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Well my reading seems to have dwindled this past year, not that I have anything else to show for it. And while I think I was less diligent about noting what I read this last year, even worse I can barely remember some of the books. But nonetheless it’s the end of the year(ish) and time to make some notations:

• The Imperfectionists by Tom Rachman – I really enjoy a multiple POV work and this look from various folks at and English language based paper in Rome does a great job of telling each story and the overarching tale, I thought it was a very good read.
• Divisidaro by Michael Ondaatje – Another multi part piece, these three parts almost form a novel and I liked two of the three enough to enjoy the story of a broken family, though being in SF I was a little bummed for a less strong tie to Divisidaro street (don’t call it NOPA).
• Skippy Dies by Paul Murray – We know he dies in the first handful of pages, which makes the tragedy of this prep-schooler’s tragic death more palatable as we go back to tell the story leading up to things with the challenges all around the students, families, and faculty.
• You Don’t Love Me Yet by Jonathan Lethem – I can always count a good deal of random with Lethem and in this odd little riff centering on a gal touching on experimental installation art and music I was entertained enough on the ‘complaint line’ becoming hit tunes and the random relationships.
• What Should I Do With My Life by Po Bronson – I think I told a friend I wanted this to be more of a self-help book, but Bronson gathers a good range of people’s stories and finding their ‘purpose’ while imparting a bit of his own story and narrative to wrap it all up that I found it intriguing.
• The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo/The Girl Who Played with Fire/The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest by Stieg Larrson – I put these off for some time, for no real reason, but kicked in prior to catching the first US flick and I was surprised by how slightly off the formula these various tales of uncovering corruption and murders and various crimes focused from the investigative journalist’s perspective, the character of ‘the girl’ is always compelling even when she’s actually less present.
• A Drink Before the War/Darkness Take My Hand by Dennis Lehane – I picked up the start of this old series and was engaged by the Boston detective and his gal pal PI as they get far too involved in far too violent crimes, they hold up to time though I laugh at the use of old technology.

And a few less than stellar notations:

• The Marriage Plot by Jeffrey Eugenides – I really dug both The Virgin Suicides and Middlesex but never quite got into this love triangle of post collegiate overly intellectualizing. 
• Freedom by Jonathan Franzen – There is a way to make an unappealing character interesting to me and then there are just well described super annoying people, I know enough annoying people in real life.
• Riven Rock by T.C. Boyle – My mom had a bunch of TC Boyle in her stacks of books and as my first try… I actually finally gave up on this densely written book about a turn of the century sexually psychotic dude under care.

This year I vow to read more, and I also vow to stop reading books that I don’t dig. What are you reading?

As most folks know, I don’t get around to books right away. Even the paperbacks that I purchase on initial release mostly sit stacked in the corner of my apartment, so clearly I haven’t gotten around to any of these. I will probably refer to this list for purchases next year and in years to come, and about now am referencing last year’s list. Stay tuned for the best of what I read this year.

• The Middlesteins by Jami Attenberg – Am
• Telegraph Avenue by Michael Chabon – MK
• This Is How You Lose Her by Junot Diaz – Ti
• Hologram for the King by Dave Eggers – Am, MK, NYT, SFG
• The Round House by Louise Erdrich – Am, PW, SFG
• Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn – Am, JM
• Canada by Richard Ford – WP
• Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk by Ben Fountain – Am, JM, SFG, Ti, WP
• Broken Harbor by Tana French – WP
• The Fault in Our Stars by John Green – Am, Ti
• Arcadia by Laren Groff – JM, WP
• The Orphan Master’s Son by Adam Johnson – Am
• The Devil in Silver by Victor LaValle – PW
• Truth Like the Sun by Jim Lynch – JM
• Watergate by Thomas Mallon – JM
• Bring Up the Bodies by Hilary Mantel – Am, JM, NYT, PW, Ti, WP
• The Twelve Tribes of Hattie by Ayana Mathis – MK
• Sweet Tooth by Ian McEwan – Am
• Dear Life by Alice Munro – SFG
• Happiness Is a Chemical in the Brain by Lucia Perillo – PW
• The Yellow Birds by Kevin Powers – Am, MK, NYT
• The Casual Vacancy by J.K. Rowling – Ti
• Where’d You Go, Bernadette? by Maria Semple – JM, Ti
• NW by Zadie Smith – NYT, Ti
• At Last by Edward St. Aubyn – Ti
• The Girl Who Fell Beneath Fairyland and Led the Revels There by Catherynne Valente  - Ti
• Building Stories by Chris Ware – NYT, PW, Ti, WP

I feel like my suppliers for top ten book lists has shrunken, anyone have any other good lists?

