Books of 2009
Jan. 1st, 2009 12:00 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
marenziTotal: 12
Fiction: 12
Non-Fiction: 2
Final Page Count:
Average Length:
Shortest Book:
Longest Book:
1. A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving -- fiction -- 617 pages
I've chosen John Irving for an in-depth author study, so I didn't expect to like this book. But Owen - ridiculous, obnoxious, always self-righteous Owen, with his ALWAYS-CAPITALIZED SPEECH & WRITING - completely won me over. It was the ending that absolutely cemented it for me, the way that every single minuscule detail just miraculously came together. My biggest annoyance was Irving's tangents into his present-day life in Canada - while they provided an interesting 'here's what happened later' and will obviously be essential to my paper, some of them just devolved into mindless, incoherent political rants.
2. The Cider House Rules by John Irving -- fiction -- 587 pages
This is only the second school book I've ever truly enjoyed, and I loved it (for the record, the other was 1984). Oh Homer. It was sweet and slow and you kinda of wanted to hit both of them by the end, but you had to sort of smile anyway. There are so many parallels between Cider House Rules & Owen Meany, but this felt much more neatly put together. I did feel that Rose Rose was a throwaway character; so much more could have been done with her. Overall, this was still wonderful; I'm thinking I need to see the movie now.
3. Are You There, Vodka? It's Me, Chelsea by Chelsea Handler -- non-fiction -- 264 pages
This was wildly popular, but all I could think was that she had nothing on David Sedaris. She can be funny, but it's mostly bland and overly simplistic. It definitely didn't help that she managed to hit my embarrassment squick five times on one page, either. I'll stick with Sedaris; in all honesty, the title was probably my favorite part.
4. My Last Supper by Melanie Dunea -- non-fiction -- 216 pages
SORT-OF FOOD PORN YAY. This is a photo-essay of fifty great chefs answering the ultimate question: What would you choose for your last meal on earth? The responses range from rambling anecdotes spanning several pages to simple one-line answers. The photos are often amusing; let's use Anthony Bourdain as an example. Speaking of which, Bourdain (whose writing I love, haven't seen his show) penned the introduction with his usual lovely snark.
5. King Lear by William Shakespeare -- fiction -- 261 pages
I dislike Shakespeare to begin with, but this? Was my least favorite of all. At least most of the others had some nice death scenes, but everyone dies offstage here. (Okay, admittedly,Glouchester's Cornwall's Glouchester's eyes were a nice touch.) Maybe it was just me, maybe I didn't follow closely enough, I don't know. It just felt like so little happened onstage that the entire play was just people explaining what happened offstage. The Fool was the most interesting character, and he disappears without any explanation before the end of the play. Meh.
6. The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini -- fiction -- 371 pages
This is the most perfect, haunting book I can remember reading in a very long time. It's difficult for me to describe how evocative and gut-wrenching it was to read, because I still haven't sorted out exactly how I feel about it. I do know that I'll need to read it again someday.
Part of this confusion stems from my ambivalence toward Amir. When he watched, just stood there and then ran away - I'm hardly ever emotional about books or movies, but I had to put the book down for a day out of hatred. I felt so deeply connected that I honestly wanted to punch the character. I didn't consider that scene triggering or anything, but I can't fathom how differently everything would have turned out if my friends hadn't been there. The idea of who would do that - who would walk away - has been shaking in my head ever since. It still is, and that's exactly what makes this novel so impossibly good.
It's that sort of emotion that bubbles at the back of your throat throughout. Of course, Amir was fantastically effective as a character, because I felt so strongly towards him, but Hassan and Sohrab are literally unforgettable.
God, you know what, just read it. It's horribly, wonderfully brilliant.
