I contributed a short piece about my fav books of 2006 for the Globe and Mail’s year-end round-up. Man, was it ever hard. All I could think of were books written in other years that meant something to me this year, like To All My Fans, With Love From Sylvie by Ellen Conroy, The Message in the Hollow Oak by Carolyn Keene, Zorro by Isabel Allende, Possessing the Secret of Joy by Alice Walker, and Elizabeth Peters’ backlist.
Here’s what I ended up writing:
For me, 2006 was the year of pulp fiction, so I’ll go with two mass-market thrillers. Grave Surprise, by Charlaine Harris, features misfit Harper Connelly, who survived being struck by lightning and gained the power to see murder victims’ last moments. How could you not love a sassy heroine who can’t wait to kick off her shoes and walk barefoot in America’s graveyards?
Denise Hamilton’s latest Eve Diamond mystery, Prisoner of Memory, is set in L.A.’s post-Cold War Russian community and contains the perfect mélange of elements — a tough reporter chick, two hot love interests, long-lost family members and organized crime.
I’ve also been semi-obsessed with The Catcher in the Rye, by J. D. Salinger. I picked it up for the first time since high school when I learned that John Lennon’s murderer sat down and started reading it right after the shooting. That’s so creepy, I just had to refer to it in my young-adult mystery novel: One of my characters carries the book around like a security blanket.
So, dear readers, what would be your picks for 2006?
I enjoyed Armed Madhouse by Greg Palast
http://www.gregpalast.com/madhouse/index.php/about/
Comment by Jesse Hirsh — January 7, 2007 @ 9:44 pm
I am having trouble remembering the fiction books that I read last year. Comes with having to concentrate too much on work related reading. Having said that however,I did enjoy The Lighthouse by P.D. James and also started Zorro by Isabel Allende that I just finished the other day.
Comment by Sherida Ryan — January 8, 2007 @ 5:51 pm
Sherida–glad to hear you enjoyed Zorro.
Comment by Emily — January 8, 2007 @ 6:06 pm
For me, the best new book (I’m not sure if it came out this year) is “A Brief History of the Dead”, by Kevin Brockmeier. That one is really psychologically creepy, and one I’d recommend strongly.
I also had a lot of fun with Terry Pratchett’s Wintersmith.
Comment by James Bow — January 9, 2007 @ 5:34 pm
this year i read this wonderful book which is next to impossible to find. it’s called “the restless supermarket” by ivan vladislavic. it’s narrated by a proofreader and filled to bursting with puns, wordplay and clever linguistic tricks.
in terms of books published in 2006, i dont really know that i’ve actually read any, shamefully, but i know that jasper fforde has a book out and i’ve been itching to get my hands on his comic genius - like douglas adams mixed with literary professor and terry pratchett.
Comment by Julia — January 9, 2007 @ 7:06 pm
James, my sister Julia loves Pratchett, but for some reason I’ve never been able to get into his writing. Have you read Fforde? I recall her saying they’re similar and I’ve liked a couple of his books…
Comment by Emily — January 10, 2007 @ 3:51 pm
First — yikes! I am sorry to hear you are sick and especially about all the gun violence. That is awful.
One of my surprise favorite books of the year is called “Clearcut’, by Nina Shengold. It’s set in the 70’s in washington state, and from reading the back it would sould like a really typical plot: roughneck cedar shake splitter picks up hitchhiker who is a talented musician/college dropout from Berkeley, in search of a ‘wild’ charismatic woman who is a tree planter — and all three get tangled up together. But the writing is brilliant and I think you in particular would like it because where it totally blew my mind was around sexuality. I’ve never read another book that really described or succeeded in describing someone opening up/overcoming reactionary fear of different sexualities and their expression. The book is quite a trip …
I think it actually came out in 2005 though.
My other fave is more conventionally well known: Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Mirakami –it’s also 2005 but I think 2006 was the first international edition. It’s a brilliant and surreal book. I tried to read a section around a campfire one night, but it was so intensely grotesque that others asked me to stop!
Comment by Shirley — January 11, 2007 @ 2:32 am
I’m pretty sure this wasn’t published last year but I quite liked it:
Andrey Kurkov’s ‘Death & the Penguin’
I guess I don’t keep up very well with current stuff.
Comment by Operator #5 — January 12, 2007 @ 12:31 am
I am a first time visiter of this website and was quite intrigued to find so many others on the internet who share my love of reading as much as all of you. There aren’t many people my age who have deemed reading as “cool” or a valid way to spend time, but I find it hard to imagine a life without reading a good book every once in a while. In 2006 I chose to read a book called The Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugencides as part of my CPT assignment for school. You may have heard of this book because there is a movie to accompany it. Although it was published in 1993, I still reccommend it to all of you. It’s an excellent novel that explores the trials and tribulations of adolescence. I hope you all enjoy it:).
Comment by Tina — January 22, 2007 @ 11:57 am