Am – Amazon, JM – Janet Maslin, MK – Michiko Kakutani, NYT – New York Times, PW – Publisher’s Weekly, SFG – SFGate, Ti – Time, WP – Washington Post

When the iPads first came out I was one of the skeptics. I have a laptop and I have a phone. Do I really need yet another thing to own, carry, and buy? And buy again in another three years when I can’t stand how outdated it has become? And as time rolls on I keep rethinking my dismissal but I’m not entirely sure the reasons I don’t need one have changed.

As I find myself reading more and more on my phone and my laptop I start to wonder if reading on some sort of tablet might make more sense. I still believe in books and I still believe in magazines but… With a trip coming up I start to wonder if not traveling with books might make sense. And with my pile of magazines stacking up I start to wonder if faux flipping of digital pages might entertain me without the backlog guilt. And would I watch more tv online? What else can I be doing?

But if I’m doing it, what should I be doing it on? Because of the magazine and video factors I am leaning toward an iPad over a straight up book reader but is the compromise on size and book readability worth it? And is it worth the cost? Is there a right answer?

We’ve heard from the critics but what have I got? This year I sadly did less reading than last, though that didn’t stop me from purchasing books… So while I try to up my ratio here’s a look at some of the books I enjoyed. And I’m going with alphabetical order by author.

• Men & Dogs by Katie Crouch – The main character Hannah is a product of her father’s mysterious disappearance and she’s an unlikable mess that we can’t help but like, as well as the rest of her southern family she’s forced to revisit along with her past, I should mention Katie is a friend of mine.
• A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan – Parts of this book are great, introducing intriguing characters with interconnected lives, the stylistic explorations of form sometimes work but toward the end push too far in what felt like the sake of pushing it and sort of lost me.
• Star Island by Carl Hiaasen – I always enjoy an eco political campy pop star romp through Florida though I think these capers have gotten even more convoluted, if they weren’t so quick I don’t know that I’d keep up.
• Heart Shaped Box by Joe Hill – I stopped reading Stephen King some time ago, though I hate to make the comparison to his father, but I haven’t had a good ghost story in a long time, even if I apparently have reached an age where I prefer to read less suspenseful text before bed.
• Nina Here Nor There by Nick Krieger – A wonderful memoir that explores the lines of gender, opening up a window to a new world for many while remaining incredibly relatable and funny and touching to all, Nick is also a friend of mine.
• Chronic City by Jonathan Lethem – His writings are always a touch irregular and this latest follows suit, we’re never quite sure what’s going on with our former child star and his new friends as they look into culture, politics, mysticism and their fair share of getting high, maybe not as compelling a tome as Fortress of Solitude but an engaging ride.
• One Day by David Nicholls – We check in with Dexter and Emma each year to see how their doing individually and together, although obviously somewhat contrived the character’s growth and change over the years makes an interesting tale, I did skip the Anne Hathaway flick version.
• Mr Peanut by Adam Ross – I really liked a lot of this book, its dark look at relationships with the reveal of the story of a murder suspect whose wife may have choked on a peanut, as well as the parallels with the lives of the two detectives relationships, but it was a bit too convoluted to be completely satisfying.
• Man Gone Down by Michael Thomas – This book quickly brought me in with its poetic look at a man on the brink, looking at his past and his present, his surroundings New York and Boston, his struggles with class and race, and his relationships, though the poetry of the language didn’t keep me as engaged throughout.

I think by now we all know that I don’t get to new releases right away, but here’s what some of the critics are talking about out of this year’s crop. And of course I mostly stick to fiction so that’s what’s covered here. Check the links out below for full reviews and lists, and check back for the best (though maybe not ten) of what I did read this year.

