All right, so the year wasn't entirely a protracted struggle between my desire to read well and my insistence on finishing work on my memoir... that was just the first three quarters. I did well to keep my subscriptions from piling up, unread, while sweating to complete that final draft. Undertaking much long-form reading was out of the question. After squaring the page corners on my manuscript, however, it was time to make up for nine months' moderation.
Some very nice people, known and unknown, ordered me titles from my wish list. Big thank-yous to Debbie D., John and Lynn, long-lost Andrew, Bridget S., my dearest Mum, Christine L., Greg W., Javier G., the Pixie, Tom at
Prospero's, pseudonymous Amy, Brooklyn Matt, the nice-and-timely folk of the
Claremont Forum, Allison H., the incomparable
Quimby's, the
Rainbow Bookstore in Madison, not-in-the-industry Valerie, Rose T., and the many anonymous others. I'm grateful not only for the books but the privilege to avoid the increasingly depressing Crossroads library for weeks at a stretch. I doubt the malevolent head librarian misses my patronage; a mere six of the books I devoured in 2011 came off her shelves.
In traditional chronological order, they and all the rest follow.
* * * * *
Sam Harris,
The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Human ValuesAlbert Camus (Matthew Ward, translator),
The StrangerAllen Ginsberg,
Howl and Other PoemsWilliam Strunk Jr. and E.B. White,
The Elements of StyleChuck Klostermann,
Eating the DinosaurGary Shteyngart,
Super Sad True Love StoryKazuo Ishiguro,
Never Let Me GoRay Bradbury,
The Cat's Pajamas: StoriesLeonard Cohen,
Book of Longing (poetry)
Kevin Wilson,
Tunneling to the Center of the Earth: StoriesJoshua Glenn and Carol Hayes (editors),
Taking Things Seriously: 75 Objects with Unexpected SignificanceRandolph B. Marcy,
The Prairie TravelerNathan Englander,
For the Relief of Unbearable UrgesJoyce Carol Oates (editor),
The Oxford Book of American Short StoriesHermann Hesse (Joachim Neugroschel, translator),
SiddharthaNeal Stephenson,
AnathemJohn Brockman (editor),
This Will Change Everything: Ideas That will Shape the FutureJean-Christophe Valtat,
AuroraramaWilliam Gibson and Bruce Sterling,
The Difference EngineHerman Melville,
"Bartleby"; and, "Benito Cereno"Howard Dully and Charles Fleming,
My Lobotomy: A MemoirChina Miéville,
The City & The CityJoe Navarro with Marvin Karlins, PhD,
What Every Body Is Saying: An Ex-FBI Agent's Guide to Speed-Reading PeopleSteven Pinker,
The Stuff of Thought: Language as a Window into Human NatureAlan Heathcock,
Volt: StoriesZachary Mason,
The Lost Books of the OdysseyNeil Gaiman,
NeverwhereWilliam Golding,
Darkness VisibleJonathan Lethem,
Chronic CityMark Haddon,
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-TimeFranz Kafka (Nahum N. Glatzer, editor),
The Complete StoriesArthur Miller,
The CrucibleTéa Obreht,
The Tiger's WifeJohn Elder Robison,
Be Different: Adventures of a Free-Range Aspergian with Practical Advice for Aspergians, Misfits, Families & TeachersVictor Hugo (Catherine Liu, translator),
The Hunchback of Notre-DameSalman Rushdie,
The Satanic VersesJorge Luis Borges (Andrew Hurley, translator),
Collected FictionsKatherine Dunn,
Geek LovePhilip K. Dick,
A Scanner DarklyWilliam Gibson,
Virtual LightNeal Stephenson,
The Diamond Age
