ILX BOOKS OF THE 00s: THE RESULTS! (or: Ismael compiles his reading list, 2010-2019)

this was posted in the voting thread but worth referencing again - freakonomics demolished:
http://www.crab.rutgers.edu/~goertzel/mythsofmurder.htm

And on Atomised - from what I remember, if it advocates anything (& I don't think it does especially) it's a scientific transcendence of the human, ie the abolition of death and sex. And it's very hard on rebellion, especially that of the 60s, which it sees as self-interested hedonism. But really Noodle Vague otm.

83. Death With Interruptions - Jose Saramago (2008)
(30 points, two votes)

http://t2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ioB6RCYquo9tYM:http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_L5KZ2GdNwMw/SuHyHrwHRYI/AAAAAAAAAEY/h3mqDqO_nRc/s400/jose-saramago.jpg

I ordered [2666] a few days ago, along with Saramago's Death With Interruptions. I probably will not get a chance to start either until May 17th, 2009, my 26th birthday, graduate school graduation day, end of a personal nightmare, and beginning of the better part of my life. I'm really looking forward to that day.
― z "R" s (Z S), Friday, November 7, 2008 5:29 PM (1 year ago)

Pretty thin archive for this - that's its only mention outside the context of this poll.

... and there's no sign of that changing. Poor Jose, with his nobel prize, solid gold house and his rocket car.

82. Fun Home - Alison Bechdel (2006)
(30 points, three votes)

http://img297.imageshack.us/img297/6672/funhome.jpg

Lovely story of a family wrestling with troubles and secrets
― Ismael Klata

Fun Home isn't really that good after all. It's more "literary" I suppose but in a very obvious way -- I'm not used to authors spelling out their allusions to other texts. Also Bechdel has an odd habit of dropping in 4 syllable words from out of nowhere. Much preferred "Blankets" despite its lower aspirations.
― Arethusa, Sunday, July 22, 2007 3:41 AM (2 years ago)

No, it really is very good.
One of the great things about Fun Home is that can spell out its allusions to other texts, because it isn't making those allusions to be clever, but instead wants to show how overwhelming the weight of those allusions can be. So a sly "did you get that? it's like Proust!" moment, which is the sort of game that most allusions end up being, would have totally defeated her purpose. Instead, she almost makes fun of you for being part of that game; the book is about some of the consequences of such a mediated life.
― Casuistry, Sunday, July 22, 2007 5:29 PM (2 years ago)

Good authors don't use allusions to be "clever". I prefer them to be used in more subtle manner, more as a seamless you-can-see-it-if-you-know-it-doesn't-matter-if-you-don't manner, rather than the book become nothing more than a personalized Cliff Notes. *shrugs* Which is how Fun Home read to me. I get that's how she had to tell her story, it just didn't work for me. (Funnily enough the Proust section worked the best for me, probably because that was the one, out of all of them, that least needed the And This Is How Budding Grove Applies To My Life tactic.)
― Arethusa, Sunday, July 22, 2007 6:21 PM (2 years ago)

Graphic novel, obviously - pity the panel didn't come out a little bit bigger. A decent result, but it's not the highest one in our poll.

Just finished reading two good books from the noughties this week:
(i) "Getting Our Way" by Christopher Meyer (published in 2009) - this is a really good book on British diplomacy. It has three parts:
1. Security
2. Prosperity
3. Values
Each part has 3 case studies. I found the most fascinating to be the 3 case studies in Part 2 which dealt with British diplomacy with China. The first case study charted Britain's first contact with China when McCartney visited the Emperor, refused to kowtow, and the general apathy of the Chinese to the outside world. The second case study examined the gunboat diplomacy of the 1800s and the third case study analysed Sino-British diplomacy over the handover of Hong Kong in 1997. Really well written with fascintating insights into how diplomacy works. Much better than Meyer's last book this one is joined by a three-part series on diplomacy coming up on BBC4 in February. I hope it's as good as the book. I was really pleasantly surprised.

(ii) "The Road" by Cormac McCarthy - this was on our nominations list and the book was adapted into a film which is currently out in the cinemas. I read it in under 20 hours so it's a really easy and quick read. On its surface it's a very sad and disturbing book given that a boy and his father are travelling down the US to the coast and scrabbling around a desolate and dead world looking for food and ways to avoid being killed and eaten. However, the way the relationship between father and son is portrayed, and the sacrifice that a parent is willing to endure for his offspring is really heart rending and life affirming. In many ways I felt the book distilled the greater human condition, the predicament we find ourselves in. Worth a read. Those of you who read it, how did the film compare?

am reading 'surperfreakonomics' atm and it's light, easy & entertaining stuff, but not presented in a way to make you sit up and think 'eureka' at any stage. i believe most of it about as much as i'd believe a student case study of 'starbucks' as a success story in 2006. in fact it's pretty much delivered in that style.

am curious as to whether palin's diaries will place, which was pretty much the book i enjoyed most the past decade.

