Yet Another Best Of List

Because of a technical glitch, my selections for favorite books read in 2014 didn’t quite make it into the annual Stuff We Like edition of Eleventh Stack.

This just means now I get to tell you all about the great things I discovered this year in MY VERY OWN POST.

Funny how life works out that way.

You already know how much I loved History of the Rain, the Man Booker Prize nominated novel by Niall Williams. As we come to year’s end, this remains one of my favorite books I read in 2014. It has one of my favorite quotes as its second paragraph:

“We are our stories. We tell them to stay alive or keep alive those who only live now in the telling. That’s how it seems to me, being alive for a little while, the teller and the told.” (pg. 1) 

Another book that I loved right away was Kelly Corrigan’s memoir Glitter and Glue.  Now, some may say I’m partial to Ms. Corrigan’s writing because, like me, she’s a Philly girl. That certainly helps, but the fact remains that she’s a damn good writer – and Glitter and Glue is a fantastic follow-up (actually, it’s somewhat of a prequel) to The Middle Place.

I read a lot of poetry this year, and much of what I read was by poets who were new-t0-me. My favorite poetry book is actually a single poem in book-length form.  Edward Hirsch’s work was among my favorites before 2014, which made Gabriel: A Poem a highly-anticipated read.  A tribute to and reflection on his loss of his son, Mr. Hirsch’s heartbreak cracks your heart open with the grief on every line he writes.

Finally, this was the year of the audiobook – at least for me.  I listened to a total of 20, mostly during my commute to and from my job here at the Library.  (Those minutes sitting in traffic on the Vet’s Bridge really do add up. Who knew?)  Among those who kept me awake was none other than Rob Lowe, who filled my car with long-ago tales of debauchery, a tearjerker about sending his son off to college, and a female co-star who had a difficult time kissing him. (Note to Rob: if you ever find yourself in such a predicament again, drop me a note and I’ll help you out.) Now, celebrity memoirs by people who don’t even need their name on the book cover are usually not my thing, but if you grew up in the ’80s as I did, you might find Love Life irresistible.

What books, music and movies did you find irresistible in 2014?

~ Melissa F.

And the winner is …

“I do not share the pessimism of the age about the novel. They are one of our greatest spiritual, aesthetic and intellectual inventions. As a species it is story that distinguishes us, and one of the supreme expressions of story is the novel. Novels are not content. Nor are they are a mirror to life or an explanation of life or a guide to life. Novels are life, or they are nothing.” – Richard Flanagan, winner of the 2014 Man Booker Prize for Fiction and author of The Narrow Road to the Deep North

As I was saying, I’ve been a little – okay, fine, call me obsessed – with The Man Booker Prize for Fiction this year.

Finally, after what seemed like endless online speculation from bloggers like yours truly, Richard Flanagan was announced this week as the 2014 winner of the prestigious literary award for a book that took him 12 years to write,  The Narrow Road to the Deep North.

I admit, I haven’t read Flanagan’s novel yet – but it’s high on my list.

That has as much to do with the author’s personal story as it does the plot of the novel itself.  The Narrow Road to the Deep North draws inspiration from Flanagan’s father’s experience as a prisoner of war on the Burma-Thailand “Death Railway” during World War II.

Not my usual fare, this.  But one of the things I’ve tried to do as a Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh staff member is to break out of my literary comfort zone from time to time. It’s good to try a new genre every once in  awhile in order to better talk books with our customers.  I mean, after all, it’s only a book; the worse that can happen is that I don’t like it and I return it unfinished for someone else to potentially enjoy.

I had never heard of Richard Flanagan before he made the 2014 Man Booker Prize for Fiction shortlist; however, in his acceptance speech on Tuesday, Flanagan endeared himself to me and perhaps to many other aspiring authors who may feel as if our roads to literacy greatness are narrowing.

“Much has been made about the death of the novel and the end of literature as it’s seen to be assailed by technology, by the web, by the many and varied new forms of entertainment and culture. I don’t share that pessimism because I think it is one of the great inventions of the human spirit. So it strikes me not as a dying medium but as an ever more remarkable one.”

Here at the Library, we think of books and literature and novels as remarkable things, too.

Congratulations.

–Melissa F.

I’m Bookin’ It

image courtesy of The Man Booker Prize, via Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/ManBookerPrize)

For whatever reason, I’m kind of obsessed with The Man Booker Prize for Fiction this year.

(Maaaaayyyyyybe it has something to do with being an avid reader and working here at the Library. I mean, I’m just sayin’.)

