Let me jump on the listmania bandwagon and give you my favourite novels of the decade. Maybe these aren't the best books of the noughties but they're the ones I liked most.1. Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
2. The Cold Six Thousand - James Ellroy
3. L'Amour est très surestimé - Brigitte Giraud
4. Grotesque - Natsuo Kirino
5. Let the Right One In - John Lindqvist
6. The Corrections - Jonathan Franzen
7. Her Last Call To Louis MacNeice - Ken Bruen
8. White Teeth - Zadie Smith
9. The Red Riding Quartet - David Peace
10. Fingersmith - Sarah Waters
31 comments:
Good pics. I had to check, but yes, The Corrections came out in 2001. And I remembered Cloud Atlas in a bit of a dream-like state after forgetting author's name (testament to my memory.) Kirino does some amazing work with point of view shifts.
Turner
I love the Cold Six Thousand novel! I've read and enjoyed everything that Ellroy has written. I think that American Tabloid is the finest creative writing book I've ever read. It is just awesome review.
Good luck.
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Hendlin Books
It really goes to show how much gets published each year. I'm a fairly avid reader, and some of the books on your list are on my To Read list, but I have yet to read a single one.
I really need to quit my job.
It makes me blush to admit it, but I haven't read any of those. Heck, there are some I haven't even heard of!
I've only read the first three of the Peace quartet. The Bruen... it's one of the diminishing list of his that I haven't gotten to yet.
Everything else... Hmm, I'm looking at my bookcase and the shelves of unread books. Maybe next year I'll look for some new books with this in mind.
Thanks for the list.
gb
Turner
Yeah I wish Kirino was better known. Hurakami gets all the attention, but he just doesnt do it for me (although I liked his non fiction book about running that came out this year).
The thing that surprised me about The Corrections was how funny it was.
Mark
Well I think Ellroy's Underworld Trilogy is a significant artistic achievement, maybe all three books should be up here together.
Brian
You could try some of them as audiobooks and listen on your commute.
You'll want to have Cloud Atlas as an object though, the structure itself is quite important.
Mike
You cant die without having read Cloud Atlas. Its long, but give it a go. David Torrans has got some signed copies squirreled away.
Ger
Louis MacNeice is a shorty but a goodie. I think you'll really like it and you probably do have it somewhere.
God I read White Teeth but could not enjoy it because I was seething with jealousy. Very lame, I know. But I could not get over it the whole time reading it.
What about Cutting for Stone by Abraham Vergehese? I loved it.
Sheiler
I think thats a very human emotion and probably quite common. I dont really get that feeling with novels but sometimes I'll read a travel book and just be taken aback by the writer's nerve at travelling to remote places on their own and then asking all sorts of impertinent questions and writing a book about it. I'm quite jealous of someone who has the cojones to do all that.
Nothing from 2007, 2008 or 2009. Did you give up reading novels?
Ian
Nope, that was just the breaks.
I can think of several books I read in the last few months that would be just outside the top 10: Blood's A Rover, Snow by Orhan Pamuk, The Adventures of Kavalier and Clay and Inherent Vice, but out of those maybe only Inherent Vice would kick something out of my personal top 10 and I cant think what.
Working in a bookstore, I do of course know all these titles, except for the Giraud. What is that, since I don't read French--Love is very overestimated, something like that? Never heard of her. But if it's not translated, I'm not going bother to say I'll get to it.
Actually, I'm not sure that that particular Bruen is over here either. It sounds familiar but that may only be from the blogs.
I didn't read Let the Right One In, but I really liked the movie. Although I must say I can't take anyone saying "Help me" in quite the same sympathetic way I might once have done. And I'm not kidding about that, either.
Mitchell's enjoyed quite a vogue among our staff when it came out, so of course I avoided it completely. It's not because I didn't believe them, it's because I am ornery.
I have Cold 6000 and the Kirino, but haven't gotten to them yet. The Corrections and White Teeth are right up there at the top of my list too, well, would be if I was capable of creating a list, which I'm not. Although I think Zadie is a most engaging and interesting personality I haven't been that excited by what she's done since. Well, actually all I've read is On Beauty, and it suffered because it begged comparison with Howard's End. I mean, quite deliberately. However, I will continue to read her, probably forever, based on the strength of that first novel. I really hope she can get there again.