Not nominated Darragh, so no (see what wrongs you could've put right by pitching in?).

Are they as amusing as they should be? I got them for Xmas one year, but was immediately put off when I read somewhere else that he's actually a miserable sod in real life. I do hope it's not 500 pages of gripes and despair.

One of the great things about Fun Home is that can spell out its allusions to other texts, because it isn't making those allusions to be clever, but instead wants to show how overwhelming the weight of those allusions can be. So a sly "did you get that? it's like Proust!" moment, which is the sort of game that most allusions end up being, would have totally defeated her purpose. Instead, she almost makes fun of you for being part of that game; the book is about some of the consequences of such a mediated life.
― Casuistry, Sunday, July 22, 2007 5:29 PM (2 years ago)

this is so otm it leaves me completely unable to elaborate on anything else about it or why else that book is great

I didn't know the film was out. I saw the trailer absolutely ages ago (like, about a year) but then it just disappeared. I wondered if the whole thing was getting canned. I've read the book but shan't pronounce on it here as there's still a tiny chance that it could feature later.

Are they as amusing as they should be? I got them for Xmas one year, but was immediately put off when I read somewhere else that he's actually a miserable sod in real life. I do hope it's not 500 pages of gripes and despair.

no, they're great! incredibly informative and much more honest about the workings of python than i was anticipating.

i didn't get involved in nominating simply because i didn't imagine anything i'd actually have read would be up to scratch in intimidating ILX book club tbh.

The film of The Road wasn't grey enough, cold enough or dead enough. It was alright, Viggo was good, I didn't have a problem with the bigger part given to the mother. My favourite scene from the book, where they come across the train rusting into the tracks was missing.

Fantastic book, above average film.

thought that whole palin conversation was about sarah. despite reference to "he".

I can't begin to imagine what her diaries would be like.

Intimidating? Hm, the meta chat re Fun Home left me floundering a little I must confess. I sometimes wonder whether all that sort of effort is totally wasted on me. Maybe I do enjoy the added layers of meaning without recognising what the author's up to. I remember there being a Proust bit in Fun Home at least, but it didn't mean a great deal as I've never read Proust and so possibly I didn't pay enough attention to what it was really saying - but whether there were other references I have no idea. I just took it, and enjoyed it, at face value - a sweet story about an awkward, infuriating man.

re: intimidating: i didn't actually have any basis for this btw, just assumed it.

fwiw, Fun Home was the first graphic novel I ever read, and it made me really excited to further explore the genre. I loved it.

81. Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned: Stories - Wells Tower (2009)
(30 points, three votes)

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2009/04/11/arts/towe.jpg

Mizzell:
A great writer of young characters, also sensitive vikings.

I encountered an unforgettable story in the 2003 Pushcart collection, "Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned," by Wells Tower, originally published, it says, in Fence, which I've never heard of. It tells of a band of marauding Norsemen who have attacked every village around but still need to maraud, so they go back to a town they had just been to recently, even though there is nothing left to steal and no one to fight with. Although the setting is historical, the main character tells the story in a contemporary voice. The contrast between setting and voice makes for some startling humor. Includes lots of grotesque violence.
― Janet Gurn-Soosy, Sunday, January 11, 2004 6:00 PM (6 years ago)

^ seriously ahead of her time. Everything else I've seen says it's from 2009. (I liked this New York Times piece)

this sounds awesome and i love fence. First one on the list I feel I'll definitely read.

Yup, will most likely read. Normally short stories from promising US writer absolutely not my thing, but I've heard about Wells Tower from a few different directions now. Also, awesome name.

would love to hear more about the palin book. i'd kinda assumed that since it was brushed up rather than straight out of her confused jumbled mind, it wouldn't be so compelling.

you know they were talking about michael not sarah right

Yeah, Darragh's talking about Michael Palin. I doubt Sarah's the reflective journal-keeping type, but if they exist they *must* one day be releasedomeIm anticipating some ungodly cross between William Steig, Mein Kapmf and William Burroughs.

"...released. I'm..." I don't have tourette's.

goddammit. i was thinking diaries was going rogue.

IIRC Palin's diaries weren't nominated, shame as they would have crept in near the bottom of my ballot.

I've never heard of Wells Tower but I will definitely have to check that book out. The description of that story sounds kind of like "Culloden."

Great thread so far, Ismael, thank you for doing this!

