It is the time of year when people start making lists. Even though the "best of" lists only cover a year (and some years are more fruitful then others), I always get sucked in. I always read the list and look for new voices, female voices, young voices, voices that aren't Roth. I sometimes regress and decide that the literati is something moldy and obsessed with 9/11. Then, I root for my favorite authors and try to figure out who made my list this year.
So here's the NY Times books of the times (they will narrow this list to 10 on Wednesday).
But more importantly who made your list this year? Or if you are like me and have a three year delay (hello! who can afford hardbacks?), what's the best book you've read recently?
UPDATE: Here are NPR's Lists
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7 comments:
Best book from the list that I read is definitely Elizabeth McCracken's new memoir, "An Exact Replica of a Figment of My Imagination." It's remarkable. I also really dug Christian Bock's "Beautiful Children."
I would have added Edmund White's "Hotel de Dream" to the list.
My favorite thing about these lists is that I get so many new ideas for reading.
I can't wait to read McCracken's newest, ever since your review on goodreads.
The only hardback I splurged on was Lahiri's "Unaccustomed Earth." Lovely. Each short story is a novel.
My own best of list? Two of my favorites came from a married couple: Dave Egger's "What is the What?" and Vendela Vida's "Let the Northern Lights Erase Your Name." I also just read Ondatje's "In the Skin of the Lion" (talk about being behind on reading...it predates "The English Patient"), and, most recently, "Being Dead" by Jim Crace.
Edmund White has been on my list...
r- what did you think of 'being dead'? it's one of my favorites.
I loved it (my post was ambiguous, but I'd meant that it made my "best of..." list).
Also ambiguous, I just noticed, was my comment about Edmund White. Edmund White is on my "to read" list.
Yeesh, I must have been drunk.
I just read "The Film Club" about a kid whose dad lets him drop out of high school if he watches 3 movies a week with him. I liked it.
I have read no books from that list. But in the last few months, I've read and loved: "Ceremonial Violence" by Johnathan Fast, "Blood Child" by Octavia Butler, and "Oryx and Crake" by Margaret Atwood.
I've got my eye on Proulx's "Fine the Way It Is." But, you know, 25 bucks.
I think I might be stunningly predictable at this time.
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