7. Brave New World by Aldous Huxley -- fiction -- 259 pages
I expected to like this a lot more than I did, mostly because I adored 1984. I came away unimpressed and bored with the ending. The entire concept of utopias/dystopias interests me, so some of the scientific setup was good, but the execution was nothing special. And the ending felt like a cop-out. :/
8. A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini -- fiction -- 367 pages
I can't really place what I love about Hosseini's writing, because I'm not usually fond of that style. But the way he writes just works for me in so many ways, and I loved this almost as much as The Kite Runner. I didn't loathe Rasheed anywhere near as strongly as I did Amir, of course, but Laila & Tariq's love story was sweet without being saccharine. Hosseini's writing is deeply emotional without ever becoming overbearing; it's not woeful lamenting or pitiful sobbing, just straight facts and a simple story that cuts. I'm not certain if he's working on a third novel, but if he is, I'll definitely be reading it.
9. The Color Purple by Alice Walker -- fiction -- 304 pages
I got very little out of this. Admittedly, female empowerment isn't exactly my crusade, but I just couldn't get into the characters or the plot or the epistolary style at all. I just found everything implausible. For every character to find their happy ending - for them to be well-off and in love and magically find each other - was just way too much for me. (This is where my friends say I have no soul, I think.) But aside from the impact of the first page, nothing grabbed me. It was too predictable.
10. The World According to Garp by John Irving -- fiction -- 609 pages
The end of my Irving books. Apparently, this was the most autobiographical of all, and it scares the shit out of me. There's a lot of Biblical-style justice - a guy's dick is bitten off during a blowjob in a car. It starts off with Garp's mother, a nurse who impregnates herself through an infantile, brain-damaged patient. There are a legion of women who cut their tongues out in support of an eleven-year-old rape victim (who of course just wants to forget it, not start a fucking trend). And I hated the novel insertions, because they were far too long and exactly the same.
Basically, Irving's books are formula: a young man grows up in a strict, rigid environment, then branches out into the real world on his own. He struggles to find the meaning of his life until an abused young girl comes to him, and he then realizes that his life's work must be to return to his childhood home. I am not looking forward to researching his life at all.
11. Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut -- fiction -- 224 pages
...All I could think about during this book is that Billy Pilgrim = my senile biology teacher. (He insists that he's 133 years old, only he was reset to a baby at 77, and that his girlfriend - Molly Jolly Golly - is enslaved on an alien planet. WHAT.) I'll admit it's an effective anti-war book, and Billy's insanity is a huge contributing factor. But I wasn't pulled into the story. The extremely non-sequential storyline threw me a bit at times, and it felt unresolved. Not terrible, but not worth it.
12. This Lullaby by Sarah Dessen -- fiction -- 352 pages
Sarah Dessen is my YA-teen-novel guilty fix. It'll never be great literature, but her characters are so relatable and quirky and imperfect. Remy's flimsy badass front is silly, and I love her for it. And Dexter's - sort of indescribable, really. But he's so self-confidant and sure of himself, no matter what. My favorite part has to be the warped pictures and their stolen collage - the pieces of strangers' lives, arranged on the wall with pins. It's one of the little details which makes Dessen's novels.
13. The Truth About Forever by Sarah Dessen -- fiction -- 400 pages
My favorite of her books - I love Macy because I love her life. I love her craving for chaos and her stupid insecurities, because really? Most of them are mine, too. I'll totally admit that Wish is sort of my dream summer job - insane and unpredictable and a bit unstable. (Not to mention that YES, I really want a Wes.God he is so ridiculously amazing) It's sappy, but it's really hopeful. This is either a rainy-afternoon or a beach-read; either way, I'll smile.
14. Terrier by Tamora Pierce -- fiction -- 608 pages
I was obsessed with Tamora Pierce in middle school. I re-read her Tortall quartets over and over again, and I was hopelessly in love with George. (Okay, I loved the tension between Alanna & Jon when she was his squire and it was all ~forbidden. But then he became a dick, so.) George was the dangerous bad boy, proving that I didn't have any sense when I was younger, either - but he was so fiercely loyal. Pierce transferred that same quality a few hundred years back to the days of George's ancestor, a Dog who loathes the Rogue (yay backstory!). Beka... takes morally righteous to a whole new level, and I'd love to yank the stick out of her ass sometimes, but I can't help but love anything Pierce writes. It defines the YA fantasy genre to me.