Very confused for a second about Wells Tower. I remember reading that short story in Anchor's New American Short Stories Anthology back in 2004 and liking it a lot. Didn't realize he was just now releasing his first book. I'm guessing I should pick it up based on the Viking story and this one from the New Yorker a few years ago.

The Sinai Diving Guide

Here are some snaps from the book which I scanned this afternoon.

THis first one is a 3D atlas of the Blue Hole - El Bells dive I described about a week ago.

http://img260.imageshack.us/img260/5449/snapshot20100117185650.jpg

And here are some of the pages describing the Blue Hole - El Bells dive. There is a smaller version of the 3D atlas dive plan, a photo of a diver in the Blue Hole, and a photo of the crack in the reef (top right) which allows entry into EL BElls and the long narrow descent to 32 metres to the start of the coral wall drift dive.

http://img503.imageshack.us/img503/2725/snapshot20100117191002.jpg

Here are some pages describing the "Canyon" dive in Dahab as well. There is a mini 3D atlas of the dive, photos, a map and descriptions.

http://img532.imageshack.us/img532/6217/snapshot20100117191614.jpg

Some more photos and 3D images of the "Canyon" dive:

http://img402.imageshack.us/img402/1751/snapshot20100117192130.jpg

Liking it. I see the Blue Hole better now in the first one - it looks bloody terrifying. Wikipedia tells me there is footage around of a guy filming his own death at the bottom, which is just about the worst thing I can imagine. The name 'El Bells' is quite fitting, I've got AC/DC on my internal jukebox now. I like the little camels up in the hills too.

I'm just relieved the book exists to be honest - I was starting to get worried that we'd been hoodwinked into lionising the book equivalent of Keyser Söze.

80. Black Swan Green - David Mitchell (2006)
(31 points, two votes)

http://img109.imageshack.us/img109/5049/blackswangreen.jpg

Parenthetic Hound (woofwoofwoof):
The best of the generation's Britishes

He got some stick (again, from Private Eye, I think) for the relentless product name-dropping, and it is very noticable (someone with a better memory for pop trivia could probably place the year exactly but I'm stuck on 'early-80s').
It's probably set in 1982 (Mitchell was born in 1969, so 13 in 1982).I loved the book. And I think I am not in the target demographic as a Dutch girl born in 1979...
― Ionica (Ionica), Friday, June 30, 2006 12:54 PM (3 years ago)

after a fairly weak start i thought "Black Swan Green" was superb. it really takes off after the Frobisher section and Jason, who i thought was weak and frustrating, suddenly started to interest me. the last 20 pages or so were incredibly moving. in fact i'm welling up just thinking about them now (no joke). there's a beautiful moment when jason meets the man at the "house in the woods" at the end *SLIGHT SPOILER* and jason says he thought the house was miles from anywhere and the man replies that the wood is "no more than the size of three or four football pitches, it's hardly sherwood forest." it's an amazing moment because it's so familiar yet so unexpected; a small moment that subtly changes your impression of the entire book.
i can't believe this book hasn't been marketed in a major way to teenagers. if i was a parent or teacher i would be urging kids to read it.
― jed_ (jed), Thursday, October 19, 2006 7:43 PM (3 years ago)

Wat is je favoriete Mitchell? Heb hier nog een ongelezen Cloud Atlas liggen.
Dat is mijn favoriet! Het eerste hoofdstuk is een beetje doorbijten, maar daarna wordt het geweldig. Past hij nog in je tas? Black Swan Green vond ik ook heel goed, maar dat is een heel ander soort boek. Een beetje "The straight story" van Mitchell.
― Ionica (Ionica), Thursday, June 15, 2006 11:51 AM (3 years ago)

It's not actually scary at all if you follow the dive plan on the first scanned photo. It would be a different story though if you entered the Blue Hole through the tunnel at 60 metres. That tunnel is not indicated in the first scanned photo as it's too deep and is off the map. However, it appears in the smaller 3D dive map on the second photo, right at the bottom in the middle of the dive plan. That is where most of the Russians die. Get nitrogen narcosis, laugh like crazy and throw away their BCD (buoyancy control device) and air tanks as the nitrogen narcosis makes them feel overconfident and ecstatic, but affects their judgment for the worse. I don't think I'll ever have enough qualifications or experience to do that part of the dive. Funny, when I turned up I initially thought I'd be able to do it!!!

I must have read 'Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned' in that Anchor collection at some point. Should look it up again and maybe get the Wells Tower book, as the descriptions so far have been rather compelling.

That's the first of a seven-way-tie, incidentally - some totals must be easier to land on than others.