• The Wandering Falcon by Jamil Ahmad – PW
• Started Early, Took My Dog by Kate Atkinson – Ti
• Lost Memory of Skin by Russell Banks – Am, JM
• The Sense of Ending by Julian Barnes – SFG
• Hark! A Vagrant by Kate Beaton – Ti
• The Illumination by Kevin Brockmeier – MC
• The Hottest Dishes of the Tartar Cuisine by Alina Bronsky – PW
• The Death Ray by Daniel Clowes – Ti
• Open City by Teju Cole – Ti, MC
• Daughters of the Revolution by Carloyn Cooke – SFG
• The Angel Esmeralda: Nine Stories by Don DeLillo – MK
• The Sisters Brothers by Patrick DeWitt – Am, PW
• The Marriage Plot by Jeffrey Eugenides – Am, PW, MC
• You Know When the Men Are Gone by Siobhan Fallon – JM, SFG
• Say Her Name by Francisco Goldman – PW
• The Art of Fielding by Chad Harbach – Am, NYT, MK, SFG, MC
• Volt by Alan Heathcock – PW
• Ten Thousand Saints by Eleanor Henderson – NYT
• The Stranger’s Child by Alan Hollinghurst – PW
• Train Dreams by Denis Johnson – PW, MC
• The Hypnotist by Lars Kepler – Ti
• Chango’s Beads and Two-Tone Shoes by William Kennedy – PW
• 11/22/63 by Stephen King – NYT
• The Lover’s Dictionary by David Levithan – Am
• Leche by R. Zamora Linmark – PW
• A Dance with Dragons by George R. R. Martin – Ti
• The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern – PW
• 1Q84 by Haruki Murakami – Am
• The Call by Yannick Murphy – PW
• The Tiger’s Wife by Tea Obreht – Am, NYT, MK, PW
• The Cat’s Table by Michael Ondaatje – Am
• State of Wonder by Ann Patchett – LG, PW, MC
• The Leftovers by Tom Perrotta – MC
• The Devil All the Time by Donald Ray Pollock – PW
• Swamplandia! by Karen Russell – NYT, JM, SFG, MC
• Cain by Jose Saramago – PW
• Luminarium by Alex Shakar – PW
• Please Look After Mom by Kyung-Sook Shin – Am
• There but for the by Ali Smith – PW
• Maine by J. Courtney Sullivan – Ti
• Someday This Will Be Funny by Lynne Tillman – PW
• I Married You for Happiness by Lily Tuck – PW
• The Submission by Amy Waldman – MC
• The Pale King by David Foster Wallace – MK, Ti, MC
• The Family Fang by Kevin Wilson – Ti

AM – Amazon, MC – Maureen Corrigan for NPR, MK – Michiko Kakutanis, JM – Janet Maslins, NYT – New York Times, PW – Publishers Weekly, SFG – SFGate, Ti – Time

Well another year and another stab at a top ten or so. In reviewing my books of last year I realized I’m mostly reading the same authors, I find myself torn between an old favorite and finding a new favorite. So this year I’m going to pull some new names off the shelf, after I finish this Michael Chabon I’m working on of course.

• Nobody’s Fool/Bridge of Sighs by Richard Russo – One of my favorite authors and while his books have a familiar comfort to them, Nobody’s Fool visits the same themes as it wraps the Mohawk trilogy, Bridge of Sighs brings a slightly new take and a greater complexity to a family in a small town over a period of time.
• Curse of the Spellmans/Revenge of the Spellmans by Lisa Lutz – These fluffy detective stories are totally delightful as we join the quirky San Francisco PI family dealing with at least one case but mostly get themselves in and out of trouble.
• The Magician’s Assistant by Ann Patchett – From the author of Bel Canto, we get to know a woman who gets to know her magician husband and maybe herself after his death.
• Lush Life by Richard Price – This was my first Price and more interesting than the Manhattan Lower East Side crime that the novel follows is the way he details the place through the various people involved.
• Gun with Occasional Music by Jonathan Lethem – I’ve been continuing back with his earlier works and he seem to cover a broad spectrum of genres, this futuristic detective novel is amusing and engaging though just a little bit plain weird.
• Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz - I enjoyed but wasn’t as absolutely in love with this book as many were, only because the story of generations of Dominican family was uneven in my engagement and attachment to the various stories and point of views.
• Generation A by Douglas Coupland – Even when he’s imperfect his writing is enjoyable, this time his slightly unusual plot is about folks stung by bees, after bees have disappeared, though the weirder it got perhaps the harder to wrap up to a satisfying conclusion.
• The Autograph Man by Zadie Smith – On Beauty was one of my favorite books so I took a step into the backlog for this and found that although it had elements of the writing and characters that I had so enjoyed, the unlikable protagonist often being lame kept me from really embracing it.
• Falling Man by Don DeLillo – A look at the lives of a few people following the destruction of the twin towers, the writing often made me feel like I should just be spending more time appreciating the language of the book rather than trying to engage with the meandering story and at times disconnected characters.

