We asked some Shelf Awareness people for their 10 (or so) favorite books of the past year. Most of these titles were published in 2009, but not all, since we wanted to know what gave them reading pleasure no matter the pub date.
Debra Ginsberg
Eating Animals by Jonathan Safran Foer and The Face on Your Plate by Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson (Little, Brown). Both of these important, compelling books address the horrors of factory farming and the need for us to change our dietary choices, but each approaches the topic from a different angle. They are must-reads.
Life Sentences by Laura Lippman (Morrow). A brilliant, expertly nuanced psychological thriller from the prodigiously talented Laura Lippman.
Blame by Michelle Huneven (FSG). A rich and beautifully written novel about the nature of loss and redemption.
Wintergirls by Laurie Halse Anderson (Viking). A stunning YA novel which tackles an old subject--eating disorders--with new insight and grace.
The Scarecrow by Michael Connelly (Little, Brown). He's baaaaack.... Unputdownable.
The Addict: One Patient, One Doctor, One Year by Michael Stein (Morrow). A searing portrait of prescription drug addiction from a physician who takes a new approach to treating it.
Box 21 by Anders Roslund and Borge Hellström (FSG). A pitch-dark Scandinavian thriller involving sex slavery, mafia bosses and bitter policemen--and that's just the beginning. It will keep you up at night.
The Last Resort by Douglas Rogers (Harmony). A warm, funny and often tragic memoir of the author's native Zimbabwe.
The Anthologist by Nicholson Baker (Simon & Schuster). This smart, funny and always entertaining paean to poetry is Baker at his best; a real gem of a novel.
Episodes: My Life As I See It by Blaze Ginsberg (Roaring Brook). Yes, I know, and you can have all the disclaimers you want--but this is still the best book I've read all year. Bar none.
Blood's a Rover by James Ellroy (Knopf). Nobody does noir like Ellroy. He is a master and this book is not to be missed.
Harvey Freedenberg
Await Your Reply by Dan Chaon (Ballantine). Far more than an absorbing mystery, in this complex and psychologically astute story Chaon puts on a virtuosic display of his considerable talent. It's a thrilling example of the best of modern literary fiction.
Jeff in Venice, Death in Varanasi by Geoff Dyer (Pantheon). Strikingly contemporary and utterly timeless, Jeff in Venice, Death in Varanasi is an intense, vivid trip to a pair of exotic cities and an equally provocative journey into the twisted passageways of the human soul.
Homer & Langley by E.L. Doctorow (Random House). Doctorow has moved Homer and Langley Collyer from the sideshow of American history to center stage. Strange as their story may be, he makes us feel privileged, if perhaps in an odd way, to share it.
The Anthologist by Nicholson Baker (Simon & Schuster). It's hard to know what to expect next from Baker, but in his new novel he's delivered a charming, if undeniably quirky, extended love letter to the art of poetry.
Love and Summer by William Trevor (Viking). Trevor's genius lies in his uncanny ability to expose, with sensitivity and insight, the complexity of even the most mundane lives. That he does so in prose that's a model of elegant compression makes his achievement even more impressive.
Last Night in Twisted River by John Irving (Random House). Irving's 12th novel is a shaggy, shambling, lovable bear of a book. It is vintage Irving, stuffed to overflowing with a cast of memorable characters, dark humor, a surfeit of tragedy and loss and enough love, sex and death to fill at least two or three less ambitious novels.
A Gate at the Stairs by Lorrie Moore (Knopf). Bubbling with intelligence and lacerating humor and showcasing Moore's uncanny ability to capture the free-floating anxiety that undoubtedly qualifies as the psychic disorder of our age, A Gate at the Stairs is a tightly focused snapshot of our unsettled world.
Cheever: A Life by Blake Bailey (Knopf). In this comprehensive, unsparing work, Bailey has produced a biography every bit as absorbing as the life of its complex and tortured subject.
Strength in What Remains: A Journey of Remembrance and Forgiveness by Tracy Kidder (Random House). The latest work from Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Tracy Kidder is a stirring account of one man's remarkable flight from genocidal terror in his homeland of Burundi to the U.S. and then back home to confront the burdens of memory and reconciliation.
Closing Time: A Memoir by Joe Queenan (Viking). Queenan's book is a painfully honest, savagely funny, wise and ultimately moving story of growing up in Philadelphia in the 1950s and '60s while outgrowing life in the home of a brutal, alcoholic father.
John McFarland
Every Man Dies Alone by Hans Fallada, translated by Michael Hofmann (Melville House). A gritty "you are there" feel pervades this brilliant and harrowing saga of a German couple fighting for their dignity in the face of unrelenting Nazi oppression and sadism in Berlin in 1941.
Translation Is a Love Affair by Jacques Poulin, translated by Sheila Fischman (Archipelago Books). A short novel set in contemporary Quebec that is brimming with satisfying tales of friendship, hope and love between two unlikely and enchanting characters.
I Am Not Sidney Poitier by Percival Everett (Graywolf). A comic romp in the beloved traditions of Mark Twain, Terry Southern and Kurt Vonnegut that smartly ponders questions of racism, classism and celebrity in America today.
That Mad Ache: A Novel by Françoise Sagan, translated by Douglas Hofstadter (Basic Books). Sagan's 1965 La Chamade, about a scampering Parisienne torn between respect and affection for an older, rich protector and uncontrolled passion with a handsome, impoverished young editor, takes on thrilling romantic urgency in a new translation by the author of Gödel, Escher, Bach.
City Boy: My Life in New York During the 1960s and '70s by Edmund White (Bloomsbury). A thoughtful, ardent memoir that captures New York City at an auspicious time for White to define his themes and come into his own as a raconteur, friend and sexy devil (in the best sense).
