Happy New Years!
My New Years resolution is read more books! Actually I never make any resolutions, because I'll never be able to keep them, unless it's gain too much weight during the holidays!
This year had some amazing books (and some clunkers to be fair), and for the first time on this list I started with my favorite just because it was such a tremendous stand out to me. I also feel I cheated a bit because two of my choices were by the same author, but looking back, they were both excellent books on their own merits regardless of the fact they were part of a planned trilogy.
Finally, this was also the year that I listened to my first books on audio on the road between LA and Palm Springs. I would be remiss if I didn't mention the three terrific books I listened to vs read because they were all 'pefformed' by their authors and all are highly recommended. Seriously now:
a) Amy Poehler's, "Yes Please" cause I love her, and she's hilarious.
b) Rob Lowe's "Stories I Only Tell My Friends" because I grew up in the 70s and 80s and if you like the Outsiders, Saint Elmo's Fire or know who the brat pack were it's necessary listening. btw he's an amazing story teller.
c) Leah Remini's "Troublemaker" because I'm obsessed with anything to do with scientology, and she's brave and crazy and so so so funny. Oh and lots of crazy Tom Cruise stories.
and now, the list:
1) "A Little Life" by Hanya Yanagihara
This is the kind of book you want to share, and have someone else experience so you can simply talk about it. It's been awhile since I've felt so completely absorbed by something I've been reading. Certainly nothing I've read this year or probably last year comes close. I read Yanagihara's,'People of the Trees', and didn't think much of it, but this was really monumental. At it's most simplistic it's the story of four male friends over the course of roughly forty years. But early on the focus narrows to Jude,a physically and emotionally damaged, beautiful, brilliant man who has endured a simply horrific past. Yanagihara doesn't indulge the violence, but she doesn't shy away from it either creating this underlying tension throughout the narrative as Jude's past begins to slowly be revealed. It's a powerful book not for the faint of heart that brought me to tears at times more by scenes of tenderness and grace between characters than the disturbing abuse.This is simply a stunning literary accomplishment, as shown by it's inclusion in almost every major literary prize list this year as well as year end lists.
http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_2_13?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=a+little+life+by+hanya+yanagihara&sprefix=a+little+life%2Cstripbooks%2C191
2) "A God in Ruins" by Kate Atkinson
Atkinson views this book not as a sequel to her highly praised 'Life After Life' but instead a companion piece, and indeed it truly is seeing as it centers on Teddy, the brother to protagonist Ursula from the former novel. In a beautifully shifting narrative, older Teddy reflects back on his life a bomber in the RAF during World War II. Paired with this is his transition to civilian life after the war that includes a wife and a self absorbed daughter whose own children play such an important role to their grandfather. Atkinson has written another sweeping historical novel that feels both vast and intimate at the same time. A simply marvelous writer.
http://www.amazon.com/God-Ruins-Novel-Kate-Atkinson/dp/0316176508/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1451678054&sr=1-1&keywords=god+in+ruins
Sometimes a book comes along and it's exactly what you need to be reading at that moment. This was one of those books for me. The Plumb siblings are plagued by various financial mishaps that will hopeful all be rectified when from the youngest sibling,Bea, turns forty and their joint trust fund becomes available to them all. However when an accident happens with oldest son Leo,the 'nest' is left decimated, being used to cover medical and attorney fees of the young female passenger he maimed in the accident. How the children grapple with their new reality is the meat of the story, and where it finds all its heart, wisdom, and redemption. A simple but smart, insightful book from a talented new writer.
http://www.amazon.com/Nest-Cynthia-DAprix-Sweeney/dp/0062414216/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1451678192&sr=1-3&keywords=the+nest
4) "Purity" by Jonathan Franzen
Long, it meanders from past to present and back again and expects your utmost attention all the while feeling vaguely misogynistic with a cast of mostly unappealing characters, especially his women. And yet. I liked it, and found myself thinking about it a lot afterwards, and what a real literary genius Franzen is in constructing a story. Sure I struggled at times and felt at the mercy of his pinballing ideas from internet privacy, to parenting, and rogue journalism to name a few but it was worth it. Purity, or Pip, as she's known, follows a near modern Dickensian search for the father she never knew. But her story is only the launching pad for a series of stories linking her to a host of supporting players who all have rich and varied stories of their own. Some are more engaging than others but as complex and wordy as the narrative can be at times, Franzen threads it mostly together by the end in a simple understated finish.
http://www.amazon.com/Purity-Novel-Jonathan-Franzen/dp/0374239215/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1451678331&sr=1-1&keywords=purity+jonathan+franzen
5) 'The Tsar of Love & Techno" by Anthony Marra
Anthony Marra is one of those crazy talented writers who like David Mitchell cause a near spiritual devotion, and there's good reason. Crafting a series of linked stories in the Soviet Union that feels very much like something Mitchell would do, Marra has raised an already lofty literary bar from his earlier, "Constellation of Vital Phenomenon" and crafted one of the years best books.