Another year, another list of recommended books that’s longer than I’ll ever get to. I just rechecked last year and I have yet to read any of those, though I have purchased Chronic City (for the record I’ve read three from the previous year). As always since I read fiction, I kept the nod to fiction. What have I been reading? Stick around and I’ll let you know the best of my year.

• The New Yorker Stories by Ann Beattie – NYT
• 61 Hours by Lee Child – JM
• Wilson by Daniel Clowes – LG
• The Passage by Justin Cronin - LG
• Memory Wall: Stories by Anthony Doerr – Am
• Room by Emma Donoghue – NYT, KV
• A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan – NYT, PW, LG
• Freedom by Jonathan Franzen – MK, NYT, Am, PW, LG, MC
• Faithful Place by Tana French – JM, LG
• Lord of Misrule by Jaimy Gordon – LG
• To the End of the Land by David Grossman – Am
• Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand – PW
• The Surrendered by Chang-rae Lee – PW, KV
• Matterhorn by Karl Marlantes – Am, LG, KV
• The Lost Book of the Odyssey by Zachary Mason – MK
• The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet by David Mitchell – MK, LG, MC
• Skippy Dies by Paul Murray – Am, LG, KV
• The Hand that First Held Mine by Maggie O’Farrell – Am
• The Invisible Bridge by Julie Orringer – KV
• One Day by David Nicholls – Am, KV
• Rich Boy by Sharon Pomerantz – KV
• The Imperfectionists by Tom Rachman – JM, Am, KV
• So Much for That by Lionel Shriver – MC
• Super Sad True Love Story by Gary Shteyngart – MK, MC
• Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand by Helen Simonson – JM, Am
• Man in the Woods by Scott Spencer – PW
• Selected Stories by William Trevor – NYT
• The Lonely Polygamist by Brady Udall – Am, PW, KV
• Savages by Don Winslow – JM
• How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe by Charles Yu – LG

MK – Michiko Kakutani for NYT, JM – Janet Maslin for NYT, NYT – New York Times, Am – Amazon Lit, KV – Karen Valby for EW,  PW – Publisher’s Weekly, LG - Lev Grossman for Time, MC – Maureen Corrigan for NPR

If you’ve followed along you’ll know that I never read anything that is actually release in 2009 until much later in the game. So since the critics have covered their picks of the new releases, I’ll highlight a few books I enjoyed over the past year. And although I’d share a top ten if I could I just don’t read enough to have ten that I’d actually recommend, so in alphabetical order:

• Beautiful Children by Charles Bock – The mystery that starts the tale of Vegas homeless kids and some of those around them was so immersed in the culture that it almost feels like a slightly psychotic PSA and although the mystery itself was unfulfilling it had enough interesting characters and moments that it was an engaging tale nonetheless.
• The Gum Thief by Douglas Coupland – An author I always enjoy, readable and topical, this novel looks at a 40 year old loser and 20 something misfit who communicate through a journal starting at their less than fulfilling job at an office supply company, it’s full of amusement in their misery, though not the most intricate of plots their stories and the odd novel that is contributed within the texts kept me turning pages.
• Continent by Jim Crace – An author I am trying to catch up with, after starting off with his wonderful Being Dead, his lovely writing adds to the intrigue in this series of short stories all set in a fictional location giving the ability to create familiar themes in an undeveloped unfamiliar territory.
• Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn – Following a journalist to her hometown to get the story when a school girl is found dead and another girl goes missing, what’s more interesting in this ‘thriller’ is the main character’s dysfunction and its sources, though the mystery wasn’t as satisfying the psychological context was well worth the read.
• Slam by Nick Hornby – Another author I always enjoy, though High Fidelity may always be the favorite, this latest installment could have come across as a young adult teen pregnancy cautionary tale but is saved by the author’s usual bouts of witty dialogue and amusing nods to popular culture in well developed characters.
• The Spellman Files by Lisa Lutz – This first in a series of tales of the Spellman family of detectives immediately pulled me in as these folks clearly blur the lines between family and family business, we follow Izzy’s struggles with family and cases as she travels through San Francisco is a fun fresh take on detectives.
• The Risk Pool by Richard Russo – Ever since I fell in love with Russo’s writing and storytelling in Empire Falls I have been going back and picking up his earlier works, like many others this is set in blue collar upstate New York and here we grow up with Sam’s son who is as impacted by the time he spends with his more than flawed father as his time without him.

