Here's my top-three:
1.) Karen Memory by Elizabeth Bear - Actually, this is the best book I've read in several years. You can read it as just a fun adventure story about a girl and her scooby gang stopping a nefarious plot by a nasty villain, but scratch a bit at the topsoil and there's so much more in there.
2.) Luna: New Moon by Ian McDonald - It's the Godfather on the near-future Moon. Except McDonald's prose is much better than Puzo's. And yes, it does have a scene of people jogging. (Every book I've read by the author has had that.)
3.) Ring Roads by Patrick Modiano - Atmospheric, moody, and reads like a good crime novel despite about perfectly everyday things.
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Following Kajehase's example:
1) Don Quixote, by Cervantes. Loads of humor and much more lighthearted than the Dale Wasserman musical!
2) Hold Tight, Don't Let Go, by Laura Rose Wagner. Set in Haiti after the earthquake, this is the only book that made me cry this year. Excellent!
3) Nightglass, by Liane Merciel. For a story set in Nidal, very tastefully done and the traditional redemption arc made me feel good. It reminded me I haven't read a Western in a long time.
My memory is notoriously bad [bubble bubble bubble], but, after briefly reviewing the What Books are You Reading? thread, I think my fave three books that I read this past year would be:
Tess of the D'Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy
The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne
From Hegel to Marx by Sidney Hook
EDIT: Upon further reflection, high marks also for Michael Moorcock's The Whispering Swarm, Leigh Brackett's The Halfling and Other Stories and Lafcadio Hearn's Kwaidan.
Top 3 this year?
1.The Forgotten Soldier/Le Soldat Oublié, by Guy Sajer. An autobiographical account of Sajer's time serving with the German forces in the Second World War, its overall accuracy is impossible to verify. But it seems to have gotten the main things right, and that's good enough for me.
2. The Wake, by Paul Kingsnorth. bit of historical fiction revolving around the Norman Invasion of England, and written almost entirely in a species of made-up Old English. VERY difficult read- puts Riddley Walker in the shade- but worth it. Took me forever to get through, and I felt like I'd accomplished something by the end. The protagonist, Buccmaster of Holland, is a deeply flawed individual.
3. Rising Sun, Falling Skies: The Disastrous Java Sea Campaign of World War II, by Jeffrey Cox. Well-written account of the debacle in the Southwest Pacific in the last days of 1941 through 1942. Contains an interesting and rather impassioned defense of Dutch Admiral Karel Doormann, who more usually comes in for a lot of abuse (as men who get killed in the course of leading failed military ventures often do).
@Cole Deschain:
The Wake is on my "to read" list! I love unreliable narrators speaking semi-made-up languages!
Glad not everybody's chickening out!
One semi-book club I'm in basically went "oh hell no!" when I posted a selection of the text.
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Following Kajehase's example:
1) Don Quixote, by Cervantes. Loads of humor and much more lighthearted than the Dale Wasserman musical!
Oooh, that was a good one. I read it this summer with translator's annotations, and that made it all the more enjoyable.
Also read this year that became favorites:
The Aeronaut's Windlass I've read Dresden Files, and this was also a great read. I already like the whole "airboat" sort of thing, and this did not disappoint.
The Alloy of Law Also read the Mistborn books, finishing off with this one. I love the functional magic he's developed, but the wild west-esque setting is pretty great as well.
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Following Kajehase's example:
1) Don Quixote, by Cervantes. Loads of humor and much more lighthearted than the Dale Wasserman musical!
Oooh, that was a good one. I read it this summer with translator's annotations, and that made it all the more enjoyable.
Also read this year that became favorites:
The Aeronaut's Windlass I've read Dresden Files, and this was also a great read. I already like the whole "airboat" sort of thing, and this did not disappoint.The Alloy of Law Also read the Mistborn books, finishing off with this one. I love the functional magic he's developed, but the wild west-esque setting is pretty great as well.
I read a dual-language edition of the Quijote/Quixote. I'm trying to improve my Spanish.
I think I'd like The Alloy of Law, since I'd like to read more fantasy/western genre, but I haven't read the Mistborn books. Would I be lost picking up Alloy without having read the previous novels? Or should I stick to reading a plain-old Western?
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Following Kajehase's example:
1) Don Quixote, by Cervantes. Loads of humor and much more lighthearted than the Dale Wasserman musical!
Oooh, that was a good one. I read it this summer with translator's annotations, and that made it all the more enjoyable.
Also read this year that became favorites:
The Aeronaut's Windlass I've read Dresden Files, and this was also a great read. I already like the whole "airboat" sort of thing, and this did not disappoint.The Alloy of Law Also read the Mistborn books, finishing off with this one. I love the functional magic he's developed, but the wild west-esque setting is pretty great as well.
I read a dual-language edition of the Quijote/Quixote. I'm trying to improve my Spanish.
I think I'd like The Alloy of Law, since I'd like to read more fantasy/western genre, but I haven't read the Mistborn books. Would I be lost picking up Alloy without having read the previous novels? Or should I stick to reading a plain-old Western?
I think you'd be okay. There's a directory in the back on what the different powers can do and the book'll explain it pretty well.
I think I'm a little behind on some things...
1. Ready Player One by Ernest (?) Cline.
2. Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld (the whole trilogy). Can't wait til my niece is old enough to read this!
3. A Land Fit for Heroes by Richard K. Morgan (the whole trilogy).