http://www.amazon.com/Tsar-Love-Techno-Stories/dp/0770436439/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1451678363&sr=1-1&
keywords=anthony+marra+the+tsar+of+love+and+techno
6) "Villa America" By Liza Klaussmann
Real life expats Gerald and Sarah Murphy became the inspiration for F Scottt Fitzgerald's, 'Tender is the Night', and in fact the book is dedicated to them. Fabulously wealthy, they built a house on the French Riviera, called Villa America which became the centerpiece of a host of parties regulary atttended by the up and coming literary elitle including the aforementioned Fitzgerald and his troubled wife Zelda, as well as posturing, macho Ernest Hemingway. Klaussmann imagines what went on at these gatherings but the real focus is on Gerald, Sarah, and the fictionalized loner pilot named Owen Chambers who comes into their lives. The brainy banter and WASPY repression feels vaguely reminiscent of Amor Towles 'Rules of Civility', while subbing out Manhattan for the Cote d'Azur. Klaussmann's descriptive prose can be as sensuous as the setting, and the story while tragic manages to avoid the maudlin and sad, ultimately delivering a satisfying denoument, for an better than average beach read.
http://www.amazon.com/Villa-America-Novel-Liza-Klaussmann/dp/0316211362/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1451678400&sr=1-1&keywords=villa+america
7) "Disclaimer" by Renee Knight
Everyone seems to be looking for the next 'Gone Girl', and the cleverness of shifting narratives that eventual reveal the whole story seem to be a popular technique, especially with the success of 'The Girl on The Train'. That said, this was more sucessful than '...Train' to me, and I polished this off in nearly one breathless sitting. When Catherine Ravenscroft finds a manuscript on her bedside she can't remember receiving, she reads it and is horrified to find it's about her and an incident in her past that she has hidden from her husband and son. To say much more would take away the fun of discovering it yourself, but Knight has written the best thriller of the year that has most cerntainly already been snapped up for a feature.
http://www.amazon.com/Disclaimer-Novel-Renée-Knight/dp/0062362259/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1451678456&sr=1-1&keywords=disclaimer
8) "Natchez Burning" by Greg Iles
Natchez Burning is a big sprawling immersive, troubling, deeply captivating reading experience. Anyone who has followed the previous lawyer turned author turned mayor, Penn Cage will be familiar enough with the players involved in the deep south of Natchez Mississippi. However this time it turns personal, as Penn's revered and highly respected father, the towns' doctor is accused of murdering an African American woman who forty years ago worked closely by his side as his nurse. Iles doesn't hold anything back is his honest, unflinching, and at times just plain horrifying depictions of the deep seeded racism that has rooted itself in this towns history, and has caused the past to rise to the present like a bloated corpse. But the book also plays as a terrific thriller, that will leave you guessing, even as the end only wraps up certain elements as this is the first book in a planned trilogy. A great read, which should make anyone hungry for the next installment.
http://www.amazon.com/Natchez-Burning-Novel-Penn-Cage/dp/0062311085/ref=pd_bxgy_14_img_2?ie=UTF8&refRID=1V6NZ3W3HEK7CNV2Y1RB
9) "The Bone Tree" by Greg Iles
It takes immeasurable talent to follow up a massive page turner (the first of a planned trilogy) with another massive page turner that picks up immediately where the first left off and doesn't let you go until eight hundred pages later. It's exhausting to read, so I can't begin to imagine what went into writing it. -And I mean exhausting in the best possible way.
Greg Iles could have just made this book, this trilogy, about the deep seeded evil racism in the Southern town of Natchez Mississippi. How earnest lawyer turned author turned Mayor, Penn Cage, tries to get to the bottom of the accusation leveled at his father for allegedly murdering his former nurse, an African American woman whose history with Cage's dad is another layer on the onion to be peeled.
But Iles has a much bigger endgame at play that toys with American history in a convincing and unsettling way. Let's just say I had to crack Wikipedia a few times to see if some of the players he was referring were real. (They were.)
Lies depiction of racial violence is terribly disturbing to read, but it's never feels overly gratuitous. By the end,there are such massive plot movements in this book, it's hard to believe that there's one more to come. That said, I'll be waiting with anticipation to see how he wraps it all up.
http://www.amazon.com/Bone-Tree-Penn-Cage/dp/0062311115/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1451678504&sr=1-1&keywords=the+bone+tree+by+greg+iles
10) "Golden Son" by Pierce Brown
Speaking of sequels, having now read the two books back to back, first off I can't believe I have to wait for a third now, and secondly what a engaging delight to read. There's no letdown with this second installment, no drag before the payoff. It's bigger than the first book, much more complex with higher engineered war sequences that at times left me flipping back so I could follow along with the expansive collection of characters he continues to amass while systematically wiping others out. Comparisons to The Hunger Games should effectively be eliminated at this point. Hunger Games was a very good trilogy but this is more brutal, more unforgiving. If anything this begins in tone where the Hunger Games ends. This sequel demands your attention which shouldn't be hard cause Brown is now supremely adept at following one breathtaking sequence with another. I really hope these books continue to find a mass audience and give this guy the recognition he deserves.
http://www.amazon.com/Golden-Son-Book-Rising-Trilogy/dp/0345539834/ref=sr_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1451678567&sr=1-4&keywords=pierce+brown
11) "Fates & Furies" by Lauren Groff
Groff has manufactured a complex portrait of a long term marriage. To say too much would spoil any sense of discovery that comes as the book progresses, but the success here is in searingly insightful prose. Lotto and Mathilde have been married for twenty four years, and through the
he said she said narrative Groff peels back the layers built up between actor turned playwright Lotto and his loving supportive wife, exposing what truths we choose to not tell our spouses.
http://www.amazon.com/Fates-Furies-Novel-Lauren-Groff/dp/1594634475/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1451678595&sr=1-1&keywords=lauren+groff
