The Best of Books, the Worst of Books

Well, the doc got started early on the new 2009 group, so I figured I go ahead and start this thread. This way, people can use it for recommendations for their new 2009 threads. You all be the own judge of how you want to get your best and worst for the year out to the group.

I'm working late so don't have much time but want to get this into 'my' posts... plus I know at least one book I need to put on the 'Good' list:

The Wasted Vigil - Nadeem Aslam

I shall be back here when I have a bit more time. Thanks for kicking this off!

Well, I'll probably read a few more books by the end of the year, but I don't think the results will change. My best books were all 5 stars, then beyond that there were a bunch of 4.5 stars. The worst were less than two stars, followed by a bunch that were 2 and 2.5. Anybody who wants more detail can look at the library - I tagged all my books this year "2008 Challenge", then just sort by rating.

Top o' the Pile:
Shutter Island
The Black Tower
Guns, Germs and Steel
Bridge of Birds

Bottom o' the Pile:
The World That Made New Orleans
Any Given Doomsday
Beyond the Zonules of Zinn

I like the titles from Doc, so I'm going to steal them for use here:

Top o'the Pile/Fiction:
The Terror
The Story of Lucy Gault
The Wonderful O
The Midwich Cuckoos
Veronika Decides to Die

Top o'the Pile/Non-Fiction or Reread:
Rebecca
The Handmaid's Tale
Spoon River Anthology
Why I Write
Homage to Catalonia

Bottom o' the Pile:
Little Boy Broken
The Architecture of Desire
Less Than Zero
Grimus
The Mixquiahuala Letters

I'm about three books early, but I might as well weigh in before I forget....

Tops in Fiction:
Bleak House by Charles Dickens
Black Dogs by Ian McEwan
The Heart of the Matter by Graham Greene
The Jewel in the Crown by Paul Scott
Bed: Stories by Tao Lin

Tops in Non-fiction:
A Life in Secrets: The Story of Vera Atkins and the Lost Agents of SOE by Sarah Helm
Gang Leader for a Day: A Rogue Sociologist Takes to the Streets by Sudhir Venkatesh
Criticisms and Appreciations of the Works of Charles Dickens by G.K. Chesterton
The Boy Who Fell Out of the Sky by Ken Dornstein
The Bookshop at 10 Curzon Street: Letters Between Nancy Mitford and Heywood Hill

Barely Managed to Finish:
Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson
The Yellow Dog by Georges Simenon
The London Embassy by Paul Theroux
Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Murakami

Copied from the Your Best Books thread.

Well, I can attempt this, since I think I'll be reading Doctor Faustus for the rest of December, although I may mix in a few lighter, shorter, reads.

It's been a good reading year for me. These lists are not in order, but I've tried to put my top favorites first in each category. I may try to narrow them down later. They are all bests, with one exception at the end, because I don't finish books I don't like.

New Fiction

Netherlandby Joseph O'Neill
Lush Life by Richard Price
Tree of Smoke by Denis Johnson
The Condition by Jennifer Haigh
A Most Wanted Man by John Le Carre
The Savage Detectives by Roberto Bolano
The Clothes on Their Backs by Linda Grant
Dear American Airlines by Jonathan Miles
The Story of Forgetting by Stefan Merrill Block
The Boys in the Trees by Mary Swan
The Plague of Doves by Louise Erdrich

Older Fiction

Unforgiving Years by Victor Serge
Buddenbrooks by Thomas Mann
The Radetzky March by Joseph Roth
The Bridge on the Drina by Ivo Andric
A High Wind in Jamaica by Richard Hughes
In Hazard by Richard Hughes
Petals of Blood by Ngugi wa Thiong'o
By the Sea by Abdulrazak Gurnah
What's for Dinner? by James Schuyler
The Deptford Trilogy by Robertson Davies
The Enchanted April by Elizabeth von Arnim
Beware of Pity by Stefan Zweig

Nonfiction

Blood-Dark Track by Joseph O'Neill
The Cave Painters: Probing the Mysteries of the World's First Artists by Gregory Curtis
The Dark Side: How the War on Terror Turned into a War on America's Ideals by Jane Mayer
A Way of Life, Like Any Other by Darcy O'Brien

The total clunker was A Charmed Life: Growing Up in Macbeth's Castle by Liza Campbell. As I have said elsewhere, the best (and only good) thing about this book is the title.

Wunderkind, on your recommendation above, I just Mooched The Jewel in the Crown. Am looking forward to it (and what happened to my vow not to add to my TBR boxes? Well...I do have those Mooch points to use up!).

Woohoo! I think you'll love it. I'm reading the second book in The Raj Quartet right now and, based on the first 25 pages anyway, it looks to be just as great.

5 Shells: Supremely Excellent

Biography

Recollections of the Last Days of Shelley and Byron by Edward Trelawney

A penetrating character analysis by one who knew both Shelley and Byron intimately.