Another year of publishing gone by, and if you know me, you know I didn’t read anything new. So I will pass along some of the critical picks if you’re looking for something good. I tend to read almost all fiction so that’s what’s here.

• The Windup Girl by Paolo Bacigalupi – LG
• Beat the Reaper by Josh Bazell – LG
• Await Your Reply by Dan Chaon – PW
• “Moe Prager” mysteries by Reed Farrel Coleman – NPR
• Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins – LG
• Spooners by Pete Dexter – Am
• Jeff in Venice, Death in Varanasi by Geoff Dyer – LG, PW
• The Man in the Wooden Hat by Jane Gardam – NPR
• Tinkers by Paul Harding – Am
• The Believers by Zoe Heller – NPR
• Swimming by Nicola Keegan – LG
• The Girl Who Played with Fire by Stieg Larson – Am
• Big Machine by Victor Lavalle – PW
• Chronic City by Jonathan Lethem – NYT
• The Kindly Ones by Jonathan Littell – LG
• The Stalin Epigram by Robert Littell – WP
• Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel – LG, WP, Am
• Let the Great World Spin by Colum McCann – Am
• Both Ways is the Only Way I Want It by Maile Meloy – NYT
• American Rust by Philipp Meyer – WP
• The City & The City by China Mieville – Am
• A Gate at the Stairs by Lorrie Moore – NYT, WP, Am, NPR
• In Other Rooms, Other Wonders by Daniyal Mueenuddin – LG, PW
• The Museum of Innocence by Orhan Pamuk – WP
• Brooklyn by Colm Toibin – Am, NPR
• Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned by Wells Tower – LG
• This is Where I Leave You by Jonathan Tropper – Am
• The Informers by Juan Gabriel Vasquez – Am
• Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese – Am
• Half Broke Horses by Jeannette Walls – NYT
• A Short History of Women by Kate Walbert – NYT
• The Financial Lives of the Poets by Jess Walter – LG, NPR
• Sag Harbor by Colson Whitehead – Am

Am – Amazon, LG – Lev Grossmas for Time, NPR – Maureen Corrigan for NPR, NYT – New York Times , PW – Publisher’s Weekly, WP – Washington Post

Well another year of not reading enough to really recommend much, so I decided to pull together some picks from the past two years. In alphabetical order:

• Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood – Telling the tale of the end of civilization in the not so distant future Atwood brings us along for the tale of how it all happened through perhaps the one surviving man.
• JPod by Douglas Coupland – I don’t miss a Coupland (Microserfs and Generation X are still the faves) and dug his latest somewhat random, tied to current times tale of life in the cubicle zone with game developers.
• Another Bullshit Night in Suck City by Nick Flynn – A tough but engaging memoir as Flynn tries to beat the ‘like father like son’ curse of writing and drinking and homelessness.
• Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen – This book was all the rage for a while for good reason, super readable and compelling story of the drama of life with the traveling circus.
• Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro – From their days in boarding school to life as adults it’s intriguing to see how the unusually special students live their lives.
• The Know it All by AJ Jacobs – I was amused and felt a little smarter as I followed the author on his real life quest to read the Britannica a to z relating it all to life, well his life.
• I Am Legend by Richard Matheson – When this Will Smith movie came out my dad handed me a tattered copy of the book it was based on, and for a vampire/plague tale first told in 1954 it holds up quite well (much better than the movie).
• The Good Life by Jay McInerney – I always find McInerney super readable (Bright Lights, Big City and Brightness Falls would be my favorites of his) and enjoyed this take on romance and family around ground zero after 9/11.
• Bel Canto by Ann Patchett – The hostages and captors create an unusual life in their standstill, impacted by one man’s love of music and a little bad timing.
• On Beauty by Zadie Smith – Structurally based on Howards End this family drama filled with academics, race, adultery and all that good stuff is compelling from start to finish, my favorite of this author.

And of course there are the critics picks of books actually written in 2008.