Monday, December 19, 2011

2011: My year in books


I've just spent a solid month compiling year-end list upon year-end list for The A.V. Club. It's official: Year-end-list exhaustion has settled into my bones. But I did want to put together this quick, admittedly erratic rundown of my favorite (and least favorite) books of 2011. Please pardon my lazy lack of commentary. I'm fresh out of adjectives. And so, without further ado...





Top 15 16 books of 2011
1. Electric Eden: Unearthing Britain’s Visionary Music by Rob Young
2 & 3. There Is No Year and Nothing: A Portrait Of Insomnia by Blake Butler
4. Low Town by Daniel Polansky
5. The Enterprise Of Death by Jesse Bullington
6. A Dance With Dragons by George R. R. Martin
7. The Silent Land by Graham Joyce
8. Deathless by Catherynne M. Valente
9. The Heroes by Joe Abercrombie
10. My Song: A Memoir by Harry Belafonte and Michael Shnayerson
11. All Men Of Genius by Lev AC Rosen
12. Seed by Rob Ziegler
13. Mechanique: A Tale Of The Circus Tresaulti by Genevieve Valentine
14. The Dragon’s Path by Daniel Abraham
15. The Engines Of Desire by Livia Llewellyn
16. Joe Simon: My Life In Comics by Joe Simon [RIP]

Worst books:
Enter Night: A Biography Of Metallica by Mick Wall
Flashback by Dan Simmons

Biggest letdown:
Embassytown by China Miéville

Best old book I read for the first time:
The Inverted World by Christopher Priest

Best rereads:
Beneath The Underdog by Charles Mingus
The Adventures Of Tintin by Hergé

Best reprint:
Away Off Shore: Nantucket Island And Its People, 1602-1890 by Nathaniel Philbrick

Sequels I slept on (despite loving their predecessors):
The Wise Man’s Fear by Patrick Rothfuss
The Magician King by Lev Grossman

Book I only wish had come out:
The Republic Of Thieves by Scott Lynch

Book I wrote (shameless, I know)
The Captain Jack Sparrow Handbook by Jason Heller

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