Short Stories

Rumpole of the Bailey by John Mortimer
The Trials of Rumpole by John Mortimer

Horace Rumpole is a brilliant creation by an ex-barrister. The stories are a sheer delight to read.

Philosophy

One Small Step Can Change Your Life by Robert Maurer

This is an excellent little manual expounding a simple but workable philosophy. It provides motivation to tackle any situation, task or problem with the greater likelihood of success than by sheer will-power alone.

Christian

What’s So Amazing About Grace by Philip Yancey

I read many excellent Christian manuals in the latter half of 2008 but this one stood out as being of particular merit.


Clunkers!

The High Flyer by Susan Howatch

Her continual use of the following terms: flufette, Tiger-thumper, nutterguff, dinosaurs, whippets and fruity-loops. These terms were used by her ad nauseum throughout the story and I found them ultimately irritating.

The Thirteenth Tale by Dianne Setterfield

After page 256 I lost interest completely and skimmed to the end.

Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad

I found it utterly dreary.

OK, the stockings are hung. Final grades are (almost) submitted. It's time to reflect on the year. I've limited myself to 5 Best Fiction and 5 Best Nonfiction, but that was hard. I've read lots of good ones this year. I've also read a few that I didn't like as much, but none that were awful - just a few that didn't resonate with me. So, I'll focus on the great ones!

Top Five Fiction (in no particular order):
Mudbound - Hillary Jordan
The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
The Bean Trees - Barbara Kingsolver
The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society - Mary Ann Shaffer
The Boat - Nam Le

Top Five Nonfiction (in no particular order):
Brother I'm Dying - Edwidge Danticat
The Last Flight of the Scarlet Macaw - Bruce Barcott
Three Cups of Tea - Greg Mortenson
The Places in Between - Rory Stewart
Dreams and Shadows: The Future of the Middle East - Robin Wright

But, I'll be back to edit if I read something great in the next 11 days!

The Good - Kid Division

Bigger Kids
Billy and the Bullfrogs
Despereaux
Be a Perfect Person in Just 3 Days
Everything and the Kitchen Sink: Weird Stuff You Didn't Know About Food
The Cabinet of Wonders
The Miraculous Adventures of Edward Tulane
Canoeing with the Cree

Elementary School age
Kids are Funny: Jokes sent in to Rosey O'Donnell
Louise, the Adventures of a Chicken
George, the Dragon, and the Princess
Despite All Obstacles

babies thru 5 or 6 y.o.
ABC3D
I Feel a Foot
George, the Dragon, and the Princess

Worst Adult Books

Kluge
Simplexity

Best Lit I read

The Tsar's Dwarf
Secret Knowledge of Water (non-fiction)
Now the Drum of War: Walt Whitman and his Brothers in the Civil War (non-fiction)
Go with Me
The Hidden City (scifi/fantasy)

Best History

Sparta - edited by Michael Whitby
Company Aytch
Colonial Ste. Genevieve
Stealing Indian Women
Mission to Asia
Ledyard

best new reads available in English
Kit's Wilderness by David Almond
Holes by Louis Sachar
The high king by Lloyd Alexander
Walk two moons by Sharon Creech
Looking for Alaska by John Green
The curious incident of the dog in the night-time by Mark Haddon
With the pain it loves and hates by Craig Kee Strete

best reads Dutch sadly not translated
Winterijs by Peter van Gestel
Brief voor de koning by Tonke Dragt
Padjelanta by Anton Quintana
Het boek van Bod Pa by Anton Quintana
Wolfsroedel by Floortje Zwigtman

worst reads all categories
De vergissing by Lennart Frick
The other Boleyn girl by Philippa Gregory
Gijsbrecht by Edward van de Vendel
Blackface stallion by Helen Griffiths

If I read something great or awfull the next 10 days I'll come back to edit ;-)

The Best:

The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas
In the Forest of Forgetting by Theodora Goss
Stranger Things Happen by Kelly Link
The Orphan's Tales: In the Night Garden by Catherynne M. Valente
The Orphan's Tales: In the Cities of Coin and Spice by Catherynne M. Valente,
Swordspoint by Ellen Kushner
The Privilege of the Sword by Ellen Kushner

The Worst:

Andorra by Peter Cameron
The Claiming of Sleeping Beauty by A. N. Roquelaure
The Djinn in the Nightingale's Eye: Five Fairy Stories by A.S. Byatt
Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card
Wizards, Inc. edited by Martin H. Greenburg and Loren L. Coleman

Pleased to see my 'worst' list is shorter than I thought it might be at one point in the year. I've read a lot of books that were just OK, but thankfully very few that I thought were actually bad.

Worst:
Then We Came to The End - Joshua Ferris. Honestly, someone writes a novel in the first-person plural and everyone hails him as a genius. bleurgh.

