Thursday 24 December 2009

Books J'ai Lu 2009

This is the first year, I think that I've read any amount of books worth listing- the result of a full year of reading-goodness-working in a bookstore. Almost all of these were excellent reads, or at least fulfilled their purpose at the time, because I usually will abandon a book if I find that it doesn't hold my interest for whatever reason. The following are in no particular order.

  1. Unbearable Lightness of Being, Milan Kundera
  2. Manhood for Amateurs, Michael Chabon
  3. Education of a British Protected Child, Chinua Achebe
  4. The Museum of Innocence, Orhan Pamuk
  5. Barney's Version, Mordecai Richler
  6. Too Much Happiness, Alice Munro
  7. Asterios Polyp, David Mazzucchelli
  8. Wolf Hall, Hilary Mantel
  9. Youth, JM Coetzee
  10. Elizabeth Costello, JM Coetzee
  11. What the Dog Saw, Malcolm Gladwell
  12. The Confessions of Edward Day, Valerie Martin
  13. Superfreakonomics, Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner
  14. Birthday Letters, Ted Hughes
  15. Brightsided, Barbara Ehrenreich
  16. Nickle and Dimed, Barbara Ehrenreich
  17. Nocturnes, Kazuo Ishiguro
  18. What is Stephen Harper Reading, Yann Martel
  19. Fun Home, Alison Bechdel
  20. Brooklyn, Colm Toibin
  21. The Blue Hour, Lillian Pizzichini
  22. Confederacy of Dunces, John Kennedy Toole
  23. Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell
  24. This is Not a Book, Keri Smith
  25. Let's Talk About Love: A Journey to the End of Taste, Carl Wilson
  26. French Women for All Seasons, Mireille Guiliano
  27. The First Person and Other Stories, Ali Smith
  28. Food Rules, Michael Pollan
  29. Late Nights on Air, Elizabeth Hay
  30. Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim, David Sedaris
  31. When You Are Engulfed in Flames, David Sedaris
  32. Things I Have Been Silent About, Azar Nafisi
  33. Journals and Notebooks, 1947-1963, Susan Sontag
  34. A Blue Hand, Deborah Baker
  35. Infidel, Ayaan Hirsi Ali
  36. After Leaving Mr. Mackenzie, Jean Rhys
  37. Somewhere Towards the End, Diana Athill

- All the ones that I had recorded or could readily remember, but the list may get slightly longer.

2 comments:

Hollie May said...

you're a serious reader!!! which one would i like??

shipssail said...

It depends on what you're looking for! Too Much Happiness is really good for short fiction. French Women for All Seasons is like a lighter, self help style book, Museum of Innocence was amazing written by a Nobel Prize winner. Just choosing from my list of books from last year.