Life as We Show It: Writing on Film, edited by Brian Pera and Masha Tupitsyn (City Lights Books). Twenty-five writers discuss attachments they formed for certain movies--ET, Shane and Rosemary's Baby acquire new significance and resonance after reading these inspired pieces of narrative nonfiction.
i sold Andy Warhol (too soon) by Richard Polsky (Other Press). A sardonic guide with lots of sassy style takes readers on a dizzying, dishy and fascinating tour of the recently crazy market for contemporary art.
Twentieth-Century German Poetry: An Anthology, edited by Michael Hofmann (FSG, 2006). A bracing collection that stands celebrities like Rilke and Brecht beside lesser-known but no-less-brilliant poets like Hans Magnus Enzensberger and Durs Grünbein to show us a poetry with a range of possibilities larger than what British and American readers have become accustomed to.
The Dedalus Book of Spanish Fantasy, edited and translated by Margaret Jull Costa and Annella McDermott (Dedalus Books, 1999). Doppelgangers, chairs acquiring souls and people metamorphosing into animals populate an anthology rich in imagination, storytelling and raw material for wild, wild dreams.
Mary Stuart by Friedrich von Schiller, translated by Jeremy Sams (Nick Hern Books, 1996). The epic battle between Elizabeth I and Mary Stuart bristles with theatrical energy in Schiller's version of the classic tale of political sibling rivalry.
Cafe Society: The Wrong Place for the Right People by Barney Josephson et al. (University of Illinois Press). Reminiscences (and captivating photographs) capture the key place Barney Josephson occupies in our cultural history and make you wish you had been there to see/hear Billie Holiday, Lena Horne, Alberta Hunter and Mary Lou Williams and others electrify the place.
Marilyn Dahl
Faces of the Gone by Brad Parks (Minotaur). A debut mystery about a Newark reporter covering some gruesome murders; a solid plot mixed with sardonic wit. I'm eager for a sequel.
Little Bee by Chris Cleave (Simon). This story of a young Nigerian refugee in an English detention center will amaze and delight you--and break your heart. It's one of the finest books I've read in years, from its lyrical opening lines to its surprising end.
City of Thieves by David Benioff (Plume). The story of two young men in Leningrad during the World War II siege, who are forced to find a dozen eggs for a colonel or be executed, blew me away with its mix of tragedy and comedy--the absurdity of war brilliantly rendered.
A Final Arc of the Sky by Jennifer Culkin (Beacon Press). An eloquent and compelling memoir by a critical care flight nurse, that soars with tragedy and tenderness. A sense of fragility, and well as resiliency and strength, permeate Culkin's life and calling.
Larry's Kidney by Daniel Asa Rose (Morrow). A hilarious story about two cousins in China, one searching for a kidney and true love, the other aiding and abetting. Rose's writing is by turns hyperbolic and hallucinatory as he deals with the outlandish situation and his wacky cousin. Sometimes slapstick, sometimes caustic, Larry's Kidney is also sweet and thoughtful as Daniel finds himself improbably falling in love with China.
A Hell of Mercy: A Meditation on Depression and the Dark Night of the Soul by Tim Farrington (HarperOne). Novelist Tim Farrington has written a candid memoir about his lifelong struggle with depression. He's not a scholar, not a therapist, not a theologian; "I'm more like a veteran, I suppose: a guy whose ass has been on the line, [with] some stories from the front." It's written with wisdom and wit, by an author who sees his dark night of the soul as a gift from God.
Dogged Pursuit by Robert Rodi (Hudson Street Press). The hilarious and truly moving story of Rodi's quest to train Dusty, "a scrawny little twist of a pipe cleaner" dog, and himself, in the demanding art of canine agility competition. Heartbreaks and heroics, defeats and victories line the path to success in unexpected ways. He comes to see his dog's Dusty-ness and his dignity and experiences some true moments of grace.
Before I Forget by Leonard Pitts Jr. (Bolden/Agate). A powerful novel about regrets, second chances, forgiveness and responsibility and what it means to be a man. A father's grief and anger, his struggles with his son and his own father, combine with love in a crucible of hope and transformation. This is a beautiful, tragic and riveting work.
Border Songs by Jim Lynch (Knopf). In Border Songs, Jim Lynch does for birds and the northwestern border what he did for sea creatures and south Puget Sound in his lovely The Highest Tide; he has an equal affinity for showing us the beauty and humor of humanity. The illusory security of the border reminds us that our lives are also fragile, but Lynch has crafted a story of love, redemption and acceptance that reminds us of what is true and strong.
A Quiet Belief in Angels by R.J. Ellory (Overlook Press). As life reaches its closing chapter for Joseph Vaughn, he begins to relate his story, and waits for judgment on who he is and what he has done, beginning in Georgia in 1939. The mystery is compelling; just as insistent is the pull of Ellory's prose, with a deceptively leisurely pace that heightens the suspense. He has crafted a dazzling tale.
Spoon by Robert Greer (Fulcrum Publishing). In Montana, a drifter rescues a family and their way of life before he moves on. It starts in late summer, it ends the following autumn, and the sweetness and melancholy of the seasons perfectly complement this classic tale of a cowboy, ranchers and big business, told with sweet humor and Western elegance.
An Altar in the World: A Geography of Faith by Barbara Brown Taylor (HarperOne). Taylor is one of my favorite writers, in part for her ability to see the sacred in the everyday, and in her latest book she concentrates on finding holiness in simple things like walking in the dark, hanging laundry and making eye contact with a clerk. A book to inspire and challenge.