On My Bookshelf
Le Petit Prince par Antoine de Saint-Exupéry -- fiction -- 96 pages
Bloodhound by Tamora Pierce -- fiction -- 560 pages
Fiction: 12
Non-Fiction: 2
Final Page Count:
Average Length:
Shortest Book:
Longest Book:
1. A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving -- fiction -- 617 pages
I've chosen John Irving for an in-depth author study, so I didn't expect to like this book. But Owen - ridiculous, obnoxious, always self-righteous Owen, with his ALWAYS-CAPITALIZED SPEECH & WRITING - completely won me over. It was the ending that absolutely cemented it for me, the way that every single minuscule detail just miraculously came together. My biggest annoyance was Irving's tangents into his present-day life in Canada - while they provided an interesting 'here's what happened later' and will obviously be essential to my paper, some of them just devolved into mindless, incoherent political rants.
2. The Cider House Rules by John Irving -- fiction -- 587 pages
This is only the second school book I've ever truly enjoyed, and I loved it (for the record, the other was 1984). Oh Homer. It was sweet and slow and you kinda of wanted to hit both of them by the end, but you had to sort of smile anyway. There are so many parallels between Cider House Rules & Owen Meany, but this felt much more neatly put together. I did feel that Rose Rose was a throwaway character; so much more could have been done with her. Overall, this was still wonderful; I'm thinking I need to see the movie now.
3. Are You There, Vodka? It's Me, Chelsea by Chelsea Handler -- non-fiction -- 264 pages
This was wildly popular, but all I could think was that she had nothing on David Sedaris. She can be funny, but it's mostly bland and overly simplistic. It definitely didn't help that she managed to hit my embarrassment squick five times on one page, either. I'll stick with Sedaris; in all honesty, the title was probably my favorite part.
4. My Last Supper by Melanie Dunea -- non-fiction -- 216 pages
SORT-OF FOOD PORN YAY. This is a photo-essay of fifty great chefs answering the ultimate question: What would you choose for your last meal on earth? The responses range from rambling anecdotes spanning several pages to simple one-line answers. The photos are often amusing; let's use Anthony Bourdain as an example. Speaking of which, Bourdain (whose writing I love, haven't seen his show) penned the introduction with his usual lovely snark.
5. King Lear by William Shakespeare -- fiction -- 261 pages
I dislike Shakespeare to begin with, but this? Was my least favorite of all. At least most of the others had some nice death scenes, but everyone dies offstage here. (Okay, admittedly,
6. The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini -- fiction -- 371 pages
This is the most perfect, haunting book I can remember reading in a very long time. It's difficult for me to describe how evocative and gut-wrenching it was to read, because I still haven't sorted out exactly how I feel about it. I do know that I'll need to read it again someday.
Part of this confusion stems from my ambivalence toward Amir. When he watched, just stood there and then ran away - I'm hardly ever emotional about books or movies, but I had to put the book down for a day out of hatred. I felt so deeply connected that I honestly wanted to punch the character. I didn't consider that scene triggering or anything, but I can't fathom how differently everything would have turned out if my friends hadn't been there. The idea of who would do that - who would walk away - has been shaking in my head ever since. It still is, and that's exactly what makes this novel so impossibly good.
It's that sort of emotion that bubbles at the back of your throat throughout. Of course, Amir was fantastically effective as a character, because I felt so strongly towards him, but Hassan and Sohrab are literally unforgettable.
God, you know what, just read it. It's horribly, wonderfully brilliant.
