Top Ten Books
Fuck 2020. It might be the worst year I've ever experienced. Covid-19 has effectively ruined all the things in my life I love to do. Playing gigs, watching gigs, going to the cinema and heading to the pub. nothing's the same anymore. But, I have found solace in reading at least. Books have given me enjoyment and an escape in a climate that has produced anxiety and fear for the most part. So I've made a list of my favourites. This isn't year specific, but I've read 22 books this year, and I thought I'd organise them into a top 10 and give a quick thought/summary on each of them. I'd highly recommend all of these books to anyone who hasn't read them. Anyway, here we go...
10. Killing Commendatore (2017) by Haruki Murakami
The most recent Murakami novel and one of voyeurism, a talking painting and an ancient mysterious bell. Honestly, whenever you try and give a brief synopsis of one of his novels you either sound ridiculous or mental - but of course our protagonist is recently divorced and searching for the meaning of his life. It doesn’t quite stand up to Wind Up Bird Chronicle and others but its still nonetheless got that magic realism that keeps the pages turning. A worthwhile read and some simply brilliant discussions of art through the narrations and characters.
9. Sapiens (2015) by Yuval Noah Harari
The only non-fiction book on the list - because I simply just don’t go for that usually. This does really deserve a place in the list though, because it lived up to its hype and made me think a lot about our history as humans. I’m shamefully ignorant to most things so I found the book to be really educational about where we come from, the other species of human and the incredible event of our species being able to create myths - which enabled us to live in harmony with millions of people under thousands of rules in hundreds of country’s with a breathtakingly complex economic system. It was quite staggering for the power of myths to be laid out so well and across every time period of our history as Homo-sapiens.
8. Beloved (1987) by Toni Morrison
I really wish I would have studied this in an educational environment. I feel like it would have provided context, discussion and deep detailed study that would have propelled this further up the list. But as such, it was just me reading it off the cuff and occasionally firing up spark notes to try to understand the countless and incredible metaphors and imagery that Morrison creates here. And it really is a work of genius. The fragmentation of the African-American identity after slavery, family relationships, repression of memory and defining manhood are all explored with a haunting plot that really does need to be read meticulously and often to harvest all the themes and meaning that Morrison deftly explores in Beloved.
7. Milkman (2018) by Anna Burns
At first I hated this book. The very long chapters, no breaks for speech from different characters and far too clever for me to follow until I really re-read pages and concentrated hard. But once I did that it was a really fascinating read. Set during ‘the troubles’ in Ireland, it’s essentially a coming-of-age tale for a young and clever 18 year old woman as she tries to navigate her way in a ultra tribal community with the unwanted attention of The Milkman, an evil senior paramilitary figure. The place and the people remain completely anonymous in name through the novel, but the content really creates this claustrophobic, highly politicised and gossip-ridden feeling place, whilst the humour and heroism from the everyday lead narrator give the reader something to root for.
6. Convenience Store Woman (2018) by Sayuka Murata
A very short and very quirky tale of female empowerment in the face of dominant communalideologies. Keiko is our lead character, who has worked part-time at a convenience store for the last 18 years. So much of the book focuses on Keiko’s constant performance around others to be what’s socially acceptable and you can feel the presence of Murata in every sentence. She herself worked three days a week at a convenience store before writing the book, and in the opening sections and various others the store itself and Keiko become harmonious and synonymous with each other. She tries to live the prescribed life under the pressure from others, but the store is ultimately the sign of her independence and female empowerment.
5. Half of a Yellow Sun (2005) by Ngozi Adichie
4. The Testaments (2019) by Margaret Atwood
THE most explosive sequel I’ve ever read. She gives context to the Aunts through Aunt Lydia, greater texture to the fascinating dystopian patriarchy of Gilead, and exercises a plot through 3 different characters that is the definition of a page-turner. I think Atwood does brilliantly to not base the sequel as purely a continuation of the first, instead, much like Mitchell, giving us the crumbs to follow with regards to our characters potentially being Offred’s daughters. I also really love in both books how we’re given a metafictional epilogue, with more being revealed about the effects of Gilead on the societies of the future and inciting complete curiosity in the reader.
3. Cloud Atlas (2004) by David Mitchell
More than anything, you have to appreciate simply the craft of postmodern storytelling that Mitchell shows in this groundbreaking book. It’s been on my radar for years, and to be honest it starts off not really that well. I plodded through Adam Ewing’s opening part of the book, and then as the dexterity of Cloud Atlas began to emerge, with the shifts of tone, vastly different characters and switches of perspective, I got through it rapidly. Mitchell says the books essential themes are reincarnation and the universality of human nature, and that much is obvious as you read, but the nuance and minute detail that he’s able to weave throughout all its characters is astounding. You are thrown everywhere as a reader, but Mitchell leaves the crumbs for you to find this thread throughout all of the characters and their stories.
2. My Brilliant Friend (2012) by Elena Ferrante
I bought this book on a whim in Waterstones, it wasn’t even on display on any of the stands, I was just flicking through and thought ‘hey an Italian book why not’. From the first 50 pages this blew me away. The story centres around the female relationship of Lila and Elena (the narrator), but the surroundings of Naples almost act as a character itself, and the texture rendered by Ferrante is born out of incredible writing talent and an attention to detail that can only be achieved when you write about what you know. I found great familiarity in Elena’s view of herself through Lila and the community’s eyes, and how this informs everything about us - whether conscious or unconscious. In general, I’m not an overly visual reader, but Ferrante’s style really brought the streets and the sensory experience to me in an overwhelming way, and not many writers can claim that.
1. Kafka on the Shore (2002) by Haruki Murakami
As you can probably tell from the fact that he's the only writer to feature twice, 2020 has been the year of Murakami for me. I ended 2019 with The Wind Up Bird Chronicles which for me is still Murakami’s masterpiece, but this novel perhaps even edges past Norwegian Wood as his second best. The surreal and magical blends with mundane life, with fish raining from the sky, cats talking to humans and alternate realities all explored through two nuanced characters. One attempts to escape an oedipal curse, one flees from murder and into an even more incomprehensible situation. One of the genius things about Murakami’s writing is his description and explanations of art and music. Something like Killing Commendatore was exceptional in how it introduced concepts and characters through how we understand art, and in this book it’s the art form of music, more specifically Beethoven, that acts as a form of redemption for specific characters. I really don’t want to spoil this for anyone, so just read it. Seriously, read it.
And here's the rest of the books I read this year...
The Man in the High Castle (1962) by Philip K. Dick
Swing Time (2016) by Zadie Smith
The Railway Man (1995) by Eric Lomax
A Wild Sheep Chase (1982) by Haruki Murakami
Keep the Aspidistra Flying (1936) by George Orwell
Sharp Objects (2006) by Gillian Flynn
The Fellowship of the Ring (1954), The Two Towers (1954) and The Return of the King (1954) by J R R Tolkien
The Woman in the Dunes (1964) by Kobo Abe
The Trial (1925) by Franz Kafka
A Decent Ride (2015) by Irvine Welsh
Also I'd like to say one last big fuck you to blogger.com, which seems to have a mind of it's own when it comes to formatting. I can't even look at all the unaligned headings and pictures without it giving me OCD so thank you, and I'm sorry it looks so shit x
Comments
Post a Comment