What I’ve read this year. I sample or skim some that aren’t included. Happily, I have lost the compulsion or sense of duty to finish every book I start.
January
Razor Girl by Carl Hiaasen 2016 Vintage Books funny, clever, strong opinions on current issues
Tapping the Source by Kem Nunn 1984 Scribner
terrific read, created surfer noir
The Sisters Brothers by Patrick DeWitt 2011 House of Anansi Press singular, complex take on the Western (book group)
The Tale of the 1002nd Night by Joseph Roth translated by Michael Hofmann c1939 first English publication 1998 St. Martin’s Press exquisitely melancholy
Seventeen by Hideo Yokohama translated by Louise Heal Kawai c2003 first English publication 2018 MCD
engrossing suspenseful newsroom story
Scratchgravel Road by Tricia Fields 2013 Minotaur Books modestly entertaining mystery, good characters in remote West Texas
February
Every Man Dies Alone by Hans Fallada translated from the German by Michael Hofmann c1947 first English publication 2009 Melville House Publishing moving, unforgettable WWII story, the inspiration and creation no less remarkable than the novel (book group)
Into the Silence: The Great War, Mallory, and the Conquest of Everest by Wade Davis 2011 Knopf bit of a slog in early chapters but utterly absorbing in the account of the three expeditions, fascinating details and analysis, exceptionally good with larger context of social and political events
Vienna’s Golden Autumn: From the Watershed Year 1866 to Hitler’s Anschluss, 1938 by Hilde Spiel 1987 Weidenfeld and Nicolson
The Street by Ann Petry 1946 Houghton Mifflin bleak, relentless narrative, emotionally exhausting (book group)
Danubia: A Personal History of Habsburg Europe by Simon Winder 2013 Picador the richly informative and entertaining fruit of years of idiosyncratic travel and study
The Informer by Akimitsu Takagi translated from the Japanese by Sadako Mizuguchi c1965 Soho Press a procedural style mystery with psychological depth
What Now, Little Man? by Hans Fallada translated from the German by Susan Bennett c1932 Melville House 2009 in 1932 Berlin a young couple holds on to each other as the society collapses, a sensational success at publication
A Stranger In My Own Country: The 1944 Prison Diary by Hans Fallada translated from the German Pollity Press 2015
March
Memoirs of a Polar Bear by Yoko Tawada translated from the German by Susan Bernofsky c2014 New Directions ironic, surreal, odd; musings on relationships, freedom personal and political, art and the creative life
Newcomer, A Mystery by Keigo Higashino translated from the Japanese by Giles Murray c2001 1st US edition 2018 Minotaur Books smoothly told procedural develops an interesting portrait of a Tokyo neighborhood
Books For Life by Will Schwalbe Knopf 2017
essays about books that speak to moments in our lives and the importance of sharing those books
El Llano Estacado: Exploration and Imagination on the High Plains of Texas and New Mexico 1536-1860 by John Miller Morris Texas State Historical Society 1997 fascinating analysis of early encounters with this singular environment, particularly the chapters tracking Coronado’s expedition
How Fiction Works by James Wood Picador 2008 insights from a critic who loves fiction and reading: what is style, what is good writing, how can fiction contain/convey “reality”
April
Almost Nothing: The 20th Century Art and Life of Jozef Czapski by Eric Karpeles New York Review Books 2018 beautifully written biography of a remarkable man and his extraordinary life
The Post-Office Girl by Stefan Zweig translated from the German by Joel Rotenberg c1982 English publication 2008 New York Review Books
bleak depiction of lives crushed by poverty and the aftermath of WWI
An American Marriage by Tayari Jones 2018 Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill (book group)
Hot Water by P. G. Wodehouse 1932 Doubleday, Doran and Co. exquisitely complex hilarity
A Novel Bookstore by Laurence Cosse translated from the French by Alison Anderson c2009 English publication 2010 Europa Editions
good bookish elements about the value of literature and bookstores in our lives, but too long and a bit too French for my taste
The Eye Stone by Roberto Tiraboschi translated from the Italian by Katherine Gregor 2015 English publication 2015 Europa Editions billed as a medieval noir, lots of atmosphere (book group)
May
The Second Rider by Alex Beer translated from the German by Tim Mohr c2017 English publication 2018 Europa Editions Vienna 1919 makes a perfect noir setting for this absorbing mystery story; good characters and plotting; hope another in the series will be translated
Tell Them of Battles, Kings & Elephants by Mathias Enard translated from the French by Charlotte Mandell c2010 English publication 2018 New Directions Books historically grounded, richly imagined story of Michelangelo in Istanbul
The Golden Scales, A Makana Mystery by Parker Bilal (pseudonym of Jamal Mahjoub) 2012 Bloomsbury excellent thriller, Sudanese refugee in contemporary Cairo