If you’re not familiar with The Man Booker Prize, here are Ten Things You Need to Know:

1. It’s a literary prize that “is recognized as the touchstone for high quality literary fiction written in English,” according to its website.

2. Before this year, authors were eligible if they were a citizen of the United Kingdom, the Commonwealth or the Republic of Ireland. Now, the prize is open to authors “writing originally in English and published in the UK” which means American authors are qualified. It also explains why you may have heard a bit more about The Man Booker Prize this year.

3. Also according to The Man Booker Prize website, “judges are chosen from a wide range of disciplines, including critics, writers and academics, but also poets, politicians and actors, all with a passion for quality fiction.”

4. The name has nothing to do with men or women and, as with many things these days, everything to do with a sponsorship.  The prize is sponsored by The Man Group, an investment management firm.

Man Group + Booker Prize = The Man Booker Prize.

Even I can do that math word problem.

5. The CEO of The Man Group is named Manny.

6. For real. I’m not kidding about #5.

7. A longlist of 13 titles was selected in July.

image courtesy of The Man Booker Prize, via Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/ManBookerPrize)

8. They were:

Author (nationality)                  Title 

Joshua Ferris (American)             To Rise Again at a Decent Hour

Richard Flanagan (Australian)     The Narrow Road to the Deep North

Karen Joy Fowler (American)       We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves 

Siri Hustvedt (American)              The Blazing World 

Howard Jacobson (British)           J  (scheduled for publication on 10/14/2014)

Paul Kingsnorth (British)             The Wake

David Mitchell (British)                 The Bone Clocks

Neel Mukherjee (British)              The Lives of Others 

David Nicholls (British)                 Us 

Joseph O’Neill (Irish/American)  The Dog

Richard Powers (American)          Orfeo  

Ali Smith (British)                          How to be Both

Niall Williams (Irish)                     History of the Rain 

9. From that baker’s dozen, the judges whittled the list down to six titles.

10. Which are these:

image courtesy of The Man Booker Prize, via http://www.themanbookerprize.com

Author (nationality)                     Title 

Joshua Ferris (US)                            To Rise Again at a Decent Hour

Richard Flanagan (Australian)        The Narrow Road to the Deep North

Karen Joy Fowler (US)                      We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves

Howard Jacobson (British)               J (…yep, still not scheduled to be published until 10/14/2014)

Neel Mukherjee (British)                 The Lives of Others

Ali Smith (British)                             How to be Both

Here’s the thing. As intrigued as I am with The Man Booker Prize, I’ve only read one contender: History of the Rain by Niall Williams, which was absolutely outstanding. (A bit slow-going in the beginning parts, but stay with it. Trust me on this.)  It’s a good thing I’m not a gambler – or a different kind of bookie – because I was telling everyone who would listen that History of the Rain was definitely going to be the winner. It had me from the second paragraph:

“We are our stories. We tell them to stay alive or keep alive those who only live now in the telling. That’s how it seems to me, being alive for a little while, the teller and the told.” (pg. 1) 

How can anyone who loves books and reading not love that quote?

Joshua Ferris has been getting some criticism that his work isn’t perhaps quite up to snuff for The Booker, but I disagree. I loved The Unnamed (which should come with Johnny Cash’s “I’ve Been Everywhere” as a soundtrack) as well as Then We Came to the End, about a group of dysfunctional coworkers barely hanging on to their jobs and sanity as they manage to survive life in an Chicago advertising agency experiencing a “downturn” in business, thanks to the dot com bust. (Dated? Somewhat. But I read all 250 pages in one sitting, so there’s that.) Almost anything by Joshua Ferris tends to make it onto my TBR (To Be Read) list, so The Booker is just an added impetus.

I was – and still am – intrigued by the premise of Orfeo, and even though it’s out of my usual reading genre, I’m willing to give The Narrow Road to the Deep North a try. And I’m especially interested to read We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves, because I really like the title and because it sounds like something I’d enjoy. (And because it’s my pick for the winner.)

Basically, I want to read ALL of these – the longlist, the shortlist, every book that has been nominated and won The Booker since its inception – RIGHT NOW ALREADY before the prize announcement is made October 16.  Now, I’m somewhat of a realistic, pragmatic person, with the exception of being able to determine how many books I can read before they’re due back to the Library.  But even I know that with The Man Booker Prize announcement being less than a month away and not having the luxury of reading 24/7, that’s not happening.

That’s where you come in.

Have you read any of The Man Booker Prize longlisted or shortlisted titles for this year?

If so, which ones did you enjoy most? Were you surprised by any on the list?

And what book do you think will be the winner?

~ Melissa F.