The editors of the New York Times Book Review have posted to the web their list of Notable Books for 2008 (actually books published since December 2, 2007). Of the forty-eight fiction titles, I have read two (J.M. Coetzee’s Diary of a Bad Year and Joseph O’Neill’s Netherland) and parts of three others (Marilynne Robinson’s Home, my friend Rachel Kushner’s Telex from Cuba, and John Edgar Wideman’s Fanon). I have not read from front to back a single nonfiction title on the list, though I’ve read parts of several: Dexter Filkins’s The Forever War, James Wood’s How Fiction Works, Drew Gilpin Faust’s This Republic of Suffering, David Reynolds’s Waking Giant, and Brenda Wineapple’s White Heat.
I’ve read at least three or four reviews of each of the above-mentioned books, and upwards of ten reviews of a few of them. The list’s publication once again provokes internal wrangling about whether the time I spend reading discussion of books in periodicals would be better spent with my nose between hard covers. And no doubt I’ll resolve to shift my focus in 2009, as I do each year, and in twelve months I’ll publish a post to TSWTT very similar to this one.
UPDATE, 11/27: The Times Literary Supplement has posted to the web best-book selections from a number of prominent figures, including fiction writer Junot Díaz, critic Clive James, poet Paul Muldoon, and philospher Martha Nussbaum.
UPDATE, 11/28: Today the New York Times posts best-book lists from critics Michiko Kakutani and Janet Maslin as well as art-book and coffee table–book gift guides.
UPDATE, 11/29: Here are some lists from The Guardian, containing recommendations from Monica Ali, Tariq Ali, Gordon Brown, Richard Ford, Hari Kunzru, and Philip Pullman, among others.
UPDATE, 12/02: The Atlantic has posted its brief list of the best books of the year, and its concision highlights its diversity. Definitely worth taking a look.
UPDATE, 12/03: Now the Times Book Review has posted its list of the ten best books of the year.
UPDATE, 12/04: The literary blog The Millions has begun publishing its annual “year in reading” posts. Entries so far have come from Hamilton Leithauser, who is the lead singer of The Walkmen, and the novelists Benjamin Kunkel and Joseph O’Neill. There will be a post a day for the rest of the month.
UPDATE, 12/04: Here, in what will be the final update to this post, is a list of the top one hundred books from Toronto’s Globe and Mail.