The Killer Is Dying by James Sallis 2011 Walker & Co. odd but involving crime/psychological drama in which the main characters never meet; lovely reflective language on themes of loss and loneliness
Coffin, Scarcely Used by Colin Watson c1958 US c1958 Putnam’s Sons first in what promises to be a delightful classic British mystery series featuring the very model of an unassuming detective in a provincial town
The Banished Immortal: A Life of Li Bai by Ha Jin 2019 Pantheon Books wonderfully readable life of the still beloved poet with a generous sampling of his poems in their literary/cultural/political historical context
June
Is That A Fish In Your Ear? Translation And The Meaning Of Everything by David Bellos 2011 Faber and Faber
attempts to define “translation” in a fascinating and lively exploration of language and its role in the ways we think and communicate
Zama by Antonio Di Benedetto translated from the Spanish by Esther Allen c1956 English translation 2016 New York Review Book
stranded in a provincial town of colonial Paraguay Zama sinks into a despairing entropy; exquisite psychological portrait, existential loneliness in a lush/nightmarish colonial setting
Miss Buncle‘s Book by D. E. Stevenson c1934 Farrar & Rinehart
I reread this from time to time and am always charmed by the affectionate, lightly satirical tale of life in a small English village
Eline Vere by Louis Couperus translated from the Dutch by Ina Rilke c1889 English translation 2010 Archipelago Books
a splendid example of the 19th century novel with a large cast, a richly detailed physical and social world, and an exceptionally acute psychological portrait of the young woman at the story’s center
July
News of the World by Paulette Jiles 2016 William Morrow
a lovely story of unlikely companions on a journey through the turmoil of post-Civil War Texas; with lyrical economy Jiles evokes the landscapes and people of west Texas, the truth of affection and loyalty in the midst of uncertain and painful times
Frontiers of the Roman Empire by Hugh Elton 1996 Indiana University Press analysis of the concepts of different kinds of frontiers and what life was like for those living in them
The World Between Two Covers: Reading the Globe by Ann Morgan 2015 Liveright Publishing Corporation an enjoyable interesting account of a blogger’s project to read a book from every nation within a year; some book talk but mostly about the challenges presented by the nature of the English language publishing industry and lack of publishing opportunities for many writers, translation issues, and stories about the many people who helped her complete the project
Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland by Patrick Radden Keefe 2019 Doubleday a history of the political conflict centered in Belfast, the intricacies of loyalty and betrayal, the terrible personal consequences for the perpetrators of violence as well as the innocent; utterly compelling narrative – the only reason I didn’t read it in one sitting is because I didn’t start early enough in the day
Border: A Journey To The Edge Of Europe by Kapka Kassabova 2017 Graywolf Press the author returns to the forbidden borderland of her childhood in communist Bulgaria where Bulgaria, Greece, and Turkey intersect; fascinating, moving stories of the borders in our personal lives, and of lives shaped by current political and economic stresses as a continuation of millennia of turmoil in this region “not quite Europe, not quite Asia”; beautifully written
Bai Ganyo, Incredible Tales of a Modern Bulgarian by Aleko Konstantinos translated from the Bulgarian by V. Friedman, C. Kramer, G. Fielder, and C. Rudin ed. Victor A. Friedman c1895 English translation 2010 University of Wisconsin Press
comic tales of a scruffy itinerant peddler who’s always looking for an angle or opportunity; satiric critique of the corruption and social confusion in the newly created state of Bulgaria
The Heartland: An American History by Kristin L. Hoganson 2019 Penguin Press a heroic effort to blow-up the stereotypes and myths attached to the “heartland” concept by examining the history of Champaign County Illinois
The Catalogue Of Shipwrecked Books: Christopher Columbus, His Son, and the Quest to Build the World’s Greatest Library by Edward Wilson-Lee 2018 Scribners
Hernando Colon bought books obsessively and created probably the largest private library of his time; his passion was to make their contents useful, what we would call “searchable”, through organizing innovations like content abstracts, topical indices, a proto card catalogue, and upright bookshelves; much good context of Renaissance intellectual ferment and the printing revolution
August
The Fall Of Rome And The End Of Civilization by Bryan Ward-Perkins 2005 Oxford University Press witty, scholarly, accessible to the general reader study of the the post-Roman world; a convincing picture of physical destruction and the steep decline in quality of life as the economic linkages of empire disappear
The Physics Of Sorrow by Georgi Gospodinov translated from the Bulgarian by Angela Rodel c2011 English translation 2015 Open Letter
