I'm a big fan of lists [1], and particularly year-end lists. A simple Google search will probably direct you to several different personal blogs on which I have published my end-of-year favorite music lists over the past eight years or so. For me, lists are intended both as a form of self-analysis and as recommendations for my (modest, random) readership.
I am also a bit unconventional with these lists. I care less about the year that something was made than the year that I first experienced it. So, on the following list, you will find my 20 favorite books that I read (for the first time) in 2012. Some of the titles were published this year, others were written over a half-century ago. But they are all great books that you should read, and they are all, incidentally, in HCPL's catalog [2]. So without further ado,
20 Books for 2012:
(1)
[3]
White Teeth [3] by Zadie Smith (a gateway book if there ever was one, see below)
(2)
[4]
The Corrections [4] by Jonathan Franzen
(3)
[5]
Cathedral [5] by Raymond Carver
(4)
[6]
Bright Lights, Big City [6] by Jay McInerney
(5)
[7]
Zeitoun [7] by Dave Eggers
(6)
[8]
The Floating Opera & The End of the Road [8] by John Barth
(7)
[9]
A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again [9] by David Foster Wallace
(8)
[10]
Post Office [10] by Charles Bukowski
(9)
[11]
Everything that Rises Must Converge [11] by Flannery O'Connor
(10)
[12]
Short Cuts [12] by Raymond Carver (previously [13])
(11)
[14]
Pulphead [14] by John Jeremiah Sullivan
(12)
[15]
NW [15] by Zadie Smith
(13)
[16]
Goodbye, Columbus & Five Short Stories [16] by Philip Roth
(14)
[17]
Every Love Story is a Ghost Story: A Life of David Foster Wallace [17] by D.T. Max
(15)
[18]
The Autograph Man [18] by Zadie Smith
(16)
[19]
Fun Home [19] by Alison Bechdel
(17)
[20]
The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian [20] by Sherman Alexie
(18)
[21]
Fear of Music [21] by Jonathan Lethem
(19)
[22]
The Crying of Lot 49 [22] by Thomas Pynchon
(20)
[23]
Eating the Dinosaur [23] by Chuck Klosterman
---
Thanks for reading. I hope there's something in this list that has piqued your interest. Click on the image or title to reserve a copy of any of these books today.
- 2012 [24]
- favorite books [25]
- Books [26]
- Catalog [27]
- Northwest [28]
