Preemptive Retaliation

1. Farewell My Lovely – Raymond Chandler – I was interested to read a detective novel that I hadn’t seen as a film, and I was very impressed with this one.  It gave a new edge to Marlowe that took him away form the calm stoicism of Humphrey Bogart. Here he was scared, and human, and it built an LA that was out of his grasp, but he was still trying his damndest.

2. Audi-vision: Sound on Screen – Michel Chion – A recommendation from a movie buff friend, and on that has made me tune an ear into what I’m watching, about how the sounds and music are part of film as much as the camera angles and colours. Reading this was akin to learning how to play bass – all I could to for weeks was pay attention to the undertones of films.

3. Rogue Moon – Algis Budrys – Terrifying, in its own quiet way. This book shows its age in its portrayal of women, but I’m still getting my head round the implications it sets about cloning. I can tell it’s a good story because I still think about it, from time to time.

4. Mr B. Gone – Clive Barker – A fun, meta book with moments of pure horror here and there. It’s a book that dares you to stop reading, and one that you’re almost tempted to, just to kill the demon inside of it. It falters at the end, relying too much on humour and parody, but still entertaining.

5. Hyperion – Dan Simmons – Arguably the first sci-fi epic I’ve ever read. I was dubious at first, but the weaving, separated narrative drew me in hook-line-and-sinker. I loved the different characters, I loved how each story was a different genre, I loved the universe it took the time to explain. I could see where Ian M Banks got his Culture novels from.

6. The Lies of Locke Lamora – Scott Lynch – I enjoyed reading this like I enjoyed watching a big blockbuster. It was entertaining and big and fun and actiony. There are like seven other books in the series. I might read them, I probably won’t, but I’d still recommend this book.

7. The Book of Lost Things – John Connolly – The book was dark, but still preserved some idea of innocence. It almost became fairytale-like whilst trying to subvert them. I liked the larger story of the main character and his struggle to accept growing up, but unfortunately I found a lot of it quite forgettable.

8. The Stars My Destination – Alfred Bester – I couldn’t stop thinking about this book for the longest time. The development of the hideous, horrid main character from degenerate to saviour kept me reading the whole way through. I couldn’t get enough of this world of jaunting and interplanetary civil war, and the eventual mutually-assured destruction that led to perfect peace or perfect death. Definitely one of my books of the year.

9. The Wasp factory – Ian Banks – It smacks of first-novel editing and I could guess the twist a mile away, but it was an entertaining piece of work. Subversive to its core and adventurous in its subject, it makes me crave more of Bank’s work.

10. Invisible – Paul Auster (reread) – This book is beautifully written, with one word flowing easily to the next to paint the sexual exploration and maturation of a sensitive young boy. The references and hidden meanings are too high brow for me, but something I still enjoyed drinking in with its simplicity and depth.

11. Apathy and Paying Rent – Zach VandeZande (reread) – An honest novel. It digs right in to apathy and depression, highlighting it for others to see. The plot’s convoluted, yeah, but the way the narrator breaks and rebuilds the fourth wall is endearing and just makes the whole thing so much more heart-breaking.

12. The Facades – Eric Landgren – Unfortunately I don’t remember much about this novel. I enjoyed it in parts, but those were far between.

13. The Gracekeepers – Kirsty Logan – A charming, fairy-tale take on future apocalypse. The book builds a fantastic world of rules and societies, and made me care for everyone involved. What I loved about this is how the supposed villain is so believable, with flawed, human justifications for their actions.

14. The Shadow of the Wind – Carlos Ruiz Zafon – I read this while on the beach in Barcelona, so it had an additional magic. I liked the mysticism and the coming of age story, but by the end it became a convoluted mess of characters and coincidences. Another blockbuster book, but one I enjoyed reading through.

15. Invisible Cities – Italo Calvino – I guess I didn’t really get it?

16. Scott Pilgrim – Bryan Lee O’Malley (reread) – Charming and funny. Rereading these years later has given me a more critical eye, but I still love the honest portrayal of the ups and downs of young relationships. 

17. Watchmen – Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons (reread) – A classic, and one that still holds up.

18. Seconds – Bryan Lee O’Malley – I liked it. The drawing style was lovely, and the story was entertaining. I really didn’t like the main character, or half the people around her, but I don’t need to like everyone I suppose. 

19. Go Set a Watchman – Harper Lee – Eh. I can see why she was pushed on To Kill  a Mockingbird.

20. Fall of Hyperion – Dan Simmons – I had to read the sequel to see what the whole thing was about, and I was left with maybe more questions than when I started. Time travelling battles, man made beings sent backwards through time, future time travelling daughters and paradoxes all over the place. It was entertaining, and I felt a sense of closure, but man what the hell was going on.

21. Ready Player One – Ernest Cline – I have never seen a novel crammed full of more fan service than this one. Everywhere they could namedrop people, games, movies, music, the namedropped hard. It was such a neckbearded adventure of being special and great due to a chosen subject, and seemed to push the idea of a friendzone and how to break out of it. I found it infuriating, and terrible, but I read the whole thing so I guess that counts for something.

22. Animal Farm – George Orwell – Due to lack of knowledge I missed the parallels to the Russian Revolution, but the message was clear enough. It was scary and infuriating, but understandable and devastating at the end.

23. The Boy Who Kicked Pigs – Tom Baker – A quick entertaining read. Its humour is matched in equal bounds by its depravity, where you are rooting on for the untimely end of this boy despite how horrible it is to imagine.

24. This Side of Brightness – Colin McCann – It was entertaining, and gave a good idea of life as a down-and-out in New York. I felt for the characters, and was eager to see how A connected to B, but the whole time I wished I was reading One Hundred Years of Solitude instead.

Man, this might be the first year in ages that I haven’t reread Franny and Zooey.