Master Georgie - Beryl Bainbridge. Shortlisted for the Booker. WHY??

Arlington Park - Rachel Cusk. Grow up, woman. Motherhood is not life imprisonment and the suburbs are not actually hell. Also you are not James Joyce.

The Emperor's Children - Claire Messud. "Look at these people. Do we really want to be like this? All smarmy and self-congratulatory?" My thoughts exactly.

Best:

This Book Will Save Your Life - A.M. Homes. Really and truly life-affirming.

What Are You Like? - Anne Enright. Astonishing styling, audacious plot.

Paris to the Moon - Adam Gopnik. Perfectly observed, very witty.

The Landscape of Love - Sally Beauman. Got to love those unreliable narrators.

The Secret Scripture - Sebastian Barry. It's not really about a mad old woman, it's about the nature of truth and history. A pity about the ending, but I forgive him.

Falling Man - Don deLillo. Best 9/11 book I've read so far.

The Earth Hums in B Flat - Mari Strachan. So glad this got bought before the financial crisis hit. It deserves to do really well in 2009.

Incendiary - Chris Cleave. The film is meant to be rubbish. Never mind, the book was great. Very impressive female voice from male writer.

When Will There Be Good News? - Kate Atkinson. Most outlandish Brodie plot, most skilfully handled.

Mrs Palfrey at the Claremont - Elizabeth Taylor. Another lovely, lovely book. I want to read lots more Elizabeth Taylor.

Edit because my typing is seriously deteriorating...

Best:

1) Deer Hunting with Jesus: Dispatches from America's Class War by Joe Bageant
2) Understanding Terror Networks by Marc Sageman
3) The Devil We Know: Dealing With the New Iranian Superpower by Robert Baer
4) The Whiskey Rebellion:George Washington, Alexander Hamilton, and the Frontier Rebels Who Challanged America's Newfound Sovereignty by William Hogeland.
5) The Curse of Chalion by Lois McMaster Bujold

Worst:

1) The Gallatin Divergence by L. Neil Smith
2) Elmore Leonard's 10 Rules of Writing by Elmore Leonard
3) Empire by Orson Scott Card
4) The Stonehenge Gate by Jack Williamson
5) Santa Responds: He's Had Enough...and He's Writing Back! by Santa Claus

All in no particular order.

edited to add touchstones

Top 10 Reads This Year in no Order of Preference:

01. A Clockwork Orange
02. The Trial
03. Crime and Punishment
04. 1984
05. Siddhartha
06. Cat's Cradle
07. Anna Karenina
08. The Unbearable Lightness of Being
09. The Satanic Verses
10. The Hitch Hiker's Guide To The Galaxy

Since everyone seems to be wrapping up their threads for 2008, I guess I will post my list of the most memorable reads for the year, in the order in which I read them:

Fiction
Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen
Bel Canto by Ann Patchett
Saturday by Ian McEwan
The Last Six Million Seconds by John Burdett
The Terror by Dan Simmons
People of the Book by Geraldine Brooks
Bridge of Birds by Barry Hughart
The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon
Forever by Pete Hamill
The Story of Lucy Gault by William Trevor
The Geographer's Library by Jon Fasman
Old Man's War and The Ghost Brigades by John Scalzi
The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows
The Madonnas of Leningrad by Debra Dean
No Great Mischief by Alistair MacLeod
Something Wicked this Way Comes by Ray Bradbury
The Real Life of Sebastian Knight by Vladimir Nabakov
The Bridge on the Drina by Ivo Andric
The Stories of Anton Chekov
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson
World War Z by Max Brooks

Nonfiction
How to Read Literature Like a Professor by Thomas C. Foster
An Ordinary Man by Paul Rusesabagina
The Last American Man by Elizabeth Gilbert
Boone by Robert Morgan
The River of Doubt by Candice Millard
Michelangelo and the Pope's Ceiling by Ross King
1491 by Charles C. Mann
Charlatan by Pope Brock
With the Old Breed by E.B. Sledge
Eden's Outcasts by John Matteson
The Arctic Grail by Pierre Berton
Two in the Far North by Margaret Murie
Escape from the Deep by Alex Kershaw
The Travels of a T Shirt in the Global Economy by Pietra Rivoli
Garlic and Sapphires by Ruth Reichl
April 1865: The Month That Saved America by Jay Winik
Patriotic Gore by Edmund Wilson

Young Adult/Juvenile
Looking for Alaska by John Green
Cry the Beloved Country by Alan Paton
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
Walk Two Moons by Sharon Creech
Kit's Wilderness by David Almond
The Wonderful O by James Thurber

The Best .. My Favorite read in 2008

The Worst...the supreme waste of my time

Truman Capote Dear Heart, Old Buddy by John Brinnin