the love that Sayers had for Oxford.

Neal Stephenson -- The Confusion

I'm doing this tricksy thing where I only mention one book out of a trilogy, thereby recommending the whole trilogy by proxy. As with all Stephenson books, I wouldn't recommend the Baroque Cycle to everyone, but if you enjoy outrageously erudite and ambitious books that each comprise 900+ pages of historical hijinks and piles of science and piratical adventures and some seriously in-depth explorations of trade and politics and espionage -- and if you can get past Quicksilver, which is the first book and unfortunately also the most tooth-grittingly dense of the three -- then this is for you. I mentioned The Confusion in particular simply because I loved it the best and think it was the most sensibly structured.

Megan Whalen Turner -- King of Attolia

AUGH. As bookelfe once pointed out, describing the Queen's Thief books and pimping them to other people is incredibly difficult without spoilering them for things that they should really, really remain unspoilered for. I don't think people should even read the BLURBS of these books before reading them. The twists are always awesome and always, always better when unexpected. However! KoA was hands-down my favourite of the series, and I enjoyed every word of it, largely because it features a very likable narrator and two of my favourite tropes: third-person observations of a beloved OTP, and also the underestimation and subsequent slow revelation of a character which the reader knows to be amazing, but with whom the narrator is not yet familiar.

Connie Willis -- To Say Nothing Of The Dog

This was a year in which I discovered many authors and then proceeded to devour their works at incredible speed, and Connie Willis was one of the highlights. I read this book of hers in a single day and never stopped enjoying myself throughout. Time travel! Misunderstandings! Hijinks with a capital H! I LOVE the concept behind the Oxford History Department and its time-travelling historians, and this is definitely the most lighthearted of the bunch. Doomsday Book is soul-crushing, and I found Blackout to be very well put together but also immensely frustrating in many ways. But this one! I recommend it without hesitation, to anyone.

Comments

[apiphile.livejournal.com]

Oh god everything you said about Pat Barker. <3 Yes! It is ... difficult to do those books true justice (you might be interested to know that the Science Museum's History of Medicine gallery has a section on WW1 psychiatry and video footage of shell-shock/PTSD patients from that time period, although I'm not sure if it's a good idea to go and look at it as I found it made me cry and shout at the TV screen up there rather unexpectedly). They are astoundingly well-written and I don't think anything else she's written lives up to that promise, unfortunately - derryderrydown may have a different opinion on Life Class to me but I only made it half-way through, and that's about the same time period, from a different perspective.

[/ramble.]

[fahye.livejournal.com]

OMG, that sounds great. I am going to the Science Museum on Monday.

Yeah, I haven't enjoyed her other books nearly as much as that trilogy, though I found Border Crossing to be very interesting.

[sainfoin-fields.livejournal.com]

YOU ARE TERRIFYING.

I mean that in the best way possible, I do.

[fahye.livejournal.com]

My mother was like, HOW ARE YOU NOT FAILING MEDICAL SCHOOL?? But she seems to accept the fact that it's quite easy to read enormous amounts of books during every weekend if you're not also trying to maintain a romantic relationship :D

[sainfoin-fields.livejournal.com]

I don't do any of those things! Mostly I just take baths and sleep, I can't really lie.

[fahye.livejournal.com]

I wish I could have more baths, I have to strategically time them and check to make sure neither of my housemates will want the bathroom during the next hour.

[loneraven.livejournal.com]

Oh, Doomsday Book! Gaudy Night! I love how many of my favourite set-in-Oxford books you've got here.

[fahye.livejournal.com]

I am SO EXCITED to be visiting Oxford at the end of the month!

[loneraven.livejournal.com]

And I am ridiculously peeved that I'll be missing you! Unless you're there by the 15th? *hopeful look*

[fahye.livejournal.com]

No, alas :(

[skygiants]

Seeing as I passionately love every single one of your 'most enjoyable' books except Regeneration, which I have not read, I am clearly going to have to put that on my list!

[fahye.livejournal.com]

Do, do! It's a different kind of book to lots of the others on that list, but I love it so impossibly much and I really want other people to read it too :)

[faynia.livejournal.com]

I was JUST looking for book recs and 'lo you come out of the mist and deliver!

[schiarire.livejournal.com]

I feel I must do a post like this too!

[fahye.livejournal.com]

Yes! Do! I'd be interested to read your favourite lists.