You should have gone for it anyway, Red

79. Rabbit Remembered
(31 points, two votes)

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/e9/John-updike-candid.jpg/220px-thumb.jpg

Red Raymaker:
I have to confess that I would have been tempted to include this novella on my voting list even if it had not been top notch, simply because Updike's four principal "Rabbit" books are my favourite books of any decade and I would have been tempted to recognise his achievements in this poll too.  However, I feel in all good consciousness, able to vote for his novella on its merits.  I think it is top notch again, but not quite as excellent as his principal works.  Given that, and the fact it is a novella, and the fact that the protagonist does not really feature in the novella, I did not think it merited finishing any higher than fourth, but I think that is already a terrific achievement.  The three books which I have voted for ahead of the novella are, I think, better.  In this novella Updike does what he always does when writing creatively - he sets himself apart from his peers by his ability to provide sharper and more profound insights into the world, consciousness and the human conditions than any of his peers.  The characters he creates feel completely and convincingly real to me.  I find it very difficult to think that there might not be a Janice Angstrom commuting between Brewer and Florida this winter.

79. Rabbit Remembered - John Updike (2001)
(31 points, two votes)

Loved this one, but I got my heading wrong - time to call it a night I think.

Updike is simply the most fantastic writer and the character of Harry Angstrom (Rabbit) is the quintessential everyman. It is wonderful to follow the growth of the character of Janice, his wife, from a young expectant mother suffering from a lack of self-confidence to the middle aged go getting owner of Springer Motors and property realtor. And to follow the resentments and inadequacies of Nelson their son throughout the four principal books and this novella. Then there are unforgettable characters like Skeeter who enter Harry's life and change it irrevocably. Updike writes so convincingly about some of the little things that make us human - the additction to the feeling of sweet and also salty snacks dissolving in our mouths to the profound everyday irritation which loved ones can cause us to the love and loyalty of family despite their shortcomings.

I'm not too surprised the novella didn't score so highly because it is just that, a novella, and not one of the principal four Rabbit books. However, I'm surprised that it didn't attract one or two further votes. Of those who have read this novella and didn't vote for it, why did it fall short for you? Because it was a novella and didn't feel substantial enough to qualify, or because you didn't think it was up to scratch?

Incidentally, I don't think I would have enjoyed the novella so much as a standalone read. It only really worked on the back of the four principal works which preceded it.

I'm just about to start a new book. I was thinking of either Bellow's "The Adventures of Augie March" or De Lillo's "Underworld". Which one should I go for?

I forgot about David Mitchell, was Cloud Atlas nominated?

Black Swan Green is in some ways my favourite David Mitchell but I very much hope Cloud Atlas places higher.

I was pretty exhausted last night and missed that Rabbit Remembered actually did pick up three votes, not two - meaning that it's been unfairly bumped down a handful of places. However, there's no room for third umpires in this poll, so Updike will just have to make do with universal acclaim instead.

78. Engleby - Sebastian Faulks (2007)
(31 points, two votes)

http://www.paramuspost.com/mediagallery/mediaobjects/tn/d/d_engleby2.jpg

Red Raymaker:
Beautifully written and fascinating to gain an insight into the mind of a dangerous loner.  Thought it was a much more successful attempt at examining the dark recesses of the human mind than his "Human Traces"

and

I'm probably being too scathing about Faulks, a writer I've read with some pleasure in the past. I didn't on the whole like "Birdsong", presumably still his most highly rated, although there were certainly good things in it. I've also read Engleby, Charlotte Grey, On Green Dolphin Street, The Girl at the Lion D'Or and The Fatal Englishman (this last non-fiction). Engleby and and OGDS in particular were enjoyable reads, although I'd be reluctant to make any claims for them beyond that.
Faulks has nothing to be ashamed of but if you compare A Week in December with, say, Hollinghurt's The Line of Beauty (there are some similarities, like a set piece dinner parties held by Tory MPs) there's a substantial gulf in class. I get the impression Faulks is bitter because he's not taken as seriously as the likes of Hollinghurst, Zadie Smith and Ian McEwan but the truth is he's just not as good as they are.
― frankiemachine, Monday, October 26, 2009 2:32 PM (2 months ago)

That quote was part of a discussion where I was lamenting Faulks' buffoonery in a recent interview. It was singularly depressing because I'd been so impressed by On Green Dolphin Street, forming a view of him as a man happy to be superb at his craft without the need to pontificate on things he knows nothing about. It's true that he can't match up to The Line of Beauty, though to be fair very few books can. But (from what I've read) as a storyteller he's far above most of McEwan's work, which is after all his job, even if McEwan does a better job of looking clever.

The tragedy is that I suspect Faulks' greatest ambition really is to be taken as seriously as Martin Amis.