a remarkable novel; a mesmerizing labyrinth of personal and family history based stories with side passage thoughts on philosophy, politics, literature
September
Moby Dick by Herman Melville illustrated by Barry Moser 1979 The Arion Press (University of California Press)
call me a fan (book group)
Satantango by Laszlo Krasznahorkai translated from the Hungarian by George Szirtes c1985 English translation 2012 New Directions Books singular, intense,compelling novel; where black comedy and black despair mingle
The Shell by Mustafa Khalifa translated from the Arabic by Paul Starkey c2006 English translation 2017 Interlink Books
there is a cinematic flow to this harrowing story of a young man’s long years in a Syrian prison that makes it impossible to look away
October
The Murderer In Ruins by Cay Rademacher translated from the German by Peter Millar c2011 English translation 2015 Arcadia Books excellent crime thriller with good characters and plotting, remarkably vivid depiction of life in the harsh winter of 1947 in war devastated Hamburg
Slow Horses by Mick Herron 2010 Soho Press
very entertaining thriller, intricate layers in the world of British intelligence operations
Better by Atul Gawande 2007 Picador
memorable stories of his experiences across a wide sample of medicine/healthcare practices; insights into how anyone can ‘do better’ in any kind of endeavor
Walking On The Ceiling by Aysegul Savas 2019 Riverbed Books a delicate novel about memory, its elusive and malleable nature, its power to shape the self and relationships, the meanings created when memory is told as story
Homeland by Fernando Aramburu translated from the Spanish by Alfred MacAdam c2016 English translation c2019 Pantheon Books
powerful novel of two families in a Basque village in last years of ETA
The Capital by Robert Menasse translated from the German by Jamie Bullock c2017 English translation 2019 Liveright Publishing winner of the German Book Prize
a very funny, very serious novel about the idea of the European Union and its fragility, about the sad scrambled botch of human lives and history
The Library Book by Susan Orlean 2018 Simon and Schuster enjoyable history of Los Angeles Library, the Hollywood version of many city library histories (book group)
The Ghosts of Belfast by Stuart Neville 2009 Soho Press terrific premise and story; IRA killer haunted by ghosts of some of his victims and his efforts to give them justice
November
From The Shadows by Juan Jose Millas translated from the Spanish by Thomas Bunstead & Daniel Hahn c2016 English translation c2019 Bellevue Literary Press
a story bizarre, hilarious, and disturbing pretty much at the same time
The Churchgoer by Patrick Coleman 2019 Harper
fair California noir but too long, protagonist ultimately tedious
A Darker Shade of Magic by V. E. Schwab 2015 Tor entertaining, well-written classic style fantasy
Falcon by Emma Bull 1989 Ace
well written sci fi, enough story to have made a series
After The Banquet by Yukio Mishima translated from the Japanese by Donald Keene c1960 English translation c1963 Knopf
fascinating character portraits and presentation of Japanese society transitioning to modern world; beautiful evocative language, acute psychology, an intensely pleasurable and rewarding reading experience
December
Convenience Store Woman by Sayaka Murata translated from the Japanese by Ginny Tabley Takemori c2016 English translation c2018 Grove Press (book group) memorable satire, winner of Akutagawa Prize
Job, The Story of a Simple Man by Joseph Roth translated from the German by Dorothy Thompson c1930 English translation c1981 Overlook Press
story of a Russian Jew who emigrates to America; conjures a lost world through the power of Roth’s imagination and language
A Primer for Forgetting: Getting Past the Past by Lewis Hyde c2019 Farrar, Straus and Giroux a collection of short pieces musing on the kinds of forgetting, their meanings and usefulness in personal and community life; genuinely thought provoking and insightful
Fabulous Monsters: Dracula, Alice, Superman, and Other Literary Friends by Alberto Manguel c2019 Yale University Press
a reader’s look at the ways literary characters stay with us through life
The Wake by Paul Kingsnorth c2013 Graywolf Press
remarkable, engrossing, powerful work of the imagination; Kingsnorth created a kind of ‘Old English’, what he calls a “shadow language”, to conjure the last days of Anglo-Saxon England
Not All Bastards Are From Vienna by Andrea Moleskin translated from the Italian by Antony Shugaar & Patrick Creagh c2010 English Translation c2015 Grove Press winer of The Campiello Prize for Literature
well-crafted story of WWI set in a village in the highlands north of Venice
What We Talk About When We Talk About Books: The History and Future of Reading by Leah Price c2019 Basic Books a lively survey that packs a lot of information and commentary about book history, reading, libraries and other book sharing systems, books as tools and as autobiography, and more
A Bookwoman’s Holiday 