The Snakehead - Patrick Radden Keefe

In the pre-dawn darkness of June 6, 1993, a ship named the Golden Venture crashed into the coast near Queens, and 300 illegal Chinese found themselves in The United States. How that ship got there is the central narrative of this well-written, well-researched book. The center of the story is Sister Ping, a Chinese shopkeeper who ran a multi-million dollar business bringing people from the Fujian Province to the US. She has trails all over the world, but it all comes undone after the Golden Venture crash.

Heavy on the facts, and told in a cold, detached journalistic style, the book could have benefited from more of a personal touch, but the power of the narrative pulls the reader along.

Vineland - Thomas Pynchon

It's 1984 in Vineland, a place in Northern California where refugees from the 60's have gone to flee the re-election of Ronald Regan's America. In Vineland television, drugs, rock'n'roll, mysticism, revolution and repression all meet. You can get your karma adjusted or join the ranks of the not quite dead, but you have to look out, because the DEA and the FBI and the state are all after you, for something you might have done or maybe will do.  But even the man has to deal with its own issues, such as budget cuts that leave you in arm's reach from your prey, standing on a ladder hanging from a helicopter when the call comes in. The plot is too complex to summarize, the characters too unique to encapsulate, but its a funny, weird, wonderful book. In a word, it's... Pynchonesque.

No Great Mischief - Alistair MacLeod

A generational family saga, rooted in a rural setting, alternating between the past and the present, nature playing a heavy role, the tension between Anglophones and Francophones,  all the necessary CanCon requirements - I usually stay away from books like this. I was surprised though - it wasn't all that bad. It's the story of the MacDonald's, a large family living on Cape Breton, told by one their sons, a successful orthodontist. The family is trapped in the past - the past of Cape Breton but also of Scotland, and the narrator takes us through the family history, filled with heartache and death. A few of the sentences sink like stones in a pond, but the prose keeps the story  moving along.

Better Living Through Plastic Explosives - Zsuzsi Gartner

There's always been something sinister about Vancouver, something dark and disturbing underneath that sheen of natural beauty and high livability index scores.  Gartner taps into this weirdness in this collection of short stories. Houses disappear, taking people and dreams with them. Civilized, home-owning males takes a few steps back on  the evolutionary chart to deal with a interloper into their suburban enclave. Angels take possession of teens and homeless junkies get publicly funded plastic surgery to boost their self-esteem.

Under the hyper-acute prose, filled with tangled sentences and cultural references, beats a heart. A dark one perhaps, but one that you can identify.

Books I Read 2011

I broke my goal of reading a book a week in 2011 by two, with a total of 54. Here are some of the highlights:


Book I Most Looked Forward To and Was Not Disappointed By: The Pale King - David Foster Wallace

He left us too soon and if you read this book, you'll what I mean by that statement.

Book I Most Looked Forward To and Was Disappointed By: The Marriage Plot - Jeffery Eugendies

It's not a bad book, but it's not as good as Middlesex. Unfair, perhaps,  but once you've been to Italy, you can't eat at The Olive Garden without complaining.

Book I Most Enjoyed: Super Sad Love Story - Gary Shetyngart


In the future, we will be inseparable from our iphones, the Chinese will own everything, political dissent will be drowned out by commercialism and our insecurities, fears and anxieties will make it difficult to maintain relationships.  Sorry, did I say in the future?


Best Book That I Thought I Wouldn't Like But I Did Mostly Because The Author Wrote The Hell Out Of It: Ten Thousand Saints - Eleanor Henderson




Best Book That Should Make Angry Enough To Take Up Arms Against The 1%: The Big Short - Michael Lewis

We got screwed, people, screwed royally, and the worst part is that we paid for the displeasure.

Best Book That Idolizes An Alcoholic: Fear and Loathing At Rolling Stone - Hunter S. Thompson, Edited by Jann Wenner

Best Book That Doesn't Idolize An Alcoholic But Doesn't Really Call Him On His Terrible Behaviour: Raymond Carver: A Writer's Life - Carol Sklenicka

Best Re-Read: The Innocents Abroad - Mark Twain


The first time was almost ten years ago, and it still made me laugh.

Best Book About Zombies: Zone One - Colson Whitehead

There shall be no more discussion on this matter.

Best Book About The End of The World: That Is All - John Hodgman

With an honourable mention to 2030 by Albert Brooks.

Best Discovery of 2011: George Saunders


I knew of him, but I was so impressed after CivilWarLand in Bad Decline that I read Pastoralia.


The Best Chuck Klosterman Book I Read This Year: Sex, Drugs and Cocoa Puffs


For reasons best left unexplained, I read four Klosterman books this year, and my only advice for him is to stick with the music/culture criticism. Unless he wants to write a novel about a Motley Crue cover band based in South Dakota that hunts vampires that dress up like Morrissey.


Book I Should Have Read Years Ago But Didn't But Finally Read This Year Because I Bought A Used Copy For $2.50: A Million Little Pieces - James Frey

I paid $2.00 too much for it.

Best Book About Japan I Read This Year: Flight Paths of the Emperor - Steven Heighton



The full list:


When You Are Engulfed In Flames -  David Sedaris
Slouching Towards Bethlehem - Joan Didion
Border Songs - Jim Lynch
Right As Rain - George Pelecanos
Although Of Course You End Up Becoming Yourself  - David Lipsky
Super Sad True Love Story - Gary Shetyngart
Bad Science - Ben Goldacre
The Innocents Abroad - Mark Twain
The War Against Cliche - Martin Amis
The Unamed - Joshua Ferris
Zombie Spaceship Wasteland - Patton Oswalt
A Writer's Life  - Carol Sklenicka
Where I'm Calling From - Raymond Carver
Roscoe - William Kennedy
CivilWarLand in Bad Decline - George Saunders
F.I.A.S.C.O. - Frank Partnoy
The Culture of Fear - Barry Glassner
King, Queen, Knave - Vladimir Nabokov
Broadsides - Mordecai Richler
Downtown Owl - Chuck Klosterman
Tokyo, My Everst - Gabrielle Bauer
Remainder - Tom McCarthy
King Leary - Paul Quarrington
The Pale King - David Foster Wallace
Esquire's Big Book of Fiction - Adrienne Miller
The Age of Wonder - Richard Holmes
Rubber Balls and Liquor - Gilbert Gotfried
True Grit - Charles Portis
This Cake is For The Party - Sarah Selecky
Among The Truthers - Jonathan Kay
Pastoralia - George Saunders
Lost in Shangri-La - Mitchell Zukoff
2030 - Albert Brooks
The Big Short - Michael Lewis
Flight Paths of The Emperor - Steven Heighton
Embassytown - China Melville
Fear and Loathing - Hunter S Thompson
Ten Thousand Saints - -Eleanor Henderson
Pulse - Julian Barnes
How To Be Good - Nick Hornby
Arguably - Christoper Hitchens
Bang Crunch - Neil Smith
Half Empty - David Rakoff
Killing Yourself to Live - Chuck Klosterman
The Visible Man - Chuck Klosterman
Sex, Drugs and Cocoa Puffs - Chuck Klosterman
Zone One - Colson Whitehead
Boomerang - Michael Lewis
The Marriage Plot - Jeffery Eugenides
Fear and Loathing at Rolling Stone - Hunter S Thompson
That Is All - John Hodgman
A Million Little Pieces - James Frey
God No! - Penn Jillette
Subtle Knife and Amber Spyglass - Phillip Pulman