And I must just say as an aside here that Sheiler you should write your novel and Adrian you should write your travel book. I am not kidding. I don't care about the excuses.
Moving right along, yes, I loved The Corrections. I think I've loved everything he's written and this goes back to his rant in Harper's about the decline of the American novel.
I think he's over that.
Seana
Just because Mitchell's popular doesnt mean you shouldnt try him.
The French title translated? Love is Overrated? (Clearly this isnt my forte).
I think Cold Six is Ellroy's best. Today would be a good day to start it too because you know it begins on November 22 1963.
If I had a bit more bottle I would write that travel book, but I just dont think I have it or could do it. Not yet anyway.
I think you think you couldn't write like Paul Theroux or use his method, which is quite true. You could only do it in your own mode. But I think a lot of people would still enjoy it. I would.
No, I wasn't saying that I was right not to have read Cloud Atlas, just that that was the case. I don't like when individual books become a kind of credential that you are in the know or whatever that is. Cloud Atlas is now no longer new, so that probably wouldn't happen anymore. None of the people who vaunted it are at the store anymore anyway.
If I can dig Cold Six Thousand out of the pile, I will at least make a very brief beginning on it, even though it is now the 23rd. But it sounds like a fun way to go about it.
I own 1,2,6 and the first of Peace's Quartet. After your recommendation I bought and read Cloud Atlas (actually, Black Swan Green at first, but I already told you). I enjoyed both tremendously. The others remain in the pipeline, along with Tipping the Velvet, the one Waters who called out to me from the bargain bin. I also discovered I had a used copy of the Italian translation of the Correction since time immemorial.
I am a bit surprised by the Lindqvist. Didn't know you liked vampires. Though many people have said good things about both the movie and the book.
And you read the Giraud in French? How polyglot.
Seana, read Cloud Atlas.
Seana
Well maybe I will. I have to think of somewhere that hasnt been done to death and that I'm interested in which could be tricky.
Marco
You're right vampires are not my thing at all. Except maybe for the first two seasons of Buffy I have no interest in the genre however Let The Right One In really got under my skin. A lovely little book I thought.
Wasnt as impressed by Black Swan Green, but Cloud Atlas is such a tour de force Mitchell really doesnt have to do anything much for a while.
I enjoyed BSG much more than Paddy Clarke Ah Ah Ah, which I tend to associate with it in my mind. I think it captured the experience of an intelligent, nerdy, perhaps oversensitive 13-year old very well, and the writing is good.
Marco
Dont get me wrong I liked Black Swan Green but I just didnt think it had the transcendant qualities of C.A.
Havent read Paddy Clark but I liked some of his earlier stuff.
Okay, okay, okay. Cloud Atlas is now on my list. I mean the one in my head where things jump around a lot.
Actually, I might be able to get my reading group to read it in January. It's been awhile since they've been bullied by me into reading something. Although they seem to remember it as happening 'all the time'.
Well I would throw in Sacred Hunger by Barry Unsworth and perhaps Birdsong by Faulks. But my heart will always go back to John D. MacDonald and that most noble knight errant,Travis McGee.
(typing typing typing typing...looking busy...zzZZzzz, snore, typing typing typing)
OK Seana, novel coming along!
Fantastic, Sheiler!
Adrian,
Sorry for being late to the list party--trying to catch up after the busy holiday season.
Did you read anything by David Foster Wallace or Bret Easton Ellis? Neither writer did much in the last decade but both of their works in the 00's were worth mention (at least on the list in my head).
Not sure if you are a fan of either writer; just thought I'd get your insight.
Josh
Josh, while we wait for Adrian to weigh in, I thought I'd mention that a group of my friends have gotten deeply into Infinite Jest, and one of their college-aged sons is taking it as a new literary gospel of sorts, though gospel isn't quite the right word. Personally, I haven't read any of Wallace's fiction, though I hold him in high regard as an essayist.
I think his death by suicide is a big loss.
Josh
I liked IJ. I liked his essays better. Did you ever read the one about lobsters? Brilliant.
Adrian
Yes, I read the one about the lobsters--I enjoyed it. I also read the one he did for McCain's 2000 presidential bid. Somehow he managed to make McCain interesting--the sign of a brilliant writer. I think "Brief Interviews with Hideous Men" was his best fiction though. The audio book was amazing.
Josh
Seana,
IJ was good, albeit a bit combersome. Try "Brief Interviews...". It's great.
Josh
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