7. Brave New World by Aldous Huxley -- fiction -- 259 pages
I expected to like this a lot more than I did, mostly because I adored 1984. I came away unimpressed and bored with the ending. The entire concept of utopias/dystopias interests me, so some of the scientific setup was good, but the execution was nothing special. And the ending felt like a cop-out. :/
8. A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini -- fiction -- 367 pages
I can't really place what I love about Hosseini's writing, because I'm not usually fond of that style. But the way he writes just works for me in so many ways, and I loved this almost as much as The Kite Runner. I didn't loathe Rasheed anywhere near as strongly as I did Amir, of course, but Laila & Tariq's love story was sweet without being saccharine. Hosseini's writing is deeply emotional without ever becoming overbearing; it's not woeful lamenting or pitiful sobbing, just straight facts and a simple story that cuts. I'm not certain if he's working on a third novel, but if he is, I'll definitely be reading it.
9. The Color Purple by Alice Walker -- fiction -- 304 pages
I got very little out of this. Admittedly, female empowerment isn't exactly my crusade, but I just couldn't get into the characters or the plot or the epistolary style at all. I just found everything implausible. For every character to find their happy ending - for them to be well-off and in love and magically find each other - was just way too much for me. (This is where my friends say I have no soul, I think.) But aside from the impact of the first page, nothing grabbed me. It was too predictable.
10. The World According to Garp by John Irving -- fiction -- 609 pages
The end of my Irving books. Apparently, this was the most autobiographical of all, and it scares the shit out of me. There's a lot of Biblical-style justice - a guy's dick is bitten off during a blowjob in a car. It starts off with Garp's mother, a nurse who impregnates herself through an infantile, brain-damaged patient. There are a legion of women who cut their tongues out in support of an eleven-year-old rape victim (who of course just wants to forget it, not start a fucking trend). And I hated the novel insertions, because they were far too long and exactly the same.
Basically, Irving's books are formula: a young man grows up in a strict, rigid environment, then branches out into the real world on his own. He struggles to find the meaning of his life until an abused young girl comes to him, and he then realizes that his life's work must be to return to his childhood home. I am not looking forward to researching his life at all.
11. Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut -- fiction -- 224 pages
...All I could think about during this book is that Billy Pilgrim = my senile biology teacher. (He insists that he's 133 years old, only he was reset to a baby at 77, and that his girlfriend - Molly Jolly Golly - is enslaved on an alien planet. WHAT.) I'll admit it's an effective anti-war book, and Billy's insanity is a huge contributing factor. But I wasn't pulled into the story. The extremely non-sequential storyline threw me a bit at times, and it felt unresolved. Not terrible, but not worth it.
12. This Lullaby by Sarah Dessen -- fiction -- 352 pages
Sarah Dessen is my YA-teen-novel guilty fix. It'll never be great literature, but her characters are so relatable and quirky and imperfect. Remy's flimsy badass front is silly, and I love her for it. And Dexter's - sort of indescribable, really. But he's so self-confidant and sure of himself, no matter what. My favorite part has to be the warped pictures and their stolen collage - the pieces of strangers' lives, arranged on the wall with pins. It's one of the little details which makes Dessen's novels.
13. The Truth About Forever by Sarah Dessen -- fiction -- 400 pages
My favorite of her books - I love Macy because I love her life. I love her craving for chaos and her stupid insecurities, because really? Most of them are mine, too. I'll totally admit that Wish is sort of my dream summer job - insane and unpredictable and a bit unstable. (Not to mention that YES, I really want a Wes.
14. Terrier by Tamora Pierce -- fiction -- 608 pages
I was obsessed with Tamora Pierce in middle school. I re-read her Tortall quartets over and over again, and I was hopelessly in love with George. (Okay, I loved the tension between Alanna & Jon when she was his squire and it was all ~forbidden. But then he became a dick, so.) George was the dangerous bad boy, proving that I didn't have any sense when I was younger, either - but he was so fiercely loyal. Pierce transferred that same quality a few hundred years back to the days of George's ancestor, a Dog who loathes the Rogue (yay backstory!). Beka... takes morally righteous to a whole new level, and I'd love to yank the stick out of her ass sometimes, but I can't help but love anything Pierce writes. It defines the YA fantasy genre to me.
On My Bookshelf
Le Petit Prince par Antoine de Saint-Exupéry -- fiction -- 96 pages
Bloodhound by Tamora Pierce -- fiction -- 560 pages
